Liturgy 9-25-2016

This blog is a record of the call to worship, Scripture readings, and prayers from our Sunday liturgies.  If you are interested in writing something for the liturgy, please email jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Call to Worship

Holy God, we have come to learn to trust in Your protection

Teach us to find rest
under Your wings

We have come to learn to have faith in Your promises

Teach us that fields
from which we will not reap
are not a sunk cost

We have come to learn to live in Your provision

Teach us to open our hands
so that we may take hold of the life
that really is life.

Amen

Scripture

Amos 8:4-7

Hear this, you that trample on the needy,
and bring to ruin the poor of the land,
saying, "When will the new moon be over
so that we may sell grain;
and the sabbath,
so that we may offer wheat for sale?

We will make the ephah small and the shekel great,
and practice deceit with false balances,
buying the poor for silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals,
and selling the sweepings of the wheat."

The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob:
Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.

Luke 16:1-16

Jesus said to the disciples, "There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property. So he summoned him and said to him, `What is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.' Then the manager said to himself, `What will I do, now that my master is taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.'

So, summoning his master's debtors one by one, he asked the first, `How much do you owe my master?' He answered, `A hundred jugs of olive oil.' He said to him, `Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.' Then he asked another, `And how much do you owe?' He replied, `A hundred containers of wheat.' He said to him, `Take your bill and make it eighty.' And his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes.

"Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth."

The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they ridiculed him. So he said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of others; but God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God.

Prayer

This week's prayer was written by Val Fisk:

Lord God, you are Mother of our souls, Giver of our passions, Forgiver of our sins, Healer of our hurts. 

Teach us to be dangerously vulnerable. 

Forgive us for our refusal to show our brokenness to one another. Forgive us for our refusal to see the brokenness that lies behind the eyes of those across the table, across the aisle, and across the room from us. Forgive us for our refusal to acknowledge the brokenness that looks back at us from the mirror. Forgive us our failure to ask for help, and our failure to ask how we can be helping. 

Mother God, teach us to be dangerously vulnerable with you and with your people. Teach us to admit our failings, our pain, and our fears, to you and to those in this community whom you have placed as vessels of your loving care. Teach us to shout, “I’m not okay!” so that someone else can catch us as we fall. Teach us to catch the weight of brokenness tenderly, with the willingness to sooth one another’s tears the way a parent soothes the cries of their young child. 

Our souls are tired, Lord. Tired of pretending “No, really, I’m fine.” Tired of pretending that we have it all handled. Tired of the death, the destruction, and the insensitivity of the world surrounding us. Tired of hearing human lives compared to inanimate objects like poisoned candy, tired of seeing men murdered because of the color of their skin, tired of seeing children’s broken bodies in ambulances after bombs rip through their homes, tired of hearing women shout “I SAID NO” while others ask “But what were you wearing?” Teach us to lament for and with these people, breaking our hearts for each broken person, each made in your image. 

My soul is tired, Lord. My heart is broken. I feel wobbly. On days when I feel wobbly, teach me to trust you. Show me your presence through your people – these people of UBC. Teach me to be dangerously vulnerable with my hurt, my anger, my frustration, my brokenness, and my sin. Teach me to stand for you by standing alongside of your community, shoulder to shoulder, arm in arm, holding one another up with tender care. If I stand, let me stand on the promise that you will pull me through. If I can’t, let me fall on the grace that first brought me to you. And teach me to give that grace to each person I meet, each soul I encounter, and each broken heart that is entrusted to me by you. 

Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Teach us to embrace the beauty of brokenness today by embracing one another. 

Amen. 

Liturgy 9-18-2016

This blog is a record of the call to worship, Scripture readings, and prayers from our Sunday liturgies.  If you are interested in writing something for the liturgy, please email jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Call to Worship

We have gathered seeking a Healer,

One who might mend
the most broken parts of us
And restore our failing loves

So that we can fully love God and all people

And spread our healing beyond ourselves

Though it may take a lifetime,

We have come today
to learn to follow Christ
And to be formed in his way

Amen.

Scripture

Amos 8:4-7

Hear this, you that trample on the needy,
and bring to ruin the poor of the land,
saying, "When will the new moon be over
so that we may sell grain;
and the sabbath,
so that we may offer wheat for sale?

We will make the ephah small and the shekel great,
and practice deceit with false balances,
buying the poor for silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals,
and selling the sweepings of the wheat."

The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob:
Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.

Luke 16:1-16

Jesus said to the disciples, "There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property. So he summoned him and said to him, `What is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.' Then the manager said to himself, `What will I do, now that my master is taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.'

So, summoning his master's debtors one by one, he asked the first, `How much do you owe my master?' He answered, `A hundred jugs of olive oil.' He said to him, `Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.' Then he asked another, `And how much do you owe?' He replied, `A hundred containers of wheat.' He said to him, `Take your bill and make it eighty.' And his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes.

"Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth."

The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they ridiculed him. So he said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of others; but God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God.

“The law and the prophets were in effect until John came; since then the good news of the kingdom of God is proclaimed, and everyone tries to enter it by force.”

Prayer

This week's prayer was:

God, in the midst of uncertainty, teach us to cling to You.

In a world afflicted with various kinds of violence, teach us to mourn with those who mourn and to love our enemies.

When we find ourselves hemmed in by darkness, tune our eyes to see the beauty that You have woven into the world, and teach us to embrace it and lift it up.

And as the tides of life threaten to wear us thin, we ask that Your Spirit would renew us that we might learn to live fully.

Amen.

Setlist 9-18-2016

This was the eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost, and our songs around the theme of discipleship.  Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, you can find recordings from Sunday morning of a few of them, and below the recordings, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

Just A Closer Walk With Thee

Death in His Grave by John Mark McMillan

Fall Afresh by Jeremy Riddle

Heart With No Companion by Leonard Cohen

Pulse by Jameson McGregor

Doxology

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

Just A Closer Walk With Thee:  We sang this song to begin our time together by expressing a desire to be more fully formed in the way of Christ. Of particular note is the second stanza, which highlights that we are not left to carry the burden of our failures in following Christ alone.  

Death In His Grave:  This song rehearses the story of Jesus' defeat of death.  We sang it because the whole of the Christian faith hinges on the resurrection of Jesus.  Within this song, we celebrate the self-emptying of Jesus for our sake, showing us what love looks like, as well as the power of the resurrection to break the fundamental cycle of life and death.  This is the story that we are seeking to model as followers of Christ, constantly dying and rising in different ways, hoping to learn something about life and love.

Fall Afresh: We sang this song to acknowledge our dependence upon the renewal of the Spirit to grow as followers of Jesus.  Be it on a great or small scale, we all experience the cycle of renewal and stagnation in the life of faith--the cycle in which our brains seek out an easier status quo than we are called to--and we thus continually need the help of the Spirit to pull us forward.

Heart With No Companion: This song is a love letter from God to the afflicted that offers the shattered Love of God to those who feel like their lives lack meaning. It carries within it a promise that those who experience the existential anguish of not being able to be what they know they have been created to be have not been forgotten.  Furthermore, it is a message that who you are and what you do are two very different things (in the song, you have a captain with no ship, a mother with no children, a prima ballerina with no dancing, etc.).  Within the context of this week's songs, it is a word to the person who feels like they aren't "good" at being a follower of Christ, reminding them that they carry an identity that transcends their religious prowess.

Pulse: We sang this song to look over our shoulder at last week's songs.  This is what we said about Pulse then:  We sang this song to acknowledge the presence of the Spirit in every living thing, to petition God to reconnect our awareness to this interconnectivity, and to show us what this means for the way we love one another.

Doxology: We close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.

-JM

Setlist 9-11-2016

This was the seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost, and our songs were gathered around the theme of reconciliation.  Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, you can find recordings from Sunday morning of a few of them, and below the recordings, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

How Great Thou Art

Pulse by Jameson McGregor

There by Jameson McGregor

Hope by Jameson McGregor

There's a Wideness in God's Mercy by Jameson McGregor (adapted from F. Faber)

Doxology

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

How Great Thou Art: This song is essentially three pairs of observations about how God chooses to be God for us and a response of praise.  In it, we find language that helps us marvel at the scope of God's redemption project--from the inception of the cosmos to the moment where things are finally set right.  In singing this song, we rehearsed identifying greatness for what it is, and in this case that means seeking to draw near to one's enemies and repair broken relationships (that's one of the running themes throughout the story that God is telling).

Pulse: We sang this song to acknowledge the presence of the Spirit in every living thing, to petition God to reconnect our awareness to this interconnectivity, and to show us what this means for the way we love one another.

There: This song establishes God as standing apart from every source of anxiety or conflict that we encounter.  Though God is in fact with us in our affliction, God is anchored outside of it.  This means that we have a well-founded hope when we root our hope in God.  As Reconciler, God is drawing us into the place of security where God dwells.

Hope: We sang this song to affirm that God has set a light in the darkness that the darkness did not overcome.  We hang our hope on this light, carrying it into the darkness, knowing that the story that God is telling does not end in darkness, but light.  

There's A Wideness in God's Mercy: We sang this song to look over our shoulder at the songs from two weeks ago (I was on vacation last Sunday).  This is what we said about There's A Wideness in God's Mercy then: We sang this song to begin our time together by thinking about the wideness of God's mercy and the breadth of God's love.  More specifically, in terms of the theme that unites this week's songs, the fact that our deficiencies are precisely what place us in the path of God's love.  Despite our tendency to attempt to construct boundaries around the love of God, the love of God transcends our limitations and reaches those who deserve it least by even the most generous human standards.

Doxology: We close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.

-JM

Liturgy 9-4-2016

This blog is a record of the call to worship, Scripture readings, and prayers from our Sunday liturgies.  If you are interested in writing something for the liturgy, please email jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Call to Worship

Today we have gathered to worship the Creator

the One who is before all things
yet casts care on the smallest of creatures

hoping to better understand what it is to follow Christ

the One who shows us
that real power is made perfect
in weakness

seeking to be formed into Kingdom people

people who place others before ourselves
and find strength in vulnerability

Amen.

Scripture

Jeremiah 18:1-11

The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: "Come, go down to the potter's house, and there I will let you hear my words." So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was working at his wheel. The vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as seemed good to him.

Then the word of the Lord came to me: Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done? says the Lord. Just like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it.

And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it. Now, therefore, say to the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus says the Lord: Look, I am a potter shaping evil against you and devising a plan against you. Turn now, all of you from your evil way, and amend your ways and your doings.

Revelation 13

And I saw a beast rising out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads; and on its horns were ten diadems, and on its heads were blasphemous names.  And the beast that I saw was like a leopard, its feet were like a bear’s, and its mouth was like a lion’s mouth. And the dragon gave it his power and his throne and great authority.  

 One of its heads seemed to have received a death-blow, but its mortal wound had been healed. In amazement the whole earth followed the beast.  They worshiped the dragon, for he had given his authority to the beast, and they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast, and who can fight against it?”

The beast was given a mouth uttering haughty and blasphemous words, and it was allowed to exercise authority for forty-two months.  It opened its mouth to utter blasphemies against God, blaspheming his name and his dwelling, that is, those who dwell in heaven.  Also it was allowed to make war on the saints and to conquer them. It was given authority over every tribe and people and language and nation, and all the inhabitants of the earth will worship it, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb that was slaughtered.

Let anyone who has an ear listen:

If you are to be taken captive,
    into captivity you go;
if you kill with the sword,
    with the sword you must be killed.

Here is a call for the endurance and faith of the saints.

Then I saw another beast that rose out of the earth; it had two horns like a lamb and it spoke like a dragon.  It exercises all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and it makes the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose mortal wound had been healed.  

 It performs great signs, even making fire come down from heaven to earth in the sight of all; and by the signs that it is allowed to perform on behalf of the beast, it deceives the inhabitants of earth, telling them to make an image for the beast that had been wounded by the sword and yet lived; and it was allowed to give breath to the image of the beast so that the image of the beast could even speak and cause those who would not worship the image of the beast to be killed.  

 Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell who does not have the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name. This calls for wisdom: let anyone with understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a person. Its number is six hundred sixty-six.

Prayer

This week's prayer was written by Emily Mosher:

Creator God,

Some of us looked around at your world this morning and felt excitement at its beauty and possibility.

Others of us woke up feeling the pain of its brokenness and wondering, "How much longer?"

Some of us walked into this space eager to speak and serve and praise.

Others came desperately needing just a space to sit in silence and catch a glimpse of Your grace. 

Whatever brought us, we have all come longing to find something more than a building, expecting to find your presence in a unique way. 

Thank you for being the God who is always here, the One who both rejoices and mourns with us. 

I pray you will continue shaping us into a people where all are welcome and where all are needed. 

A people who have the courage to be vulnerable, to share our pain, to do the uncomfortable task of asking for help. 

A people who have the compassion to listen quietly to the gift of another person's story, to be present in times of heartache, and to act when help when needed. 

Please whisper hope into all of our hearts this mornings and form us into a community that makes your love known to one another and throughout the world. 

Amen.