Morning Prayer Wednesday, 19 August 2020

Good morning, Cornerstone friends.
A new day with new opportunities.
What shall we ask for: comfort or challenge?

Out of the depths have I cried to you, O Lord,
Lord hear my voice;
let your ears consider well
the voice of my supplication.

If you, Lord, were to mark what is done amiss,
O Lord, who could stand?
But there is forgiveness with you,
so that you shall be feared.

I wait for the Lord; my soul waits for him;
in his word is my hope.
My soul waits for the Lord,
more than the night watch for the morning,
more than the night watch for the morning.

O Israel, wait for the Lord,
for with the Lord there is mercy;
With him there is plenteous redemption,
and he shall redeem Israel from all their sins.

Psalm 130

Father we commend to your faithful love
those who are crying from the depths;
help them to watch and pray
through their time of darkness,
in the sure hope of the dawn of your forgiveness and redemption,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Matthew 8: 1–13
[Remember, chapters 5–7 are the Sermon on the Mount, Our Lord’s teaching to his disciples.]

When Jesus had come down from the mountain great crowds followed him; and there was a leper who came to him and knelt before him, saying, ‘Lord, if you choose, you can make me clean.’

He stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, ‘I do choose. Be made clean!’ Immediately his leprosy was cleansed. Then Jesus said to him, ‘See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.’

When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him and saying, ‘Lord, my servant is lying at home paralysed, in terrible distress.’

And he said to him, ‘I will come and cure him.’

The centurion answered, ‘Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed. For I also am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one “Go” and he goes, and to another, “Come”, and he comes, and to my slave “Do this”, and the slave does it.’

When Jesus heard him, he was amazed and said to those who follow him, ‘Truly I tell you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you many will come from east and west and will eat with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ And to the centurion Jesus said, ‘Go, let it be done to you according to your faith.’ And the servant was healed at that hour.

Matthew 8: 1–13

This healing episode comes straight after Jesus has had a period away with his disciples to train them for his ministry.
He first heals a leper, an outsider, and then he travels to Capernaum (note this place has a Roman name)
and performs a healing for the servant of a Roman officer, outsiders in a different sense.
He then tells his disciples that the ones who think they are righteous will not be part of the kingdom he is to establish.

Just as the psalmist has said, ‘If you, Lord, were to mark what is done, O Lord, who could stand?’

We can make no assumptions about God to limit where his love and mercy will show,
only be like the leper and kneel before him and say, ‘Lord, if you choose, you can ….’

In that way let us come before Almighty God and pray for his Church and the world.

From my browsing on the Internet I can see many opportunities
where the Church is reaching out to its faithful people and,
like we are, sharing daily prayer.
BUT! Like us I see much less evidence of the Church maintaining its witness by public service.
We have our building open for private prayer, true,
however, our duty pastors are not in the building daily to listen to people who feel lost or need help.
Several of our duty pastors are joining with other Christians in Milton Keynes
in training to help those who have lost loved ones and need help with their grief,
having had only a quick funeral with minimum attendance to mark their passing.
Several who regularly worship at Cornerstone are involved in a personal capacity
in volunteering and doing public service, but we seem to be ‘lightweight’, as a group, in this.
‘Outsiders’ are being helped, the Food Bank is still doing great service;
the cranes on the YMCA site are still busy and the first bit of the new development is now in use with residents and activities; Milton Keynes Christian Foundation has survived the lock-down and getting ready for its enterprises,
such as the Urb Farm, Urban Bee-lievers and Cycle Saviours
to help youngsters who have left school with an unsatisfactory school experience, to make a better start in adult life.
Let us, this morning, give thanks for our regular fellowship and worship during this period
and pray for ways in which we can share the love of God in the future,
in a more practical way for the needs of our Milton Keynes community.
With the theme of our readings, let us pray for those who are regarded or who regard themselves as ‘outsiders’
and how we at Cornerstone can show that we care.

Dear Lord, the Gospel tells us of a time when you were asked, ‘Who is my neighbour?’.
Your reply was a story of a man being helped by an outsider, when the religious people had passed by.
In these days of ‘proper distancing’ let us be prepared to move closer to those who suffer.
Give us opportunity to serve and, by your grace, may we not be counted
when the words ‘inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these’ are uttered.
We ask this in the name of our Saviour, Jesus Christ the healer.

Amen

The world is still struggling to control the spread on Covid 19.
This involves limits on our daily activities, and those things that we can do once more,
involve wearing masks indoors apart from in our own homes.
Many people are losing their jobs and there are few vacancies for new work opportunities for them.
Travel restrictions are tighter and economic activity is still running at a low level in all areas of the world.
Health services everywhere are dealing with cases of this infectious virus
and other health conditions are taking second place,
which for some countries or some individuals in our country means, no place at all.
Public services are under stress,
governments are unable to chart a clear direction on all of the issues on their agenda and their people are disquieted.

It all seems, Dear Lord, that we are in one great pickle.
We thank you that the disquiet in our country has not led, as elsewhere, to great street protests and violence,
our feeling for understatement and keep calm and carry on sentiment makes us  behave a bit like Captain Tom.
We thank you for all those striving to improve things for others
in caring and seeking remedies to illness and to economic slowdown.
We pray for all who are suffering, in health or economic well-being, that they will not feel abandoned or unloved.

Almighty God, Creator of the universe, at the beginning of another day
we feel helpless in the face of our world’s suffering:
yet this morning, once more I offer back to you the only thing I can  –
my ordinary, everyday life.
I ask you to take it into your hands
that it may be used to bring even a flicker of justice into your world:
a candle for peace, for hope.
And not just for a day, Lord, but through the coming days as I move in your Spirit of love.

Amen

Let your merciful ears, O Lord, be open to the prayers of your humble servants;
and that they may obtain their petitions make them to ask such things as shall please you;
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit, One God, now and for ever.

Amen

Go easily on you way good Cornerstone people.
You see, the challenge is not that we must be superhuman.
We just have to say ‘Lord. If you choose you can make me clean.’
He will say ’I do choose, trust me; now, just show my love to all that you meet, in whatever way you can.’

I can hear a funny-voiced meercat saying ‘Simples’.

Don Head