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Call to Worship (Based on Matthew 13:31-33, 44-53)
A small seed grows into a large tree,
the Kingdom of God is a home for all.
A field filled with treasure is bought,
the Realm of God is beyond price.
Yeast is kneaded into flour to make it rise,
the Kingdom of Heaven brings life.
A pearl of unsurpassed beauty is bought,
the Realm of God is worth waiting for.
A net that catches all the fish of the sea,
the Kingdom of God catches us all.
Let us worship the One, who teaches us
about the Kingdom of Heaven.
Opening Prayers
Our gracious and ever loving God,
we come in the midst of summer looking for refreshment.
We rest in the knowledge of the wonderful works you have done for us, We rest in your deep and abiding love for us and all people.
We rest in the work of Christ on the Cross on our behalf.
Search our hearts.
Fill our soul with your indwelling Spirit
who whispers to our soul that all will be well if we but trust in you.
Shine your light before us,
that we may see our path to you and to your kingdom on earth.
Merciful God:
Some days, we don’t know how to pray or what to pray to you.
Sometimes the words of “I am sorry God for …”
don’t easily come of our mouths.
Some days, we are afraid to be honest with you and with ourselves
About our sins, failures and lack of trust in you and your ways.
We are afraid to confront and confess the words, thoughts, actions,
of our lives that have not brought you praise and honor.
We are afraid to confront and confess the times
when we treasure things and other people more than you.
We are afraid and reluctant to confront and repent of
the areas of our lives that keep us
from following you as you desire.
We confess now in silence . . .
Lord have mercy upon us.
Help us to be brave and honest before you
That we might again experience anew Your saving grace
that forgives, renews, and changes us
into the people you created us to be,
Help us to be brave in following your ways of forgiveness
that free us from our past and which opens us
to the life in Christ you always offer to us.
Assure us once again that in Christ we are forgiven
And we are freed to love, serve, and follow you
With grateful and devoted lives.
In Christ, our Savior, we pray. Amen
Song: “Seek ye first” Words/ Music: Karen Lafferty
Prayer for Understanding
God of wisdom, you teach us with your love,
you touch us with your mercy,
and you challenge us with your truth.
Send us your Holy Spirit to help us understand
the depths of your Word speaking to us
through the scriptures this day. Amen.
Scripture
Romans 8:24-30 God at work in our lives through the Spirit, circumstance, and through Christ
Matthew 13:31–33, 44–52 More Parables of the Kingdom of Heaven.
Sermon:
I want to thank the Rev. Charles Hoffacker for his sermon on the Matthew text that helped shape this sermon.
In the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Amen.
In first my pastoral charge, every Sunday before the children headed off for Sunday School, I did a children’s sermon for them. The children’s sermon highlighted the main Scriptural theme for that Sunday.
On one Sunday after I talked about Jesus being a shepherd or one of the other many ways Jesus talked about himself, one of the children became angry with me. She said you have talked about Jesus being a friend, a farmer, a light, a loving parent, and she listed another half dozen things.
I was impressed that she remembered all the different things Jesus compared himself to.
Then she asked, “Can Jesus really be all these things to us at once?” My wife recalls, I responded by simply saying “Yes, he can.”
I don’t remember her being impressed with my answer to her. But young friend did have a good point. Why did Jesus use so many different ways of explaining himself and his Kingdom to us?
When we think about God, or Jesus it is far too easy to get trapped into thinking about God like some bearded Roman Zeus god-like deity hanging out in heaven, wherever heaven is. Or Jesus as a Robinhood like character wandering around the Sea of Galilee with his band of merry men.
Jesus knew that the Kingdom of God, which was the focus of his teaching, was a huge concept for people to grab hold of and understand. And because of this what we needed were multiple pictures of the kingdom of God for even just a couple them to take root in our thoughts and imaginations.
In chapter 13, Matthew includes with Jesus parable of The Sower, Weeds growing the Wheat, five more additional parables or verbal pictures of the Kingdom of God. Jesus speaks of the kingdom of God as being like a mustard seed that grows into something large, a woman who bakes bread with yeast, a treasure that is hidden in a field, a merchant that finds a rare and valuable pearl, a net that catches different kinds of fish.
You combine all the parables that are recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke and you have a pretty good picture of what the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Heaven is like from Jesus. And what you see is something of God’s sovereign rule and gracious activity on earth that Jesus was announcing and demonstrating.
The parable of the yeast in the flour is a simple one, and is one of the shortest parables Jesus told. We can easily miss its importance of it like we do with a newly placed road sign on our regular travel routes.
The parable goes like this: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.”
Three measures of flour. At first glance that doesn’t seem very much, but do you know how much that is? It is about eighty pounds or 36 kilograms of flour! That is enough flour to make 120 one-pound loaves of bread.
This woman is not a contestant on the British or Canadian Baking Show whipping up a couple delicate, frosting covered bit size biscuits that together weigh less than a canary. No, no. This woman is a baker, perhaps a farmer’s wife feeding her extended family, which would have included the farm hands. She is baking enough bread to share with her poorer neighbors as well.
She’s emptying sixteen five-pound bags of flour into the biggest mixing bowl you’ve ever seen. She is pouring in forty-two cups of water. She’s got a mass of dough on her hands that weighs over a hundred pounds.
Kneading this lump of dough, shaping it, pounding it. It looks like some scene from a professional wrestling match. We have a woman, with her apron dusted with flour, her ten fingers deep into the dough – who is a combination of a Martha Stewart and a professional wrestler.
“The kingdom of heaven,” Jesus says is the smallest part of the baking operation, but an essential one. The woman takes less then 1.5 lb of yeast and adds it to the 80 lbs of flours until all of it was leavened and ready to be baked.
Jesus tosses out this simple, one verse parable to help us gain another glimpse the kingdom of heaven, where God’s rule is recognized.
Take another look at that huge mass of dough. It’s not just flour any more. The yeast is in the dough, it’s invisible, but it spreads through the mass, and has its effect on the greater whole. Sounds like something else that’s been in the news a lot lately. But yeast has a positive effect on the other ingredients. It brings out the best in them.
There is this mystery that is bubbling away inside, with so much more happening than meets the eye.
As this process continues, the hidden will become visible. There’s no way to stop it! You can punch that dough all you want and it will keep rising on you.
The movement is from what is at first hidden to something that is finally revealed. Jesus presents this to us as the pulse of the kingdom of heaven.
Here is how God’s sovereignty becomes apparent: it resembles the strange transformation that turns flour into dough into bread.
We get to watch the baker woman at work. We’re invited to look at this process and see it for what it’s worth. But if we are to get a glimpse of the kingdom, then two things are asked of us:
1) We must be patient,
2) We must exercise discernment.
Yeast takes a while to work, and its working is mysterious. So we have to be patient as the dough rises and comes to life. This dough is not a dead, hopeless, shapeless lump, but instead it is a universe where opportunities become real.
God is a baker woman who is at work within our lives, our circumstances, and the people around us.
We are leavened with gift of God’s Presence through the Holy Spirit as Paul points out to us in Romans 8.
The Holy Spirit, like the yeast in the dough, is slowly expanding its positive and life-giving influence in us, and in many others.
We not only need to be patient with God working his Kingdom plans and goals within and with us, but we also need to exercise this same patience with one another and our circumstances. In some unseen way, in some purposeful fashion God is at work carrying out his redemptive plans for us and our world.
Just as yeast permeates the entire lump, so the kingdom is present everywhere, and everywhere it becomes visible for those with eyes to discern it.
Yeast is invisible and known by its effects, so the kingdom is hidden, concealed, buried deep in ordinary circumstances, yet known by its positive effects.
If we look around us and within us, we can recognize the presence of the God’s kingdom. That kingdom is at work, just as yeast is active in the dough.
Look at your life in the light of God’s grace. Something is there for you to find of God’s yeast bubbling, Kingdom building activity in your life,
whether you feel happy or sad,
whether your life seems successful or disastrous,
whether you are seeking God or doubting God.
And when you find the kingdom among the realities of your life, nothing prevents you from finding this same kingdom present as well . . . in the circumstances around you, in the lives of other people, and everywhere you choose to look.
We can see these times not as a threat to your life or to the mission of the church, but as an opportunity for us to grow in your love of God, your love of Neighbor and growth in your in participation in God’s Kingdom work happening through you each day.
There is however, one caution to always keep in mind. The kingdom does not come with brass bands. Nor is it the make headline news. Nor is it the result public-relations efforts. We are talking here about yeast working invisibly in the dough, bringing about God’s hidden yet effective activity.
As it takes faith to believe that bread will rise, so too it takes faith to see the kingdom visible in the everyday and the ordinary. We must exercise patience and discernment wherever God places us.
We will see that what seems like a dead lump is in fact bubbling with divine life and possibilities.
So may each of us go forth this week, and encounter places and people and circumstances, and look there for the kingdom:
not as distant, but near at hand;
not as obvious, but hidden;
not as static, but alive and becoming visible;
a kingdom making room for all of us.
When we look for the kingdom, then we find it present, abundantly present. And when we do, then we have more reasons to give thanks than we ever expected.
Thanks be to God for a small uplifting parable that helps to expands our thinking about the Kingdom of Heaven.
AMEN!
Song: I greet the, who my sure Redeemer art Sung by Moody’s Men’s Collegiate Choir
Words: John Calvin, Music: French Psalter, Strasbourg
Moment for Mission: Keeping Communities Hygienic
Presbyterian World Service & Development (PWS&D) helps ensure that countries affected by natural disasters have access to proper sanitation. In South Sudan, continuous rainfall that caused massive floods washed away homes and food supplies of hundreds of thousands of people. Waterways and latrines were also destroyed. Without proper sanitation, the chance of contracting deadly diseases like cholera and typhoid are much higher. With PWS&D’s support, 9,000 men and women are accessing clean water and adequate sanitation. Hygiene kits are distributed to families, along with training on improved hygiene practices.
Ensuring cleanliness and sanitation is vital to keep communities as healthy as possible while allowing them to continue to thrive.
PWS&D promotes sanitation programs for a healthy community
Prayers of the People
Good and generous God,
In Jesus Christ you came to us, promising us life in abundance.
We give you thanks today for the abundant gifts we receive in him:
Assurance of your love day by day;
Relief of mercy when we recognize our own failings;
Hope renewed when things seem bleak;
Peace that comes when we trust ourselves to your eternal keeping.
These are the gifts that matter, O God, so for all the times we experience these gifts we thank you in these moments of silence:
(Keep silence for at least 10 seconds)
Generous God, the world is going through difficult times this summer.
So we pray for all whose lives seem empty of joy:
Because plans have changed, and friends seem far away.
Because hearts are filled with disappointment and loneliness.
Because sorrow and grief rise up each day.
Support each one we name in this silence with your abundant compassion:
(Keep silence for at least 10 seconds)
Generous God, so many things must be rearranged because of the pandemic and what it has revealed.
We pray for those whose lives are empty of purpose,
and for those who do not know the respect of their neighbours:
Because they are without work.
Because they face discrimination and are devalued in our communities.
Because they have made poor choices and cannot find a way forward.
Support each one we name in this silence with your abundant mercy and show them signs of hope:
(Keep silence for at least 10 seconds)
Generous God,
We remember before you in silence those who lives are empty of peace and hope:
Because they struggle with illness or disability.
Because they are powerless in the face of violence.
Because old animosities rankle and opportunities for reconciliation are elusive.
(Keep silence for at least 10 seconds)
Loving God, you are so faithful and generous to us.
We dedicate the gifts we have offered to you in Jesus’ name this week
of our time, talent, treasure, trusting that you will bless them and us,
so that your goodness is multiplied to touch the lives of those in need,
Good and generous God, fill us with the energy and compassion of your Spirit to reach out to those facing difficult times.
May we become the gift we have received in Jesus for it is in his name we boldly pray, saying…
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..
Song: The Love of God Comes Close Words: John Bell, Music: Claude Maule
1. The love of God comes close
where stands an open door,
to let the stranger in,
to mingle rich and poor.
The love of God is here to stay,
embracing those who walk the Way;
the love of God is here to stay.
2. The peace of God comes close
to those caught in the storm,
forgoing lives of ease
to ease the lives forlorn.
The peace of God is here to stay,
embracing those who walk the Way;
the peace of God is here to stay.
3. The joy of God comes close
where faith encounters fears,
where heights and depths of life
are found through smiles and tears.
The joy of God is here to stay,
embracing those who walk the Way;
the joy of God is here to stay.
4. The grace of God comes close
to those whose grace is spent,
when hearts are tired or sore
and hope is bruised and bent.
The grace of God is here to stay,
embracing those who walk the Way;
the grace of God is here to stay.
5. The Son of God comes close
where people praise his name,
where bread and wine are blest
and shared as when he came.
The Son of God is here to stay,
embracing those who walk the Way;
the Son of God is here to stay.
Charge and Benediction
We go now to carry on God Mission in the world,
To love and honor God in all we do, think and say,
To Love our neighbors as ourselves, and
To be and make faithful followers of Jesus the Christ.
“Grace and peace
be yours in abundance,
through the knowledge
of God and of Jesus our Lord.” (2 Pet. 1:2)
We bless each other using the words of the Spirit Song,
Have great week. Stay safe!
Prayer Partnership
Monday, July 27 We pray for those in the Order of Diaconal Ministries who are called to serve the church in areas of Christian education, pastoral care and social ministries.
Tuesday, July 28 We pray that our hearts may be open and generous so that we might make stewardship a way of life.
Wednesday, July 29 We pray for the ministries and mission of the Presbytery of Montreal.
Thursday, July 30 (World Day Against Trafficking in Persons) We pray for all victims and survivors of human trafficking. We give thanks for those who work diligently to end all forms of human trafficking.
Friday, July 31 We pray for the strength and commitment to protect the earth in all its beauty and wonder.
Saturday, August 1 We pray for the ministries and mission of the Presbytery of Western Han-Ca.