Morning Prayer Wednesday, 10 March 2021
Good morning, Cornerstone friends.
Let us spend time together moving closer to our God.
Sing praise to the Lord, O Jerusalem;
praise your God, O Zion.
For he has strengthened the bars of your gates
and blest your children within you.
He has established peace within your borders
and satisfies you with the finest wheat.
He sends forth his command to the earth
and his word runs very swiftly.
He gives snow like wool
and scatters the hoarfrost like ashes.
He casts down his hailstones like morsels of bread;
who can endure his frost.
He sends forth his word and it melts;
he blows with his wind and the waters flow.
He declares his word to Jacob,
his statutes and judgements to Israel.
He has not dealt with other nations;
they do not know his laws.
Great is our Lord and mighty is his power.
Psalm 147: 13–20
Compassionate God, as you know every star you have created, so you know the secrets of every heart;
in your loving mercy bring to your table all who are fearful and broken,
all who are wounded and needy, that our hungers may be satisfied in the city of your peace;
through our Lord Jesus Christ who is our peace.
Amen
Common Praise
‘Do not think I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, nor one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. …’
Matthew 5: 17–19
The last few psalms in the collection of 150 all begin with words like,
Praise the Lord, O my soul; and all that is within me bless his Holy name.
That is what we need to do daily and give thanks for all that we have:
our health, homes, food, loving communities, peace and security.
Chapters 5–7 of St Matthew are referred to as the ‘Sermon on the Mount’,
the teaching our Lord gave to his disciples before getting into his wider ministry in Galilee.
It begins with the Beatitudes, which are nine verses that one can consider again and again.
There is so much in these chapters, and it is sobering to realise
that this is basic ‘level-one’ stuff for discipleship,
not ‘more advanced’ teaching, which comes later in the life, death and resurrection of our Lord.
It does not always feel that basic!
We all have to use our time in Lent learning what it means for each of us to follow Jesus.
It is not a passive thing. It includes all aspects of our lives:
what we eat, what we spend our money on, how we treat others in different situations
and how we use each hour of the day.
We all tend to go through life not giving God sufficient of our attention.
Let us pray today to be more mindful of our faith in all we try to do.
Let us pray for the Church in all the world and particularly for our Ecumenical Partnership.
The news has included items about the papal visit to Iraq, where Christians are a minority
and face a number of difficulties from thousands of their number having fled from persecution.
The Church in many places of the world faces difficulties because of the pandemic
and, as Ernesto pointed out on Sunday, needs to embrace disruption
to find new ways of being followers of Christ.
Our Ecumenical Partnership has its Annual Congregational Meeting on Sunday, 21 March 2021
and the Annual Report has a very significant element.
It is in the first few pages of a forty-eight-page document and titled ‘Looking Ahead’
outlining a three-year plan with six ambitious aims, which I have paraphrased here for brevity,
but please read the whole document itself. The aims are:
- Reviewing our business approach with a new Charitable Incorporated Organisation.
- Improving and growing our involvement with young people.
- Improving our relationships by better engagement with other Christians and people of goodwill.
- Increasing the presence of our church within our community.
- Seek, train and support new volunteers for existing and new work of the church.
- Renew our commitment regularly, to ensure the future of our mission here.
Let us humbly commit ourselves to launch this initiative with our prayers
and use all our efforts to keep these aims foremost in our thoughts and activities
so that we can give thanks in March 2024 for all that God has guided us through.
O Lord, from whom all good things come: grant to us humble servants,
that by your holy inspiration we may think those things that are good
and by your merciful guiding may perform the same through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen
We pray for our world, which seems beset with difficulties.
Broken relationships within families such as our own Royal Family
and broken relationships between nations, which can also affect individual families,
such as the family of Nazarin Zaghari-Ratcliffe released from captivity in Iran
to be immediately arrested for additional charges
which will keep her from her husband and daughter.
Our own way of life is contributing to inequality between rich and poorer nations,
our failure to take the right decisions adds to conflict, hunger,
lack of health and educational services in other parts of the world.
Our way of life injures the ecology of our only planet.
Our world needs our prayers and needs disruption
to create a new way of being humans with love for one another and for our earth.
Lord we thank you for your gift of hope, our strength in times of trouble.
Beyond the injustice of our time, its cruelty and its conflict
we look forward to a world of peace
when men and women deal kindly with each other and no one is afraid.
Every bad deed delays its coming and every good deed brings it nearer.
May our lives be your witnesses.
May the day come when the ‘sun of righteousness will rise with healing in his wings’
Help us to pray for it, to work for it, to be worthy of it,
to bless your name, our hope and salvation.
Amen
May we all find beauty, today.
Let us go in God’s love.
Don Head
