October 20, 2024

Worship Resources for
the Center for Faith and Giving

Pentecost +22

Job 38:1-7, (34-41) 

 Psalm 104:1-9, 24, 35c 

Hebrews 4:14-16

Mark 10:35-45

Call to Worship (inspired by Ps. 104)
 
One:  We gather today to bless the Lord, for God is great.
Many:  We look at the beauty around us — the earth on its foundations,
           the heavens stretched out like a tent, colors blazing from the trees.  
One: Our God continues to create, filling the earth with God’s own creatures.
Many:  Praise the Lord!
One:  And bless God’s holy name.
Many:  With open minds and loving hearts,
             we come to worship the Lord our God.

(If you want a choral call to worship, consider singing/sharing Matt Redman’s 10,000 Reasons.)

Opening Prayer 

Creator of all life, we’re surrounded by your good gifts of earth and sky. 
Thank you for all you provide:  air, water, land.
Thank you most of all for the gifts of your love,

your yearning for peace,
  and the opportunities we have to respond by sharing what we’ve received.
In this hour help convict us, in love, to offer help to neighbors who struggle for adequate food, shelter and safety.  AMEN

Moment for Stewardship

There is a certain amount of pleasure in reading the Gospel stories about ways the disciples acted with one another, seeking to gain power, prestige or position from Jesus.  Mark 10 describes James and John (often remembered as brothers known as “sons of thunder”) asking to sit on either side of Jesus in his glory.

Jesus reiterates what lies ahead for the disciples, then reminds the whole group “whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant.” When we commit ourselves to following Jesus, we take on the identity of servants, remembering Jesus came “not to be served but to serve.”

How are we servants in 2024? 

By sharing what we have,
    providing for “the least” among us,
    using whatever power, prestige or position we may have
       to lift up those who are in need.

Today, you’re invited to bring your gifts, your tithes and your offerings as signs of your intention to truly follow Jesus, who gave his life as a ransom for many.

Let us offer our gifts and our lives as servants of Jesus, the Christ.

(Offertory music might be CH #490 “Sister, Let Me Be Your Servant”)


Prayer of Thanksgiving

With grateful hearts we bring you these gifts,
       God of all life.  
Transform them and transform US,
into outpourings of peace, justice,
       and care for all your creation.  AMEN

Invitation to Communion

In his book Re/Membering, Joey Jeter writes of a Scottish pastor, Richard Waterson, who told the story of the city of Rotterdam, under attack by the Duke of Galva, centuries ago.

Many people in the city barricaded their homes and fought to the death when the soldiers broke in.

In one house, however, the people killed a goat, splashed the door and entry with its blood and left their door wide open.

Hiding upstairs, they waited to see what happened.  The troops of the Duke decided that house surely showed signs of a complete massacre, and they passed by.

This Passover motif managed, just as it did in the Biblical story, to protect people from the evil at their door.

Communion is not a shot-glass filled with vaccine, to protect us from evil, but it helps us see evil for what it really is: “powerful enough to kill the beloved Jesus, but not strong enough to overcome the resurrecting power of God.”

Christ, our Passover lamb, invites you to share in this feast!
    (Re-Membering, #61, p. 73)