Proper 11 - Worship with Rejoicing
Notes
Transcript
Call to Worship
Call to Worship
Gathering for Worship
Called to Worship
The Might of the Word
Prayers of the People
Benediction
Sent out to live
Worship
Worship
Worth-ship
Some shops are a bit lazy with their price tags.
Sometimes I’ll spot something I like - or need - and I won’t find the price on it.
Then - in my head - I’ll set a price for it - say R50 - and then head off to find one of those little price scanners. Hoping that the price will be right.
But then the price scanner tells me R200 - and I quietly put it in the little basket with all the other bits and pieces that people have thought too expensive to worry about.
For someone else a pair of undies might have been worth R150 - but to me they were nice - but not R150 nice…
I have standards.
Value
Value
Worship is about setting the right values on the right things.
Getting your priorities in order.
We think about something Jesus said:
33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
Getting our priorities straight.
Seeking God’s kingdom and righteousness first.
Living in a world where cash isn’t King - God is. And righteousness with God is our most important priority.
In each our services we incorporate a call to worship - maybe a scripture, an idea - a verse - that calls us to draw closer to God.
Why?
Because we need to be reminded that God is calling us to worship him.
Presence
Presence
But worship is not just an adjustment of our priorities. A call to adjust the values we have attached to the things in our lives.
Worship is a reminder that God calls us into communion with him.
Our God is a God of relationship.
We read from 2 Samuel 7 - we hear David’s thoughts about what God wants from him - the idea of building a temple. At first Nathan says go ahead and do it - but then the Lord gives Nathan a word:
5 Go and tell my servant David: Thus says the Lord: Are you the one to build me a house to live in?
6 I have not lived in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day, but I have been moving about in a tent and a tabernacle.
7 Wherever I have moved about among all the people of Israel, did I ever speak a word with any of the tribal leaders of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, saying, “Why have you not built me a house of cedar?”
Is God’s presence a ‘place’.
Is this church building a place where God is present?
Or maybe its a more holy looking building - like St George’s Cathedral standing so tall.
We have a desire in our hearts to frame a place where God is.
A symbolic space - a place where we can go and meet with God.
It is not a bad impulse. It is a helpful impulse.
I have my spot on the stoep that is a holy place for me - I sit there while the birds wake up and start singing. I love it when it is cold and raining.
Its my little Holy place.
With my porridge and my coffee before the rest of the family wake up.
Space / place - helps us.
But God is just as much out by the couch on the stoep as God is in the kitchen.
Its just - out by the couch my heart is more opened to God and I become more aware.
In order to take God into the kitchen with me where I get breakfast ready, make school lunch and unpack the dishes from last night.
Presence
Presence
So God says to David - don’t build the temple - lets leave that to Solomon.
But God says something so much more significant to us as Christians reading from this side of the Old Testament.
At the time in 2 Samuel 7:11-14 Nathan is speaking to David and prophesying about Solomon who will come after him:
12 When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come forth from your body, and I will establish his kingdom.
13 He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.
16 Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me; your throne shall be established forever.
Although these words will apply to Solomon we know that Solomon will not stand forever. Under Solomon’s children God’s kingdom will be divided and will fall.
But Jesus will fulfil God’s promise.
Come
Come
As much as David wants to build God a ‘house’ of cedar and of stone - God will build a house of flesh and Spirit through Jesus’ his son.
And so we hear Jesus’ call to worship - from Mark 6:31
31 Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”
That’s not the call to worship I was expecting.
I was expecting:
Come
Clap your hands
Sing praise.
Join with the heavens and earth.
Hear the waves as they sing their praise.
Then Jesus just said:
“Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”
This takes place in the context of Jesus’ ministry.
Its been a rough chapter.
Chapter 6 begins with Jesus and his disciples getting thrown out of his home town - ‘the took offence at him.’ Says Mk 6:3.
He then sends out the 12 to do ministry from village to village - carrying nothing but a stick - no bread, no bag, no money… Mk 6:13 says that “They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them.”
Emotional roller coaster -
1 Rejected at Nazareth
2 Healings and exorcisms
3 Herod’s threats
So they need a break.
Then Jesus just said:
“Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”
Every Sunday - every day - every hour, every minute, every second - you are being called to worship.
1 - Set your values ‘worthship’
2 - Be present with God.
And God’s call to us is not what we always think. Often God’s call to us is a solid kick in the backside.
But just as often - God’s call to us is ‘come get some rest.’
Rest & Chaos
Rest & Chaos
But the rest is accompanied by some chaos.
Its a strange selection of verses the lectionary gives us today - just Mark 6:30-33 and then Mark 6:53-56 - leaving out a whole lot of things that happened. Feeding 5,000; Jesus walking on water and then arriving at a place called Gennesaret.
On one hand in these scriptures -
We pay attention to God’s call to us:
Come and get some rest.
But we also pay attention to those who have recognised his voice.
And realise that maybe we aren’t as eager to hear his voice as we should be.
We have learnt to take God’s call to his presence for granted.
We yawn and get out of bed and dutifully plod along to church - excited to see our friends maybe. Feeling a bit Meh about the new songs or maybe its the old hymns we don’t like.
Yay Gus is preaching or maybe - Yay - Gus is in Atlantis and we have an interesting visitor.
But how many of us are like these early witnesses of Jesus who hear his call…
33 Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them.
Or Mark 6:54-55
Mark 6:54–55 (NRSV)
54 When they got out of the boat, people at once recognized him, 55 and rushed about that whole region and began to bring the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was.
My first response whenever I read this passage is to think agh these poor disciples - poor Jesus - when will they ever get a break.
Then I realise…
Poor me.
I haven’t realised the privilege of God’s presence offered to us. So generously.
I haven’t realised the privilege of meeting Jesus here in his body - with his people -
Jesus calls me to come and rest with him - I fail to realise that there is a world of need and struggle and pain just longing to hear the same voice.
Come to me and rest.
56 And wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.
Today we are being called to worship.
Call to Worship
Call to Worship
Gathering for Worship, Called to Worship, The Might of the Word, Prayers of the People, Benediction, Sent out to live.
And every Sunday as we gather we are called to worship - with a scripture, a song, a prayer - something that points us to Jesus who says:
“Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”
Our Sunday discipline - 9am or 11am on a Sunday should set the tone for the rest of the week.
Sometimes life happens and we rock up late.
Sometimes life happens and we miss the service.
And I know that this little building on Janssens Road isn’t the only place where you might find Jesus.
But hear the call like those people at Jesus’ time heard the call…
Picking up those who were sick - carrying them on mats - bringing them to Jesus - rushing on foot - by themselves to hear what he had to say. To see what he would do.
All because
We’re called to worship.
Call to Worship
Call to Worship
Worship is not an hour on Sunday.
Its not a praise and worship song in the car.
Its not a temple built of wood and cedar.
All those things help.
Those are a part of it.
It is responding to God’s call.
In our life.
The call to worship.
To set the values right - and to hear Jesus call you to be with him.
“Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.” (Mark 6:31)
Gathering for Worship, Called to Worship, The Might of the Word, Prayers of the People, Benediction, Sent out to live.
