All Hallows Evening for Wednesday Evening (March 30, 2022)

 

PROCLAMATION OF THE LIGHT

One or more candles may be lit.

Bless be God who forgives all our sins
God’s mercy endures forever

EVENING HYMN

Open this link in a new tab to hear Joyous Light of Glorious God from Kent Gustavson’s Mountain Vespers.

Joyous light of glorious God,
heavenly, holy, Jesus Christ,
We have come to the setting of the Sun
and we look to the ev’ning light.
We sing to Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Our voices pure voices together.
O precious God, giver of life,
we sing your praises forever.

Joyous light of glorious God,
heavenly, holy, Jesus Christ,
We have come to the setting of the Sun
and we look to the ev’ning light.
We sing to Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Our voices pure voices together.
O precious God, giver of life,
we sing your praises forever.

PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.

Blessed are you, O Lord our God,
the shepherd of Israel,
their pillar of cloud by day,
their pillar of fire by night.
In these forty days you lead us
into the desert of repentance
that in this pilgrimage of prayer
we might learn to be your people once more.
In fasting and service
you bring us back to your heart.
You open our eyes to your presence in the world
and you free our hands to lead others
to the radiant splendour of your mercy.
Be with us in these journey days
for without you we are lost and will perish.
To you alone be dominion and glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Psalm 141 from Kent Gustavson's Mountain Vespers.

Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.

O God, I call you; come to me quickly;
Hear my voice when I cry to you.

Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.

Set a watch before my mouth,
and guard the doors of my lips.
Let not my heart incline to any evil thing;
Never occupied in wickedness.

Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.

My eyes are turned to you, O God,
in you I take refuge.
My eyes are turned to you, O God,
Strip me not of my life.

Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.

Silence is kept.

May our prayers come before you, O God, as incense, and may your presence surround and fill us, so that in union with all creation, we might sing your praise and your love in our lives. Amen.

SCRIPTURE

Colossians 3: 8-15 Forgiving Others

Now is the time to get rid of anger, rage, malicious behavior, slander, and dirty language. Don’t lie to each other, for you have stripped off your old sinful nature and all its wicked deeds. Put on your new nature, and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator and become like him. In this new life, it doesn’t matter if you are a Jew or a Gentile, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbaric, uncivilized, slave, or free. Christ is all that matters, and he lives in all of us.

Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony. And let the peace that comes from Christ rule in your hearts. For as members of one body you are called to live in peace. And always be thankful.

May your word live in us
and bear much fruit to your glory

HOMILY

No Loopholes in Forgiveness

In this past Sunday’s Gospel reading, Luke 15: 11-32, Jesus uses the Parable of the Prodigal Son to illustrate how generous God is in his forgiveness. Jesus also teaches us that we also should forgive more than is usual or expected.

In Matthew 6: 14 Jesus ties God’s forgiveness of our sins to our forgiveness of the sins of others. “If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you.”

In Luke 6:37 Jesus gives this warning to his disciples and to us.

“Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn others, or it will all come back against you. Forgive others, and you will be forgiven.”

If we hope to be forgiven, we must be willing to forgive.

In Mark 11:25, in instructing the disciples on how they should pray, Jesus tells them, “But when you are praying, first forgive anyone you are holding a grudge against, so that your Father in heaven will forgive your sins, too.”

In Matthew 6: 15 Jesus further warns, “But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.”

If we withhold forgiveness from others, we cannot expect forgiveness from God.

The apostle Paul takes up the subject of forgiveness in today’s reading from his letter to the Colossians. He writes:

“Make allowance for each other’s faults and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others” (Colossians 3:13 NLT).

We should think about our fellow Christians’ good qualities as well as their bad ones and not judge them too severely. We should forgive anyone who makes us upset or angry. We should keep in mind that God has forgiven us and therefore we should forgive others.

What may be a common shortcoming for Christians is that we give a lot of attention to what Jesus teaches about God forgiving us but do not give enough attention to what Jesus and the apostles teach about our forgiving others. We may even mistakenly conclude that because God is so forgiving, we do not need to forgive others. But Jesus does not teach that. Neither do the apostles.

What Jesus does teach is that we are to be merciful as God is merciful. We are to copy God’s mercifulness. Being merciful means being forgiving. In forgiving others, we are to copy God’s generosity in forgiving us. We cannot stint on forgiving them. We cannot say to ourselves, “We’re not friends anymore. I don’t have to forgive them.”

Whatever our relationship may be, we are to forgive our fellow Christians’ faults. We are to show them the same grace that God shows us. Jesus does not give us any loopholes.

We may not like a particular individual. We may not find them agreeable, and we may prefer not to be around them. However, we cannot withhold forgiving them for these reasons or for any other reason.

It may rankle us that we must forgive them but forgive them we must. If we are going to follow Jesus as his disciple, we have no choice.

Jesus tells those who would be his disciples that they must first count the cost to themselves and to others such as family and friends. One such cost is that they must forgive all kinds of people. They may be people who have behavioral health or mental health problems and may not be easy to deal with or to understand.

On the other hand, we may be mistaken in the way that we think about a particular individual or the impression that we have of them. We may have gotten the wrong end of the stick. Aa a consequence, we do not see them as they really are but only as we imagine them. We may project our own feelings on to someone else and then believe that our feelings are theirs.

Whatever the case, we will be expected to forgive them.

In today’s reading Paul reiterates what Jesus taught and what he practiced. We are to make allowances for each other’s weaknesses and imperfections. We are to forgive our fellow Christians when what they say or do or what we think that they have said and done or are saying or doing triggers feelings of anger, apprehension, confusion, disappointment, discomfort, or unhappiness in us. We do our best to get along with them.

Only in exceptional circumstances where there is probable cause or reasonable suspicion to believe that we may be physically harmed or sexually assaulted may we cut off all communication with them and keep away from them. This does not preclude forgiving them.

Forgiveness does not require us to accept or approve of what someone has said or done or to endanger ourselves or others. It does require, however, that we let go of our anger and resentment and do not hold against them what they did or said. In this sense forgiveness is radical. We are not making a deliberate effort to hide or not have these feelings but having expressed them in a healthy way are giving them up.

One of the reasons that we may have difficulty in forgiving others is that we have not learned to express anger and resentment in a healthy way. Instead, we bottle-up these feelings, hold onto them.

Bottled-up anger and resentment, however, have a way of expressing themselves in unhealthy ways. We may talk to other people about someone with whom we are angry or annoyed behind their backs, saying things that are unkind or untrue. We may spread rumors that are intended to harm them or their reputation or cause them embarrassment and upset. We may act in various ways out of spite and ill-will because we want to hurt or upset them. We may behave toward them in an unfriendly way, to show them that we do not care about them or that we want them to go away.

We may make a mental note of each unkindness and unpleasantness that someone shows us and when we have accumulated enough of these wrongs, real or imagined, to our satisfaction use them to justify being unkind and unpleasant to them.

None of these behaviors are appropriate or acceptable for a disciple of Jesus. They may be what we are accustomed to doing out of habit, but they are not in keeping with what Jesus taught and practiced.

Paul goes on to tell us that the disciples of Jesus should above all else clothe themselves with love. He certainly has in mind Jesus’ own teachings and example. He may also have in mind this verse from the Book of Proverbs. “Love prospers when a fault is forgiven but dwelling on it separates close friends” (Proverbs 7:19 NLT). It is impossible to love one another when we are unwilling to forgive one another. Forgiveness is a pre-condition to love.

Paul urges us to let the peace that comes from Jesus to rule in our hearts, reminding us that we as the Body of Christ are called to live in peace with one another, not enmity. The kind of peace about which Paul is talking is not maintained unwillingly and without enthusiasm but flows out of mutual love for each other. We experience Jesus’ shalom, his healing peace, which brings harmony, wholeness, and tranquility to our lives, when Jesus reigns as king over our lives, when we imitate God’s generous forgiveness in forgiving each other’s faults and show grace and kindness to each other, when we genuinely live our lives according to Jesus’ teachings and example.

SONG OF PRAISE

Open this link in a new tab to hear the Magnificat from Kent Gustavson’s Mountain Vespers.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.

1 You O God have done great things
and holy is your name.
You have mercy on those who fear you
n ev’ry generation.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.

2 You have shown the strength of your arm,
you have scattered the proud in their conceit.
You have cast the might down from thrones
and have lifted up the lowly.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.

3 You have filled the hungry with good things,
the rich you have sent away empty.
You have come to the help of your servant Israel
you’ve remembered your promise of mercy.
The promise you made
to Sarah and Abraham.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.

Glory to you, O Lord our God
With your love and power.
Glory to you, O Lord our God
With your love and power.
Amen

PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE

With confidence and trust let us pray to the Lord, saying, “Lord, have mercy.”

For the one holy catholic and apostolic Church throughout the world, we pray to you, Lord.

Lord, have mercy.

For the mission of the Church, that in faithful witness it may preach the gospel to the ends of the earth, we pray to you, Lord.

Lord, have mercy.

For those preparing for baptism and for their teachers and sponsors, we pray to you, Lord.

Lord, have mercy.

For peace in the world, that a spirit of respect and reconciliation may grow among nations and peoples, we pray to you, Lord.

Lord, have mercy.

For the poor, the persecuted, the sick, and all who suffer; for refugees, prisoners, and all in danger; that they may be relieved and protected, we pray to you, Lord.

Lord, have mercy

For all whom we have injured or offended, we pray to you, Lord.

Lord, have mercy.

For grace to amend our lives and to further the reign of God, we pray to you, Lord.

Lord, have mercy.

Free Prayer

In silent or spontaneous prayer all bring before God the concerns of the day.

The Collect

We praise you God,
that the light of Christ shines in our darkness
and is never overcome;
show us the way we must go to eternal day;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.

RESPONSE

Open this link in a new tab to hearJohn L Bell’s arrangement of Alison Robertson’s hymn, “Love Is the Touch.”

1 Love is the touch of intangible joy;
love is the force that no fear can destroy;
love is the goodness we gladly applaud:
God is where love is, for love is of God.

2 Love is the lilt in a lingering voice;
love is the hope that can make us rejoice;
love is the cure for the frightened and flawed:
God is where love is, for love is of God.

3 Love is the light in a tunnel of pain;
love is the will to be whole once again;
love is the trust of a friend on the road:
God is where love is, for love is of God.

[Instrumental interlude]

4 Love is the Maker, and Spirit, and Son;
love is the kingdom their will has begun;
love is the pathway the saints all have trod:
God is where love is, for love is of God.
God is where love is, for love is of God.

THE LORD’S PRAYER

And now, as our Saviour has taught us,
we are bold to say,

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.

SOLEMN PRAYER OVER THE PEOPLE

Look with compassion, O Lord,
upon this your people;
that rightly observing this holy season
they may learn to know you more fully,
and to serve you with a more perfect will;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.