All Hallows Evening Worship for Wednesday Evening (January 18, 2023)

The order of worship for this Wednesday evening is based upon A Form for Ordering a Service of the Word, suggested in the Appendices of A New Zealand Prayer Book (2020). The three songs used in the service come from the United Methodist Church’s The Faith We Sing (2000), a supplement to The United Methodist Hymnal (1989).

THE PREPARATION

Come, bless the Lord, all you servants of the Lord,
who stand by night in the house of the Lord!
Lift up your hands to the holy place,
and bless the Lord. Psalm 134: 1-2

Open this link in a new tab to hear Timothy Dudley-Smith’s “Sing a New Song to the Lord.” [TFWS # 2045]

1 Sing a new song to the Lord,
he to whom wonders belong;
rejoice in his triumph and tell of his power,
O sing to the Lord a new song!

2 Now to the ends of the earth
see his salvation is shown;
and still he remembers his mercy and truth,
unchanging in love to his own.

3 Sing a new song and rejoice,
publish his praises abroad;
let voices in chorus, with trumpet and horn,
resound for the joy of the Lord!

4 Join with the hills and the sea
thunders of praise to prolong;
in judgment and justice he comes to the earth,
O sing to the Lord a new song!

The Lord be with you.
The Lord bless you.

Let us pray.

Silence is kept, followed by this opening prayer.

Almighty God,
by whose grace alone we are accepted
and called to your service:
strengthen us by your Holy Spirit
and make us worthy of our calling;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

THE MINISTRY OF THE WORD

A Reading from the Old Testament (Amos 8)

Then the Sovereign Lord showed me another vision. In it I saw a basket filled with ripe fruit. “What do you see, Amos?” he asked.

I replied, “A basket full of ripe fruit.”

Then the Lord said, “Like this fruit, Israel is ripe for punishment! I will not delay their punishment again. In that day the singing in the temple will turn to wailing. Dead bodies will be scattered everywhere. They will be carried out of the city in silence. I, the Sovereign Lord, have spoken!”

Listen to this, you who rob the poor
and trample down the needy!
You can’t wait for the Sabbath day to be over
and the religious festivals to end
so you can get back to cheating the helpless.
You measure out grain with dishonest measures
and cheat the buyer with dishonest scales.
And you mix the grain you sell
with chaff swept from the floor.
Then you enslave poor people
for one piece of silver or a pair of sandals.
Now the Lord has sworn this oath
by his own name, the Pride of Israel:

“I will never forget
the wicked things you have done!
The earth will tremble for your deeds,
and everyone will mourn.
The ground will rise like the Nile River at floodtime;
it will heave up, then sink again.
“In that day,” says the Sovereign Lord,
“I will make the sun go down at noon
and darken the earth while it is still day.
I will turn your celebrations into times of mourning
and your singing into weeping.
You will wear funeral clothes
and shave your heads to show your sorrow—
as if your only son had died.
How very bitter that day will be!
“The time is surely coming,” says the Sovereign Lord,
“when I will send a famine on the land—
not a famine of bread or water
but of hearing the words of the Lord.
People will stagger from sea to sea
and wander from border to border
searching for the word of the Lord,
but they will not find it.
Beautiful girls and strong young men
will grow faint in that day,
thirsting for the Lord’s word.
And those who swear by the shameful idols of Samaria—
who take oaths in the name of the god of Dan
and make vows in the name of the god of Beersheba—
they will all fall down,
never to rise again.”

Silence follows the reading.

Hear what the Spirit is saying to the Church.
Thanks be to God.

A Famine of God’s Word in the Midst of Plenty?

A famine of hearing the words of the Lord prophesized in this evening’s reading from the Old Testament would happen. Amos preached in the Northern Kingdom of Israel when King Jeroboam II sat on its throne. Amos himself was from the Southern Kingdom of Judah where King Uzziah ruled.

Amos preached at time when the Northern Kingdom of Israel was enjoying peace and prosperity. But its people were not faithful to God. They did not keep the laws that God had given them. They treated the poor and those unable to protect themselves unfairly and cruelly. They worshipped other gods.

The Northern Kingdom of Israel would fall to the Assyrians who transported a large part of its population to various parts of their empire, leaving a remnant to till the soil. The Assyrians would settle people from other parts of their empire in Israel. This is the way the Assyrians kept a conquered people from rebelling against them. They uprooted them from their ancestral lands and relocated them somewhere else.

The Southern Kingdom of Judah would subsequently be conquered by the Babylonians who would deport the Judeans to Babylon where they lived in exile for 70 years. They would eventually be permitted to return to Judah and to rebuild the city walls of Jerusalem which had been razed by the Babylonians to the ground.

After Malachi through whom God exposed the corruption of the Judeans after they returned from Babylon, God sent no more prophets to the people of Judah for three hundred years. He then sent John the Baptist to herald the coming of the Messiah. God himself would then come in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, in the person of the Son, in fulfilment of a prophesy in the Book of Isaiah that God would teach his people and make them his disciples.

To the amazement of some Jews and the chagrin of others the people that God came to teach were not just themselves but all humankind, Jews, Samaritans, and Gentiles.

What did Jesus teach? He reiterated a lot of what God had taught through the prophets such as loving God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind and loving our neighbors as ourselves. He emphasized being compassionate and merciful as God is compassionate and merciful, showing sympathy for others and a willingness to help them, being kind to them and forgiving their failings. He modeled for us humbleness, faithfulness, obedience, and personal holiness.

Being a teacher and model for us was not God’s only reason for becoming a human being like us. He also opened to us the way to salvation through his suffering and death on the cross and rising to new life again.

What then does this evening’s reading mean for us? Those of us who live in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States have access to many different translations of the Bible. We are singularly blessed in this way. However, Bible reading is on the decline of all of these countries. We are experiencing a famine of God’s words in our own time. We, however, are starving ourselves by refusing to eat the food that God offers us.

One of the reasons that we are not reading our Bibles is that we have been led to believe that the words they contain, God’s words, are not trustworthy and true. We also do not see any benefit in reading the Bible.

Our questioning of the trustworthiness and truthfulness of God’s words the Bible itself traces back to the very first man and woman. It is how humankind got off on the wrong foot with God in the first place, according to the Bible narrative. We questioned the character of God and his friendliness and helpfulness toward us. In his teaching Jesus emphasizes the goodness of God and demonstrated God’s compassionate and merciful nature with the miracles that he performed.

As the Church of England’s thirty-nine Articles of Religion and John Wesley’s abbreviation of these articles call to our attention, the Holy Scriptures “sets forth everything that is necessary for our salvation.” We are not “required to believe as a article of the Christian faith, or to regard as necessary to salvation, anything that is not found in Scripture or cannot be proved from Scripture. “

We benefit from reading the Bible in a number of ways. “Searching the Scriptures,” as John Wesley described reading and studying the Bible and meditating upon its contents is a means of grace. The means of grace are ways God works invisibly in us, hastening, strengthening; and confirming faith so that God's grace pervades in and through us. We encounter God in the Bible and God speaks to us through the Bible. God uses the Bible to renew our minds, to transform us into the likeness of Jesus in our attitudes, thinking, and behavior, forming in us those qualities of character that the apostle Paul describes as fruit of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

I recommend starting with the Gospels and then the letters of John, Peter, and James. Take your time. Read aloud. That way you both read and hear the words. It also helps you to keep from rushing. Amble through each Gospel and each letter, a few verses or a passage of two at a time. Let the words sink in. Ask questions like “What is this passage saying? What does it mean? What does it tell me about God, about Jesus, about people? How should I live my life based on what I have read?”

Get to know Jesus from the narrative of the Gospels first and then make Jesus the lens through which you read Luke’s Acts of the Apostles, the letters of the apostles, and the books of the Old Testament.

Jesus not only teaches from the Old Testament, but he also interprets the Old Testament. In his teaching he alludes to a number of passages from the Old Testament without quoting them. However, those to whom he was speaking would have recognized the allusions, the indirect references that he was making. They are often references to passages in Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Psalms, Proverbs, and the Prophets.

For this reason, it is desirable to focus on these books when reading the Old Testament. The more familiar we become with the Old Testament, the better we understand what Jesus is saying. Bear in mind that what Jesus teaches us or models for us trumps whatever the Old Testament appears to say.

Every time you read the Bible begin and end with prayer. At the beginning ask God to help you understand what you are reading and at the end ask God to enable you to apply what you read to your own life.

We need not go hungry when the Bread of Life is found within the pages of the Bible. All we have to do is “taste and see that the Lord is good.” The Lord is good indeed!

A time of silence is kept, followed by this affirmation of faith.

We believe in one God,
who made us and loves all that is.
We believe in Jesus Christ,
God’s only Son, our Lord,
who was born, lived, died and rose again,
and is coming to call all to account.
We believe in the Holy Spirit,
who calls, equips and sends out God’s people,
and brings all things to their true end.
This is our faith, the faith of the Church:
We believe in one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

Open this link to hear Eddie Esponoza’s “Change My Heart, O God.” [TFWS #2152]

Change my heart oh God,
make it ever true.
Change my heart oh God,
may I be like You.

Change my heart oh God,
make it ever true.
Change my heart oh God,
may I be like You.

You are the potter, I am the clay,
Mold me and make me,
This is what I pray.

Change my heart oh God,
make it ever true.
Change my heart oh God,
may I be like You.

You are the potter, I am the clay,
Mold me and make me,
This is what I pray.

Change my heart oh God,
make it ever true.
Change my heart oh God,
may I be like You.

THE PRAYERS

Return to the Lord, who will have mercy:
to our God, who will richly pardon. Isaiah 55:7

Let us now confess our sins to almighty God.

A time of silence is kept, followed by this prayer of penitence.

God of mercy,
we acknowledge that we are sinners.
We turn from the wrong that we have thought and said and done,
and are mindful of all that we have failed to do.
For the sake of Jesus, who died for us,
forgive us for all that is past,
and help us to live each day
in the light of Christ our Lord. Amen

May the Lord forgive what we have been,
help us to amend what we are
and direct what we shall be,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Let us pray for all people and for the Church throughout the world.

Grant, almighty God,
that all who confess your name may be united in your truth,
live together in your love, and reveal your glory in the world.

Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

Guide the people of this land, and of all the nations,
in the ways of justice and peace;
that we may honor one another and serve the common good.

Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

Give us all a reverence for the earth as your own creation,
that we may use its resources rightly
in the service of others and to your honor and glory.

Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

Bless all whose lives are closely linked with ours,
and grant that we may serve Christ in them,
and love one another as Christ loves us.

Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

Comfort and heal all those who suffer in body, mind, or spirit;
give them courage and hope in their troubles,
and bring them the joy of your salvation.

Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

We commend to your mercy all who have died,
that your will for them may be fulfilled;
and we pray that we may share with all your saints
in your eternal kingdom

Lord, in your mercy,
hear our prayer.

Additional intercessions, petitions, and thanksgiving may be offered in silence or aloud.

Almighty God, you have promised to hear our prayers.
Grant that what we have asked in faith
we may by your grace receive,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Accept our prayers through Jesus Christ our Lord, who taught
us to pray,

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.

THE CONCLUSION

[Loving God, we thank you for hearing our prayers,

feeding us with your word,

and encouraging us in our meeting together.]

Father, take us and use us

to love and serve you
and all people,
in the power of your Spirit
and in the name of your Son,
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Open this link in a new tab to hear David Haas’ “We Are Called.” [TFWS #2172]

1 Come, live in the light
Shine with the joy and the love of the Lord
We are called to be light for the kingdom
To live in the freedom of the city of God

We are called to act with justice
We are called to love tenderly
We are called to serve one another
To walk humbly with God

2 Come, open your heart
Show your mercy to all those in fear
We are called to be hope for the hopeless
So all hatred and blindness will be no more

We are called to act with justice
We are called to love tenderly
We are called to serve one another
To walk humbly with God

3 Sing, sing a new song
Sing of that great day when all will be one
God will reign and we'll walk with each other
As sisters and brothers united in love 

We are called to act with justice
We are called to love tenderly
We are called to serve one another
To walk humbly with God

We are called to act with justice
We are called to love tenderly
We are called to serve one another
To walk humbly with God

May the God of peace equip us with everything good for
doing his will, working in us what is pleasing to him,
through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.