Sundays at All Hallows (Sunday, April 28, 2024)

Welcome to Sundays at All Hallows.

This Sunday is the Fifth Sunday of Easter. Two more Sundays and then it will be the Feast of Pentecost, or Whitsun, which falls this year on May 19. On Pentecost Sunday Christians celebrate Jesus’ keeping of his promise to send the Holy Spirit to empower his disciples to continue his mission in the world. A number of churches celebrate the birth of the Church on that Sunday as well as the gift of the Holy Spirit.

This Sunday’s message looks at how Christians can be fruitful branches in the true vine, Jesus.

GATHER IN GOD’S NAME

Open this link in a new tab to hear Marty Haugen’s “All You Works of God,” adapted from the Benedicite.

All you works of God,
Every mountain, star and tree,
Bless the One who shapes your beauty,
Who has caused you all to be
One great song of love and grace,
Ever ancient, ever new.
Raise your voices, all you works of God.

1 Sun and moon: Bless your Maker!
Stars of heaven: Chant your praise!
Showers and dew: Raise up your joyful song!

All you works of God,
Every mountain, star and tree,
Bless the One who shapes your beauty,
Who has caused you all to be
One great song of love and grace,
Ever ancient, ever new.
Raise your voices, all you works of Love.

2 Winds of God: Bless your Maker!
Cold and winter: Chant your praise!
Snowstorms and ice: Raise up your joyful song!

All you works of God,
Every mountain, star and tree,
Bless the One who shapes your beauty,
Who has caused you all to be
One great song of love and grace,
Ever ancient, ever new.
Raise your voices, all you works of Love.

4 All the earth: Bless your Maker!
Hills and mountains: Chant your praise!
Green things that grow: Raise up your joyful song!

All you works of God,
Every mountain, star and tree,
Bless the One who shapes your beauty,
Who has caused you all to be
One great song of love and grace,
Ever ancient, ever new.
Raise your voices, all you works of Love.

5 Wells and springs: Bless your Maker!
Seas and rivers: Chant your praise!
Whales in the deep: Raise up your joyful song!

All you works of God,
Every mountain, star and tree,
Bless the One who shapes your beauty,
Who has caused you all to be
One great song of love and grace,
Ever ancient, ever new.
Raise your voices, all you works of Love.

6 Flying birds: Bless your Maker!
Beasts and cattle: Chant your praise!
Children at play: Raise up your joyful song!

All you works of God,
Every mountain, star and tree,
Bless the One who shapes your beauty,
Who has caused you all to be
One great song of love and grace,
Ever ancient, ever new.
Raise your voices, all you works of God.
Raise your voices, all you works of God.

The Lord be with you.
The Lord bless you.

This is the day which the Lord has made.
Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

God has promised forgiveness
to all who truly repent,
turn to Christ in faith
and are themselves forgiving.

In silence we call to mind our sins.

Silence

Let us confess our sins.

Merciful God,
we have sinned
in what we have thought and said,
in the wrong we have done
and in the good we have not done.
We have sinned in ignorance:
we have sinned in weakness:
we have sinned through our own deliberate fault.
We are truly sorry.
We repent and turn to you.
Forgive us, for our Saviour Christ’s sake,
and renew our lives to the glory of your name. Amen.

Almighty God, who pardons all who truly repent,
forgive our sins, strengthen us by the Holy Spirit,
and keep us in life eternal;
through Jesus Christ our Redeemer.
Amen.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Marty Haugen’s “Glory to God” from Beneath the Tree of Life.

Glory to God, glory to God,
glory to God in the highest,
and peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people on earth.

1 Lord God, heavenly King,
almighty God and Father,
we worship you, we give you thanks,
we praise you for your glory.

Glory to God, glory to God,
glory to God in the highest,
and peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people on earth.

2 Lord Jesus Christ, only Son of the Father,
Lord God, Lamb of God,
you take away the sin of the world:
have mercy on us;
you are seated at the right hand of the Father,
receive our prayer.

Glory to God, glory to God,
glory to God in the highest,
and peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people on earth.

3 For you alone are the Holy One,
you alone are the Lord,
you alone are the Most High,
Jesus Christ, with the Holy Spirit,
in the glory of God the Father.

Glory to God, glory to God,
glory to God in the highest,
and peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people,
peace to God’s people on earth.

Let us pray

Loving God,
you are the vine dresser, and your Son Jesus Christ is the true vine.
Show us how to remain in him so that he may remain in us,
and we may bear much fruit. Prune from our lives the things
that keep us from growing as you want us to grow.
This we ask in his name. Amen.

THE MINISTRY OF THE WORD

A reading from the New Testament (Acts 8:26–40).

As for Philip, an angel of the Lord said to him, “Go south down the desert road that runs from Jerusalem to Gaza.” So he started out, and he met the treasurer of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under the Kandake, the queen of Ethiopia. The eunuch had gone to Jerusalem to worship, and he was now returning. Seated in his carriage, he was reading aloud from the book of the prophet Isaiah.

The Holy Spirit said to Philip, “Go over and walk along beside the carriage.”

Philip ran over and heard the man reading from the prophet Isaiah. Philip asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?”

The man replied, “How can I, unless someone instructs me?” And he urged Philip to come up into the carriage and sit with him.

The passage of Scripture he had been reading was this:

“He was led like a sheep to the slaughter.
And as a lamb is silent before the shearers,
he did not open his mouth.
He was humiliated and received no justice.
Who can speak of his descendants?
For his life was taken from the earth.”*

The eunuch asked Philip, “Tell me, was the prophet talking about himself or someone else?” So beginning with this same Scripture, Philip told him the Good News about Jesus.

As they rode along, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, “Look! There’s some water! Why can’t I be baptized?” He ordered the carriage to stop, and they went down into the water, and Philip baptized him.

When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away. The eunuch never saw him again but went on his way rejoicing. Meanwhile, Philip found himself farther north at the town of Azotus. He preached the Good News there and in every town along the way until he came to Caesarea.

Silence

This is the word of the Lord,
thanks be to God.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Marty Haugen’s “Let All the Earth (Psalm 66).”

Intro
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.

Chorus
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.

1 Cry out in joy to the Lord all peoples on earth,
Sing to the praise of God’s name forever.
“Tremendous your deeds for us.” Oh

Chorus
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.
(Alleluia)
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.

2 Leading your people safe through fire and water,
bring their souls to life, we sing of your glory,
your love is eternal. Oh

Chorus
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.
(Alleluia)
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.

3 Harken to me as I sing my love of the Lord,
who answers the prayer of my heart.
God leads us in safety from death unto life. Oh

Chorus
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.
(Alleluia)
Let all the earth cry out in joy to the Lord.

Outro
To the Lord, alleluia!
To the Lord, alleluia!
To the Lord, alleluia.

A reading from the New Testament (1 John 4:7–21)

Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love.

God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.

Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us.

And God has given us his Spirit as proof that we live in him and he in us. Furthermore, we have seen with our own eyes and now testify that the Father sent his Son to be the Saviour of the world. All who declare that Jesus is the Son of God have God living in them, and they live in God. We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love.

God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them. And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgement, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world.

Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. We love each other because he loved us first.

If someone says, “I love God,” but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their fellow believers.

Silence

This is the word of the Lord,
thanks be to God.

Open this link in a new tab to hear the Alleluia from Marty Haugen’s Mass of Creation.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.

Open our hearts, O Lord, to listen to the words of your Son.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.

A reading from the New Testament (John 15:1–8)

“I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me.

“Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father.

Silence

This is the word of the Lord,
thanks be to God.

Fruitful Branches

In today’s reading from the Gospel of John Jesus compares tGod to a vine dresser, himself to a grape vine and his true disciples to fruitful branches on a grape vine. Every winter vine dressers prune the branches of each grape vine in a vineyard, cutting them back to where they are little more than stubs on the vine stock. If they do not prune them in this way, the grape vines will not produce any fruit when comes time for them to yield fruit. They will produce only leaves.

How then do we as disciples of Jesus remain in him and bear abundant fruit in season? Today’s readings from the Acts of the Apostles and the First Letter of John offer some clues as to how we can remain in Jesus and be fruitful. Let us take a look at these two readings and then consider some other ways that we can be fruitful branches.

Among the things that stand out in the reading from Acts is that Philip was responsive to the promptings of the Holy Spirit. He went where the Holy Spirit directed him to go and did what the Holy Spirit directed him to do. Whe he saw an opportunity to share the good news and witness to Jesus, he took full advantage of that opportunity. He not only explained the Book of Isaia to the Ethiopian eunuch, a high ranking servant of the Candace, the Queen of Ethiopia, but also baptized the eunuch at the Ethiopian’s request.

According to tradition, the eunuch played a key role in the spread of the Christian faith to the Ethiopian people. God uses all kinds of people from every walk of life as messengers of the good news, women and eunuchs as well as men, new believers as well as those mature in the faith.

Being open to the Holy Spirit’s guidance, sharing the good news with all and sundry, and witnessing to Jesus are among the ways that we remain in Jesus and bear abundant fruit. So are making disciples, baptizing new believers, and instructing them in Jesus commands, his teaching.

Among the things stand out in the reading from First John is that those who are living in God and in whom God is living declare Jesus to be the Son of God. When we live in God and God lives in us, we remain in Jesus and Jesus remains in us. We put our faith, trust, and confidence in Jesus and are open to his influence. Jesus’ influence shapes our attitudes, the way we think, and our actions.

We also learn that those who are living in God and in whom God is living, who remain in Jesus and in whom Jesus remains, live in love. They love their fellow believers. They show kindness, generosity, forgiveness, and empathy to their fellow believers and treat them with compassion, fairness, patience, and respect. Whenever possible they seek to be reconciled with a fellow believer from whom they have become estranged, with whom they had a misunderstanding and as a consequence they are no longer on friendly terms. They are kindly and lenient in how they judge the words and actions of their fellow believers, making allowances for them and giving them the benefit of the doubt. In other words, they live what Jesus taught. They have internalized Jesus’ teaching and his teaching has become a part of their character. This is what Jesus means when he says, “my words remain in you.” His words, his teaching, have become an integral part of them.

Among the other ways that we remain in Jesus, and he remains is us is that we employ what John Wesley called the “ordinances,” the means of grace ordained by God. They include hearing the Scriptures read and expounded; reading, studying, and meditating on Scripture; prayer, both public and private, the Lord’s Supper, fasting and abstinence; “holy conferencing,” spiritual conversations with fellow believers and others; and acts of mercy, treating the poor and those in need or any kind of difficulty as we would treat Jesus himself. It is through these means that God works in our lives, transforming us into the likeness of Jesus, and perfecting us in love. As Jesus points to the attention of the disciples in today’s reading from John’s Gospel, we can do nothing apart from him. We are dependent upon God’s grace to give us the will and the power to accomplish God’s purposes.

Ultimately it is God who enables us to be fruitful branches. It is God who arouses faith in us, moves us to repentance, forgives us, helps us to change our ways, and pares away those things that are barriers or obstacles to our spiritual growth. It is one of the many ways that God who is love shows his love for us.

Silence

Let us affirm with Christians across the ages what we believe about God
and his love for us.

I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit
and born of the virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to hell.
The third day he rose again from the dead.
He ascended to heaven
and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty.
From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. Amen.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Steven C. Warner’s “I Am the Vine.”

Intro
I am the vine, you are the branches,
remain in me, and you will bear abundant fruit.

Refrain
I am the vine, you are the branches,
remain in me, and you will bear abundant fruit.

Verse 1
I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower.
He trims away ev’ry barren branch
but the faithful ones he trims to increase their yield.

Refrain
I am the vine, you are the branches,
remain in me, and you will bear abundant fruit.

Verse 2
Live on in me as I do in you.
No more than a branch can bear fruit alone
can you bear fruit apart from me.

Refrain
I am the vine, you are the branches,
remain in me, and you will bear abundant fruit.

Verse 3
If you live in me, and my words live on in you,
ask what you will, it will be done for you.
Through your work God is glorified.

Refrain
I am the vine, you are the branches,
remain in me, and you will bear abundant fruit.

THE MINISTRY OF PRAYER

Let us pray for the Church and for the world, giving thanks for
God’s goodness.

Heavenly Father,
you have promised to hear when we pray
in the name of your Son.
Therefore in confidence and trust
we pray for the Church:

(Particular intercessions/thanksgivings may be offered.)

Father, enliven the Church for its mission
that we may be salt of the earth and light to the world.

Breathe fresh life into your people.
Give us power to reveal Christ in word and action.

We pray for the world:

(Particular intercessions/thanksgivings may be offered.)

Creator of all,
lead us and every people into ways of justice and peace.
That we may respect one another in freedom and truth.

Awaken in us a sense of wonder for the earth and all that is in it.
Teach us to care creatively for its resources.

We pray for the community:

(Particular intercessions/thanksgivings may be offered.)

God of truth, inspire with your wisdom
those whose decisions affect the lives of others
that all may act with integrity and courage.

Give grace to all whose lives are linked with ours.
May we serve Christ in one another, and love as he loves us.

We pray for those in need:

(Particular intercessions/thanksgivings may be offered.)

God of hope, comfort and restore
all who suffer in body, mind or spirit.
May they know the power of your healing love.

Make us willing agents of your compassion.
Strengthen us as we share in making people whole.

We remember those who have died and those who mourn:

(Particular intercessions/thanksgivings may be offered.)

We remember with thanksgiving those who have died in the faith
of Christ, and those whose faith is known to you alone.
Father, into your hands we commend them.

Give comfort to those who mourn.
Bring them peace in their time of loss.

We praise you for (N and) all your saints
who have entered your eternal glory.
May their example inspire and encourage us.

We pray for ourselves and our ministries:

(Particular intercessions/thanksgivings may be offered and the prayers
conclude with the following.)

Lord, you have called us to serve you.
Grant that we may walk in your presence:
your love in our hearts,
your truth in our minds,
your strength in our wills;
until, at the end of our journey,
we know the joy of our homecoming
and the welcome of your embrace,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Accept our prayers through Jesus Christ our Lord who has 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 SENDING FORTH OF GOD'S PEOPLE

Holy and everliving God,
by your power we are created
and by your love we are redeemed;
guide and strengthen us by your Spirit,
that we may give ourselves to your service,
and live each day in love to one another and to you,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.

Let us bless the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

The almighty and merciful God bless us
and keep us now and for ever. Amen.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Richard Bruxvoort Colligan’s “Christ Within.”

Ostinato
Christ within, before and behind
Christ beneath, above, beside
Christ every hour, every day, every night.

Those present may exchange a sign of peace with these words:

The peace of the Lord be always with you.
And also you.