Sermon Tone Analysis

WELCOME

CALL TO WORSHIP

‘Great are the works of the Lord,

studied by all who delight in them.

Full of honour and majesty is his work,

and…his praise endures for ever.’

Let us praise the Lord!

Hymn 66: Great is thy Faithfulness

PRAYERS

Lord, you are gracious and compassionate,

loving and just in all your ways.

We give you praise for all that you are.

Holy and awesome, wise and good –

our God forever.

We worship you today and always.

Amen

Faithful God, we carry within us forgetful hearts.

So often we neglect to reflect on your goodness to us,

but gratitude is a form of remembering

and remembering is a form of gratitude.

Where we have forgotten to remember,

where we have forsaken love for hate,

mercy for revenge, thoughtfulness for selfishness –

turn us around once more, O God.

Remind us of who you are

and who we are called to be.

We repent and turn away from the things

that reek of forgetting you,

the things that dishonour

the identity we have been given in you.

We ask your Spirit to lead us

into a new day, full of remembering grace.

In Jesus’ name.

Amen.

Assurance of forgiveness

The Holy Spirit has the power and the willingness

to clean our hearts and minds today,

ridding us from the things that hinder us.

Thank you, O God, for your Spirit’s cleansing presence,

and that we can be renewed, daily,

with assurance of your forgiveness and grace.

Amen.

THE LORD’S PRAYER

Hymn 556: Just as I am without one plea

READING

Janet

2 Kings 5: 1-3 and 7-15

5 Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram.

He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded, because through him the Lord had given victory to Aram.

He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy.[a]

2 Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. 3 She said to her mistress, “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria!

He would cure him of his leprosy.”

7 As soon as the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his robes and said, “Am I God? Can I kill and bring back to life?

Why does this fellow send someone to me to be cured of his leprosy?

See how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me!”

8 When Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his robes, he sent him this message: “Why have you torn your robes?

Have the man come to me and he will know that there is a prophet in Israel.” 9 So Naaman went with his horses and chariots and stopped at the door of Elisha’s house.

10 Elisha sent a messenger to say to him, “Go, wash yourself seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will be restored, and you will be cleansed.”

11 But Naaman went away angry and said, “I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy.

12 Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel?

Couldn’t I wash in them and be cleansed?”

So, he turned and went off in a rage.

13 Naaman’s servants went to him and said, “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it?

How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed’!”

14 So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.

15 Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God.

He stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel.

So please accept a gift from your servant.”

PAT

Hymn 566: Now thank we all our God

SERMON

Several years ago, a dog became stranded in the water at the bottom of a canal in Romania.

A passer-by saw the dog crying and trying to climb the wall to safety.

The passer-by scaled the wall, jumped into the water, and carried the dog to dry land.

The dog ran away and shook itself, but then it quickly returned, ran to its rescuer, and showered the man with lots of nuzzles and licks.

We can learn a lot from the dog.

This morning in our second reading Jesus is approached by 10 men with leprosy who ask for mercy.

Jesus sends them to the priests, and, on the way, they are healed.

In this week’s Old Testament reading, Naaman was almost too arrogant to allow God to heal him – he thought he was too important to do what Elisha asked of him.

As a commander, Naaman must have hidden his disease from all but his family and closest staff.

He was seen as a leader not an outcast – controlling his identity saved him.

Unlike Naaman the 10 lepers in the Gospel story, were deemed outcast, both they and Naaman had the same disease but Naaman’s situation in life allowed him to conceal his malady allowed him to maintain his position, he no doubt felt superior because of this status,

When we look at the two stories the question is, how would we react to the 10 leapers?

And would this be different in our reaction to Naaman? we need to ask ourselves do we allow others to break free of the labels we give them?

Jesus does not set labels and in this story of the 10 lepers, it is set apart from all the other healing stories of the New Testament, for of all those Jesus healed and raised from the dead, only this leper came back to say thank you.

He serves as an example for how we ought to live each day in gratitude for God’s redeeming love.

There are two things I want us to think about this morning gratitude and attitude.

First, let’s look more closely at our new testament story.

As we all know, leprosy was a dreaded disease in Jesus’ day, mostly because it was not really understood.

When they spoke to Jesus, he told the lepers to go show themselves to the priests.

He told them to go back to the temple.

That is a challenge to our Churches today.

Who has the Church cast out or ignored?

Who are those considered “unclean” to us?

They may be refugees, prisoners, ex-convicts and so on.

One Sunday morning at a rather large Church, as the congregation was going up the steps to the Church there sat a tramp, as people walked past, some ignored him some acknowledged him, someone actually dropped him a few coins.

As the service began, he came to the front of the Church and sat down, someone came quickly and told him to move to the back if he wanted to stay.

Then the minister stood and said they were to welcome the new minister who would give the sermon this morning and asked him to come forward.

The tramp walked to the front removed his old coat and hat, and revealed he was the new minister bet you can’t guess what his sermon was on.

Often first impressions can be misleading.