NEWCASTLE UNITED CHURCHSeptember 20, 2020 10:30 a.m.

The Season of Pentecost“As followers of Christ, we are called to be a worshipping and learning, receiving and giving

community of faith, hope and love.” – Newcastle United Church Mission Statement

Surely God is in this place. Help me notice.We Approach God

Lighting The Christ Candle

A Time of Centring – “Take, O Take Me As I Am” MV # 85(Words and music Copyright 1995 WGRG, Iona Community, Scotland)

Take, O take me as I am; summon out what I shall be; set your seal upon my heart and live in me. (sung through twice)

Call to Worship (Responsive)

People of God, come. Turn your sense to what God has placed around you.We notice God wherever we turn: in the world and people around us.We gather to praise God for what we have received.Every day we realize anew, all that our caring God has provided.Come with praise on your lips and in your hearts… Come!

Hymn of Praise “Morning Has Broken” # 409

Morning has broken like the first morning, blackbird has spoken like the first bird.Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning!Praise for them, springing fresh from the Word!Sweet the rain’s new fall sunlit from heaven, like the first dew fall on the first grass.Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden, sprung in completeness where God’s feet pass.Ours is the sunlight! Our is the morning born of the one light Eden saw play!Praise with elation, praise every morning, God’s recreation of the new day!

Below is the service I have created for this Sunday. I hope this is something you can use for personal/family worship. We are all worshiping together, no matter where we are. If you are joining us online this week then please have this resource with you so you have the words

to the responses and hymns at your fingertips in case you can’t see the screen.Rev. Mary-Jane

The words provided for the hymns are done with permission under One License # A-727596.

2

Prayer of Approach (Unison)

God of all creation, may we always look for your presence. May we seek you in the ordinary, not just the extraordinary. You love us with an everlasting and steadfast love. May we love you in return. Amen.

We Hear God’s WordHymn “Would You Bless Our Homes and Families” # 556(Words copyright 1977 Walter Farquharson. Music copyright 1977 Ron Klusmeier.)

Would you bless our homes and families, Source of life who calls us here; in our world of stress and tension teach us love that conquers fear.Help us learn to love each other with a love that constant says; teach us when we face our troubles, love’s expressed in many ways.When our way is undemanding, let us use the time that’s ours to delight in simple pleasures, sharing joys in gentle hours.When our way is anxious walking and a heavy path we plod, teach us trust in one another and in you, our gracious God.From the homes in which we’re nurtured, with the love that shapes us there, teach us, God, to claim as family every one whose life we share.And through all that life may offer, may we in your love remain; may the love we share in families be alive to praise you name.Let us reach beyond the boundaries of our daily thought and care till the family you have chosen spills its love out everywhere.Help us learn to love each other with a love that constant says; teach us when we face our troubles love’s expressed in many ways.

A Time To Be ChildrenDo you like to eat? What’s your favorite thing to eat? What if every morning you could open

the front door and walk out into the yard and pick up your favorite food? You could pick up as much as you could eat! That would be great, wouldn't it?

3

We read in the Bible about a time when something almost exactly like that happened. The Israelites have left slavery in Egypt, they have crossed the Red Sea and gotten away from Pharaoh. After they had been wandering around in the desert for some time, the people started to grumble and complain against their leaders, Moses and his brother, Aaron. They said things like: "We had it better when we were in Egypt." and "At least we had plenty to eat.” They asked why God had

brought them out of Egypt is it was just to come to the desert to have them starve to death.God heard the people complaining and told Moses that in the evening birds called quail

would come and cover the camp so that the people would have meat to eat. Not only that, but in the morning, after the dew was gone, there would be manna on the ground for everyone to eat. All they had to do was go out, pick it up, and eat it.

Why do you think God would do this for those grumblers and complainers? God did it so the people would know that God loved them and would take care of them. God hadn't brought them out of Egypt to let them starve in the desert! God was going to see to it that they made it to the Promised Land.

Sometimes you and I grumble and complain, don't we? When do you complain? We forget that God loves us and provides us with everything that we need. Instead of grumbling and complaining, we can say, "Thank You, God" and let’s do that right now! In fact, if ‘Thank you’ is all you say in a prayer, it is enough. We just need to say it.

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 that 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.

Exodus 16:2-15 Food from heaven.

Psalm 105:1-6, 37-45 Make known what God has done. VU # 828 Parts 1 & 4

Sung Response: Bless God, my soul. Hallelujah!

Give thanks and call on God’s name.Make known to the nations what God has done.

Sing, O sing the songs of praise; tell of all God’s wonderful deeds.

Exult in God’s holy name; let those who seek God be joyful in heart. R

Turn for help to the One who is your strength; seek God’s presence continually.

Remember the marvels the Most High has done, the wonders and judgements God has given,

O children of Abraham and Sarah, God’s servants, O offspring of Israel, chosen of God. R

4

You are the eternal God, your justice reaches every corner of the earth.

You are ever mindful of your covenant, the promise you gave to a thousand generations,

the covenant you made with Sarah and Abraham, the oath you gave to Isaac.

You confirmed it for Jacob as binding.To Israel your everlasting covenant you declared,

“To you I give the land of Canaan, as your appointed inheritance.” R

You led Israel out, with spoil of silver and gold.Among the tribes not one fell behind.

The Egyptians were glad when they went, for dread of Israel had fallen upon them.

You spread cloud as a screen, and fire as light by night.

The people asked, and you sent them quail; you filled them with bread from heaven.

You opened a rock and water gushed out: It flowed like a river through the arid land. R

For you remember the sacred promise you made to Abraham and Sarah, your servants.

You led out your people rejoicing, your chosen ones with songs of gladness.

You gave them the lands of nations; they took possession where others had toiled, that they might keep your laws and obey your teachings. R

Matthew 20:1-16 What is a fair wage?This is the Word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

Hymn “Bless Now, O God, The Journey” # 633(words copyright 1994 by GIA Publications, Inc.)

Bless now, O God, the journey that all your people make, the path through noise and silence, the way of give and take. The trail is found in desert and winds the mountains round, then leads beside still waters, the road where faith is found. Bless sojourners and pilgrims who share the winding way, whose hope burns through the terrors, whose love sustains the day.We yearn for holy freedom while often we are bound.Together we are seeking the road where faith is found.Divine Eternal Lover, you meet us on the road.We wait for lands of promise where milk and honey flow.

5

But waiting not for places, you meet us all around.Our covenant is written on roads, as faith is found.

Message

Did you know that there is an interest in a detailed description of the manna because it corresponds quite closely to a natural phenomenon in the Sinai Peninsula? A type of plant lice punctures the fruit of the tamarisk tree and excretes a substance from this juice, a yellowish-white flake or ball. During the warmth of the day it disintegrates, but it congeals when it is cold, such as in the cool of morning. It has a sweet taste. Rich in carbohydrates and sugar, it is still gathered by natives, who bake it into a kind of bread (and call it manna). The food decays quickly and

attracts ants. And regarding the quails, migratory birds flying in from Africa or blown in from the Mediterranean are often exhausted enough to be caught by hand.

When I was about 19, I attended a national youth and young adult conference. When I returned home my minister thought it would be great for people to hear what we young people in the church talked about and did when we got together. He asked me to preach after my return. I believe he was expecting a nice little play-by-play or simple information session on what our church youth do when 5 or 6 hundred of us get together. Instead he got a full-fledged sermon, my first.

My topic was what miracles really are. You see we had spent our week talking about just that sort of thing and I thought it needed to be shared. I proceeded to, among other things, tell everyone how the parting of the Red Sea was not really a miracle as we see it, and that the manna and quail were not a miracle as we usually think of it, and so forth. I wasn’t just trying to shock everyone; I had been struggling with this for more than just a week at the conference. I told them what I just told you. That, in actual fact, the whole manna and quail story had scientific or natural explanations. I also told them how the Red Sea is apparently quite reedy at the top and can be traversed by people on foot and with ox-carts and the like, but the speedy chariot would get bogged down.

So, I with a congregation once again, tell you that those miracles really were not great miracles as we have always thought of them. So... Where does that leave us as we consider this week’s reading from Exodus and try to find something in this story to take with us into our lives this week?

So often we look to the miraculous in the biblical stories to find God’s presence. We look to the miraculous and extraordinary to reassure us that God does enter our lives and will be there for us. But when we take the miraculous out of the story, what is left? For me, since I was that searching 19 year old, when you take out the extraordinary or miraculous part, you are left with a different miracle which assures you that God does indeed take an interest and active part in our lives.

For me, the miracle is that God placed the Hebrew people in the right place at the Red Sea at the right time so that they would be able to get across, while Pharaoh’s chariots could not.

For me, the miracle is that when the food ran out, God placed the Hebrew people in the right place to find manna and quail. It doesn’t diminish the power of God’s presence; it simply makes it more real.

For me, it is more reassuring to know that God is in the everyday experiences we have than only in the miracles we hear of, because frankly, those miracles never seem to happen to me.

6

Israel’s situation is not unlike a community of faith whose understanding of “act of God” has been largely determined by their insurance policies. The connections of God with daily affairs have, for all practical purposes, disappeared. The resolution is not to stress the extraordinary acts of God one more time but to keep God linked with everyday blessings. And, as with Israel in this text, it will be in discerning the presence of God in connection with daily needs that they will be able to return once again to the confession: Yes, we now know, Yahweh is the one who brought us out of Egypt; Yahweh is God indeed.

Gifts of God’s good creation are placed at Israel’s disposal; but what they do with the gift is not an insignificant matter. The issue is the relationship of food and faith. This story’s focus has to do with a food crisis, which leads to a faith crisis. The lack of discernment of God’s presence in the ordinary leads to a denial of God’s activity in the extraordinary.

You see, if the provisions of God in the wilderness are all placed under the extraordinary or miraculous, then the people of God will tend to look for God’s providential care only in that which

falls outside the ordinary. When the miraculous can no longer be discerned in one’s life, there will be a profound experience of the absence of God altogether.

The text shows how grace must shape the lives of the people of God. This point is made through the addition of specific instructions about when the manna must be collected and eaten, and it is the instructions which become the test for Israel. The central instruction is that the manna cannot be stored or saved up, but must be received anew every morning. This instruction raises the question of whether Israel will have the faith to live solely by the gift of God’s grace from heaven – which will mean taking only as much food as they need each day – or will they try to horde the manna.

Sacramental grace is not a stockpiling of spiritual armaments; it is an expression of trust in a God who will not fail us in the hour of trial. Not even

God’s miraculous gifts may be taken for granted, but are to be used in the manner and for the purpose for which they are intended. But with gifts come responsibilities. And God has a stake in the way people carry out those responsibilities, for the use to which gifts are put affect the fabric of the new creation in positive or negative ways. The gathering of provisions for only one day at a time becomes learning to rely on God for one’s daily needs.

This passage also begins with the reminder of sabbath and rest. A time for rest, but not at the expense of daily needs. A double provision is to be gathered on the day before sabbath, so that daily needs are given attention. So we discover that worship has to do with all of life. The worship life of the people of God is not simply to focus on the dramatic acts of God but also to provide remembrances of how the seemingly little things in their daily lives are undergirded by the sustaining care of God. If this is not done, physical crises of one kind or another may lead into unbelief.

Many sermons based on this lesson begin by saying something about the foolish, untrusting Israelites. Only one month out of Egypt and they complain – again! Let’s get one thing clear up front. This is not just a story about simple hunger on a simply journey. We all know what that’s like. You’re on your summer holiday, heading to the beach. You’ve been in the car since dawn and around noon the kids start saying, “I’m starving. When are we going to eat?”

This is deeper hunger. The Israelites had been in the desert for a month. Unless we’ve been in the desert it is hard to imagine how desolate deserts can be. The kids cry for food and you can offer them nothing. You mind wanders back to Egypt.

If you know what it means to be tired and weary and hunger for God, then this text must sound very familiar. The desert can take many forms.

7

A person addicted to alcohol discovers God and decides to quit drinking. But it’s hard. It hurts. You want to turn back to the bottle. It was easier being numb to the world. It’s hard to survive in this wilderness of responsibility and pressure and temptation, without a drink.

A battered wife leaves her husband and home in search of safety. It’s fine for a few days, and her bruises start to heal. Then she faces pressures, a wilderness of finding shelter, a job, and providing for herself. She thinks she needs to go back to the man who beat her, even though it was so painful.

Perhaps it will help us to know that God is in our deserts to bless us, to promise us the bread from heaven, manna from above, offering us the strength to continue our journey through our wilderness.

The manna and the quails provided for the hungry people are natural phenomena of the wilderness viewed as extraordinary grace. For a hungry people, bread and meat from any source is a gift of grace.

For we hungry people, grace, abundant grace, is offered anew each day, we need only to seize it in our small, everyday blessings and say thank you.

We Respond To God’s WordOffering InvitationEvery day is a new beginning. Every day is another gift from God. God gives us life in abundance. In gratitude we share what we have for the work of God in our church and our community…The Offertory (over)

We praise you, O God, our Redeemer, Creator;in grateful devotion our tribute we bring.

We lay it before you; we kneel and adore you;we bless your holy name, glad praises we sing. (#218 v. 1)

Dedication Prayer (Unison)Creator God, in love you have given us these gifts to share. Please accept these offerings of who we are and what we have. May your blessing multiply the work they do. Amen.

Prayers of the People We delight, most loving God, in your continued presence. You are there in every stimulating advance we make. Where we take a wrong turn and end up in a maze of contemporary doubts and anxieties, you are there to lead us through. If we become disheartened by the ability of evil to adopt new forms and corrupt new achievements, you speak with us. When we are disgusted with our own folly and sin, you forgive us and lift us up. Whenever we are confused by the tough ethical decisions to be made by a citizen of this twenty first century, you are with us. We delight, most loving God, in all that you were, all that you are and all that you will continue to be.Holy Friend, you are the hope of all who call upon your name, teach us to pray with our hearts as well as with our lips, with our actions as well as our thoughts.First we pray for our family members and dear friends, who are extra special to us. Bless those who are doing it tough: The unemployed or work-weary, handicapped or enduring pain, those trying to break a drug habit, coping with mental illness, or facing a slow death, and especially those who have no faith to guide and encourage them.

8

Bless those who have big decisions to make: Whether to have surgery or not, or to change jobs, or return to study and retrain, or shift house, or to stay in a difficult marriage, move across the country or overseas, or to take legal action against an injustice.Bless those who are enjoying life: The happily married, those expecting a new baby, the ones who are successful in sport, those promoted at work, the ones who are newly in love, those who have a secure and growing faith, any who celebrate a birthday or anniversary. 

And now we pray for those outside the circle of our loved ones. For neighbours and work colleagues, strangers in the street, our enemies and the host of people who are only faces and names in news programmes.Bless them according to their respective needs we pray. Everything we ask for our loved ones we also ask for them.Bless those who are doing it tough. Bless those who are facing difficult decisions. Bless those whose who are enjoying life.Bless those who are trying to be reconciling agents wherever violence, war or terrorism is happening. Be with the victims of violence and war, those soldiers forced to fight against their better judgment, civilians losing home, limbs or life, and the host of young orphans. For every human being we seek the guiding, nurturing, inspiring friendship of the Holy Spirit, the redeeming, challenging, healing love of Christ Jesus, and the undergirding, enfolding, ever-enduring love of God.Hear the prayers which lie deep in our hearts….To you be given all trust and thanksgiving, love and praise, today and forever. Amen.   (inspired by and adapted from Bruce Prewer and used with permission.)

Closing Hymn “Lead On, O Cloud Of Presence” # 421(Words copyright 1992 GIA Publications Inc.)

Lead on, O cloud of Presence, the exodus is come.In wilderness and desert our tribe shall make its home.Our slavery left behind us, new hopes within us grow.We seek the land of promise where milk and honey flow.Lead on, O fiery Pillar, we follow yet with fears, but we shall come rejoicing though joy be born of tears.We are not lost, though wandering, for by your light we come, and we are still God’s people. The journey is our home.

Lead on, O God of freedom, and guide us on our way, and help us trust the promise through struggle and delay.We pray our sons and daughters may journey to that land where justice dwells with mercy, and love is law’s demand.

Commissioning and Benediction

Let thanksgiving enhance the joys you experience, let thanksgiving transcend the pains you may suffer, let thanksgiving sweeten the duties you must perform, let thanksgiving underpin even the griefs you may have to endure.

9

And may the grace of Christ attend you, the love of God surround you, and the Holy Spirit keep each one of you, now and always. Amen.

Sung Blessing “Go Now In Peace” (Copyright 1988 by Harold Flammer Music, a Division of Shawnee Press, Inc.)

Go now in peace. Never be afraid.God will go with you each hour of every day. Go now in faith, steadfast, strong and true.Know God will guide you in all you do.Go now in love, and show you believe.Reach out to others so all the world can see.God will be there watching from above.Go now in peace, in faith, and in love.

And online we end together (wait for folks to get their mics unmuted) And the people say:

Hallelujah and Amen!

Cheese Campaign - the Stewards offer this fundraiser from now until September 20th. The cheese is from Empire Cheese & Co-op in Campbellford. Please contact Janet O’Neill at janetloneill@hotmail.com for an order form; if you’re a “regular”, please contact her with your order or copies of the order form can be picked up from the wood receptacle in the Emily Street entrance. Cheese will be delivered September 30, in time for Thanksgiving. Thank you!

Coming SoonThe Project Finance Committee is working to provide an opportunity for you to purchase a Harvest Basket of fresh local fall vegetables. Watch for more information.

Our church now has a YouTube channel. We have posted a short welcome video and are now uploading worship each Sunday afternoon. We now have Music to Wash Dishes By videos as well. Please head over and click the subscribe button. Subscribing is free. You may not ultimately want to worship that way, but once we have 100 subscribers we will be able to have a dedicated link with our name in it and we will be easier to find. We are just

10

getting started, but it is a new opportunity for us to reach one another and so much more. It doesn’t just have to be about worship. Tell your friends about it and get them to subscribe as well. It will be like inviting them to church. If you want more information or assistance in subscribing please contact Rev. Mary-Jane and she can help (905-244-8453). For now, here is the link - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpPUnPABHPlOJzAJ7uXvHoA

Music to Wash Dishes By is now posted on our YouTube channel. One click and no password needed. We are now recording in the sanctuary.

From the Stewards:Church envelope donations are down 11.85% from this time last year and our overdraft ($20,000+) is double from this time last year.

We would ask that During this time, and if you are able, please continue giving your church donations regularly. You can contact

Lorna McSwan, our treasurer, at le.mcswan@bell.net or 905-987-3940. You can arrange to register for Pre-Authorized Remittance (PAR) which can be cancelled at any time.

You can mail your donations to the church at: 84 Mill St. South, Newcastle, ON L1B 1H2. You can donate via CanadaHelps: https://www.canadahelps.org/en/charities/newcastle-unted-church/ through this link or the link on our website: www.newcastleunitedchurch.org “Donate” page, e-transfer: nucetransfer@gmail.com. Post-dated cheques are yet another option.

Thank you for considering these options. While we may not be gathering together, our expenses need to be met.

Thank you to all who continue to send in their church givings – we very much appreciate it.

11

Newcastle United Church