Trinity-St. Andrew’s United Church
Order of Worship
September 08, 2024 – 16th after Pentecost
Prelude
Words of welcome, announcements
Lighting the Christ Candle
We light this candle as a sign of God’s Spirit that is still at work in the world. May its light brighten our spirits, and may the light of God shine through us to brighten the world.
Call To worship
Come and worship, all you who love and serve the Lord. God welcomes in the outsiders and insiders, the old-timers and new-comers, the young, old and the in-between. God welcomes in those who have faith and those who are still searching for something to believe in. So come as you are, for this is God’s house. This is a house of prayer for all people. To each of you God says ‘Welcome home.”
Hymn “Lord you are” “Refiner’s Fire”
Lord, You are more precious than silver
Lord, You are more costly than gold
Lord, You are more beautiful than diamonds
And nothing I desire compares with You (2x)
Purify my heart, let me be as gold
And precious silver
Purify my heart, let me be as gold
Pure gold
Refiner’s fire, my heart’s one desire
Is to be holy
Set apart for you Lord
I choose to be holy
Set apart for You my Master
Ready to do Your will
Purify my heart, cleanse me from within
And make me holy
Purify my heart, cleanse me from my sin
Deep within
Refiner’s fire, my heart’s one desire
Is to be holy
Set apart for you Lord
I choose to be holy
Set apart for You my Master
Ready to do Your will
Prayer of Approach
Holy God, we gather here today to we call upon your name. We know that your wisdom is more precious than gold. You hate wickedness and the neglect of your people. You call us to righteousness, to reach out to others with justice and mercy. You teach us right from wrong, that we may truly follow the way of Jesus. Gracious God, we come before you today knowing that we often fall short of your call to love one another. We allow ourselves to be blinded by wealth and power. We ignore those around us who suffer injustice, poverty, and rejection. We tune out the cries of the poor and those on the edges of our communities. Help us to see your great generosity, hear your word of mercy, and trust your great love for all who need your redemptive grace. Strengthen us to reach out in service to those who are in need. Amen.
Scripture Reader: Peter Raaphorst
First Scripture: Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23
Gospel Reading: Mark 7:24-37
Hymn There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy VU 271
- There’s a wideness in God’s mercy
like the wideness of the sea;
there’s a kindness in God’s justice
which is more than liberty.
- There is no place where earth’s sorrows
are more felt than up in heaven;
there is no place where earth’s failings
have such gracious judgement given.
- There is plentiful redemption
in the blood that Christ has shed;
there is joy for all the members
in the sorrows of the Head.
- Troubled souls, why will you scatter
like a crowd of frightened sheep?
foolish hearts, why will you wander
from a love so true and deep?
- For the love of God is broader
than the measures of the mind,
and the heart of the Eternal
is most wonderfully kind.
Sermon “Seeking Wisdom”
Special Music
The offering
We give thanks for everyone who continues to support TSA and our many ministries. Your gifts of support and encouragement mean a lot to us. You can get more information about making a donation by contacting the church office or by visiting our website. For all the gifts you share, for all the people you bless by your serving and giving as a disciple of Jesus, we give thanks.
Offering Song Know That God is Good MV 104
Know that God is good, (3x)
God is good, God is good.
Offering Prayer
All that we do is in your holy name, O God. Even as we share the riches of our labours, may we continue to honour your name in all that we do. Bless these gifts given freely, that your justice and mercy may prevail in a weak and weary world. Amen.
Hymn For the Healing of the Nations VU 678
- For the healing of the nations,
God, we pray with one accord;
For a just and equal sharing
Of the things that earth affords.
To a life of love in action
Help us rise and pledge our word.
- Lead us forward into freedom,
From despair your world release;
That, redeemed from war and hatred,
All may come and go in peace.
Show us through care and goodness
Fear will due and hope increase.
- All that kills abundant living,
Let it from the earth be banned;
Pride of status, race or schooling,
Dogmas that obscure your plan.
In our common quest for justice
May we hallow life’s brief span.
- You, Creator-God, have written
our great name on humankind;
for our growing in your likeness
bring the life of Christ of mind;
that, by our response and service,
earth its destiny may find.
Pastoral Prayer, The Lord’s Prayer
Hymn Great Is Thy Faithfulness VU 288
- Great is thy faithfulness, God our Creator;
there is no shadow of turning with thee;
thou changest not, thy compassions, they fail not;
as thou has been thou forever wilt be.
Refrain: Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
All I have needed thy hand hath provided –
great is thy faithfulness, ever to me!
- Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,
sun, moon, and stars in their courses above
join with all nature in manifold witness
to thy great faithfulness, mercy, and love. Refrain
- Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth,
thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide,
strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow –
wondrous the portion thy blessings provide. Refrain
Benediction
We go into this new week seeking to love one another. So be rich in faith and serve one another in a spirit of joy and humility. May the power of God our Creator, Christ our Salvation, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us now and forever. Go now in peace. Amen.
Choral Amen Wherever You May Go MV 216
Refrain: Wherever you may go, I will follow,
and your people shall be my people too.
Wherever you may go, I will follow,
for I would be faithful, loyal and true.
- Say the word and I will stay,
I will never go away,
we will travel side by side
and God’s love will be our guide. Refrain
- From beginning to the end
I will always be your friend,
when you need me, I’ll be there,
you can trust my faithful care. Refrain
Postlude
Seeking Wisdom. Text: Mark 7:24-37
By Rev. James Murray at Trinity-St. Andrew’s United Church, Renfrew. September 8, 2024
Charles Dickens begins his Tale of Two Cities with the famous line “They were the best of times, they were the worst of times.” His novel tells the tale of lives caught up in a terrible time of conflict. It tells of the choices people make when everything is on the line. They are words that have resonated across the years, because they can just as easily apply to our world here today. Sometimes I wonder why we keep making the best of all possible worlds into the worst of all possible worlds. We are so caught up in our present moment we often forget the power the choices we make each day can make a huge difference. We can change things for the better. We can just as easily change things for the worse. In our world today we live in a time of great freedoms. We also live in a time of great fear. We are not the first to live in such difficult times. We will not be the last to live in such wonderful times. What we need is the wisdom to make the right choices.
Those words of Charles Dickens can just as easily apply to the world that Jesus lived in, since it too was a time of great turmoil. His nation had been conquered by Alexander the Great over a century before. Now the Romans ruled the land. What had once been the nation of Israel was nothing more than a part of the province of Syria. The Hebrew language had almost disappeared. Their traditional culture was being suppressed. Yet life was good. The economy was prospering like never before. The Silk Road trade routes were making lots of people rich. The Romans built good roads. There was peace, but it came at the end of a Roman sword. The burning issue of the day for the people of Israel was how to maintain their cultural identity in the face of the overwhelming power of Roman culture. Many chose to look inwards, defining themselves by setting themselves apart from society. Others chose to look outwards to find new ways of defining who they were. Everyone was struggling to find the wisdom needed to live in such challenging times.
We know that Jesus was the product of those challenging times. We know he was from Galilee, but as an adult he chose to live in the Decapolis, which was a Roman district that was just over the border in Jordan. On this occasion, we find Jesus travelling in the north country. He is visiting people in Tyre, which is part of Lebanon. In Tyre he is met by a Greek woman, whose daughter is sick. She enters the house where he is having dinner. She bows down, grasping his feet. This woman has heard of Jesus. She asks him to please heal her sick daughter. There are so many things wrong with this picture. In those days women didn’t go around talking to men in public. It should have been the woman’s husband or father who spoke to Jesus for her. This is scandalous behaviour. Plus polite Jews didn’t touch foreigners as it made them unclean. As if her audacity wasn’t enough, she doesn’t even offer Jesus any money to heal her daughter, which would have been the correct thing to do. So Jesus is doing the right thing when he refuses her request. Nevertheless, this woman persists. She publicly challenges what he has said. She has no shame and no modesty. She does, however have a deep and unsinkable belief in God. She knows God’s blessings are for everyone, and not just for some. She is both gutsy and wise, because she knows that the God of Israel is supposed to bless people of every nation. This woman is among the first foreigners to recognize what Jesus represents. Because she is willing to risk everything, she finds healing for her daughter. Because she is willing to risk everything, she opens the door of faith for us here today. Salvation doesn’t just come because you are born into the right family. Salvation comes because we have faith in God.
If we don’t get this message the first time, the Bible repeats the message over and over again. The Gospel of Mark says he leaves this place to head south to his home to the Decapolis. Instead he travels further north to Sidon, which is halfway to Beirut. In Sidon Jesus meets an Arab man who is deaf. Back then deafness was believed to be a curse.
This man can’t speak clearly, so people assume he is possessed by some kind of demon. This man is treated like a sinner. He is an outcast. And Jesus heals him. So the Bible has shown us that Jesus is not afraid to go into a foreign country. He is a devout Jew who is willing to heal an Arab. He is a strong man who has compassion for a vulnerable woman. He heals the sick. He casts out their demons. He restores them to their rightful place in their society. He welcomes these strangers into the household of God. And he can do the same for us, if we want him to.
To use the language of the Bible, we can say that Jesus can help us to cast out the demons and evil spirits that plague our world today. To use more modern language, we can say that Jesus can help us to break down the barriers of hatred that threaten to tear our society apart. He can help us to build bridges of understanding across huge social divides. He shows us how to invite new people who are different from us into the household of God, so we can become a community for each other. He shows us how we can all experience the love of God, the love which can cast out all fear.
It takes a certain kind of wisdom to try to make this kind of healing and reconciliation possible. We live in a world full of information and misinformation. Wisdom helps us to know the difference between hay and straw. This is why wisdom is the persistent pursuit of the deeper understanding. It comes from God, and it comes from experience. Wisdom is different from morality. Morality is a set of rules given to us by society. Wisdom is guided by compassion, a spirit of love which seeks the best for all things. And love is a little oblivious to morals. Wisdom helps us to see beyond this present moment we are caught up in. It sees the big picture through God’s eyes. Wisdom grows out of our experience, and it is something which is meant to be shared. Wisdom is a global phenomenon, for it contains the sage advice from the ages which teaches us how we can peacefully live together.
If wisdom is not listened to, there are consequences. Without wisdom, unexpected events can strike us like a summer storm. Calamity can blow through town like a tornado. With wisdom to guide us we can survive any disaster. As people of faith we can draw wisdom from our scriptures which tell us that you can’t fight fire with fire. We can only ‘overcome evil with good.’ (Romans 12:21) Instead of always seeking solve our conflicts with violence and war, we can follow the sage advice which says ‘those who live by the sword shall die by the sword.’ (Matthew 26:52) When things get hot and heavy we need to trust the wisdom of Jesus’ advice to ‘love your enemies.’ (Matthew 5:44). Last week I shared with you the very timely wisdom of Saint James. James reminds us we should be ‘quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger.’. Such advice really turns down the heat in any difficult situation, doesn’t it?
We can trust this great storehouse of wisdom, because God is still at work in this world. Jesus, as the child of wisdom, reminds us that we cannot forget the importance of the spirit in all we do. Jesus says “What good is it for you to gain the whole world, if it comes at the cost of your soul?”
Even though our government and our economy are working according to secular principles, this does not stop our God from being an active force in this world. God is always seeking our healing when we are ill. God is always seeking our liberation when we are in bondage. God is always seeking our justice when we are being treated unfairly. God works to redeem every moment of our lives. Jesus came into this world as God’s anointed one, to make this persistent grace a visible, tangible reality for us all. And that is a wisdom we can trust to guide us all of our days.
