God’s Love Embodied through Us (click here)

Welcome:
Hello, I am glad you are worshipping virtually with us today.

Prayers of Adoration and Confession:
Jesus Christ, our Risen Lord, you are the vine, and we are the branches.
Your love is our strength.
Your energy is our joy.
Your attentiveness is our hope.
Your power can transform even the most difficult situations.
You nourish our faith and imaginations so that we can bear fruit in many ways.
You promise we can dwell in you because you are dwelling in us.
We offer our praise to you,
and bring glory to God the Father, through the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Fill us with the love you know as God, ever Three and ever One,
so that our love will honour you each and every day.

God, our Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer,
We confess there are so many ways we fail to love you fully.
Forgive us for our lack of reverence for the earth
and for using up more than our share of its resources.
Forgive us for ignoring the cries of others
who know pain or discrimination which we dismiss as mere complaint.
Forgive us for seeking praise from others
yet failing to encourage them in their endeavours.
Forgive us, O God, and root our lives more deeply in your love.
This we pray and confess in the name of Christ our Redeemer.
Amen.

Assurance of Pardon

St. John records that God is love, and that God’s perfect love casts out fear.
Friends, we are promised that those who abide in love abide in God
and God abides in them. Claim your hope in this good news:
God’s perfect love abides in you through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Hymn: Love divine all loves excelling https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPsxqQsnzJA

Prayer for Understanding

Holy Spirit, move in us and among us as we listen to the scriptures be read and interpreted. Open our minds and hearts to receive the Living Word so that we may be transformed to live as your Easter people. Amen.

Scripture:

Deuteronomy 10:12-22 The Essence of the Law
1 John 4:7-21 God is Love

Message: God’s Love Embodied through us.

The Book of Deuteronomy contains Moses’ final sermons to the people of God before they moved from 40 year wilderness journey into the land that God had promised to Abraham and his descendants.

The people of God who were once slaves in Egypt have needed 40 years to develop into a new nation with a common identity, a common history, and a common set of laws. A whole new generation has grown up in the desert and have heard the stories of what Egyptian captivity was like. They have heard stories of the older generation’s failure to be obedient to God. This has led the older generations to be prevented by God from entering the Promised Land. Sadly, Moses will be one of those who does not enter the Promised Land because of his disobedience.

So if you are Moses, what do you teach and what do you share with the generation that is about to fulfill their destiny as the People of God in the Promised Land? What do you want the generation headed for the Promised Land to remember and do?

Moses takes this opportunity that God has given him to remind the people of God in chapters 1-4, of the events that shaped and created them as a people. They take with them their primary confession that will guide all they do which is found in Deuteronomy 6:4, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is God alone.” They have been reminded that their primary responsibility is to “love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.”

Moses reminds them in the context of his final series of sermons of the important commandments that will govern their individual and communal lives with each other and with the people they will encounter in the Promised Land. The living out of these commands will witness to the nations of their love and loyalty to God who has saved them from slavery.

Whereas some of the laws that direct how they are to love God and live with each other in Deuteronomy sound odd to us today, like not farming with an ox and donkey yoked together (Deuteronomy 22:10) when farming is done with tractors today. On the other hand, some directives from God make perfect sense for every age, for example, the law in Deuteronomy 24:17-18 declares that Israel should not deprive anyone in their society of justice. This law, as Moses reminds the people, comes out of God’s merciful and redemptive action of freeing them from slavery. The command to love their neighbors by showing and doing justice to all still applies today as much as it did in Moses’ day. Many laws spell out how to do this.

The laws that required the people of God to leave part of their crops for the poor are still worth following today. When we support the food banks of Banff and Canmore, we faithfully follow not only the Deuteronomic law to look after the poor, but also the teachings of Jesus who said we when we offer help to the least we have done it unto to him.

These laws were meant to keep Israel ever humble and mindful of the fact that God heard their cries for help and has and continues to show his great mercy to them and specifically chose them because they were the least of all nations. Therefore, they were not to overlook anyone especially the least in their society.


Harold Kushner in his book “Who Needs God” tells the short story about the wife of a British colonel in India. She was expecting important guests for tea one afternoon. She looked out from her front porch after lunch & was horrified to see that the man who swept the leaves off her stairs every morning had not shown up for work. When he finally got there, she tore into him. “Don’t you realize what you’ve done to me? Do you know who’s coming here in an hour? I ought to fire you and see to it that you don’t get another job anywhere in the city!”

Without looking up the man said, “I’m sorry. My little girl died during the night and we had to bury her today.”

For the first time, the colonel’s wife began to see this man as something more than just a device that swept her stairs every day. [Harold Kushner, Who Needs God (New York: Summit Books, 1989), p. 100.]

What an important eye opening experience it was for this particular woman. The ability to see people as people, who are in need of the of grace and mercy of God as much as we are. This is an act of love for God that is inspired by God.

The story of the colonel’s wife reminds us of how the “Black Lives Matter” and “the Me Too” movements, the “Truth and Reconciliation Commission: Calls to Action” and other groups that advocate for those have not been seen or heard in our society. The call to love God who is unseen by loving the neighbor who is before us is in our midst is a theme that is present throughout the Scriptures.

The numerous laws that were given by God to God’s people flow out of God’s love for people. There is a love expressed for those who are part of God’s family, those who live among and with God’s family (the stranger /alien), those on the fringes of society (the poor and widows), and a concern for animals who share the same day of creation with humans.

This important theme and directive of God loving us and us in turn loving one another is highlighted in 1 John 4:11-12, 21, we read
“Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. . . . The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.”
What John declares here, must surely have come out of his memory of what Jesus said when asked by the Pharisees “What is the greatest commandment?” John would have remembered that Jesus boiled down all the hundreds of laws in Exodus to Deuteronomy to two:
1) love God
2) love neighbor as self.

I don’t know about you, but I like that. I like simple. Simple is good. Simple memorable principles are better at guiding us that a whole bunch of detailed laws.

I appreciate that Jesus simplified the application of how to love neighbor by telling us to treat others as we would have them treat us. But just because something is simple and easily remembered doesn’t mean that it is easily done. We know we are to love our neighbor and treat others with justice, mercy, and love, but have you caught yourself in one of these situations:

• Paying for items at a store without ever noticing the store clerk or noticing their name is or asking them how their day is going or blessing them with “Hope you have good day?

• Becoming impatient at someone in line ahead of you at a store or fast food restaurant, who places a special order?

• Pointing out what a person hasn’t done, before you’ve acknowledged the good work they have done?

• Tuning out or ignoring opinions that disagree with your views or individuals or Scripture that you have a difficult time with.

• Focusing more on your response to a person your opinions rather than truly listening, hearing and understanding what they have said?

We all do foolish stuff like this all the time without even thinking about it. We normally do the uncaring stuff like this when our focus is off of what God has done for us and what God requires of us. Is it any wonder that Moses continually calls upon Israel to remember what God has done for them and who they are in relation to God?

Jesus, during his last night with his disciples gave his final instructions to them before his suffering and death. Jesus spoke numerous times about love that evening just has he had throughout his ministry. He spoke of staying connected to God as a vine does with a branch. He reminded the disciples of God’s redeeming, sacrificial, and saving love for them and the world. Jesus shared that the world would identify them as his disciples by the way they loved each other and those around them.

It is our everyday acts of love, inspired by God’s love for us, that point the people of our lives to Him. For example . . .

• Looking for ways to serve and help those you encounter throughout your day.

• Wearing a mask to keep others safe and getting vaccinated.

• Letting our eyes show the covered smiles on our faces as we walk by someone.

• Hearing the perspective and stories of those whose pain has not been heard or responded to before.

• Calling, e-mailing, texting, writing someone to say you’re thinking about them today.

• Doing something extra for somebody or part of someone else’s job, not because you have to, but because you know it will make their life a little easier.

It is those simple acts of love and kindness that mean so much to others and to us. These acts of love give witness to the fact that we are followers of Jesus. Our loving words and actions are the visible and tangible evidence of God’s love in us. Just as God’s love took human form in Jesus the Christ, so God’s love continues to take human form in our loving words and actions.

We need to remember that the most of the of the ministry and mission of the church does not happen on Sunday or in the church building, but rather it happens in the places where we live, work, play, socialize, and interact with people who have yet to connect to Christ in a meaningful way. It is in those places where by the grace of God we bring and demonstrate God’s love to a hurting and struggling world one person at a time.

John reminds us that we are God’s loved ones so let us
love one another,
because love is from God;
everyone who loves
is born of God and knows God.
(1 Jn 4:7).
AMEN!

Prayers of the People:

Lord Jesus Christ, we draw near to you in prayer this day,
trusting that your love changes lives
and your resurrection brings hope into the world God loves.
You have drawn near to us and walk with us through every challenge.
We are so grateful for signs of hope even in the midst of the pandemic,
for vaccine distribution and recovery plans,
for generosity and creativity offered in so many surprising corners.
As we lay before you the concerns on our hearts today,
draw near to those we name, and bring the gift that is needed.

We lay before you, Lord, those who are in the news headlines this week
and situations in the world where justice and renewal are desperately needed:
(pray in silence)

We lay before you, Lord, those who are in hospital or care
and all those who struggle with illness, pain or health burdens of any sort:
(pray in silence)

We lay before you, Lord, families under stress, relationships that are strained,
and friends and neighbours in need of reconciliation:
(pray in silence)

We lay before you, Lord, people seeking food, homes or jobs in these hard times,
and those worried about economic recovery from the pandemic:
(pray in silence)

We lay before you, Lord, those who face discrimination daily,
and who lack respect and opportunity because of their identity,
or fear violence in their daily lives:
(pray in silence)

Lord Jesus, we believe that you hear our prayers
and will be faithful to our requests and concerns.
Help us seize the moments you give us to reach out to our neighbours
and show them the love you have to share.

And so we pray together the words you 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.

Pastoral Blessing (1 Thess. 3:12-13)

We go into this new week to embody the love of God
In our words and actions just as Jesus did.

May the Lord make your love
for one another
and for all people
grow more and more.
May God strengthen you
and make you perfect and holy
in the presence of our God and Father
when our Lord comes with all who belongs to him.
Amen.

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Mission Moment – May 2, 2021 – Empowering Youth in Malawi

The people in Malawi’s Mzimba District face many challenges. School dropout rates are high and teen pregnancy is on the rise. More women are experiencing gender-based violence, and there is a lack of knowledge about HIV transmission and prevention. To help address and educate the community about these issues, Presbyterian World Service & Development’s local partner, Livingstonia Synod AIDS Programme, has trained 20 community facilitators to teach parents how to nurture adolescents. The facilitators help parents engage youth on issues such as sexual and reproductive health, teen pregnancy, early marriage and the transmission of HIV. The project has been successful in encouraging adolescents to return to school after dropping out.

Prayer Partnership

Sunday, May 2 We pray for Eastern Orthodox Christians as they celebrate Easter and the Resurrection of our Lord.

Monday, May 3 We pray for the candidates for ministry and the guidance counsellors who will gather to engage in dialogue and reflection about vocation and discernment during the Guidance Conference this week.

Tuesday, May 4 (Asian Heritage Month) We give thanks for Asian cultures and people in Canada, and pray that their rich contributions to our history and our nation be honoured and remembered.

Wednesday, May 5 We pray for graduating theological students who are beginning the process of seeking a call to a congregation.

Thursday, May 6 We give thanks and pray for clerks of Session as they, with ministers and fellow elders, provide leadership and pastoral care in congregations.

Friday, May 7 We pray for the ministries and mission of the Presbytery of Western Han-Ca.

Saturday, May 8 We pray for the safety of LGBTQI2+ refugees seeking sanctuary in Canada, and give thanks for the congregations and sponsors supporting them.