| New Book now Available Here is an anthology of over 1100 brief prayers and thought-starters, for each day of the year, with almost 400 original prayers by Bruce Prewer. Included is both a subject index and an index of authors-- an ecumenical collection of about 300 different sources. |
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| Title: Brief Prayers for Busy People. Author: Bruce D Prewer ISBN 978-1-62880-090-6 Available from Australian Church Resources, web site www.acresources.com.au email service@acresources.com.au or by order from your local book shop or online on amazon. |
Year C, SUNDAY 20
14-20 August
Luke 12: 49-56
(Sermon
1: “Double Trouble.”)
Hebrews 11: 29 to 12:2
( Sermon Cloud of
Witnesses”)
Isaiah 5: 1-7
Psalm 80: 1-2 & 8-19
PREPARATION
Grace mercy and peace, from God our Friend and from
Jesus our Brother, be with you all.
And also with you.
I urge you, my friends, by the generosity of God, to
present your whole bodies, as a living sacrifice, dedicated, and acceptable to
God, which is a very reasonable kind of worship.
The love of
Christ inspires us to give thanks and praise and honour and glory!
OR—
Turn your ear to us, great Shepherd of people,
you who lead the church like a
flock.
You who are enthroned among heavenly beings,
shine upon every church
congregation.
Stir us up with your unique glory
and come to liberate and heal
us all.
Let the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
the love of God,
and the fellowship of the Holy
Spirit,
shine upon us all today.
PRAYER OF APPROACH
Most loving God, help us to centre our lives on your
awesome light and love, that we may recover, or maybe even discover in a new
way, that ennobling awe and worship which can hallow all our years.
May we become more true than we have been, and offer
you more than we thought possible,
with a liberty of spirit which
makes praise as natural as dancing for joy. Let this hour colonise all the
hours of this week. To your glory.
Amen!
CONFESSION AND ASSURANCE
We have all done wrong, wilfully or clumsily, aware
or unaware. Let us turn to the therapy of confession and forgiveness.
Let us pray.
God our Saviour, we humbly seek catharsis in the
presence of your saving grace.
If we have shrugged off our vows to you and rushed
headlong into temptations we could not safely deal with, have pity on us.
Please
forgive, purge, and rehabilitate us, loving God.
If we have slid slowly into an
apathy towards loving our God with all our being and loving our
neighbour as ourselves, have pity on us.
Please
forgive, purge, and rehabilitate us, loving God.
If we have received blessings with scant gratitude,
begrudged calls on our time and energy, and faced new opportunities with a sour
face, have pity on us.
Please
forgive, purge, and rehabilitate us, loving God.
If we have tried to hide behind excuses, or
attempted to dignify half-hearted efforts with pious self-justifications, have
pity on us.
Please
forgive, purge and rehabilitate us, loving God.
God our holy Friend, we put ourselves in your hands.
Those hands can be most gentle, as when you forgive us and smooth away our
frustration. But your hands can also be very firm, disciplining our delinquent
ways. Quietly we ask you do whatever is best for us. May we receive your mercy
without doubting and accept discipline without grumbling. Through Christ Jesus our
Redeemer.
Amen!
FORGIVENESS IS DECLARED
It is written: “If we come clean about our sins, God
is true and more than fair, forgiving our sins and cleansing us from all evil.”
In the name of Christ Jesus, I assure you that our sins are remarkably and
completely forgiven.
Thanks be to God.
PRAYER FOR CHILDREN
It’s
Hard to Stand Alone
Do you know, God,
how much we want others to like us?
Do you know,
how hard it is to stand alone
while others giggle at us or jeer?
If you do,
then please help us, help us a lot,
to be brave and tough like Jesus
and to do the right thing
even when it’s not popular.
Amen!
PSALM 80:1-2 & 8-19
Turn your ear to us, great Shepherd of people,
you who lead the church like a
flock.
You who are enthroned among heavenly beings,
please shine upon every
congregation.
Stir us up with your startling energy
and come to liberate and heal
us all.
Restore us,
God of countless hosts.
Let your face
shine, that we may be saved.
You brought the church like a vine out of alien
soil,
cleared away the weeds and planted
it.
You dug the soil thoroughly to receive it
and it took deep root and
spread everywhere.
Restore us,
God of countless hosts.
Let your face
shine, that we may be saved.
Once the mountains were covered with its shade
and the forests sheltered under
its branches.
Some branches reached the distant seas
and its shoots grew along wide
rivers.
Restore us,
God of countless hosts.
Let your face shine,
that we may be saved.
Why are we now being broken down by the world,
and strangers pick our fruits
without asking about You?
Like a wild boar, the secular world ravages our
ranks,
and the press feeds on our
every mistake.
Restore us,
God of countless hosts.
Let your face
shine, that we may be saved.
Turn things round again, God of countless hosts!
Look around and see what’s
going on.
Have regard for this wilting vine
which you planted with your own
wounded hands.
Restore us,
God of countless hosts.
Let your face
shine, that we may be saved.
Let your blessing be upon your chosen Son,
the son of man to whom you give
your own strength.
Then we will never grow away from you;
give us new life and we will
praise your name.
Restore us,
God of countless hosts.
Let your face
shine, that we may be saved.
POEM: HE BRINGS FIRE
He brings fire
for forging;
the hammer strikes
with skill
but I’m not yet unbent.
He brings fire
for greening;
the new life
covers the bush
but I’m not yet full spent.
He brings fire
for feasting;
with much laughter
on the wind
but I’m not yet content.
© B.D. Prewer 2000
COLLECT
God of Christ Jesus,
you call us out from the cloying comfort of pleasing ourselves, to the
exhilarating adventure of pleasing you, no matter what the cost. Should
division and pain be our lot, let us receive it gracefully, not licking our
wounds or sulkily demanding special favours. May your
holy fire let loose on earth,
inflame us with love both for friend and foe, and purge us from
things that are unfaithful and unloving. Through Christ Jesus
our Saviour.
Amen!
SERMON 1: DOUBLE TROUBLE
Luke 12:49
& 51
I came to cast
fire upon the earth, and I wish it were already ablaze.
Luke
12:49
Do you imagine
that I came to bring peace on earth? No way! I bring division.
Luke 12:
51
The main thrust of these texts is a warning from
Christ that his followers must expect trouble from being loyal to him.
He himself will suffer. He will inevitably pay a
costly price for his beliefs. The shadow of his fate looms over him. He wishes
his bloody baptism into suffering and crucifixion would quickly come.
His disciples will also suffer. Christ’s work is
inflammatory, his work brings division.
Later I will come back to this, but first I want to
enlarge the scope to include the varied disasters that can happen to good
Christians.
A DIALOGUE WITH ROSY
Let me introduce you to Rosy.
There are some rosy Christians who are convinced
that trusting in Christ results in a charmed life. Rosy Christians claim that
believers receive good health, good friends, happy families, popularity and
financial prosperity. They will be spared in drought or flood, protected for
road accidents, and healed from any diseases. Their church, where the full Gospel
is preached, will also be rosy; flourishing and well respected in the
community.
If I try to argue with Rosy, to suggest that this
superficial optimism is not true for all Christians, the conversation goes
something like this:
Rosy: Ah! But
that’s because many so-called Christians are not sincere. Churches have nominal
members, not committed to Christ. They are in it for the wrong reasons. That is
why some do not receive the full blessings of the Lord..
Bruce: “That is misguided. I know very dedicated
Christians, true believers through and through, who have known nothing but a
succession of misfortunes. Some go
bankrupt; some are persecuted. What about those Christians in East Timor who
put their trust in God but were slaughtered in their
church?”
Rosy: Maybe.
But have they prayed enough? If they trusted the Lord and prayed faithfully
every day, then their lives would be one long blessing. Prayer is the key that opens
all doors.
Bruce: I cannot agree with you. There are Christian
people who do pray, daily and earnestly. But things go badly wrong for them.
They get made redundant from work, or a beloved daughter gets pregnant at the
age of fourteen, or old friends turn against them, or their spouse runs off
with a family friend.
Rosy: No.
Something was not right. Maybe they were more superstitious than true believers. Or maybe they just did
not have enough faith. You have to really believe, you know. You must have
complete faith that God will bless you and care for you. Anything is possible
if you have true faith.
Bruce: But I have known people with tremendous
faith. But they were financially ruined when a business partner embezzled the
firm’s funds. Another person contracted cancer yet totally believed that God
would heal them. They had no doubts at all. She was still telling me she
recovering the day she died.
Rosy: But were
they born again Christians? You must be born again. Those who have been born
again will ask Jesus for anything they want and they will receive it My cousin Esme was a born again Christian and she recovered from
cancer.
Bruce: I cannot let you say this stuff. It is not
true. There many most wonderful, born again, faithful, prayerful, true
believers, for whom everything goes wrong.. Marriages
break, or their children turn out badly, or they get blamed for a crime they
did not commit, or their house burns down, or the badly needed rain storm
misses their farm, or they suffer from relentless pain and disease and so on.
Rosy: So you
say. But were they properly baptised? It has to be by immersion you know, none
of that sprinkling. Or maybe they did
not get the second blessing of the Spirit. That could be the reason. God will
not let harm come to those who truly trust him.
What is more--
I just have to say this--
I find you, as a Minister, somewhat..... lacking in faith .
THE FAITH OF THE UNFAITHFUL?
So it goes on . Nothing
will shift this rosy outlook on the fortunes of these who preen themsleves as the “true” Christians.
Yet at the same time as they mouth their optimism,
somewhere in the world devout Christians are dying of starvation, or falling
foul of anti-Christian regimes, or being laid off from work, or seeing their
marriage fall apart, or grieving for a son or daughter who is on drugs, or
dying of disease, or being murdered in some sectarian or racist outrage, or
being maimed on our roads.
As I see it, people who peddle this religious
optimism are no only being grossly unloving but they are being unfaithful to
Christ. Yes, I mean it. Some of those who are loquacious about faith, are in fact peddling a product which does not match
up with Jesus. In a sense they are being ignorantly unfaithful.
Jesus did not offer us a twenty four hour protection
policy, nor a prosperity bargain. Nor a good health
voucher for all predicaments, nor an assured popularity certificate.
I came to cast
fire upon the earth, and I wish it were already ablaze. Luke 12:49
Do you imagine
that I came to bring peace on earth? No way! I bring division. Luke 12: 51
Fire! Division! There is nothing comfortable about
these things!
Jesus on a number of occasions told his followers to
expect big trouble. His way would divide people. His way would inflame people.
His way would result in misunderstanding, unpopularity and maybe persecution.
He chose to describe discipleship in terms of
picking up a cross and following him. He attempted to prepare them for the
troubles that lay ahead.
At first his closest friends, like Peter, did not
want to believe this. They considered such talk to be ill considered. God would
not allow things to go so badly wrong. Only when Jesus came to his cross, and
was not spared any suffering and shame, did they have to face up to the hard truth.
Jesus, the person of supreme faith in a heavenly
Father, died on a cross crying out his desolation to the heavens. A disciple,
then or now, cannot assume that becoming a Christian will ensure a comfortable
life surrounded by peace and prosperity.
I came to cast
fire upon the earth, and I wish it were already ablaze.
Do you imagine
that I came to bring peace on earth? No way! I bring division.
Not for one moment am I suggesting that we should go
looking for trouble. Nor am I approving
that sick form of religion where devotees are regarded as most holy if they
frequently whip their own bodies, starve themselves, live alone in caves, or
deliberately sever themselves from loved ones. Not that.
I am saying that the way of Christ is so contrary to
the ways of this world, that there must at times be conflicts. Fire: It does at times inflame those who
stand against us. Division: It may embroil us in misunderstanding or make us the but of jokes. It may lose us friends. It can, alas, in
some cases cause the break up of marriages.
Christ does not offer us a safety zone against
misunderstanding or conflict. Nor are we hedged against accident or disease.
Nor are we buttressed against poverty or some bloody outrage.
THINGS CAN GET MESSY
Things get messy. As Jesus warned: People in the one house will be divided:
three against two and two against three. Father against son and son against father. Mother against daughter and daughter against mother. Mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against
mother-in-law. It does not get much messier than that!
Sometimes very bad things happen to very good
Christians.
Whether good or evil happens to us in no way
signifies our grasp on faith or lack of it.
The same applies to churches. Whether a parish
church is prosperous or struggling is in no way a reflection of the quality of
Christianity being practised. Whether a denomination is large or small, says
nothing about the standard of belief or practice.
Things are never as neat as the self-righteous
people who are experiencing apparent success would have us believe. And that
applies to the clergy as well as to the congregations to which they pastor.
WHY AM I HET UP?
Why am I feeling particularly worked up about this
theme?
I can identify two personal factors.
1/ During my ministry to seven different parishes,
sometimes my efforts seem to have been rewarded with considerable success:( Have you heard that pernicious phrase: A.B. is a
successful minister?)
At other times I have appeared to have been notably
unsuccessful; a failure even. I know in
my heart of hearts that the difference does not lie with me being more faithful
to Christ in some situations than others.
There is much that I don’t understand about how God works in this world,
but this I know: There is no simple (slick?) law which says-: good faith = good results,
or bad faith = poor results.
2/ Not long ago I was
pastor to a man whose wife was dying of cancer. He is a truly lovely
Christian. Yet the more he prayed, the
more she declined. Some friends
(perhaps they would better be called acquaintances!) from another church kept
on telling him that if he had faith, his wife would recover. They were praying
for healing, he must have similar faith. As she sank closer to death, they
badgered him about needing to repent and be born again. When she died they said
it was his fault; he was a faithless Christian.
That kind of pious cruelty makes me so angry!
It is, as I said earlier, such pious humbug is both
grossly unloving and unfaithful to Christ Jesus.
CROSSES AND THE LOVE OF GOD?
Crosses remain mysteries in a world where the ultimate
power is the love of God. But it is far better to live by faith in the Christ
of the cross, that to go into denial and concoct some God of pretty-pretty
optimism.
The Christ of the Cross is the God who shares
everything that goes wrong in our lives, and who can take all the fire and division, all the disasters and the torn bleeding ends, and work
them all together for good.
That is the bottom line. Our God works all together
for good. God does not send calamity, but for those who maintain their trust,
new patterns of beauty are forged out of the most ugly
circumstances.
SERMON 2:
THE GREAT CLOUD OF WITNESSES.
HEBREWS 12:
1-2
Travel can be an enriching experience.
In younger years, when I was not so reliant on
physical comforts, I with my wife Marie, and two dear friends, camped around
various parts of the
“Old World.”
I recall one afternoon in Greece.
We pitched the tent not far from the famous ruins of
Delphi. In our sightseeing we did the usual things, the treasury ruins, the
shrine of Apollo, the site of the sacred spring and the oracle and so on.
Towards evening we sat quietly for a time on the tiered seats of the
amphitheatre and absorbed the atmosphere.
I can still hear a blackbird singing as we sat there in the near
silence.
I thought of the ancient spectators.
Those who long ago packed
these same seats to watch athletic events. I imagined them cheering the athletes of
their respective city states. What a wonderful scene it must have been, here in
this amphitheatre carved from the side of the mountain.
In a whimsical mood, I descended to the arena.
I stood at the starting blocks and then sprinted (I
told you I was much younger!) the length of the stadium. I imagined hearing the
cheering of the crowd around me, as it had been in that ancient era when Greece
was in its hey day. I did not pretend to win the race
but I did have to give my best.
It seems the writer of the letter to the Hebrews had
a scene like that in mind.
It is the backdrop to when he/she concluded the roll
call of the ancient heroes of faith in Chapter 11.. We
are the athletes of Christ. The onlookers include those mighty servants of God,
like Abraham and Sarah, Miriam and Moses, Joshua, Samuel, Isaiah and all the
prophets, who have died but are definitely not out of the picture. They are
seated in the stands, watching the present day men and women of faith run the
race.
Being surrounded by such a great
cloud of witnesses, let us strip down to basics, and rid ourselves of every clinging sin. Let us run
with determination the race before us, looking to
Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. This
same Jesus who for the celebration that
lay ahead of him, endured the cross despising its shame, and is now seated at
the right hand of God.
THE GREAT CLOUD OF WITNESSES
Don’t you love that poetic phrase: great cloud of witnesses?
One could translate it in a more mundane way by
saying The large crowd of spectators. That may
make the picture immediately accessible to the modern mind, but it misses the
deeper level of meaning.
The metaphor “cloud” is much more evocative than
“crowd.”
Cloud expresses a vast number of people (as in our
contemporary expression “a sea of faces’) but also adds the heavenly dimension.
In the Bible there are those holy moments when God draws near to humanity in a
radiant cloud. Such as happened with Jesus, and three
disciples, on the mount of transfiguration.
This is a “cloud” of spectators with a
difference.
This host of whom the
Letter to the Hebrews speaks, are on the heavenly side of reality, delighting
in the eternal presence of God. They are those who by faith have already run
the race, they have lived and died in the faith, and now watch on as a new
generation give their best for Christ and his God. They are not dead and
totally extinguished, but are living witnesses. Witnesses at a higher level,
with expanding horizons and joys we cannot even begin to imagine.
That word “witnesses” is also important.
As I said, one could use the word spectators. But
then we would miss much of the meaning. In the Greek language, “martyr” and
“witness” are the same word.
Spectators are not so involved.
Many spectators may never themselves have run the
race, or endured the test of wrestling, or thrown the javelin..
Most have only a superficial spectator’s knowledge of what is going on in the
arena. As a result they do not appreciate the difficulties or the pain of
competing in the stadium. As we well know from observing sporting crowds in
this country, spectators are fickle and can turn nasty. If a favoured athlete
gives their all yet falls and loses, their cheers can turn to boos.
Not so with God’s triumphant witnesses.
In their day, these witnesses had been totally
involved. Many had suffered and died in the arena, giving their last breath, or
their last drop of blood,
for their God. Some of the witnesses are indeed martyrs. They are
not fickle, and ready to turn against us should we stumble or fall. They are
utterly for us, willing us on with all their prayers; with all their being.
Included in the great cloud are the more recent faces of those precious people
with whom we once shared the joys and sorrows of this phase of service to
Christ.
Not mere spectators but definitely a great cloud of witnesses.
These give us strength as we run the race of faith.
Just as contemporary athletes speak of the strength they draw from a home
crowd, so we draw strength from our “home crowd”, those who are on the heavenly
side of reality. We are not alone; never bereft of the fellowship and
encouragement of a shining host of fellow believers.
Being surrounded by such a great cloud of
witnesses, let us strip down to basics, and rid ourselves of every clinging sin. Let us run with determination
the race before us
THE ONE SPECIAL WITNESS
Among these wonderful witnesses is one extra special
one.
Jesus. In fact, Jesus is like the coach, teaching
and showing us all we need to know. Training us, and warning us about the
dangers, feeding us a remarkable bread and wine for strength, standing at the
end of the race, waiting to catch us when exhausted or wounded we fall across
the line.
At this point the allegory breaks down.
Jesus is also the Lord of this race. He is seated in
the royal box overlooking the finishing line. It is towards him we run; on him
we keep our eyes fixed as we give heart and mind and soul and strength in the
race he has set us.
It is not unusual for important people to be seen at
major sporting events.
I guess it is one of the perks of office, to have
access to the best seats on such occasions. Like past Prime Ministers such as
Bob Hawke, our present Prime Minister, John Howard, is no exception. He enjoys sharing the
glory of the contest from his VIP seat, and afterwards meeting with the
sporting stars involved. Not that he was ever much of an athlete himself.
Mediocre would not be an unkind word. He does not know, from personal
experience, what it is really like down in the amphitheatre.
But in the holy faith, our true “Prime Minister” is
Jesus.
He himself is the one outstanding love athlete this
world has known. And for his race he was prepared to suffer beyond anything we
could ever expect. He still wears the scars of his day in the arena, when every
negative power possible was pitted against him.
Let us run
with determination the race before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. This same Jesus who for the
celebration that lay ahead of him, endured the cross despising its shame, and
is now seated at the right hand of God.
THERE ARE NO SMALL CONGREGATIONS
I started this sermon with the picture of a much
younger me.
B.D.P. in a whimsical mood,
running in the arena at Delphi in Greece. I return to Delphi now with another
snapshot.
Our campsite was just around the corner, in a tiny
camping ground.
Perched on a height,
overlooking the mountainside falling away below us, and stretching way down the
hillsides where olive groves and vineyards were growing, forming dark green
patterns.
Below us, maybe about 500-700 metres, was a small chapel at the head of a
village. Morning and evening an orthodox priest would climb up to the chapel
for prayers. He would ring the bell, its notes echoing up the slopes to our
campsite. Three or four village folk, women as far as I could discern from that
distance, would join him. What a tiny congregation it might have seemed to him.
But not so. Things were not as they
might appear .
I suspect that as an Orthodox Priest, he would be
keenly aware of the great cloud of witnesses: That wonderful host who
surrounded him and those few villages, as they gave thanks to Christ for his
goodness, and prayed for his grace in their daily affairs and that of their
small hamlet.
In the Christian church there may be some struggling
congregations.
They may be weary congregations, suffering
congregations, but there is never a small congregation. When we gather
in the name of Christ Jesus, we gather with the great cloud of witnesses. The
place is packed to the rafters! The screen between them and us is very thin.
From them we draw strength and our sincere efforts to serve our loving Lord,
gives them added joy.
Being
surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us strip down to basics, and
rid ourselves of every clinging sin. Let us run with determination the race
before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter
of our faith. This same Jesus who for the celebration that lay ahead of him,
endured the cross despising its shame, and is now seated at the right hand of
God.
PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING
From beginning to end, life is one extensive bonus.
It is time to give thanks.
Let us pray.
We thnak you, O God ,for bountiful blessings, above, beneath and around us.
Thanks for our brother the sun who brings us the day
with all its delights and surprises.
Thanks for our
sisters the moon and the stars who make the night a glorious mystery.
Thanks for our brother the wind who comes and goes
as he chooses for our benefit.
Thanks for our
sister water who is humble, precious and clean, and refreshes the weary.
Thanks for our brother fire, who cheerfully warms
our homes and cooks our food.
Thanks for our
mother the earth, who gives us fruits, grasses, trees and radiant flowers.
Thanks for people who forgive one another and share
burdens and tribulations.
Thanks for our
sister death who embraces all, and sets free the child of God.
We thank and praise you, love and adore you, and we
seek to serve you humbly and gladly for ever. Through Christ Jesus our Lord..
Amen!
(Adapted
from St Francis of Assisi)
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
Let us identify with God’s compassion for all
humanity.
Let us pray.
God of Christ Jesus, please hear our prayers for the
human family in its happiness or its distress. Gather us up into the
reconciling fire of your love, that we may be purged of all that fosters
misery, and inducted into everything that creates love, joy and peace.
We commend to you those who feel ground down or
broken, isolated or alienated.
We commend to you the hungry or homeless, anxious or
in agony.
We commend to you those who through terrorism and
war are shattered and despairing.
We commend to you the frightened and insane, the
dying and grieving.
We commend to you the tempted and the fallen, the
fearful and the faithless.
We commend to you the church with its truth and
error, its faith and its fear.
We commend to you all who love Christ, and work for
his way of reconciliation, justice, compassion, and peace.
God of Christ Jesus, we submit these prayers to your
refining fire. Purify all that is pleases you for the service of your kingdom
of grace, where no good thing is discarded, and no loving deed wasted. For your love’s sake.
Amen!
SENDING OUT
Happy is the person who leaves this church forgiven
and uplifted.
Happy are all
who know the love of God and embrace it.
Happy is the person who goes their way with
thanksgiving.
Happy are all
whose greatest joy is to do God’s will.
Happy are all who realise they do not travel alone.
Happy is the
person who enjoys the company of Christ.
The peace of God, which goes beyond all our
understanding, nurture your hearts in the knowledge
and love of God. And the blessing of God, the Creator, Saviour and Inspirer,
will be with you always.
Amen!
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