Worship at Home
Worship for the week beginning 1st August 2021
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01604 266000.
Sunday 1st August
Local preacher Mary Winchcombe has prepared this week’s message
This short act of worship is for use from home. Please use this service whenever you like during the week.
Pause to settle yourself in God’s presence, knowing that other people are sharing in worship with you.
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© ROOTS for Churches Ltd www.rootsontheweb.com. Reproduced with permission.
Call to Worship:
As we prepare to hear the words of Scripture, Lord. We pray that you would draw us into a deeper understanding of all that John’s Gospel is offering us.
Grant us clarity of thought, openness of heart and eagerness of Spirit to receive all it has to say to us and share it with others too.
Amen
Hymn: Come People of the Risen King
Come, people of the Risen King,
who delight to bring Him praise;
Come all and tune your hearts to sing
to the Morning Star of grace.
From the shifting shadows of the earth,
we will lift our eyes to Him,
where steady arms of mercy reach to gather children in.
Rejoice, Rejoice!
Let every tongue rejoice!
One heart, one voice;
O Church of Christ, rejoice!
Come, those whose joy is morning sun,
and those weeping through the night;
Come, those who tell of battles won,
and those struggling in the fight.
For His perfect love will never change,
and His mercies never cease,
But follow us through all our days,
with the certain hope of peace.
Refrain
Come, young and old from every land,
men and women of the faith;
Come, those with full or empty hands,
find the riches of His grace.
Over all the world, His people sing,
shore to shore we hear them call
The Truth that cries through every age:
“Our God is all in all”!
Refrain
Keith & Kristyn Getty & Stuart Townend
Prayer of Adoration:
Loving God
whose powers proclaimed in the glory of the skies above us and in the wonders of the world around us;
Draw near to us in this act of worship; open our eyes to see your beauty, and our ears to hear your words of wisdom;
Open our minds to understand the truth that sets us free and our hearts to embrace the love which passes all understanding through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen
Hymn: I Am the Bread of Life
I am the Bread of life,
You who come to me shall not hunger,
You who believe in me shall not thirst.
No one can come to me
unless the Father draw them.
And I will raise you up,
and I will raise you up,
and I will raise you up on the last day.
The bread that I will give
is my flesh for the life of the world,
and if you eat of this bread,
You shall live for ever,
You shall live for ever.
Refrain
I am the Resurrection,
I am the Life,
If you believe in me
Even though you die,
You shall live for ever.
Refrain
Suzanne Toolan
Bible Readings
4 Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions.
10 While Aaron was speaking to the whole Israelite community, they looked towards the desert, and there was the glory of the Lord appearing in the cloud.
11 The Lord said to Moses, 12 ‘I have heard the grumbling of the Israelites. Tell them, “At twilight you will eat meat, and in the morning you will be filled with bread. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God.”’
13 That evening quail came and covered the camp, and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. 14 When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor. 15 When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, ‘What is it?’ For they did not know what it was.
Moses said to them, ‘It is the bread the Lord has given you to eat.
Holy Bible, New International Version® Anglicized, NIV® Copyright © 1979, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
John 6:24-35
24 So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went across to Capernaum to look for him. 25 They found him on the other side of the lake and asked, “Rabbi, when did you get here?”
26 Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, you want to be with me because I fed you, not because you understood the miraculous signs. 27 But don’t be so concerned about perishable things like food. Spend your energy seeking the eternal life that the Son of Man can give you. For God the Father has given me the seal of his approval.”
28 They replied, “We want to perform God’s works, too. What should we do?”
29 Jesus told them, “This is the only work God wants from you: Believe in the one he has sent.”
30 They answered, “Show us a miraculous sign if you want us to believe in you. What can you do? 31 After all, our ancestors ate manna while they journeyed through the wilderness! The Scriptures say, ‘Moses gave them bread from heaven to eat.’
32 Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, Moses didn’t give you bread from heaven. My Father did. And now he offers you the true bread from heaven. 33 The true bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
34 “Sir,” they said, “give us that bread every day.”
35 Jesus replied, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again. Whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.
Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Time to Reflect…
Both of these readings involve food, expectation, provision and instruction.
At the beginning of John 6 Jesus had performed the miracle of the feeding of the 5000.
Some of the crowd have followed him and they want more miracles; they have been reminded of their ancestors in the desert and the provision of meat and manna. Jesus is quite sharp with them, pointing out that it was God, not Moses who provided the food in the desert, and that being God’s people is not about running after miracles that will make daily life a bit easier. It’s not about fulfilling a set of requirements in order to gain miracles as a reward.
It is about coming to Jesus and having faith in him. This is God’s final covenant and his gift is much bigger than a free meal it is the gift of Jesus himself.
Earthly bread has a sell by date, its lifespan is limited; the spiritual bread that Jesus offers is never ending – it exists in this world and the next- it can be received again and again – all we have to do is ask, believe and receive it.
But when we take the decision to believe in Jesus, to invite him into our life, to receive this gift of the bread of life, there comes responsibility. Responsibility to use it, to stay close to God, to use the gifts that he has given us.
We need to ask ourselves are we growing spiritually or are we still where we were when our Christian journey began? And what is it we need to do to grow spiritually? It may be different for different people.
We need to spend time with God. We need to read His word, speak to him in prayer and listen to His voice – and respond to it however much we might not like what He’s saying!
We will then become active in serving Him and others, and this could be in any number of different ways according to our God-given gifts.
How many times a week do we eat? How many meals, and snacks, and sweets? Compare this with how many times a week we pray, or read our Bible.
We get our earthly food by working, either to produce it or to make money to buy it from someone else.
What sort of work do we need to do to afford the bread of life that Jesus offers? We have to work at our faith, to believe in Jesus, to trust that he is the bread with no sell-by date, but bread that gives us eternal life.
The bread of life we get from Christ is to be shared with others not kept to ourselves. Do our lives reflect our faith? Do we speak about our faith to others? We all have a story to tell and God will give us the words if we trust him.
As we do the work of God by believing in the One he has sent, our lives will reflect the quality of the Living Bread that we have shared. It is still a two-way deal as we respond to what we have received by sharing it.
As Paul explained to the Ephesians, each of us has been given the gift that is right and sufficient for doing God’s work. Are we engaging with the task, even as we question what it is?
Amen
Prayers
Lord God, we are sorry for the times we haven’t acknowledged our need of you.
For the times we have tried to do things in our own strength, because we have forgotten what a great God you are, and forgotten how able you are to meet all our needs.
For the times we have hugged you to ourselves, and haven’t realised there is enough of you and more, for everyone.
Forgive us Lord.
We long for the day when the world will be as you want it to be: a world in which you lift up the lowly. And fill the hungry with good things.
In which love and justice shall triumph evil be ended, and the meek inherit the earth.
Give us confidence that such a day will come,
And more than that give us the resolve to
help make it happen.
Help us to respond as best we can
To the many millions who cry out for help,
And so to play our part in bringing the dawn of your kingdom closer, turning vision into reality
In Christ’s name we pray.
Amen
The Lord's Prayer
Please use the version that you prefer
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy Name,
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.
Our Father in heaven,
Hallowed be your name,
Your kingdom come,
Your will be done,
On earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
As we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial
And deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power
and the glory are yours
Now and for ever.
Amen.
Hymn: For I’m building a people of power
For I’m building a people of power
and I’m making a people of praise
that will move through this land by my Spirit
And will glorify my precious name
Build your church Lord
Make us strong Lord
Join our hearts Lord, through Your Son.
Make us one Lord, In Your Body,
in the kingdom of your Son.
Blessing:
As we seek to do what you want, Lord,
may we bring bread to the hungry –
food for bodies and food for souls,
strength for the journey, and hope for the future.
In Jesus’ name.
Amen
Service prepared by Mary Winchcombe
Webpage: Paul Deakin
RE:Uniform Project
Rev David Speirs, who is currently a minister in the Hull (Centre and West) Methodist Circuit, will be joining us in Northampton later this month. Please watch this short video about the RE:Uniform project that his current circuit setup a couple of years ago in Hull. It might start sparking some ideas for us in Northampton on how we might reach out to our local communities through service and social action.