Welcome and Announcements
Thanks for joining us for worship today.
Opening Prayer
God of God and Endurance, God of Comfort and Strength,
We draw near to you because you first came to us in Christ.
We thank you that you gather us together
From the many places we live,
reaching across human boundaries that often divide us from each other.
We thank for the strength you have given us
to face the challenges of the past week.
We thank your you for the comfort we have received from you
and have passed on to others in their time of need.
We thank you for our calling to unite our voices in praise to you
this day and every day that people might join us in this great endeavor.
God who just and merciful,
We confess and acknowledge those times this past week,
When we have hoarded your gifts of strength and comfort
And have not shared with them with others.
Forgive us when we did not follow the example of Christ
Who looked not to his own interests,
always to interests and well-being of others.
Forgive our judgments of others without dealing with our own failings and sins.
Lord in your mercy hear our silent confesses. . .
Gracious God, assure our spirits with Paul’s words to the Romans… (Rom 3:23-24 (CEV)
All of us have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory.
But God treats us much better than we deserve,
and because of Christ Jesus, he freely accepts us
and sets us free from our sins.
Accept the worship we offer you gratefully in Christ’s name. Amen.
Prayer for Understanding
Loving God,
love through us, as we worship your holy name.
Love through us, as we listen for your holy word.
Love through us, as we live your teachings
and offer your love to our world.
In your majestic name, we pray. Amen.
Scripture
Romans 15:1-6 A reminder for the strong to support the struggling members of the congregation.
Sermon: Unified through Encouragement
The church has never been immune from controversy. The first major controversy to hit the church focused on whether or not to include Gentiles or individuals outside of the Jewish faith into the life, leadership, and witness of the church.
When Paul writes to the church at Rome, controversies arise over whether or not Christians can eat meat offered to the Romans gods and which days of the week are more significant than others. While these controversies seem unusual or tame for us today, consider controversies within the church around mask wearing and following provincial and local safety orders for public worship. Christians are equally passionate and divided around these issues as Christians in Paul’s day were about going to or refraining from having a meal at the local Roman Temple.
The teachings of Paul around how we support one another when we disagree around current issues is one I want to explore with you today.
We’ve explored over the past number of weeks our calling as Christians too encourage one another out of love for one another. As good neighbors we are to come alongside others and offer them the support, help, comfort, and motivation that we have received from God’s gracious hands.
Paul In Romans 14:1, urges us to accept the weaker or struggling believers without quarreling over debatable matters. Paul also commands us not to judge or despise others for how they exercise of their faith, be it weak or strong (14:3, 13). He also gives commands not to destroy or tear others down based on what they do or do not do (14:17, 20). God has accepted them, which is the only criterion for us to accept them as well (14:3).
Paul lays out lofty goals for how we are to come alongside to encourage and love another in response to God’s mercy and grace in this time too.
Paul then begins chapter 15 with a rather shocking statement that goes against goes against our society’s current trend to focus on rights over responsibilities. Paul says that that we who are strong in our faith have an obligation to support those who are struggling in their faith.
Paul never defines or identifies who the stronger Christians are and who are the weaker Christians. He leaves the definition of who is strong and who is weak vague to help us see that we all fall into either category.
An important word for me is that word “obligation.” This carries with it the idea that the strong OWE it to the struggling to support them and to move beyond what is convenient for them. Paul has stated earlier in Rom 13:8,
“Owe no one anything, except to love one another;”
Think for a moment someone who helped you out with a gift or gifts that you could never fully repay. Have you ever had someone tell you after they’ve given you a gift to pay it forward to the next person in need?
Paul was on the receiving ends many times of others who celebrated God’s gifts to them forward to him. Paul has reminded us in Romans in great detail how much mercy and grace God has shown to us in Christ. We celebrate the gifts of God forward when we do what is in the best interests of our neighbor.
My wife and I spent part of our Christmas Eve this year at the Tom Baker Cancer clinic. She was having one of her radiation treatments. And while we were waiting for her turn we heard many of radiation technicians talk about how they were purposefully choosing to spend their 4 day Christmas break alone and not with their families. It wasn’t because they couldn’t under the current COVID-19 rules and restrictions, but they do so for those who were at risk. It was a huge sacrifice to give us “in person” time with family and friends for others.
I thought to myself, how incredibly Christ-like were their choices. These strong caring individuals were not insisting upon their personal rights, not insisting on what was pleasing them, not insisting on what was convenient for them to do, but suspending what they wanted for the good of others. I was deeply humbled and moved by their choices as I hope you are.
I know that obligations can sometimes be a burden especially when we feel like we have to do them. We are obligated to do many things at home in our marriages, as parents, at work, as citizens of the places where we live. Many of these responsibilities are difficult to do but that doesn’t stop us from doing them because we see the greater good and what they accomplished and so we do them.
In verse 3, “Paul says for Christ did not please himself, but as it is written ‘the reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me.’”
This simple quote from the Psalm 69, a Psalm of David, which is a prayer for deliverance from persecution. It invokes for a picture of what Christ endured for us in his life, suffering and death. The one who came alongside of us in our time of need, was met with opposition, insults of the cruelest kind, belittled by those who he came to save. Jesus does not do what was personally pleasing or convenient for himself, but choose to put the needs of others before himself.
When we reflect upon what Christ did for us, how can we not be moved and motivated to celebrate God’s gift of encouragement to us by supporting those who we know who are struggling.
Paul also reminds us that the Scriptures were written to help every generations to experience God’s strength in whatever circumstances they faced and words that keep them moving forward at any given moment.
In February of last year, my wife and I were in California visiting my younger sister and her husband. My youngest sister has become the keeper of family photos and documents. One night she brought out my Grandpa’ Kuhn’s diaries from his military service in World War 1. These diaries were ones he had written when he was on assignment looking after President Wilson’s luggage on his trip to Paris at the end of the war. It was interesting and a joy to read his observations of Paris, of the conditions he served under, of his struggles and boredom of his work, and of the deep love he had for my grandmother.
As we read his diaries, he often mentioned passages from the Bible he had read that had helped that particular day. It was another wonderful glimpse into a man who I love dearly, whose encouragement led me to become minister.
How amazing it is that my grandfather found strength and support from Scriptures just as Paul did when we wrote to the church at Rome to do the same thing. The Scriptures are gift and source of strength to us to face the challenges we have today as in generations past.
What parts of the Scripture have you leaned on over the course of the past year that helped you? What parts are currently helping you to endure patiently? Which parts are encouraging you to reach out to help others? What parts are helping you remain hopeful in the face of the challenges where you live? I would invite you if you wish, to share these with me by way of emails to stpaulsbanff@telus.net
Our passage ends with a prayer for the church at Rome. God is identified as first, the source of patient endurance, who enables us to endure hardship, with the strength God offers. And secondly as the God who encourages us to work together to come along side each other to support each other as Christ did with us.
When I read this prayer, I picture a choir of many voices, of diverse backgrounds, ages, genders, and ethnicity. I picture a choir with voices some strong, some struggling, some experienced, some new, blending their voices together to sing a song that praises God. I hear a song that lifts the spirits of all who bend their ear into hear it and who embrace the words of encouragement being sung.
I see the choir director with his nail pierced hands conducting the huge choir one moment and reaching to invite others to join it the next.
It is a picture of the church that is needed in our day as much at it was in in Paul’s.
The words of Paul are a much needed reminder to us to stay the course of supporting and coming along side others in their times of need. I know that we all are struggling with Covid-19 fatigue. I know we all we struggle emotionally, physically, and spiritually with the challenges this time presents.
But thankfully, the God of Endurance and Encouragement provides us with moments when we strong so that we come along side those who are not to build others up.
Bless you for all your unselfish words and actions of encouragement that have supported others this week.
May we our lives continue to glorify God as we encourage others.
AMEN.
Closing Prayer
Holy God, Lord of heaven and earth,
in you we live and move and have our being.
Your energy fills the cosmos and enlivens every cell of our bodies.
You are around us, within us and beyond us.
Thank you for the simple pleasures of each day,
and for the strength to meet the challenges that arise.
When it feels like we have come to the end of our own resources,
replenish us with the energy of your Spirit
so that we know you are there for us and with us.
In these strange times of isolation and distancing,
we are grateful for prayer in its many forms,
for the intimate ways we can find communion with you:
in word and in silence, in music and movement,
in the Spirit’s breath within us.
We pray for all who struggling to make ends meet.
That you would help us to provide for those who we can assist
With our time, talent, and treasure.
We pray for all who need you healing touch upon
Their minds, bodies, and spirits
We name the people we are concerned about in silence. . . .
Bring healing and comfort to them through our medical health professionals
And Through our efforts to pass on the comfort, strength, and encouragement
We have received from you.
Keep us ever dependent upon you and ever aware of those who you want us to help.
We offer our prayers today and throughout the week in the powerful name of Jesus.
Amen.
Benediction (2 Thess. 2:16)
Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself
and God our Father,
who loved us and through grace
has given us eternal comfort and good hope,
comfort your hearts
and strengthen them
in every good work and word.
Have great week. Stay safe!
Be a blessing to someone this week!
Prayer Partnership
Sunday, January 31 We celebrate in prayer that vulnerable families in Nicaragua are being empowered through PWS&D-supported programs to help with their babies’ growth, and the overall health of their families.
Monday, February 1 We pray that God nurtures and grows our practice of hospitality so that we might offer our time to those in need of friendship and compassion more easily and often.
Tuesday, February 2 We give thanks and pray for all frontline workers who support and serve under difficult circumstances.
Wednesday, February 3 We pray for the Near East School of Theology (NEST) in Beirut, Lebanon, and for Dr. George Sabra, President of NEST, as the school continues its recovery efforts after the explosion in Beirut’s port in August.
Thursday, February 4 We pray for church secretaries and custodians and all those who support the worship and mission of the church in ways that are too often overlooked.
Friday, February 5 We pray for all those affected by COVID-19, including international partners of Presbyterian World Service & Development who continue to respond.
Saturday, February 6 We give thanks for the people in our lives who have mentored and nurtured us in Christian faith and discipline.