| 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 25
18-24 Sept
Luke 16: 1-13
(Sermon
1: “Who is This?”)
1 Timothy 2: 1-7
Jeremiah 8: 18
to 19:1
(Sermon
2: “The Tears of God”)
Psalm 79:1-9
PREPARATION
On behalf of that Son of God whose shoes I am not
worthy to unlace, I welcome you into this most hospitable house. The grace of
the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
And also with you.
Shake off your worries, shrug off your sluggishness,
prepare to worship with all your heart, soul, mind and
strength.
This is the
day of the risen Lord. We will rejoice and be glad in it.
OR—
No person can worship two masters. Either he will
hate the first and love the second or he will love the first and hate the
second.
We cannot
serve both God and worldly possessions.
It is up to each of us to chose
this day whom we will serve.
We O God, are the flock of your pasture, will love you and give
thanks to you forever.
From
generation to generation we will keep repeating your praise.
PRAYER OF APPROACH
Most wonderful God, help us to delight in you more
than farmers do with rain, bankers with profits, and children with parties.
Give us the liberty of your Holy Spirit, that here side by side with fellow
disciples of Jesus, we may dare to be your children,
in your house, and at your feast. In the name of Christ
Jesus.
Amen.
CONFESSION AND ASSURANCE
It is written of old:
“Help us, O God of our salvation for the glory of
your name.
Deliver us, and forgive our sins,for your name’s sake.”
Let us admit to each other and to God,
that we are in need of mercy and renewal.
Let us pray
together.
God of truth
and God of grace, we confess that too often we are nondescript Christians,
rarely very wicked and seldom very
loving.
We drift along
in the stream of Australian life, sharing the general indifference and the
common selfishness.
We participate
in the popular fashions and delusions, following Christ rather timidly, from
afar.
For this our
share in community evil, we seek your cathartic mercy, and for our many private
faults and static faith we beg your forgiveness.
Through Christ Jesus our Saviour.
Amen!
FORGIVENESS
Holy Scripture says: “There is one God, and there is
one mediator between God and humanity, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself
as a ransom for all.”
My sisters and brothers, in Christ Jesus we have a
Saviour who has shared our nature and known the difficulties we face. He is our
mediator before the altar of God. He turns to us and says: “My sister, my
brother, your sins are forgiven you. Go in peace.”
The peace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
And also with you.
PRAYER FOR CHILDREN
Excited
Christians?
Dear God,
what would happen if all of us
in church
would love Jesus with the same
excitement
and offer him the same big
effort
as those who love playing
sport?
Or the crowds who sit in the stands
and wildly cheer their team?
Wouldn’t that be something!
Wow!
Amen!
PSALM 79: 1-9
O my God! Pagans have taken over lives,
they pollute the temple of your Spirit.
Their own bodies are the site of ruin,
and they treat others like so much meat.
Like birds of prey they circle around,
like animals in the night seeking carrion.
They waste precious life-blood like water,
and there are few who care for the victims.
Believers are a joke to their neighbours,
behind our back they laugh at our faith.
How long, God, will you let it go on?
Why
are you so mad at us or something?
Why don’t you pour out your anger on them,
those who have nothing to do with you?
Lay it on the arrogant power freaks
who can’t say your name without swearing.
For their influence is devouring your children,
making a wasteland of the human spirit.
Do not lay on us the guilt of our forebears,
come quickly with your compassion.
Meet us where we are right now
for we have been brought very low.
Help us, God of liberation and healing,
deliver and forgive us to the glory of your name!
© B.D. Prewer 2000 & 2012
POEM: GOD OF DRONGOS
Glory be to the God
of drongos* and crows,
wasps and leeches,
who sees something worthwhile
in unprofitable things
and wild creatures.
Glory be to the Christ
of tax cheat and sinner
betrayer and coward,
who even makes a parable
about the wily plans
of a sly steward.
Glory be to the Lord
of the small church,
the two and three,
the God finds some good
in the piebald faith
of you and me.
* drongo = an Australian bird; also a slang term for a fool.
© B.D. Prewer 2000
COLLECT
Loving God, you are the source of all that is worth
living for.
Give us clear goals, lofty values, transparent
motives,
and enough love-courage to put
our faith into practice
through all the common scenes of
life.
To you, with your beloved Son in the fellowship of
the Spirit,
be all praise this day and
always.
Amen!
.
SERMON 1: WHO IS THIS?
Luke 16:8
The Master
commended the unjust steward for his shrewdness; for the sons of this world are
more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than
the sons of light.
And…
“The boss
could not help but applaud the amoral manager for his astuteness. For the
children of the secular world look further ahead, when dealing with their own
sort, than do the children of light.”
Who is this boss who commends an unjust steward, even though
the boss himself is a victim of the manager’s shrewd schemes? Where do we find
such an amazing Master?
Before we think more about that question, let’s try
to clear the ground.
TRICKY TRANSLATION?
Most translations these days say something like this
in describing the scheming rogue: “The master commended the ‘dishonest steward’.
But translation is a bit tricky.
A literal translation of the Greek text would make
it ‘steward of unrighteousness.
That to us seems a clumsy expression. Maybe it is
the Greek translation of a common Aramaic idiom of Jesus’ time, now lost to us.
The old Authorised version put it: ‘and
the lord commended the unjust steward.’
I much prefer “unjust” to the word “dishonest.”
However, in my attempt at translation, I have opted
for the word ‘amoral’. I choose this because it seems close to the attitude of
many people of the present, post-modern (so labelled!) era. It is not so much a
matter of breaking a moral code but not having a code. It is living without any
concern for anyone but themselves. They are not so much immoral as amoral.
I reckon that sums up the manager, or steward, in
the parable. Anything that seemed good for him was okay. That, as far as he was concerned, was all
that mattered. (Have you seen that ‘bumper sticker?”
If it feels good, then do it.) There was something of the sociopath about
this amoral manager.
THE MAIN THRUST
Lets now return to the key
theme;
The main thrust of the parable is clear: People of faith, look ahead. Be far sighted.
Where are we heading? What lies ahead of us? If we have any
inkling at all, the only smart thing to do is to get ready for whatever lies
ahead. That includes the spiritual dimension.
Be as astute about the practice of your faith, as
the amoral manager was. In particular, astutely use whatever worldly
possessions you have for the glory of God, in the same astute manner as the
unscrupulous manager did for himself.
A confession: I have a sneaking admiration for this
rogue in the parable. I like the way he sums us the future. If the boss sacks
him, if his present comfortable existence is to suddenly end, what is the
reality? What are the options in that
reality?
He quickly gets to the nitty gritty: I’m too old to dig post holes or gardens, or
ditches. (O how my back sympathises with him these days!) and I am too proud to beg. (fair enough!) This
is not some impractical dreamer. He deals with facts. With
outcomes. So he takes the
shrewdest way to a more comfortable future:
He uses what is still in his control, to lay the ground for what is to
come. This fellow alters the accounts of his boss’s debtors so that they will
be grateful and show him hospitality after he gets the sack.
You know, I reckon this character would have been at
home on that comedy we knew as “Seinfeld”. There is at least a refreshing
honesty about amorality. When Seinfeld first appeared, I looked at it once and
turned off. Its amorality offended me. Then later, on about its 3rd re-run, I tried
it again and found it an insightful (and much more humorous than I first
thought) commentary of much of secular society in which we live.
I do not want to emulate such amorality of ‘the children of this secular world in
dealing with their own,’ but I can learn from their frankness when dealing
with themselves. We are called by Christ to be realistic, to open our eyes and
to look ahead.
OUR GOAL IS SUBLIME
Of course our goal is very different. Our aims are
indeed sublime.
It takes us very high, and extends us very wide. It
transcends space and time.
Our future is the kingdom of God and its
righteousness. It is meeting with and serving with Christ in the manifold
activities of life. It is loving our neighbours and
even our enemies. It is living the eternal life, the boundless life, here and
now, for that is the destiny to which we are turned, tuned and committed. It is
providing for spiritual needs and the spiritual needs of those around us.
As Jesus went on to say, even make friends of filthy
money so that it serves your true purpose and destiny. Don’t despise money. Use
it for the glory of God.
Jesus seems to be speaking to us: “Open your eyes.
See where you are and what lies ahead.
Be as frank with yourself and as clear headed as those astute operators
in the secular world.”
WHO IS THIS?
And the boss
applauded the amoral manager for his astuteness. For the children of the
secular world look further ahead, when dealing with their own sort, than do the
children of light
Now I turn back to the question with which I
started: Who is this?
Who is this master?
The Lord who sees some good in an unjust
steward? Who commends a rogue?
It is Christ and his God.
God is the sublime Master who sees something worth
commending where cold justice would pass only condemnation. God is the one who applauds the far sighted
rogue.
Who is this unjust steward?
We are the unjust stewards. We are rightly counted
among the unjust, the unrighteous, the unprofitable, and yes, at times the
amoral!
My friends, if God does not commend the unjust
(amoral/dishonest/unscrupulous) disciple, then there is not much hope for us.
If God does not see some good in us, then let us pack up and go back downhill
to faithlessness.
If the God of Jesus does not see in us something worth
his affirmation, then we might as well surrender all hope. Cease coming to
church and forever give up gathering at the Lord’s Table.
But, a wonderful “but” this time,
but if God does think there is
something worthwhile in us (and you have Christ’s word that there is!) then
come, eat and drink and be thankful.
SERMON 2: THE TEARS OF GOD?
Jeremiah 18:
18 and 19:1
“My grief is
past healing, my heart is sick within me”
Jeremiah
18: 18
“O that my
head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears,
That I might weep day and
night, for the slain of the daughters of my people.”
Jeremiah
19:1
The God of the Bible is not the God of
theoreticians.
God does not live in ivory, intellectual towers.
This is not a God who launched the “big bang” at the beginning of creation , and then sat back and let it all go its own way.
The God of Sarah and Abraham,
Moses, Ruth, Jeremiah, Elizabeth, Mary, Joseph and
Jesus the Messiah, is a God who stays emotionally involved with his creation.
God can laugh and God can cry, get frustrated loose patience, become angry and
feel compassion.
THE GOD WHO IS A PERSONAL PRESENCE
“My grief is
past healing, my heart is sick within me”
Jeremiah
18: 18
“O that my
head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears,
That I might weep day and
night, for the slain of the daughters of my people.”
Jeremiah
19:1
Please, don’t write this off as merely a regrettable
anthropomorphism.
That is, it is not a mere projecting of our human
feelings and failings on to God. Without doubt, at times this does happen in
parts of the Bible. Yet in the main, something far more important and wonderful
is at stake. The people whose faith is reflected in the Bible believed in a personal
omnipresent God. Our ‘personhood” derives from our Creator.
Personal God. An amazing, loving
Presence!
Not just some far distant First Cause, not some
elementary Principle, not some unconscious evolutionary Drive, not some
perfectly unruffled Being far removed from the stuff
of daily life. But a real Person. A Presence who is
more beautiful than we can imagine.. A Person of feelings as well as thought. A Person whose
personhood is infinitely more wonderful and mysterious than ours, yet is not
alien from ours.
The Bible God is not made in our own likeness; no
way!
We are made in God’s likeness..
Not a bodily likeness, but a spiritual one. We are (our real selves, that is)
tiny, flawed, distorted reflections of that most wonderful Presence. The source
of our self consciousness, that which makes us a living “soul”, is the
ultimate, intimate Person, God. A God who is always involved.
The creating and redeeming Presence.
A God who like the God of
Jeremiah sheds tears.
INVOLVEMENT:
COGENT PHILOSOPHY AND GOOD SCIENCE
“O that my
head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears,
That I might weep day and
night, for the slain of the daughters of my people.”
Jeremiah
19:1
This kind of God, who is utterly involved, is
neither illogical nor unscientific.
The influential thinker A. N. Whitehead
built a cogent philosophy around
a God who is completely involved in the process of creation. Some of us may
think he pushed the concept too far, but he was a wonderful counterbalance to
the insipient nihilism which hides behind many other thinkers.
Moreover, from the view point of science,
the study of quantum physics
has opened up to us another way of seeing God involved in the very essence of
things.
“Scientists specialising in quantum physics
are aware that at the subatomic level, the universe seems more like a thought
than like matter. They also know that their expectations, their thoughts, can effect the outcome of some experiments with elemental
particles like electrons and protons. They understand that the universe is not
as mechanistic as they once believed, and they have begun to suspect that it
exists as an act of will, that this willpower — the awesomely creative
consciousness of the playful Presence — is the organising force within the
physical universe.” (D Koontz)
This is a God who is thoroughly involved.
The God who laughs and sheds tears is not at odds
with the basic structure of this universe. Faith does not depend on the
validation of either current science or some philosophers, but it is not unwelcome when it
happens. This is what we should expect the clearest thinking and the deepest
research to encounter. The Presence!
INVOLVEMENT: BOTH TEARS AND LAUGHTER
True involvement always puts a person at risk.
By involvement there will be much joy but also
considerable pain.
In training counsellors, the advice is often given:
“Don’t get emotionally involved.” That advice has
extensive wisdom in it. To be an adept counsellor one needs to keep a clear
head, and not get one’s own feelings mixed up with the client’s.
However as a pastor to a congregation,
I have found that the advice is not always possible,
or desirable, to implement. So often pastors are dealing with
friends whom Christ has given us. We are involved, deeply so. A critical
road accident to a young mother, the abuse of a precious child, or the drawn
out illness and death of a dear member, these do deeply affect us. A pastor
often feels grief and anguish, frustration and anger, compassion and joy. He is
involved.
How can it be otherwise when we follow a Christ who
gives his all?
Who says: “This is my body, broken for you. This is
my blood, shed for you.” A Christ who more truly reflects the
likeness of God than any of the rest of us.
Our God is truly an involved God.
“My grief is
past healing, my heart is sick within me”
O that my head
were waters, and my eyes a
fountain of tears,
That I might weep day and night, for the slain of the daughters of my
people.”
This is wonderful, just as long as we balance the
tears with the joy of God.
To be involved is not all tears and crosses.
There is the joy of God in the beauties of creation,
such as we see reflected in many Psalms. The joy God in the most lovely and
most loving Child, Jesus, as he arises from the waters of baptism: “You
are my beloved son, you are an utter joy to me.” The joy of
God and the angels over one rebel who repents. And of
course the cosmic laughter of God on Easter day, when the joy in heaven was a
tumult of “wonder love and praise”.
CONCLUSION: MORE ABOUT THE PRESENCE
In conclusion
I can do no better that the quote again from the
writer of “thrillers,” Dean Koontz
He is a writer who seems to often get on my “wave
length.” In the context of a novel, Koontz expresses far better than I could,
aspects of the faith that I treasure and try to proclaim, Here
is a quote referring to a remarkable, 9 year old boy named Curtis, experiencing
the woodlands in a new way:
“He receives the truth that is simultaneously
a revelation and a mystery, both a euphoric exaltation and a profound humbling.
The boy recognises the Presence everywhere around him, not confined to one bosk of ferns or one pool of shadows, but resonant in all
things. He feels what otherwise he has only known through faith and common
sense, feels for one sweet devastating moment what only the innocent feel: the
exquisite rightness of creation, from shore to shore across the sea of stars, a
clear ringing in the heart that chases out all fears and every anger, a sense
of belonging, purpose, hope, an awareness of being loved.”
Our God is always involved.
The holy Presence. The
wonderful, holy Presence sharing our laughter and our tears, and promising an
even greater joy that is to come.
CREED
Against all confusion, disease, wickedness, and
desolation,
we believe in you, God of
grace and glory.
We believe in your purpose for us,
persisting and making sense of all our days.
We believe in your providence,
preceding and succeeding all pain and misfortune.
We believe in your saving grace,
forgiving our sins and delivering us from evil.
We believe in your friendship,
intimately with us today, yesterday and forever.
We believe in your life,
underlying our birth and transcending our death.
Through the love of Christ, in the fellowship of the
Spirit,
we believe in you, God of
grace and glory.
INTERCESSIONS
We lift up to God the cares of burdens of those
around us in this life, in the sure and certain hope that
our prayers are never in vain.
Let us pray.
Loving God, we come to you praying for this world
for which Christ came, died and rose again.
Lord in your mercy;
Hear our
prayer.
For those in government, and all behind the scenes
who influence them. May there be a revulsion against injustice, hatred and war,
and a turning towards reconciliation and compassion.
Lord in your mercy;
Hear our
prayer.
For the victims of the
current greed and mismanagement of the world’s resources. May there be a better day
for the hungry, homeless, unemployed, refugees, oppressed, and those who are
condemned to grinding toil with scant reward.
Lord in your mercy;
Hear our
prayer.
For the people who try to alleviate the suffering of
humanity. May your Spirit be with humanitarian agencies, church outreach and
social justice bodies, and those arms of government that seek to rectify wrongs
and heal the hurts of citizens.
Lord in your mercy;
Hear our
prayer.
For those who are looking for spiritual answers and
find a bewildering array of churches and other religions. May you aid them in
their search, expose religious errors, and bless everything that is true and
good in the life of believers.
Lord in your mercy;
Hear our
prayer.
For any among our friends and loved ones who are
finding it hard to cope at the moment. Loving God, in weakness be their
strength, in darkness their light, in suffering their healing, in anxiety their
peace, in fear their courage, in dying their hope, and in sorrow their comfort.
Lord in your mercy;
Hear our
prayer.
And now to you our God, who are able to do more than
we can ever ask or conceive, we commit ourselves, our church, and all those who
seek first the kingdom of God. May your will be done and your name loved and
hallowed, today and always. Through Jesus Christ our Saviour.
Amen!
SENDING OUT
May God give you wisdom to know-
when to speak and when to be silent,
when to offer help and when to hold back,
when to ask for help and when to go it alone,
when to comfort and when to challenge,
when to pray and when to get busy.
Amen!
The grace of our Saviour Christ,
the love of our faithful God,
and the joy of our Friend the
Holy Spirit,
will be
with you now and always.
Amen!
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