Seventeenth Sunday After Pentecost
**Please note this service is based on the format of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Canada. Unless otherwise indicated, all prayers come from Evangelical Lutheran Worship (ELW). Hymns and other prayers have been sourced to give appropriate credit.
**NRSV translation used for the readings, unless otherwise stated.
Opening Prayer
Giver of life, save us from the desert of faithlessness and nourish us
with the living water of your word, that we may bring forth fruit that will
last, in the name of Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen.
Confession and Forgiveness
Blessed be the holy Trinity, ☩ one God,
who forgives all our sin,
whose mercy endures forever.
Amen.
Almighty God, to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from
whom no secrets are hid: cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration
of your Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love you and worthily magnify your
holy name, through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Let us confess our sin in the presence of God and of one another.
Most merciful God,
we confess that we
are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves. We have sinned against you in
thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as
ourselves. For the sake of your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive
us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in your will and walk in your
ways, to the glory of your holy name.
Amen.
In the mercy of almighty God, Jesus Christ was given to die for us, and
for his sake God forgives us all our sins. As a called and ordained minister of
the church of Christ, and by his authority, I therefore declare to you the
entire forgiveness of all your sins, in the name of the Creator, and of the ☩
Redeemer, and of the Sanctifier.
Amen.
Gathering Song – In Christ Called
to Baptize (ELW #575)
Greeting
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion
of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
And also with you.
Canticle of Praise – Glory to God (page #213)
Prayer of the Day
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Let us pray.
O God, our teacher and guide, you draw us to yourself and welcome us as
beloved children. Help us to lay aside all envy and selfish ambition, that we
may walk in your ways of wisdom and understanding as servants of your Son,
Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.
Amen.
Readings
A reading from the Book of Proverbs 31:10-31
A capable wife who can find?
She is far more precious than jewels.
The heart of her husband trusts in her,
and he will have no lack of gain.
She does him good, and not harm,
all the days of her life.
She seeks wool and flax,
and works with willing hands.
She is like the ships of the merchant,
she brings her food from far away.
She rises while it is still night
and provides food for her household
and tasks for her servant-girls.
She considers a field and buys it;
with the fruit of her hands she plants a vineyard.
She girds herself with strength,
and makes her arms strong.
She perceives that her merchandise is
profitable.
Her lamp does not go out at night.
She puts her hands to the distaff,
and her hands hold the spindle.
She opens her hand to the poor,
and reaches out her hands to the needy.
She is not afraid for her household
when it snows,
for all her household are clothed in crimson.
She makes herself coverings;
her clothing is fine linen and purple.
Her husband is known in the city gates,
taking his seat among the elders of the land.
She makes linen garments and sells
them;
she supplies the merchant with sashes.
Strength and dignity are her clothing,
and she laughs at the time to come.
She opens her mouth with wisdom,
and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue.
She looks well to the ways of her
household,
and does not eat the bread of idleness.
Her children rise up and call her
happy;
her husband too, and he praises her:
“Many women have done excellently,
but you surpass them all.”
Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain,
but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.
Give her a share in the fruit of her
hands,
and let her works praise her in the city gates.
The word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
Psalm 1
Happy are those
who
do not follow the advice of the wicked,
or take the path that
sinners tread,
or sit in the seat of scoffers;
but their delight is in the law of the Lord,
and
on his law they meditate day and night.
They are like trees
planted by streams of water,
which yield their fruit in its season,
and
their leaves do not wither.
In all that they do,
they prosper.
The wicked are not so,
but
are like chaff that the wind drives away.
Therefore the wicked
will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the congregation of the
righteous;
for the Lord watches over the way of the
righteous,
but
the way of the wicked will perish.
A reading from the Letter of James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a
Who is wise and understanding among
you? Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of
wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not
be boastful and false to the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from above,
but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. For where there is envy and selfish
ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the
wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full
of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a
harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace.
Those conflicts and disputes among you,
where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war
within you? You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And
you covet something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes and
conflicts. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive,
because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures.
Submit yourselves therefore to God.
Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw
near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you
double-minded.
The word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
Gospel Acclamation – Alleluia (page #216)
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
The Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Mark 9:30-37
Glory to you, O Lord.
They went on from there and passed
through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; for he was teaching his
disciples, saying to them, “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands,
and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.”
But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.
Then they came to Capernaum; and when
he was in the house he asked them, “What were you arguing about on the way?”
But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was
the greatest. He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wants
to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little
child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them,
“Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes
me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, O
Christ.
Sermon
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Amen.
The
disciples were north near Mount Hermon, and Jesus divided them into two groups.
Three disciples (Peter, James, and John) went to the top of the mountain and
experienced the Transfiguration where Jesus shone like the sun and the three
disciples had a vision of Moses and Elijah.
Meanwhile,
the other nine disciples were down in the lowlands and saw a young boy who had
epileptic seizures, threw himself into the fire, and the nine disciples could
not heal him.
On
the walk home to Capernaum, Jesus’ home town, the disciples got into an
argument as to which of them were the greatest. The three who were on the top
of Mount Hermon and saw the glorious Transfiguration? Or, the nine who could
not cast out the demon from the little boy who had seizures?
You
can probably imagine this argument, with everyone coming up with ways to explain
why they are the greatest disciple.
Jesus
overheard their discussion about greatness. He waited to talk with them until
they got home to Capernaum and inside a house, perhaps Jesus’ own home in
Capernaum.
We
are told that Jesus sat down on the floor, into the teaching position of a
rabbi, and began to teach them, “The first and greatest in the kingdom of God
is a person who is last like a servant.”
So
who is the greatest?
Have
you ever heard someone be called a GOAT?
This
might not sound like a compliment because you think of those barnyard animals
that chew grass and go baaa but that's not the GOAT I’m talking about here.
When
you call someone a GOAT, you are calling them the Greatest of All Time.
When
we think of someone or something that is the greatest, we think in terms of the
best. Who is at the top of their game, what is the best product, who is the
best known.
Now,
a lot of times, it has to do with sports.
For
example, Tom Brady was recently named the greatest of all time for football. Actually,
he was called the greatest athlete of all time, which started an amazing
Facebook rally to declare Terry Fox the greatest athlete of all time.
But
I digress…
Tom
Brady has won a lot of Super Bowls and awards and trophies, and he is hailed as
the GOAT, the greatest of all time, for football.
Then,
for basketball when we think GOAT, often we think of Michael Jordan. If you
know tennis, you might say that Serena Williams is the GOAT of that sport.
These
people are considered the GOAT, the Greatest of All Time, in their sport,
usually because of games that’ve won, awards they’ve won, and how much time the
spent in the spotlight while playing their sport.
And
to be that greatest of all time meant that they had to work very hard and to be
competitive, and practice, drive themselves, and discipline themselves to do
things day in and day out to become that top tier level greatest of all time.
There
are also movie stars, authors, and historical figures who are considered to be
the GOATs of their fields because they worked hard to earn the respect and
recognition of others.
What
do you think it would take to be a GOAT follower of Jesus?
Can
we be the greatest when it comes to being Christian disciples?
What
does it take? Does it take memorizing a certain number of verses? or maybe reading
the Bible for so many minutes every day? or maybe it's how many times you come
to Sunday service? or if you know the words to all the hymns?
What
does it take to become the best?
Now,
I'm a little competitive. Ok, maybe a lot competitive.
I
like to be the best. If there's a contest, I want to win. And I want to know
what it will take to be the greatest, to be the best, to come out on top.
How
hard do I have to work? What do I have to put in to become the greatest?
This
is the question that happens to come up in our gospel lesson today. Then Jesus
sort of turned it upside down a little bit and surprised his disciples by what
he told them.
You
see, he had been speaking and saying a lot of very interesting and kind of hard
things about who he was and what his ministry was. During this time, his
disciples had been arguing and Jesus, knowing this, said “hey, what were you
guys talking about?”
The
disciples knew Jesus wouldn't really like what they had been arguing about, so
they tried to brush it off, “we weren’t talking about anything”.
But
actually, they were talking about who among them was the greatest. They were
arguing because they wanted to be the best disciple, the disciple that Jesus
loved the most.
None
of them were going to ask the question, “well, who's really the greatest of us?
Which one of us is the best? Which one of us is the best disciple? What do we
have to do to get the best disciple award? Is it an arm wrestling competition? Fishing
contest? Most miracle completions? What does it take?”
And
Jesus knew they had been arguing about that, and that they were concerned about
that, so he told them, “you know what? To be the greatest, you have to become
the least, the least among you will be the greatest.”
It
wasn't the first or last time that Jesus said something like that. He often
said things like “the last shall be first and the first shall be last” or “to
be lifted up you must be willing to put yourself down” and so he told his
disciples “if you want to be great in God's eyes, you have to be not so great.”
In
fact, Jesus took a little child and said, “if you want to really be great, be
nice to children and welcome these children.” Back in those days, people didn’t
see to like children and they weren't very welcome, so Jesus was telling us to
recognize that sometimes we need to do things we might not always naturally do.
“Welcome
the children, talk to them.”
Jesus
also wanted them to realize that they weren't the greatest, that they couldn't
do things on their own.
Children
realize that, children know they can’t do all things on their own because they
still rely on adults.
So
Jesus was telling his disciples that it's not about being the best. Wanting to
be the best is not always the best thing.
It's
not about working by yourself to achieve something. It's about recognizing that
God works through us,
that
God does the work,
that
to be the greatest we accept that we're not,
that
God is the greatest,
that
Jesus was the true GOAT of all time,
that
we rely on him for everything that we have,
that
greatness does not mean always that we get special recognition but that we
trust in God,
and
that we sometimes have to reverse our usual expectations of things.
We
think that being the greatest is about doing well, about getting praise.
But
really, it's about knowing that who we are relies on who God is, that our identity,
that our greatness (whatever that might be) rests in Jesus.
And
we can trust him, always, and know that he provides for us, that he does the
work for us.
Those
were the admonishing words that Jesus gave his disciples but they're comforting
words when he gives them to us.
We
know that a lot of things that we might not be the greatest at, maybe we aren’t
the GOAT of anything, but we can be the greatest in God’s eyes when we humble
ourselves.
Being
the best, the greatest, is not the one with the greatest skills or talents nor
the one who is the most famous or who draws the most attention or the one who
has the most people serving him or her, but the greatest is the one who serves
the least and lowliest.
The
greatest is the one who gives voice to the voiceless.
Jesus
welcomes the child to the center of the community and wraps his arm around them,
the child who represents the voiceless ones, and suggests that if we want to be
great, then we must practice welcoming the voiceless to the very center of the
community.
Expand
the community's center to include those people at the margins. Make the margins
the new center of the community because this is where the welcoming presence of
God dwells.
Otherwise,
we alienate ourselves from the very presence of Jesus and the One who sent him.
This
is what greatness looks like in Jesus' ministry.
So
what does this mean for us?
A
church that fails to be the welcoming presence of God ceases to be the church.
So
this is an invitation to you to re-imagine what the practices of greatness look
like in your church.
This
is also an invitation to imagine practices that cultivate your capacity to
develop a community of disciples who share in this greatness:
To
create a safe space for Christians to explore their vocation in the world.
To
spend more time asking provocative questions rather than giving patent answers.
To
model what greatness really looks like in Jesus' ministry.
To
welcome the voices and the vocations of young people in the community.
To
expand your community's center to include the voiceless.
And
to make the margins of the community the new centers of congregational and
denominational life.
This
is the invitation to re-imagine greatness; it is the call of the Gospel.
Amen.
Hymn of the Day – Children of the
Heavenly Father (ELW #781)
Creed
Let us confess the faith of our baptism, as we
say the Apostles’ Creed:
I
believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator
of heaven and earth.
I
believe in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord,
who
was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born
of the virgin Mary,
suffered
under Pontius Pilate,
was
crucified, died, and was buried;
he
descended to the dead.*
On
the third day he rose again;
he
ascended into heaven,
he
is seated at the right hand of the Father,
and
he will come to judge the living and the dead.
I
believe in the Holy Spirit,
the
holy catholic church,
the
communion of saints,
the
forgiveness of sins,
the
resurrection of the body,
and
the life everlasting. Amen.
Prayers of Intercession
Made children and heirs of God’s promise, we pray for the church, the
world, and all in need.
Silence
God of community, we pray for the church around the world. Unite us in
our love for you. Help us overcome our divisions, that we are encouraged to
work together for your sake.
Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
God of creation, we pray for this hurting earth. Awaken in us a new
desire to care for this world and empower us to support agencies,
organizations, and individual efforts to heal our environment.
Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
God of cooperation, we pray for nations of the world embroiled in
conflict, especially in Afghanistan, Yemen, Sudan, and throughout the Middle East. Inspire
leaders to listen to each other and work towards peaceful solutions to
disagreements. Protect the vulnerable, especially children, who cannot find
safety in their home or country.
Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
God of comfort, we pray for all who live with mental or physical
illness. Help them find appropriate care. Bring healing and wholeness when the
path forward seems bleak.
Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
God of compassion, we pray for the young people of this congregation.
Renew in us your call to welcome the children in our midst. As they grow,
strengthen their faith and our commitment to them.
Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Please
take time to offer your own intercessions or to pray in silence.
God of consolation, we give you thanks for our loved ones who have died
and pray for all who grieve today. Shine your grace on all your saints.
Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Receive these prayers, O God, and those in our hearts known only to you;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Peace
The peace of Christ be with you always.
And also with you.
Hymn
of Thanksgiving – We Give Thee but Thine Own (ELW #686)
**Although
not physically at our church buildings to share our offering together I would
encourage you to set your offering of money aside so that it can be dropped off
or placed in the church once services resume, to mail your offering to the
church, or to make donations online. Please remember ministry is still taking
place.
Thanksgiving for the Word
Let us pray.
O God of justice and love, we give thanks to you that you illumine our
way through life with the words of your Son. Give us the light we need, awaken
us to the needs of others, and at the end bring all the world to your feast;
through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy
Spirit, be honor and glory forever.
Amen.
Lord’s Prayer
Gathered into one by the Holy Spirit, let us pray as Jesus taught us.
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.
Save us from the time
of trial
and deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the
power,
and the glory are yours,
now and forever. Amen.
Blessing
The Lord bless you and keep you.
The Lord’s face shine on you with grace and
mercy.
The Lord look upon you with favor and ☩ give you peace.
Amen.
Sending Song – Jesu, Jesu, Fill Us with Your Love (ELW #708)
Dismissal
Go forth into the world to serve God with gladness; be of good courage;
hold fast to that which is good; render to no one evil for evil; strengthen the
fainthearted; support the weak; help the afflicted; honor all people; love and
serve God, rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Thanks be to God.
No comments:
Post a Comment