FREELTON STRABANE UNITED CHURCH
To Live Our Discipleship With Integrity And Grace
Horseshoe Falls Regional Council
Epiphany
January 5 2025
Rev. Will Wheeler BA M. Div. E-mail: [email protected]
Organist : Joan Simpson
Centering
Take this moment sign and space
Take my friends around
Here among us make the place
Where your love is found me
(Iona Abbey Music book pg 122)
Call To worship
One it is the New Year
All the past is the past and a whole new time lies before us.
One. Then let us Gather
All: All our moments coming together in this moment
One We gather
All :All our days coming together in this day
One We gather
All : All our breaths coming together in this breath.
One and in all of our moments, all of our days, all of our breaths.
All We find God - and God Finds us !
One and in that finding
All The covenant is renewed, The covenant is lived. The covenant is alive.
One Hallelujah
All Hallelujah Amen
New Years Prayer
One: Thanks be to God for the gift of a new beginning. It is time to celebrate the birth of the new year. In order to truly make it a new beginning we need to see to let go what we are dragging along with us. To leg go of any self – inflicted burdens from old year. Let us gather our hearts as one and give up that which burdens our hearts.
God of the new beginning as we begin this new year renewed by your love, we dare to look deep into our own hearts, to see if there is anything we need to let go in order to begin an new and follow you.
In the light of your love we confess any words spoken or deeds done that escalated harmful conflict rather than promoted reconciliation…….We Let it Go
All: Let it go…Let it go…Let it go…
One: We confess any projects that we did not get done, no matter how well intentioned….we let it go.
All: Let it go…Let it go…Let it go…
One We confess that there where people we meant to connect with, support , encourage, and strengthen. We didn’t get to them all….We let it go.
All: Let it go…Let it go…Let it go…
One: We confess to any grudges that we still hold closely, like a favourite but worn out blanket…..We let it go
All: Let it go…Let it go…Let it go…
One: We confess to any personal goals around health or habits that we didn’t achieve last year…..We let it go
All: Let it go…Let it go…Let it go…
One: We Offer up anything else that comes to mind that we need to let go of in order to embrace a new day, a new beginning, a fresh start…..We let it Go.
All: Let it go…Let it go…Let it go… God we offer these burdens up to you for you will lift these burdens away. These burdens do not serve your purposes, they do not give us abundant life, they hold us back from our high calling as your servants. Free us O God to be your renewed joyful people bold in our faith. In Jesus’s name we pray. Amen
One. Forgiveness is what God does. Thanks be to God for a new beginning.
One Hear the word of God
All our ears are open
One : Listen again to the word of God our Lesson is from Ephesians 3:1-12
One: Hear the word of God
Gospel Matthew 2:1-12
One: This is the Gospel of our Lord
All Thanks be to God
The fun thing about New Years coming in the middle of the week is that You begin writing your sermon in 2024 but won’t actually give it till 2025. Now this thought tickled a memory of a story I have used before about SS Warrimoo. She was a passenger steamer travelling
through the waters of the mid-Pacific on its way from Vancouver to Australia. The navigator had just finished working out a star fix and brought the Captain John DS. Phillips, the result. The Warrimoo's position was LAT 0º 31' N and LONG 179 30' W. The date was 31 December 1899. As the story goes the first mate told the Captain " You Know what this means?" We're only a few miles from the intersection of the Equator and the International Date Line". Captain Phillips was prankish enough to take full advantage of the opportunity for achieving the navigational freak of a lifetime. He called his navigators to the bridge to check & double check the ship's position. He changed course slightly so as to bear directly on his mark. Then he adjusted the engine speed. The calm weather & clear night worked in his favor. At mid-night the SS Warrimoo lay on the Equator at exactly the point where it crossed the International Date Line! The consequences of this bizarre position were many: The forward part (bow) of the ship was in the Southern Hemisphere & in the middle of summer. The rear (stern) was in the Northern Hemisphere & in the middle of winter. The date in the aft part of the ship was 31 December 1899. In the bow (forward) part it was 1 January 1900. This ship was therefore not only in:
Two different days, Two different months, Two different years, Two different seasons But in two different centuries - all at the same time!
Thank the stars for the journey,
We all have journeyed to this moment. I can remember being young. And going star gazing out on a small lake lying in the bottom of a canoe. just lying there looking at the stars.
They were the road map to the new world, they throughout time have given direction and lead and guided us amazed us.
We look to them to provide answers which sometimes they do and other times do not. This past year our own star (the sun) showed us her power in the eclipse and solar storms which have provided stunning northern lights. Super moons, passing commits and annual meteor showers.
We can look to our skies and we are reminded that they have existed long before time and that countless generation have gazed at them and looked at them for direction.
They remind me at least that there are still places to go and see and explore.
We are by nature I think explorers. Seeking out, looking for.
We are a people for the most part who like to journey. I have been privileged to have traveled. I often find when I have travelled when I am standing on the streets of Vienna or the center of court outside the Kremlin and there is a certain wow and a little unbelief that I am seeing this with my own eyes.
To be in a place like Cologne Cathedral, the glass the art, to look at the shrine that holds remains of the three Wiseman to know that around me work continues on the building. It is a living building still growing in an ancient way
From being in Mexico for spring equinox at Chichen Iza and seeing the event happen on the great temple. To the Passion play in Germany or standing on the Rim of the Grand Canyon. They each have provided me with a spiritual experience.
Where have you gone, what have you seen in your lives that have changed you. Perhaps profoundly. When we plan to go somewhere, we without even being aware of it create a mental expectation of what we will find.
Where have you gone, what have you seen in your lives that have changed you. Perhaps profoundly. When we plan to go somewhere, we without even being aware of it create a mental expectation of what we will find.
We have the same image of the Christmas story and Matthew got squeezed into that image. The Magi were never at the stable, or even at the birth. (I had to slip in something)
The gospel states they came to a house and saw mother and child, not infant. The later point could just be a matter of semantics
In many ways this gospel makes up the bulk of Matthew birth Narrative. It is still a wondrous event however it lacks the ceremony and triumph of Luke.
No angels or host of heaven. A lot of dreaming, the subtle hand of God at work. A single angel speaking to a principal character. It is encased in intrigue with Herod scheming to find the child it is awash in tragedy for in the next passage is the slaying of the first born. It ends with Jesus and his family being refugees in a strange land.
In many ways it speaks more to our own world our own reality. We see Jesus born and his early years reflective of our world today.
As the Magi came to honour Jesus, God comes to us to honour the covenant that he made with us through his son on the cross. God seeks us out and offers us costly gifts. Gifts more costly then gold or Frankincense myrrh. Gifts of love and forgiveness and eternal life.
We are a people who journey perhaps we are like the magi searching for something.
Perhaps like the liner Warrimoo at the cross roads of time and place and history.
We come looking for something and we to bring gifts like the Magi. Some never complete the journey never find what they are searching for because they never feel that the gift that they have are worth giving.
Others set their course on the wrong star and search and search but never find what they are looking for.
We are called to let God set our course and to give the best that we can
After the fall of the Roman Empire Europe and England moved into a time of known in the vernacular as the Dark Ages. More academically the early part of the Medieval times. It was a dark time as world moved from science to a time of superstition. Unfortunately the early church was one of the drivers behind this. It would not be until the beginning of the Renaissance which lead to the enlighten that world would begin to change. Renaissance in French translate to rebirth. It is true that
Epiphany means manifestation a realization, but that realization is a time of renaissance and enlightenment. A time to allow faith to grow and yes even question our faith and our beliefs.
We are on a journey of faith we travel not looking for Christ but with Christ having been touched by the light of Christ. He is the star the light that has risen for us and it leads us forever onward. He is our star of wonder He is the star of night star which shines with an earthly beauty bright,
His is the star which West word leading or east or which ever direction we need to travel on the road still proceeding guide us helping to set our course as like the stars have done for our ancestral explorers.
We By virtue of being in the presence of the one who loved us first are changed. Perhaps it is nothing any one can put a finger on but we are different. For God has come in the form of a child lived as one of us died and lives again with us through the action of the Holy Spirit.
We will continue to journey, we shall bring the best we have to offer. We will get lost, and lose sight of the star at times but it will always be there guiding leading ever proceeding reminding us that we are not alone. Thanks be to God. Amen
Prayers of the people
Hear our prayer we humbly offer
Grant to us your peace O God
Hear our prayer we humbly offer
Grant to us your peace O God.
Wonderous God of light, by virtue of being in the presence of the one who loved us first we are changed. Sometimes God we are unable to name how we are changed but know we are different. For you God have come in the form of a child lived as one of us died and lives again with us through the action of the Holy Spirit. We do not know what this year will hold for us. So in this moment and time we give ourselves over to you trusting in your Spirit to lead us. The great canvas of our future is waiting to have you guide our hands to the colours that will tell your story in us. We know we don’t journey alone, but with others. May we be a support to those in need, those that are alone, those that struggle to see the joy of the day. For those near to us, for those we shall never know we offer prayers and we offer you our own prayers here in this holy place. Lord as we see honour and celebrate these Holy Days we rejoice in our soul knowing that you have heard our prayers and so with hearts full of gladness we offer you the great prayer that you gave us saying Our Father
Offering
We give thee but thy own. The work of the Church continues and there are three ways you can continue to support that work. Consider using PAR, use the donate button on our Web Site or drop your gift at the Manse. Let us make our offering and give thanks.
One: Praise God who from all Blessing flow
Prayer
The amazing gift of One who fully embodied your intention for humanity prompts us to make a grateful response. In Christ we have known a love that will not let us go. Through our offerings we would share this love in our community and to the ends of the earth. Amen.
Sending Forth and Blessing.
One: Go out to the world with a new outlook; God is ruling in our midst.
All: We will take the promises of God to a needy world; share good news with friends and co-workers.
One: God will direct your paths during the week ahead and provide all that you need to face its choices.
VU 4
God of all places present unseen
Voice in our silence song in our mist
Send us your people knowing and sure
Called to spread the word.
amen amen amen
Yesterdaywe honour our heritage.
Todaywe know that we are not alone,that we live in God's world.
Tomorrowwith God,we will discoverthe undiscovered country.
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