Prelude: Flute Sonata in E minor J.S. Bach

Holy Communion Service

Celebrant: Revd Ernesto Lozada-Uzuriaga

Introit: ‘Sing joyfully unto God our strength’

Composed by William Byrd, based on Psalm 81: 1–4
Performed by the Cornerstone Choir

Sing joyfully to God our strength.
Sing loud unto the God of Jacob!
Take the song, bring forth the timbrel,
the pleasant harp, and the viol.
Blow the trumpet in the new moon,
even in the time appointed, and at our feast day,
for this is a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob. 

Welcome

Welcome in the name of Christ.
God’s mercy, grace and peace be with you.

Good morning, Living Stones, and welcome to our Holy Communion Service on the sixteenth Sunday after Trinity.

We begin with the Prayer of the Week.

Let us pray.

Prayer of the Week

Pour out your Spirit, O God, over all the world
to inspire every heart with knowledge and love of you.
Grant that we who confess Jesus as Lord
may shun whatever is contrary to this faith
and give witness to your love that has saved us in Christ,
for he lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God for ever and ever.

Amen

Hymn: Angel-voices ever singing

Angel-voices ever singing
round thy throne of light,
angel-harps for ever ringing,
rest not day nor night;
thousands only live to bless thee
and confess thee
Lord of might.

Thou who art beyond the farthest
mortal eye can scan,
can it be that thou regardest
songs of sinful man?
Can we know that thou art near us,
and wilt hear us?
Yea, we can.

Yea, we know that thou rejoicest
o’er each work of thine;
thou didst ears and hands and voices
for thy praise design;
craftsman’s art and music’s measure
for thy pleasure
all combine.

In thy house, great God, we offer
of thine own to thee;
and for thine acceptance proffer
all unworthily
hearts and minds and hands and voices
in our choicest
psalmody.

Honour, glory, might, and merit
thine shall ever be,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
blessèd Trinity.
Of the best that thou hast given
earth and heaven
render thee.

Francis Pott (1832–1909)
CCL31580

Gathering Prayer

Jesus said: My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.

Welcome to the house of God.
We have come from all the corners of the earth.

Welcome to the hospitality of God.
We come as we are; we bring our life, our stories, our journey.

Welcome, brothers and sisters.
We are the rainbow people of God.

Welcome, chosen people.
May God our companion bind us in his love.

Amen

The Confession

Forgive us for the things we have done and have not done.
Forgive us for the things we have said and have not said.
Forgive us for the life we have lived and not lived.
Beloved God, help us to reflect the image
of the one we profess to follow
in thought, word and deed,
and in discovering our true self
draw others into that light.

Amen

The Word of the Lord

Psalm 25: 1–9

Read by Janet Trimnell

¹ In you, Lord my God,
  I put my trust.

² I trust in you;
  do not let me be put to shame,
  nor let my enemies triumph over me.
³ No-one who hopes in you
  will ever be put to shame,
but shame will come on those
  who are treacherous without cause.

⁴ Show me your ways, Lord,
  teach me your paths.
⁵ Guide me in your truth and teach me,
  for you are God my Saviour,
  and my hope is in you all day long.
⁶ Remember, Lord, your great mercy and love,
for they are from of old.
⁷ Do not remember the sins of my youth
  and my rebellious ways;
according to your love remember me,
  for you, Lord, are good.

⁸ Good and upright is the Lord;
  therefore he instructs sinners in his ways.
⁹ He guides the humble in what is right
  and teaches them his way.

NIV®

This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

Matthew 21: 23–32

Read by Ian Trimnell

The authority of Jesus questioned

²³ Jesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him. ‘By what authority are you doing these things?’ they asked. ‘And who gave you this authority?’

²⁴ Jesus replied, ‘I will also ask you one question. If you answer me, I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. ²⁵ John’s baptism – where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?’

They discussed it among themselves and said, ‘If we say, “From heaven”, he will ask, “Then why didn’t you believe him?” ²⁶ But if we say, “Of human origin” – we are afraid of the people, for they all hold that John was a prophet.’

²⁷ So they answered Jesus, ‘We don’t know.’

Then he said, ‘Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.

The parable of the two sons

²⁸ ‘What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, “Son, go and work today in the vineyard.”

²⁹ ‘ “I will not,” he answered, but later he changed his mind and went.

³⁰ ‘Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, “I will, sir,” but he did not go.

³¹ ‘Which of the two did what his father wanted?’

‘The first,’ they answered.

Jesus said to them, ‘Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. ³² For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.

NIV®

This is the Gospel of Christ.
Praise to Christ our light.

Sermon

By Revd George Mwaura

Living God, we thank you for the gift of your word. As we reflect on it, speak to us by the power of your Holy Spirit and open the ears of our hearts to hear, understand and respond to the teachings in Jesus name.

Amen

Young Kevin of ‘Home Alone’, played by Macaulay Culkin, is one of Hollywood’s beloved characters. He is mischievous, playful, innovative and just as cute. But what really made Kevin such a fine character was how he taught us the value of family. We learnt that even if we’re not always that crazy about our family, when we’re separated from them, it’s terrible. In ‘Home Alone 1 and 2’, when Kevin was reunited with his family and ran into the arms of his mother, even the most stoic English men and women found themselves holding back tears.

His portrayal of a good child was so convincing that when he played a bad kid in the movie ‘The Good Son’, the effect was stunning. Here he appeared to be an ideal boy: polite, courteous and obedient, and since he was perceived to be all good, when things went wrong around his house, the blame naturally went to his less charismatic brother. It was only at the end of the movie that his parents realised that this son, who appeared to be good, was, in fact, evil.

That which appears to be isn’t always what it seems. This is what Jesus is teaching in our parable of two sons today. Jesus begins by saying. ‘A man had two sons’ – and right away we know we’re in for drama, for whenever two brothers are mentioned in scripture, drama is sure to follow: remember Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Essau, the prodigal son and his elder brother, and so on. Jesus says that the father asked his boys to work in the vineyard. The first said that he’d do it, but never did. The second son said he would not, but then changed his mind and did what his father had asked. Jesus asks, ‘which of the two did the will of his Father?’  and the answer is, of course, the second.

The point is made here that what we say isn’t as important as what we do. This is a parable which every parent and child understands. There are not many parents listening today who have not asked their children to clean their room, cut the grass, take the bins out or do their homework and heard, ‘Yes I’ll do it,’ only to learn later it was never done. And every child knows that the best way to get mom and dad off their back is to say, ‘Sure, I’ll do it … just give me a minute.’

Is Jesus’ point in this parable simply that actions speak louder than words? If that’s the case, then we might as well sing our closing hymn and go check that roast dinner in the oven! Jesus message is gleaned by taking a closer look at Jesus’ audience. Jesus was talking with the elders and priests, who were respected members of their communities but had betrayed their trusts. They had said yes to God, but had not done the job. They represented the first son in Jesus’ parable. But this is also a parable of integrity in that what we say should match what we do.

And it’s a parable for our time as well, because today we see with too much regularity that those who should be people of character and are not. You only need to look at Boris and Trump. Jesus pointed out the hypocrisy of some of these leaders who took advantage of their office to exploit others and he told them that tax collectors and prostitutes would enter the kingdom before them. Tax collection for the hated Roman government and prostitution were both serious sins in the Jewish culture.

Is Jesus overstating his case? I don’t think so. In our world, think of the disillusionment we feel when those we trust betray us: Jimmy Seville, Harold Shipman, Max Clifford, Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein. Some of you may even remember a few year ago the scandal of a famous oncologist from Addenbrookes hospital in Cambridgeshire, who was found guilty of abusing children under his care. Now Jesus was not saying that tax collectors and prostitutes are better than the priests; rather he was saying that when they heard God’s message and embraced it, they were better than those who had originally embraced the message but had not lived accordingly. They represent the second son in Jesus’ parable, who first had rejected the Heavenly Father’s call, but now were embracing it. As you can imagine, Jesus’ words did not go down very well with many in the religious circles. How dare he compare us to tax collectors and prostitutes, they hissed! They heard the truth but rather than change, they conspired with the Romans to kill Jesus. We could say that Jesus died in the cause of integrity. He taught people to live lives of redemption and to understand what it means to be created in the image of God and for this they put him to death. The story of Jesus and the priests is a sad story about resistance to judgment.

It is very much like the story of King David and the prophet Nathan. David was the good son and God chose him to be King of Israel. But David was not a perfect person. He took the wife of one of his soldiers and when she became pregnant, he had the soldier killed. Even though he was God’s choice to be King, he misused that authority to commit two terrible crimes. The prophet Nathan, being very diplomatic, goes to David and tells him a parable. There was a rich man who had many flocks, he says, and a poor man who had one little lamb which he loved as if it was a member of his family. When a visitor came to the home of the rich man, rather than serve a lamb from his large flock, he slaughters the beloved lamb of the poor man. David got very angry at the injustice and said that the man who had done that deserved to die, and Nathan said to him, ‘You are that man.’ Only then did David get it, and he remorsefully said, ‘I have sinned against God.’ Did David change? Yes, he did. Did he become a perfect person? No, he didn’t, but he sought God’s forgiveness, paid the price of his foolishness and God restored him.

Here we see two reactions to sin. Jesus confronts the priests and they plot his execution. Nathan confronts David and he repents. Which one are we? Are we like the priests: smug, self-sufficient and blind to our own sin; or are we like David? Are we smart enough to change when confronted with the truth? Have we disillusioned others by our betrayals? Is there still time to change? We can’t undo the past, but David teaches us that our shady past need not condemn our future if we are willing to change. And that is our hope; that we who have said that we will go into the vineyard will be helped by God’s grace to actually go there.

God does not love us because we are good. But God can make us good because he loves us. That should be our prayer today. Praise God.

Amen

Choral Reflection: For He shall Give His Angels

For he shall give his angels charge over thee,
that they shall protect thee in all the ways thou goest,
that their hands shall uphold and guide thee,
lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.

An 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 Father, beloved Son and living Spirit.

Amen

Intercessions

By Rosemary Kearsey

Gogh, Vincent van, 1853-1890. Red Vineyards near Arles, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=57026 [retrieved September 23, 2020]. Original source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vincent_van_Gogh_-_Red_Vineyard_at_Arles_(1888).jpg.

Last week, our Gospel reading told Jesus’ parable of the workers in the vineyard, and the two sons in today’s Gospel were also called to work in a vineyard for their father. This was a common occupation in Jesus’ day and in the places where he taught. We may not see workers in a vineyard so often in Britain, and if we could, the nature of the work may not be quite as backbreaking as Van Gogh illustrates it here. But we can transfer Jesus’ messages relatively easily into our own context. The attitude of the second son might easily transfer across into our own family context, or into the context of the church.

How often have we wondered why some people don’t volunteer for duties in the Service or in our building? Yet none of us knows what commitments others have, what difficulties they may encounter, or what other priorities they may have in their lives. God know what we each contribute, and we are only answerable to him.

So, remembering that we each have our own concerns at present, let us spend a short while bringing these to God, before we pray together for the needs of the world.

Loving God, we ask you to forgive us for all those thoughts, deeds and words we are ashamed of; to bring us into a close relationship with you, so that our actions and thoughts are guided by Jesus’ example. Knowing your love and care for us and for all your children, we bring our petitions to you now, in Jesus’ name.

Loving God, we pray for the peoples of the world in all their richness and diversity.  We pray for all those who have influence and authority, that they may seek justice, freedom and peace for all and serve each other with wisdom, honesty and love.

We pray for those who suffer:

from poverty
from the effects of war
from the aftermath of natural disaster
and for those who work to relieve suffering.

Give them patience, understanding and skill, to heal and support emotional ills as well as physical ones.
Help us to take opportunities to support their work, even if this has to be indirectly.
Help us to take advantage of modern communication to do our part to help the peoples of the world grow together in love.

Lord in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray for those working for justice in trade.
Strengthen and inspire them; bless them with success.

We pray for ourselves as consumers.
The choices we make in our shops and stores and supermarkets
will affect the lives of people in this country and overseas for good or for ill.
Help us to choose wisely and with care
so that exploitation may be overcome and deprivation may be ended.

May we do our part to redress the imbalances in world trade
that keep millions trapped in poverty,
to give dignity and respect to those who grow and make the things we buy and use.

Lord in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray for all in our community in Milton Keynes, for their richness and diversity.
Help us to be open to opportunities to grow together with people of other faiths and backgrounds,
to identify their needs, and ways in which we, as a church and as individuals,
can make a contribution to one another’s lives.

We thank you for those who serve us in political and public office
and pray that they may carry out their duties with insight and integrity.

Lord in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We pray for those who are sick and in need in our own church community.  It is not always easy to keep in touch, but we want them to know that we care.

We thank you that our church is open again and pray that all who come into it on Sundays and during the week will feel welcome.  We thank you for Woody and Simon, for Mark and Chibby, and the volunteers who have felt able to return, ensuring that there is someone here for them, to show your love in action.

Lord in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

As members of one world, your world:

Give us open eyes to see those who hurt.
Give us open ears to hear those who cry.
Give us hearts which can stay alongside their pain.
Give us the words to say, to share your love.

Show us how to bring joy, love, peace and hope to all who need to know your care.

We ask our prayers for the sake and in the name of Jesus Christ, the light of the world.

Amen

Hymn: As the deer pants for the water

As the deer pants for the water,
so my soul longs after you.
You alone are my heart’s desire
and I long to worship you.

You alone are my strength, my shield,
to you alone may my spirit yield.
You alone are my heart’s desire
and I long to worship you.

I want you more than gold or silver,
only you can satisfy.
You alone are the real joy-giver
and the apple of my eye.

You alone are my strength, my shield,
to you alone may my spirit yield.
You alone are my heart’s desire
and I long to worship you.

You’re my Friend and you’re my Brother,
even though you are a king.
I love you more than any other,
so much more than anything.

You alone are my strength, my shield,
to you alone may my spirit yield.
You alone are my heart’s desire
and I long to worship you.

Martin Nystrom (b. 1956)
CCL31580

The Peace

Jesus says,

‘Peace I leave with you;
my peace I give you.
Do not let your hearts be troubled,
neither let them be afraid.’

The peace of the Lord be always with you.
And also with you.

The Offering

Remember this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.
Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

2 Corinthians 9: 6–7

Thank you

To everyone who is continuing to pay us regularly through the Parish Giving Scheme.
To everyone who is continuing to pay us regularly by bankers’ order.
To people in the envelope scheme who are putting their money aside every week ready to bring in when we re-open.
To members of the envelope scheme who have already sent cheques and on-line donations.

Thank you

Holy Communion

The Thanksgiving

Blessed are you, Lord, God of all creation.
Through your goodness we have this bread to offer,
which earth has given and human hands have made.
It will become for us the bread of life.

Blessed be God for ever.

Blessed are you, Lord, God of all creation.
Through your goodness we have this wine to offer,
fruit of the vine and work of human hands.
It will become our spiritual drink.

Blessed be God for ever.

The Lord be with you
and also with you.

Lift up your hearts.
We lift them to the Lord.

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give thanks and praise.

Eucharistic Prayer

It is right to praise you, Father, Lord of all creation;
in your love you made us for yourself.
When we turned away
you did not reject us,
but came to meet us in your Son.

You embraced us as your children
and welcomed us to sit and eat with you.

In Christ you shared our life
that we might live in him and he in us.

He opened his arms of love upon the cross
and made for all the perfect sacrifice for sin.

On the night he was betrayed,
at supper with his friends
he took bread, and gave you thanks;
he broke it and gave it to them, saying:
Take, eat; this is my body which is given for you;
do this in remembrance of me.

Father, we do this in remembrance of him:
his body is the bread of life.

At the end of supper, taking the cup of wine,
he gave you thanks, and said:
Drink this, all of you; this is my blood of the new covenant,
which is shed for you for the forgiveness of sins;
do this in remembrance of me.

Father, we do this in remembrance of him:
his blood is shed for all.

As we proclaim his death and celebrate his rising in glory,
send your Holy Spirit that this bread and this wine
may be to us the body and blood of your dear Son.

As we eat and drink these holy gifts
make us one in Christ, our risen Lord.

With your whole Church throughout the world
we offer you this sacrifice of praise
and lift our voice to join the eternal song of heaven:

Holy, holy, holy Lord,
God of power and might,
heaven and earth are full of your glory.
Hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
Hosanna in the highest.

The Lord’s Prayer

As our Saviour taught us, so we pray:

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.
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

Breaking of the Bread

We break this bread to share in the body of Christ.

Though we are many, we are one body,
because we all share in one bread.

Take this bread:

Share this wine.

In these Christ comes to us with love from God.
The gifts of God for the people of God.

Amen

Hymn: Ye holy angels bright

Ye holy angels bright,
who wait at God’s right hand,
or through the realms of light
fly at you Lord’s command,
assist our song,
for else the theme
too high doth seem
for mortal tongue.

Ye blessèd souls at rest,
who ran this earthly race,
and now, from sin released,
behold the Saviour’s face,
his praises sound,
as in his sight
with sweet delight
ye do abound.

Ye saints, who toil below,
adore your heavenly King,
and onward as ye go
some joyful anthem sing;
take what he gives
and praise him still
through good and ill,
who ever lives.

My soul, bear thou thy part,
triumph in God above,
and with a well-tuned heart
sing thou the songs of love;
let all thy days
till life shall end,
whate’er he send,
be filled with praise.

Richard Baxter (1615–1691) & J.H. Gurney (1802–1862)
CCL31580

The Blessing

Thank you for joining us this morning.

May the Lord bless you and keep you.
May the Lord make his face shine on you
and be gracious to you.
May the Lord turn his face towards you
and give you peace.

And the blessing of God Almighty,
the Father,
the Son
and the Holy Spirit
be among you
and remain with you
today and always.

Amen

Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.
In the name of Christ.

Amen

Postlude: Te Deum in D

Videos of all the music for this Service can be viewed by following this link: cornerstonemk.co.uk/music-videos-for-sunday-27-september-2020.