Sundays at All Hallows (Sunday, March 23, 2025)

Welcome to Sundays at All Hallows.

This Sunday, the Third Sunday in Lent, unlike the two preceding Sundays, is more concerned with Jesus’s teaching than it is with an event in his life and ministry.

In this Sunday’s message we unpack the Gospel reading appointed for this Sunday and what it teaches us about God and ourselves.

GATHERING IN GOD’S NAME

Open this link in a new tab to hear Timothy Seaman’s arrangement of the Appalachian folk hymn tune BEHOLD THE LAMB OF GOD for hammered dulcimer.

Silence

[The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and the love of God,
and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit
be with you all
And also with you.]

[Let us pray.]

We thank you, O God, that you have again brought
us together on the Lord’s Day to praise you for your
goodness and to ask your blessing. Give us grace to
see your hand in the week that is past, and your
purpose in the week to come; through Christ our
Lord.
Amen.

[Dear friends in Christ,
as we turn our hearts and minds
to worship almighty God,
let us confess our sins.]

Most merciful God,
we confess that we have sinned against you
in thought, word, and deed,
by what we have done
and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart;
we have not loved our neighbours as ourselves.
We are truly sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
have mercy on us and forgive us,
that we may delight in your will,
and walk in your ways,
to the glory of your name. Amen.

Merciful God,
grant to your faithful people pardon and peace,
that we may be cleansed from all our sins
and serve you with a quiet mind;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

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

Those present may greet one another in the name of the Lord.]

Open this link in a new tab to hear John L. Bell’s Kyrie Eleison (Bridget).

Kyrie,
Christe, Christe,
Kyrie eleison.

Kyrie eleison.
Kyrie eleison.
Christe eleison.
Christe eleison
Kyrie eleison.
Kyrie eleison.

Kyrie eleison.
Kyrie eleison.
Christe eleison.
Christe eleison.
Kyrie eleison.
Kyrie eleison.

Kyrie eleison.
Kyrie eleison.
Christe eleison.
Christe eleison.
Kyrie eleison.
Kyrie eleison.

Kyrie,
Christe, Christe,
Kyrie eleison.

[Let us pray.]

Father of mercy,
alone we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves.
When we are discouraged by our weakness,
strengthen us to follow Christ,
our pattern and our hope;
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

THE MINISTRY OF THE WORD

A reading from the Book of Isaiah.
Isaiah 55:1-9 

The Lord says,
“Come, everyone who is thirsty—
here is water!
Come, you that have no money—
buy grain and eat!
Come! Buy wine and milk—
it will cost you nothing!
Why spend money on what does not satisfy?
Why spend your wages and still be hungry?
Listen to me and do what I say,
and you will enjoy the best food of all.
“Listen now, my people, and come to me;
come to me, and you will have life!
I will make a lasting covenant with you
and give you the blessings I promised to David.
I made him a leader and commander of nations,
and through him I showed them my power.
Now you will summon foreign nations;
at one time they did not know you,
but now they will come running to join you!
I, the Lord your God, the holy God of Israel,
will make all this happen;
I will give you honor and glory.”
Turn to the Lord and pray to him,
now that he is near.
Let the wicked leave their way of life
and change their way of thinking.
Let them turn to the Lord, our God;
he is merciful and quick to forgive.
“My thoughts,” says the Lord, “are not like yours,
and my ways are different from yours.
As high as the heavens are above the earth,
so high are my ways and thoughts above yours.

[The word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.]

Silence

Open this link in a new tab to hear Timothy Dudley Smith’s paraphrase of Psalm 63, “God Is My Great Desire.”

1 God is my great desire
your face I seek the first;
to you my heart and soul aspire,
for you I thirst.
As one in desert lands,
whose very flesh is flame,
in burning love I lift my hands
and bless God’s Name.

2 God is my true delight,
my richest feast God’s praise,
through silent watches of the night,
through all my days.
To you my spirit clings,
on you my soul is cast;
beneath the shadow of your wings
you holds me fast.

3 God is my strong defense
in every evil hour;
in him I face with confidence
the tempter's power.
I trust God’s mercy sure,
with truth and triumph crowned:
my hope and joy for evermore
in God are found.

A reading from Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians.
1 Corinthians 10:1-13 

I want you to remember, my friends, what happened to our ancestors who followed Moses. They were all under the protection of the cloud, and all passed safely through the Red Sea. In the cloud and in the sea they were all baptized as followers of Moses. All ate the same spiritual bread 4 and drank the same spiritual drink. They drank from the spiritual rock that went with them; and that rock was Christ himself. But even then God was not pleased with most of them, and so their dead bodies were scattered over the desert.

Now, all of this is an example for us, to warn us not to desire evil things, as they did, nor to worship idols, as some of them did. As the scripture says, “The people sat down to a feast which turned into an orgy of drinking and sex.” We must not be guilty of sexual immorality, as some of them were—and in one day twenty-three thousand of them fell dead. We must not put the Lord to the test, as some of them did—and they were killed by snakes. We must not complain, as some of them did—and they were destroyed by the Angel of Death.

All these things happened to them as examples for others, and they were written down as a warning for us. For we live at a time when the end is about to come.

If you think you are standing firm you had better be careful that you do not fall. Every test that you have experienced is the kind that normally comes to people. But God keeps his promise, and he will not allow you to be tested beyond your power to remain firm; at the time you are put to the test, he will give you the strength to endure it, and so provide you with a way out.

[The word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.]

Silence

Open this link in a new tab to hear Bernadette Farrell’s “Praise to You, O Christ, Our Saviour.”

Praise to you, O Christ, our Saviour,
Word of the Father, calling us to life;
Son of God who leads us to freedom:
glory to you, Lord Jesus Christ!

1 You are the Word who calls us out of darkness;
You are the Word who leads us into light;
You are the Word who brings us through the desert:
Glory to you, Lord Jesus Christ!

Praise to you, O Christ, our Saviour,
Word of the Father, calling us to life;
Son of God who leads us to freedom:
glory to you, Lord Jesus Christ!

4 You are the Word who binds us and unites us;
You are the Word who calls us to be one;
You are the Word who teaches us forgiveness:
Glory to you, Lord Jesus Christ!

Praise to you, O Christ, our Saviour,
Word of the Father, calling us to life;
Son of God who leads us to freedom:
glory to you, Lord Jesus Christ!

[The Lord be with you.
And also with you.

The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ
according to Luke.]
Luke 13:1-9 
[Glory to you, Lord Jesus Christ.]

At that time some people were there who told Jesus about the Galileans whom Pilate had killed while they were offering sacrifices to God. Jesus answered them, “Because those Galileans were killed in that way, do you think it proves that they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No indeed! And I tell you that if you do not turn from your sins, you will all die as they did. What about those eighteen people in Siloam who were killed when the tower fell on them? Do you suppose this proves that they were worse than all the other people living in Jerusalem? No indeed! And I tell you that if you do not turn from your sins, you will all die as they did.”

Then Jesus told them this parable: “There was once a man who had a fig tree growing in his vineyard. He went looking for figs on it but found none. So he said to his gardener, ‘Look, for three years I have been coming here looking for figs on this fig tree, and I haven't found any. Cut it down! Why should it go on using up the soil?’ But the gardener answered, ‘Leave it alone, sir, just one more year; I will dig around it and put in some fertilizer. Then if the tree bears figs next year, so much the better; if not, then you can have it cut down.’”

[The Gospel of Christ.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.]

A Parable of God's Grace

Have you ever entertained the thought that a person must have been a very bad person upon hearing that something really bad happened to that person? This is what the people who told Jesus about the Galileans in this Sunday’s gospel appeared to have thought, based upon Jesus’ response. If you read through the gospels, you will discover that in the time of Jesus’ earthly ministry it was a common belief that bad things happened to people such as blindness because they or their parents or even their ancestors had done something bad.

Even today some people wrestle with that belief. When something bad happens to someone else, in the back of their minds they think that the person must have done something bad. The Hindu and Buddhist notion of kharma is the belief that our actions in our past lives or even early in this life have positive or negative consequences in this life, depending on the nature of the action. This belief has found its way into contemporary culture, both in Canada and the United States, and influences the thinking of many North Americans even though they are not practitioners of Hinduism or Buddhism.

In his response Jesus appears to imply that they are being too harsh in their judgment of the Galileans. He points to their attention that eighteen people in Siloam who were killed when a tower fell on them were no more sinful than all the other people living in Jerusalem. He then tells them to repent of their own sins.

Jesus’ response brings to mind what he said earlier in Luke’s Gospel in the Sermon on the Plain. He instructs his disciples and whoever else was listening not to be too quick to judge others or to be too harsh in their judgment of others (Luke 6: 37). He also instructs them to examine themselves for their own faults and failings before drawing to the attention of someone else what they perceive to be that person’s faults and failings (Luke 6: 41-42).

Jesus is touching on something that Paul also touches on in this Sunday’s
Epistle reading. It is tempting to see ourselves as more righteous than other people and not to recognize our own sinfulness, the things in our lives that are hurting our relationship with God. One of the ways that we do this is to focus our attention on the bad things that other people do or say, real and imagined, even treating them as worse than they really are, while ignoring the bad things we say and do or treating them as less bad than they are.

In his call to repentance Jesus is repeating the call to repentance that God makes through the prophet Isaiah in this Sunday’s Old Testament reading. This call to repentance has bearing upon how we understand the parable of the unfruitful fig tree which Jesus tells those who came to him with news of Pilate’s massacre of the Galileans in the Temple at Jerusalem.

One or more fig trees growing in a vineyard were not an uncommon sight in the ancient Mid-East. Planting a fig tree was one way of determining the suitability of the soil for growing grape vines. Fig trees and grape vines flourish in the same type of soil. The fruit of the fig tree is larger than that of a grape vine and has more seeds. It attracts birds that otherwise would eat the grapes. Figs are also a source of food for humans.

When a fig tree bears fruit depends upon the kind of fig tree, its location, and its growing conditions. Some fig trees will bear fruit two years after they are planted. Other fig trees take longer to produce fruit. This knowledge one might expect the gardener to have, the man who tended the vineyard; the owner of the vineyard who may have rarely come to the vineyard except to gather its fruit, on the other hand, may be not. In any event the gardener asks the vineyard owner to spare the fig tree, telling the vineyard owner what steps he will take to encourage the fig tree to produce fruit. We do not learn from the parable the ultimate fate of the fig tree.

In the parable we have two ways of looking at God. In the first view God is seen to be like the owner of the vineyard, ready to cut down the unfruitful fig tree because it failed to produce fruit in the time that he expected it to produce fruit. In the second view God is seen to be like the gardener, willing to give the fig tree more time to produce fruit and to tend the fig tree to do all that he can to achieve that result. When we consider the second view these words from this Sunday’s Old Testament reading commend themselves to our attention:

"Let the wicked leave their way of life
and change their way of thinking.
Let them turn to the Lord, our God;
he is merciful and quick to forgive.
'My thoughts,' says the Lord, 'are not like yours,
and my ways are different from yours.
As high as the heavens are above the earth,
so high are my ways and thoughts above yours.'"

These words and other passages from the Old Testament suggest that God is in no hurry to punish the wicked. God is willing to give us more than one opportunity to repent.

The gardener digging around the unfruitful fig tree and fertilizing it may be compared with the way that God’s grace, the power of the Holy Spirit, works in our lives. God does not work at the same pace in everyone’s life.

The parable of the unfruitful fig tree also has bearing upon how we view those who do not yet know Jesus and even our fellow Christians. We may become impatient with someone because they do not immediately turn in repentance from their sins and in faith to Jesus in response to our witness and be tempted to abandon them for someone who may be more responsive to our witness. We may react in a similar fashion to a fellow Christian who is not producing the kind of fruit that we might expect from a disciple of Jesus. In both instances Jesus is holding up to us as an example the patient gardener. It is an example that Jesus would have us follow.

While we do not know what happened to the fig tree in the parable, it is my hope that it flourished like the fig tree that grew next to my family’s well during my teen years and later. It bore abundant fruit which my family enjoyed as fig preserves. It is my prayer that all who hear or read this message also produce much fruit in their lifetimes to the glory of God. May God make it so.

Silence

[Let us confess our faith
as we say,]

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

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.
He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit
and born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried.
He descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again.
He ascended into heaven,
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again
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.

THE MINISTRY OF PRAYER

In peace we pray to you, Lord God.

Silence

For all people in their daily life and work;
For our families, friends, and neighbours,
and for all those who are alone.

For this community, our country, and the world;
For all who work for justice, freedom, and peace.

For the just and proper use of your creation;
For the victims of hunger, fear, injustice, and oppression.

For all who are in danger, sorrow, or any kind of trouble;
For those who minister to the sick, the friendless, and needy.

For the peace and unity of the Church of God;
For all who proclaim the gospel, and all who seek the truth.

For N. our bishop, and for all bishops and other ministers;
For all who serve God in the Church.

For our own needs and those of others.

Silence.

Those present may add their own petitions.

Hear us, Lord.
For your mercy is great.

We thank you, Lord, for all the blessings of this life.

Silence.

Those present may add their own thanksgivings.

We will exalt you, O God our king;
And praise your name for ever and ever.

We pray for those who have died in the peace of Christ,
and for those whose faith is known to you alone,
that they may have a place in your eternal kingdom.

Silence.

Those present may add their own petitions.

Lord, let your loving kindness be upon them;
Who put their trust in you.

Gracious God,
you have heard the prayers of your faithful people;
you know our needs before we ask,
and our ignorance in asking.
Grant our requests as may be best for us.
This we ask in the name of your Son
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Open this link in a new tab to hear Marty Haugen’s “Tree of Life and Awesome Mystery.”

1 Tree of life and awesome mystery,
In your death we are reborn,
Though you die in all of history,
still you rise with every morn,
Still you rise with every morn.

2 Seed that dies to rise in glory,
May we see ourselves in you,
If we learn to live your story,
We may die to rise anew,
we may die to rise anew.

3 We remember truth one spoken,
love passed on through act and word,
Every person, lost and broken
wears the body of our Lord,
wears the body of our Lord.

Adoramus te Criste
Adoramus te Criste
Adoramus te Criste
Adoramus Christe

Repeated as 3-part round.

4 Gentle Jesus, mighty Spirit,
come inflame our hearts anew,
We may all your joy inherit,
if we bear the cross with you,
if we bear the cross with you.

5 Christ, you lead and we shall follow,
[Adoramus te Criste]
stumbling though our steps may be;
[Adoramus te Criste]
one with you in joy and sorrow,
[Adoramus te Criste]
we the river, you the sea,
[Adoramus Christe]
we the river, you the sea.

[If a collection is taken, it is presented with these words and placed in a suitable place.

Yours, Lord, is the greatness,
the power, the glory, the splendour, and the majesty;
for everything in heaven and on earth is yours.
All things come from you, and of your own do we give you.]

[And now, as our Saviour Christ 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.

THE SEENDING OUT OF GOD’S PEOPLE

Glory to God
whose power, working in us,
can do infinitely more
than we can ask or imagine.
Glory to God from generation to generation,
in the Church and in Christ Jesus,
for ever and ever. Amen.

May the God of hope
fill us with all joy and peace in believing
through the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.