Order of Worship
Second Sunday of Pentecost
June 6, 2021
Organ Prelude
Call to Worship (adapted from the Iona Community)
In the beginning, God created the world:
made it and mothered it,
formed it and fathered it,
planted it and parented it.
God filled the earth with seeds and signs of fertility,
God filled us with love and with various abilities.
All that is green, blue, deep and growing,
God’s is the hand the created you.
All that crawls, flies, swims, walks or is motionless
God’s is the hand that created you.
All that speaks, sings, cries, laughs or keeps silence,
God’s is the hand that created you.
All that suffers, lacks, limps or longs for an end.
God’s is the hand that created you.
The world belongs to God;
the earth and all its people.
We belong to God,
so let us walk with God in worship.
Opening Prayer (Body Prayer Attributed to Julian of Norwich)
Await. Hold hands together, palms open and letting go.
Allow. Lift arms overhead, palms open to receive.
Accept. Place hands on heart, welcoming God’s Presence.
Attend. Extend hands outward to the world God loves.
Call to Confession
God calls to us: “where are you?”
God seeks us out, but we pull away.
We know we are not as we should be.
We know the world is not as it should be.
Let us remember the loving kindness of our Creator,
who longs to walk with us side-by-side.
In faith and penitence, let us pray together:
Prayer of Confession
You call to us, O God, but we hide ourselves away.
We gird ourselves with shame and dress down others with blame.
We are afraid to stand before you as we truly are:
broken and burdened,
tired and aimless,
self-absorbed and willfully ignorant,
careless and even cruel.
Though you made us and breathed your Spirit into us,
we are conflicted about our true identity as your good creations,
and in our inner conflict, we have torn your world apart.
Let your Holy Breeze fall upon your world.
Blow away the sin and shame that leaves us lifeless.
Breathe healing into your creation and hope into your people,
that we may again walk boldly beside you
in the garden of your love and mercy.
Amen.
Words of Affirmation
God calls to us. God seeks us out.
God leaves the many to go after each lost one.
We are not abandoned,
for in Christ, God has already reconciled us to Godself.
We have been made anew! Let us rejoice! Hallelujah!
In the name of the Creator, the Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Sharing of Scripture Genesis 3:8-15
They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and the woman hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?”
The man said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.”
God said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?”
The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.”
Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?”
The woman said, “The serpent tricked me, and I ate.”
The LORD God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you among all animals and among all wild creatures; upon your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”
Message in Music
Message “Let’s Talk about Sin” Rev. Elizabeth McCord
Preparation for Prayer and Holy Communion
Sacrament of Holy Communion (adapted from the Iona Community)
Invitation to the Table
He was always the guest.
In the homes of Peter and Jairus,
Martha and Mary, Joanna and Susanna,
he was always the guest.
At the meal tables of the wealthy
where he pleaded the case of the poor,
he was always the guest.
Upsetting polite company,
befriending isolated people,
welcoming the stranger,
he was always the guest.
But here, at this table, he is the host.
The Prayer of Great Thanksgiving
God be with you. And also with you.
Lift up your hearts. We lift them up to God.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is truly right to give God thanks and praise.
Gratitude, praise, heart lifted high,
Voice full …these you deserve.
For when we were nothing, you made us something.
When we had no name and no faith and no future,
you called us your children.
When we lost our way or turned away,
you did not abandon us.
When we came back to you,
your embrace welcomed us home.
And look,
You have prepared a table for us
offering not just bread and wine, but your very self
so that we may be filled, forgiven,
healed, blessed, and made new again.
You are worth our praise, and so in gratitude,
we join the voices of the faithful from all times and places:
Holy, Holy, Holy, God of Power and Might,
Heaven and earth are full of you glory
Hosannah in the Highest.
Blessed is the One who comes in the name of God.
Hosannah in the Highest.
For you were born for us, O Christ.
For us you healed,
you preached and taught and showed us the way.
For us, and for the truth of love and justice,
you were crucified.
And for us, by the mercy of God,
you were raised.
Great is the mystery of our faith:
Christ has died.
Christ is risen.
Christ will come again.
So as we do in our homes today,
Just as you did with your friends in an upper room thousands of years ago,
Send forth you Holy Spirit upon us and upon these gifts of bread and wine
that they may be for us your body, your life,
healing, forgiving, and making us whole,
for your earth and your people.
Celebrating Communion Together
Prayer after Communion
With gratitude, coming from the richness of your table,
we will not forget the rawness of the earth.
We cannot take bread and forget those who are hungry.
We cannot take wine and forget those who are thirsty.
We cannot proclaim peace and forget the world at war.
We cannot celebrate this family feast and forget our divisions.
We hear the earth and its weary people cry out for justice.
Put our prosperity, O God, at the service of the poor.
Put our fullness at the service of the empty.
Bring about your Peaceable Kin-dom
and commission us, your Church, as repairs of the breach. Amen.
Blessing
Friends, we have been beheld, befriended, and blessed by God.
We have been forgiven and made whole.
Now God calls to us from the world God made.
Let’s go out, embodying the good news of God’s grace and reconciliation.
We go forward now,
not with an easy peace,
not with an insignificant peace,
not with a half-hearted peace,
But with Christ’s peace.
The peace of Christ be with us
now and always. Amen.
Organ Postlude