Holy Communion Sunday, 7 February 2021
This Service will be by Zoom. This is the link: https://bit.ly/3b2gtjz.
Full details on how to access the Zoom service can be found here.
A recording of the service is now available:
Led by Revd George Mwaura
Preacher: Revd Ernesto Lozada-Uzuriaga
Gathering music
Introit
Call to Worship and Welcome
Let us lift our voices, for it is good to sing praises to our God.
Let us lift our hands and worship him whose wisdom is beyond all telling.
Let us praise the Lord as long as we live.
Alleluia!
Opening Prayer
Creator God, we now gather in our homes and houses,
which have become with your permission holy sanctuaries to praise and worship you.
We thank you for one another:
for those who have worshipped for many years with us and for those who are new;
for those who are confident as they follow you and for those who are hesitant.
Bless each one of us, that we might bless others in your name and to your glory.
We bring to you this morning all within us that needs healing,
that which is visible and that which is hidden;
that which we have shared with others and that known only to you.
Stretch out your healing hands and give us the courage to believe
that you can use our weakness and our strength in your service.
Amen
Hymn: The voice of God goes out to all the world
The voice of God goes out to all the world:
his glory speaks across the universe.
The Great King’s herald cries from star to star;
with power, with justice, Christ will be the way.
The Lord has said: Receive my messenger,
my promise to the world, my pledge made flesh,
a lamp to every nation, light from light:
with power, with justice, Christ will be the way.
The broken reed he will not trample down,
nor set his heal upon the dying flame.
He binds the wounds, and health is in his hand:
with power, with justice, Christ will be the way.
Anointed with the Spirit and with power,
he comes to crown with comfort all the weak,
to show the face of justice to the poor:
with power, with justice, Christ will be the way.
His touch will bless the eyes that darkness held,
the lame shall run, the halting tongue shall sing,
and prisoners laugh in light and liberty:
with power, with justice, Christ will be the way.
Luke Connaughton (1919–1979)
CCL31580
Prayers of Thanksgiving and Confession
Our eyes feast on the beauty of the sky and the scenery around us.
Words are not enough to express our heartfelt wonder of the beauty of creation.
But, thankfully, you know our hearts and our motives.
We do not always understand your motives, Lord, but then you are God,
and who are we to question you when you see the bigger picture?
We are sorry, Lord, that the weight of life’s demands causes us to stumble,
to lose our temper and at times to buckle under the pressure.
Help us to be more like you, Lord.
We are sorry for not getting our priorities right.
Help us to know, as you did, the importance
of spending time with and drawing refreshment from the Father.
We are sorry for allowing other people and things to take over
and squeeze out our time with you.
Help us to draw daily on your refreshing strength to cope with whatever our day holds.
Lord, hear our prayers.
Amen
Absolution
Prayer of the Week
Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sins,
and give us the liberty of that abundant life
which you have made known to us in your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ;
who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen
Bible readings
Isaiah 40: 21–31
21 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood since the earth was founded?
22 He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth,
and its people are like grasshoppers.
He stretches out the heavens like a canopy,
and spreads them out like a tent to live in.
23 He brings princes to naught
and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing.
24 No sooner are they planted,
no sooner are they sown,
no sooner do they take root in the ground,
than he blows on them and they wither,
and a whirlwind sweeps them away like chaff.
25 ‘To whom will you compare me?
Or who is my equal?’ says the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens:
Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one
and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
not one of them is missing.
27 Why do you complain, Jacob?
Why do you say, Israel,
‘My way is hidden from the Lord;
my cause is disregarded by my God’?
28 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
29 He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
30 Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
31 but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.
NIV®
This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
Mark 1: 29–39
Jesus Heals Many
29 As soon as they left the synagogue, they went with James and John to the home of Simon and Andrew. 30 Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they immediately told Jesus about her. 31 So he went to her, took her hand and helped her up. The fever left her and she began to wait on them.
32 That evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon-possessed. 33 The whole town gathered at the door; 34 and Jesus healed many who had various diseases. He also drove out many demons, but he would not let the demons speak because they knew who he was.
Jesus Prays in a Solitary Place
35 Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. 36 Simon and his companions went to look for him, 37 and when they found him they exclaimed: ‘Everyone is looking for you!’
38 Jesus replied, ‘Let us go somewhere else — to the nearby villages — so I can preach there also. That is why I have come.’ 39 So he travelled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons.
NIV®
This is the Gospel of Christ.
Praise to Christ our light.
Reflection
By Revd Ernesto Lozada-Uzuriaga
Musical Meditation: Christ’s is the world in which we move
Christ’s is the world in which we move,
Christ’s are the folk we’re summoned to love,
Christ’s is the voice which calls us to care,
and Christ is the one who meets us here.
To the lost Christ shows his face;
to the unloved he gives his embrace;
to those who cry in pain or disgrace,
Christ makes, with his friends, a touching place.
Feel for the people we most avoid,
strange or bereaved or never employed;
feel for the women, and feel for the men
who feel that their living is all in vain.
To the lost Christ shows his face;
to the unloved he gives his embrace;
to those who cry in pain or disgrace,
Christ makes, with his friends, a touching place.
Feel for the parents who’ve lost their child,
feel for the women whom men have defiled,
feel for the baby for whom there’s no breast,
and feel for the weary who find no rest.
To the lost Christ shows his face;
to the unloved he gives his embrace;
to those who cry in pain or disgrace,
Christ makes, with his friends, a touching place.
Feel for the lives by life confused,
riddled with doubt, in loving abused;
feel for the lonely heart, conscious of sin,
which longs to be pure but fears to begin.
To the lost Christ shows his face;
to the unloved he gives his embrace;
to those who cry in pain or disgrace,
Christ makes, with his friends, a touching place.
John L. Bell & Graham Maule, The Iona Community (1989)
CCL31580
Affirmation of Faith
We believe in the Creator.
The maker of all things.
We believe in the Son.
The redeemer of our broken world
We believe in the Spirit.
The sacred wind that binds all things together in the family of God
Creator God, beloved Son and living Spirit.
Amen
Intercessions
By Katherine Wheldon
Sharing Peace
Church, may the peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you!
And also, with you!
Even as we are separated physically, we are connected by the Spirit of God.
Let us share peace with those with us and wave to those on the screen.
Holy Communion
Generous God we gather now each in our homes in Christ’s spirit
to celebrate your presence among us.
We come hungry to be nourished and as sinners to be forgiven.
And so, I invite all of you to eat from the elements which you have prepared,
which represent the expected heavenly feast of the people of God.
It is not I but Christ who invites everyone
to eat the bread of life and to drink the cup of the new covenant.
Jesus said: I am the bread of life. She who comes to me shall never hunger
and he who believes in me shall never thirst.
In the beginning, God provided every plant yielding seed and every tree with seed in its fruit for food
and when the Israelites were in the wilderness, God fed them with miraculous food.
When the crowds were hungry, Jesus fed over five thousand with two fish and five loaves of bread.
When two were walking towards Emmaus,
they recognized the Anointed One as they broke bread together.
And on the night of his arrest,
Jesus took bread, and after giving thanks to you, mighty Jehovah, he broke it and gave it to his disciples
saying, ‘Take and eat; this is my body which will be broken for you: do this always to remember me.’
After supper, again he took the cup and said, ‘This is the cup of the new covenant between you and God,
whenever you drink it, do it in remembrance of me.’
Gracious God we are not worthy to partake at your table,
but through your grace and kindness we are made righteous.
Look down with mercy upon your servants scattered in their homes this morning
and send your Spirit upon us and the simple elements before each one of us
so that they may be for us the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ:
Holy food for God’s broken people.
Amen
The Lord’s Prayer
Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom,
the power and the glory are yours
now and for ever.
Amen
Meal is shared.
This is the body of Christ broken for our sins.
Amen
This is the cup of salvation poured for our sins.
Amen
Prayer after Communion
Having fed us, generous God, take hold of our hands as you took hold of Simon’s mother-in-law,
and gently bless us with the courage and the confidence to step out from our fear of failures
so that we may offer all that we are in service to others.
Amen
Notices
Closing hymn: Thou, whose almighty word
Thou, whose almighty word
chaos and darkness heard,
and took their flight;
hear us, we humbly pray,
and where the gospel-day
sheds not its glorious ray,
let there be light.
Thou, who didst come to bring
on thy redeeming wing
healing and sight,
heath to the sick in mind,
sight to the inly blind,
O now to all mankind
let there be light.
Spirit of truth and love,
life-giving, holy Dove,
speed forth thy flight;
move on the water’s face,
bearing the lamp of grace,
and in earth’s darkest place
let there be light.
Holy and blessèd Three,
glorious Trinity,
Wisdom, Love, Might;
boundless as ocean’s tide
rolling in fullest pride,
through the earth far and wide
let there be light.
John Marriott (1780–1825)
CCL31580
Blessings
May the Lord Jesus Christ go with us into the world this week,
helping us to remain focused upon him and to make his priorities our priorities
in all the places he will send us.
And the blessings of God almighty,
the Father, the Son and Holy Spirit,
be with you today and all the days of your life.
Amen
Postlude
One more hymn (We cannot measure how you heal), which could not be included in the Service, is available by following this link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7P_xj_G7Hk
