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Sunday Worship from the United Reformed Church for Sunday 8th November
Today’s service is led by The Revd Peter Clark
Welcome and Introduction
Hello, my name is Peter Clark and I am a retired Minister, living in West Dorset, having served in pastorates based first in Gravesend and in then in United Reformed Church / Methodist United Churches in Bridport and Dorchester. I bring greetings not only from me but from all the churches I lead services in Dorset. Our focus for today’s service will be on the parable of the wise and foolish bridesmaids who famously fell asleep on the job – so our Call to Worship fits with that theme
Call to Worship
No one knows when the Son of Man will come – Jesus says it will be at a time we least expect. He told a story to encourage his followers to be ready, prepared, realistic and wise so that we may not be fooled or taken by surprise. Now is the time to wake from sleep. Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light. So be careful how you live. Don’t be foolish. Be wise, and make the most of every opportunity. Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light. Wisdom shines with an unfading light, those who love wisdom, will see her, those who seek wisdom will find her. Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light. What I say to you, I say to all:
Keep awake! Amen
Eternal God,
your love’s tremendous glory
cascades through life
in overflowing grace,
to tell creation’s
meaning in the story
of love evolving
love from time and space.
2 Eternal Son of God,
uniquely precious,
in you, deserted,
scorned and crucified,
God’s love has fathomed
sin and death’s deep darkness,
and flawed humanity is glorified.
3 Eternal Spirit,
with us like a mother,
embracing us
in love serene and pure:
You nurture strength
to follow Christ our brother,
as full-grown children,
confident and sure.
4 Love’s trinity,
self-perfect, self-sustaining;
love which commands, enables
and obeys:
You give yourself,
in boundless joy, creating
one vast increasing
harmony of praise.
5 We ask you now, complete your image in us;
this love of yours, our source and guide and goal.
May love in us, seek love and serve love’s purpose,
till we ascend with Christ and find love whole.
Prayers of Adoration and Approach
At the beginning of another week,
with many distractions and demands on our attention,
we wait in quietness:
thinking of those whose lives are hard,
who long for justice, for help, and for your salvation,
we wait in hope:
thinking of those who live only for themselves
and forget the needs of others,
we wait with impatience:
thirsty for wisdom, hungry for righteousness,
glad to be gathered with your people,
we wait with joyful expectation:
we wait for you, O God. Amen.
Prayers of Confession & Assurance of Pardon
Wisdom begins with respect for the Lord,
and understanding begins with knowing the Holy One.
God our Father,
we betray our lack of respect for you in our carelessness,
our thoughtlessness, our selfishness.
We stand before you in sorrow
[Silence]
Lord Jesus Christ,
you call us to follow,
but we are unready and ill-prepared,
we forget our calling and lose our way.
We stand before you in expectation
and wait for your forgiveness.
[Silence]
Give us understanding and turn our hearts towards you.
Holy Spirit of God,
you bring wisdom and understanding
to the hearts and minds of those who seek you.
We stand before you in hope and wait for your forgiveness.
[Silence]
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
To all who turn to him he says:
‘Your sins are forgiven.’
He also says: ‘Follow me.’
Amen.
The Lord’s Prayer
Act of Remembrance
Now, before we start the main service, I am conscious that this is the nearest Sunday to Remembrance Sunday, when we remember the awful costs paid by those in the army, navy, and air force in past wars, not to mention the huge suffering that wars have inflicted on civilians, too. We are hugely conscious that wars and conflicts continue this day still and as we hold two minutes of silence, let us pray to God that humanity will indeed convert swords to ploughshares and the world will live, finally, to live in peace.
TWO MINUTE SILENCE
The Legion Exhortation
They shall grow not old as we that are left grow old
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun, and in the morning,
We will remember them. Lawrence Binyon
The Kohima Epitaph
When you go home tell them of us and say –
For your tomorrow we gave our today.
O let us spread the pollen of peace throughout our land;
let us spread the pollen of peace throughout our land.
Let us spread the pollen of peace, and make old conflict cease,
let us spread the pollen of peace throughout our land.
O Christ has sown the seeds of love,
O Christ has launched the wingèd dove.
Let us make the flower grow and let the people know
that Christ has sown the seeds of love.
O let us spread the pollen of peace…and make all conflict cease…
ReadingAmos 5:18-24
Alas for you who desire the day of the LORD! Why do you want the day of the LORD? It is darkness, not light; as if someone fled from a lion, and was met by a bear; or went into the house and rested a hand against the wall, and was bitten by a snake. Is not the day of the LORD darkness, not light, and gloom with no brightness in it? I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the offerings of well-being of your fatted animals I will not look upon. Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.
Reading St Matthew 25:1-13
Then the kingdom of heaven will be like this. Ten bridesmaids took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. When the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them; but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps. As the bridegroom was delayed, all of them became drowsy and slept. But at midnight there was a shout, ‘Look! Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’ Then all those bridesmaids got up and trimmed their lamps. The foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the wise replied, ‘No! There will not be enough for you and for us; you had better go to the dealers and buy some for yourselves.’ And while they went to buy it, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went with him into the wedding banquet; and the door was shut. Later the other bridesmaids came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ But he replied, ‘Truly I tell you, I do not know you.’ Keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.
Sermon
My daughter used to work as a wedding arranger for a pub venue in Oxford and it was quite fun sitting with her at a relative’s wedding as she critically analysed all the arrangements in the barn venue. In actual fact they generally got good marks from her … apart from the fact that the potatoes at the reception meal running out before they reached our end of the table! Ah well it can’t all be perfect eh?
And it occurs to me sometimes occurs to me that maybe Jesus had a thing about problems with weddings too? Perhaps it started with the one he attended at Cana when all he wanted to do was enjoy the event. Ah but then the wine ran out and his Mum got him roped into sorting the problem?
Spectacularly and wonderfully … oh but such a bind eh?
So, look at his parables on weddings and the first one that springs to my mind is the wonderful openness of inviting ordinary people to the wedding that all the posh folks turned their noses up at…
…ah but then we get the really awkward ending with the chap who turns up without wearing appropriate wedding clothes and gets condemned for it, which seems so unfair! It’s no surprise that I prefer the Luke version of the story!
And today’s parable similarly makes me come down with a bump with this difficult parable at yet another wedding.
Wouldn’t I be SO MUCH happier if the wise bridesmaids offered some of their spare oil and all the bridesmaids went together to accompany the groom?
Well yes, I’m sure we all would be! And yet that is not the text – and as I well remember an eminent theologian saying as a guest lecturer at Cambridge University, “We should on the first pass at exploring Scripture take the text at face value.”
That makes sense as there is always a temptation to launch into efforts to explain away words, sentences and indeed whole chapters just because they make us uncomfortable!
So it’s worth remembering that Matthew is reporting on a story that he says Jesus told and it ill-behoves us to take it too lightly?
So let us start with the story and – as important as anything – the context, which is always worth doing.
Jesus was telling this at a time when his message of grace, salvation and liberation was increasing meeting resistance, rebuttal and rejection. Jesus was increasingly feeling the frustration that many of us feel as we look any the political situation in our own land, not to mention the terrible things that are going on across the world!
People are looking around, expressing discontent, feat and worry and perhaps feeling that nobody is listening to them or understanding their concerns!
So Jesus tells a series of stories – his special parable stories that circle back like a parabola and hit the listener between the eyes – and hands them a series of rather stark warnings about the consequences of NOT listening! Perhaps reminding them them…and us…that perhaps we, too aren’t properly listening?
Which is not dissimilar from the message Amos is offering in his context of 8thCentury BC Israel when he saw people sitting complacently believing that they were the people specially chosen by God and would be looked after no matter what they did?
But through Amos’s eyes, the people and the ruling classes were actually abusing each other, cheating each other and carrying out all sorts of corrupt practices.
So he warned them “Don’t be fooled into thinking that as long as you pay priests to carry out sacrifices in the Temple, that God will be appeased!”
It’s actually a timeless message perhaps for us in the Reformed Tradition who know the Reformation started off with similar concern about the then church practices including the selling of indulgences – very much in the tradition of soulless Temple sacrifices!
But I digress. Amos’ point was that you had to live the faith and carry out God’s ways in your daily life if you wanted God to be pleased with you. Living the faith meant more than lip-service but indeed (in the words later quoted by Martin Luther-King) letting ‘justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.’
And Jesus too lay in the tradition both of Judaism’s roots in living the faith of the God of righteousness and in that of prophetic Judaism – teaching, preaching, telling stories and – yes – warning the folk of the consequences of ignoring the message of the prophets!
And he tells three stories revolving around weddings – of those who are excluded because they either turn down the invitation, turn up half-heartedly or in the case of five of the ten bridesmaids, being unprepared! The context of a wedding would’ve been as familiar to his audience as it is to us – except that of course the way of doing it there would be so very different.
The bridegroom had apparently to go to his future father-in-law’s house to collect his bride before bringing her in triumphal procession to his own home to start the wedding celebrations.
However, there could be delays as the final negotiations about the wedding (maybe details of the dowry or other issues of the settlement) might still need to be concluded? Often this resulted in delays –– so the bridesmaids could well be expected to have had to prepare for a long waiting period.
The audience to Jesus’ story would’ve been well aware of this and you can almost imagine them tut-tutting as they imagined the ‘foolish’ bridesmaids waking up on hearing the excited shout of the groom’s party in the distance – only to gasp in horror on realising they’d virtually run out of oil.
Our instinct as ‘nice Christians’ is to feel pity for the ‘foolish’ ones – but there would’ve been precious little sympathy for them from the original audience.
Hilarious laughter even as they hear of them dashing off to find a shop in the middle of the night!
Consternation even that they were impossibly fortunate enough to find a source of oil at such an unlikely time!
Jesus’ parables often had such inconsistencies! They were meant to be there to suck in the listeners, draw them in ready for the point of the story to arrive and puncture their mood.
And puncture it, it would – for the laughter would be thin as the horror dénouement unrolled – the foolish five arrive eventually but are refused entry!
Despite their begging, despite their pitiful please of “Lord, lord, open to us,” they are too late. And suddenly, the audience realises that they, who all along had identified with the wise bridesmaids all those who had laughed at the misfortune of those who had failed to plan in advance are themselves rather the target are actually meant to be represented by the foolish bridesmaids!
Can you see what I meant when I talked of these stories travelling parabolically back and striking the listener? Can’t you imagine the indrawn breathe as they hear the words of warning to them – to the audience members to, “Keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour!” And they realise that the warning lays at their feet and not at others’?
But that is the nature of parables – they hit those who don’t expect to be hit. They identify with the prodigal’s older brother – only to discover he is ultimately the bigger sinner. They hear the story of the man mugged on the Jericho road – only to find their neighbour is a hated Samaritan. They identify with the the vineyard’s landlord – subsequently to find they are accused of being the dastardly tenants! That is what the parables do. That is what they are meant to do!
And friends, they do it still. We hear the familiar story that we know oh so well. We know before the reader has finished the fate of the foolish five. And then some sneaky preacher has the temerity to suggest that maybe we have something to learn from the story today! How very dare he!
And yet I ask the question, are we prepared? Have we sorted ourselves? Are we ready should the bridegroom come – as surely we do believe most heartily he will?
Are we perhaps focusing on the wise five and perhaps remembering that of course they too made errors. They too fell asleep without extinguishing their lights to save oil? They were wiser but they too made a mistake! And yet they were admitted. And we look at our lives and our living and we are reassured that we are OK because we will be forgiven, we have been forgiven.
But I ask again, are we prepared? Do we face every day as if it potentially were our last? And I don’t just mean do we have a list of preferred readings and hymns ready for our funeral ? (Though folks, if I may add here that is an absolutely excellent thing to do. The number of times I have conducted funerals for a dear church member whose family have been left in the awkward situation of having not a clue what their Mum or Dad wanted. It’s almost as if we sometimes live in a state of denial about our mortality. And if you think I’m only talking to the older of you, let me tell you that my hymns and readings are together with my will. On that front at least I am prepared!)
But there is more preparation that is, I think, called for by today’s readings. We are being asked if we so order our lives as the story suggests we should – i.e. do we stay awake?
Do we live our lives constantly aware of the consequences of our actions?
From consideration of fairly-traded rather than cheaper, less ethically-sourced goods, to the way we vote in the election – based not upon what is good for us, but what is good for others, the nation and the world? Do our daily actions and thoughts lead from a desire to simply get by as best we can, or are they inspired by a desire to “let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream?”
I don’t know about you but I read this story and I wonder if I am anything like as prepared as I really ought to be? I wonder if perchance that’s yet another reason why I was uncomfortable with this passage? Was it something about the call to be wise as well as one to be prepared?
For take note – this text does not differentiate between bad and good bridesmaids. Rather it is between the wise and the foolish! And it is worth knowing that those clever people who understand Hebrew tell us that the root word translated as wisdom – hokmah – actually also means ‘skill’ or ‘care’ and implies an ability or ‘skill in living.’
So the wise way, often referred to as the narrow way, is to stay awake, to be prepared and to be so skilled in living that you live it God’s way. Not as a means for entry to heaven – to interpret this text so simplistically I think would be a mistake.
But the call of this text is to so order our lives and our living that as God looks about our world and our worship, far from despising our solemn assemblies and festivals, he looks on it and us as first he did on this wonderful creation and, seeing it, sees it as good and us as ones he would wish to include in his company. Let’s do our best to stay awake eh? Amen
Now I mentioned the wedding went to earlier in the year and running out of potatoes, which prompted me to do what I often do, which is to write short, humorous poems. When I was at theological college, one of my fellow students berated me for wasting my talent by being silly and told me I should write a hymn instead. I did so and she put it to music, which is our next hymn:
Eleven frightened men locked in a room,
their Master dead and buried in a tomb.
Their Lord betrayed, denied, they feel misled;
their dreams of triumph, with Messiah, dead,
not knowing that the stone is rolled away.
And if the stone had not been rolled away
And if the ‘gardener’ hadn’t turned to say, “Mary.” The Resurrected One God’s One and Only Son. And if those men retold their tale today, would we believe the stone is rolled away?
2. Three women who had seen the sacrifice
go to anoint his body with their spice.
Oh, see them grieving, weeping at their loss.
No triumph, just a death upon the Cross.
Not knowing that the stone is rolled away.
And if the stone had not been rolled away And if the ‘gardener’ hadn’t turned to say, “Mary.” The Resurrected One God’s One and Only Son. And if those women told their tale today, Would we believe the stone is rolled away?
3. A world of fearful people who have heard,
but not believed, nor understood the Word.
A world in painful bondage, needing peace –
the triumph, glory, wonder of release
in knowing that the stone is rolled away.
For we know now the stone is rolled away. We know the ‘gardener’ too who turned to say, “Mary.” The Resurrected One God’s One and Only Son He calls on every one of us today, to tell the world the stone is rolled away.
Offertory
Loving God, we bring these our gifts in thanksgiving
for all that you have given us –
asking that we may be servants of others
and witnesses to your love.
In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen
Prayers of Intercession
Blessed are you, Lord our God, Master of the universe,
who gave the heart understanding to distinguish between day and night.
We pray today for the Church of God,
sharing our regret that you called us to be one
and yet we have often disagreed, conflicted and insisted
that our way of being your Church is the only one!
We give thanks that we work so much better together ecumenically
and we pray for those involved in Churches Together
and interfaith working.
SILENCE
Keep us attentive and alert;
ready to make the most of every opportunity to grow in faith,
to share the hope we find in you
and to witness to your love in acts of kindness and hospitality.
Blessed are you, Lord our God, Master of the universe,
who gave the heart understanding to distinguish between day and night.
We pray for the wonder of God’s creation
and share our regret that we have mistreated it
and caused global problems.
We pray for initiatives to make the world more sustainable.
We also pray for places across the globe
where injustice, oppression and war make life intolerable,
unsafe and miserable.
We pray for tolerance, fairness and peace.
SILENCE
Give us wisdom to seek you,
and courage to work for the coming of your kingdom,
when justice will roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.
Blessed are you, Lord our God, Master of the universe,
who gave the heart understanding to distinguish between day and night.
We pray this day for our national governments and also,
closer to us the communities we each live in,
praying for local elected and community leaders
as they seek to make the places we call home
safe, efficient and supportive.
SILENCE
May we encourage one another with life-giving words of hope,
and put into action the words that reflect our readiness to serve you,
and one another, in love.
Blessed are you, Lord our God, Master of the universe,
who gave the heart understanding to distinguish between day and night.
We pray for those in need.
SILENCE
Lord, we know that you rejoice with those who celebrate
and also share the grief of those
who are sorrowing, homeless, hungry or in need of support.
We pray for those working as volunteers for foodbanks,
debt counselling in Citizens Advice or other voluntary organisations.
Make us attentive to the needs of those around us,
and attentive to your word of life.
At this time of Remembrance,
we pray for those who have lost loved ones in wars
and for peace for those who died in conflict
Blessed are you, Lord our God, Master of the universe,
who gave the heart understanding to distinguish between day and night.
We pray as we look forward in hope.
SILENCE
We remember with thanksgiving those who have died,
especially those known to us,
those remembering the anniversary of a loved one,
those both facing illness and death
and those caring for them and sharing the pain.
Teach us to number our days
and give us patience to wait with your creation,
in eager expectation for the glory that will be revealed.
Blessed are you, Lord our God, Master of the universe,
who gave the heart understanding to distinguish between day and night. We bring our prayers together in the name and presence of our Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.
Come with me, come wander,
come welcome the world
where strangers might smile
or where stones may be hurled;
come leave what you cling to,
lay down what you clutch
and find, with hands empty,
that hearts can hold much.
Sing hey for the carpenter leaving his tools! Sing hey for the pharisees leaving their rules! Sing hey for the fishermen leaving their nets! Sing hey for the people who leave their regrets!
2 Come walk in my company,
come sleep by my side,
come savour a lifestyle
with nothing to hide;
come sit at my table
and eat with my friends,
discovering that love
which the world never ends.
3 Come share in my laughter,
come close to my fears,
come find yourself
washed with the kiss of my tears;
come stand close at hand
while I suffer and die
and find in three days
how I never will lie.
4 Come leave your possessions, come share out your treasure,
come give and receive without method or measure;
come loose every bond that’s resisting the Spirit,
enabling the earth to be yours to inherit.
Blessing
Lead us, Lord from death to life, from falsehood to truth.
Lead us, Lord from despair to hope, from fear to trust.
Lead us from hate to love, from war to peace.
Let peace fill our hearts, our world, our universe.
And the blessing of God,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit
be upon us and remain with us always.
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