Friday 29 October 2021

Marsden Road Uniting Newsletter - November 2021

Marsden Road Uniting Church

203 Marsden Road Carlingford

November 2021

Our mission: Reflecting Christ Alive in the Community

Welcome! We gather to worship together at 9.30am every Sunday on the

homelands of the Wallumedegal clan of the Darug people. 

We acknowledge their Elders, past and present.

We hope that you will experience the presence of God in this place and among the people of God here. 

BIBLE READINGS FOR OCTOBER

Psalms: 127; 16; 93; 25: 1 - 10. 1 Kings 17:816; 1 Samuel 2:110; Daniel 7:910,1314; Jeremiah 33:1416Mark 12: 38-44; Mark 13: 1-8; John 18:3337; Luke 21:2536

PRAYER

God of power and mercy, protect us from all harm. Give us freedom of spirit and health in mind and body to do your work on earth. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen



CHURCH SERVICES

7th November 9.30am: Rev John Candy will lead our service 

14th November 9.30am: Rev John Candy will lead our service

21st November 9.30am: Lyn Graham will lead our service 

28th November 9.30am: Warwick Roden will lead our service

Note:

** Zoom links for Rev John and other leaders are different **


CHURCH COUNCIL MEETING


will be held on 9th November at 7.30pm. It will be a Zoom meeting, with Zoom address, as usual: 4820112178

ADVENT CANDLES

Delta Era Zoom Style. Let’s collect five candles for lighting in our own homes during Advent Sunday Services from 28th November up to Christmas Day.

ADVENT AND CHRISTMAS SERVICES

Advent commences on Sunday 28th November and will currently be a Zoom service.

We plan to return to face to face worship in the church on Sunday 5th December with 1.5 metre distancing, plus singing and morning tea allowed. Masks will be optional. We will be able to make a joyful noise once again !

CURRENT DONATIONS

We have made monthly projects of the following groups:

August: “Covid Caring” - to Foodbank

September & October: “Covid Caring” to Christian Community Aid

November: Christmas Child and Parramatta Mission

December: Christmas Bowl

Christmas boxes to fill for Christmas Child are available from Elaine  during November or donate on line through Samaritan’s Purse on: https://samaritanspurse.org.au/what-we-do/operation-christmas-child/

 

CHURCH CHRISTMAS PARTY

will be held on Friday 3rd December commencing at 11.30am in Terry’s Creek Park. Bring your food and drink, and some to share.

NURTURE GROUP CHRISTMAS PARTY

will be on Thursday 9th December at 11.30am in the home of Lyn and Malcolm Colless, 26 Pauline Avenue, Killcare. This will be a barbecue, so Lyn will buy the meat and we will cover the cost. Please let Elaine know if you wish to attend, and what you would like to bring. Also, please bring a wrapped present to the value of $15 for the Present Game.


REV JOHN WRITES:

Dear All at Marsden Road,

Well the departure of Wendy and I has drawn very close, as we continue to prepare for our time of moving into Retirement. The arrangements are for us to have our last Sunday with you on the 21st of November 2021 and then go on leave. Our leave task will be to move back to our home in Adelaide. We fly out  to Adelaide on the 6th of December 2021 to start the process of moving into a retirement life. We have no plans to return to Sydney in the near future. Wendy hopes to get casual/part-time work in Adelaide for next year.

 Sadly due to Covid regulations we have had difficulty in planning a Closure of     Ministry Service. The difficulty is finding an appropriate venue, as Marsden Road is  only able to have  20 people attend at present. The service is proposed for 2pm  Saturday 20th of November 2021. Please watch your Emails for    confirmation of day and date    and whether we will have it by Zoom or which    venue at a nearby Church we will use.

I am hoping to contact as many people as possible to say goodbye before then. However, the Covid situation may ensure circumstances may make that difficult also. If I am unable to directly make contact I will apologise now if that happens and say farewell to you all and thank you all for the privilege of being your Minister over the last five and half years. Wendy and I have valued our time with you, and the friendships that have been formed. We have valued the way in which you have invited us into your homes and lives. For this we give you thanks. Farewell and blessings to all in your future faith journey.

Wendy and John

CHURCH SERVICE ZOOM LINKS

REV JOHN: Meeting ID: 939 5582 8254. Passcode: 972207

                        OTHER LEADERS or Meetings: 4820112178 

Dates for your Diary

Friday 3rd December: Christmas Lunch 11.30 in the park

9th December: Nurture Group Christmas Lunch @ Killcare

24th December: Christmas Eve Carol Service 7pm in the church 

25th December: Christmas Day Family Service 8.30am in church

Sunday 9th February 2025: Triumphant 200 

We will celebrate the 200th Anniversary of our Congregation


CONTACTS

Minister of the Word

Rev John Candy 0411 267 639  or whitestarhaven@gmail.com

Church Council Chairperson: Warwick Roden 9874 7584 Church Council 

Bank details: A/C name: Marsden Road Uniting Church BSB: 634 634; A/C Number: 100049856

Website: www.marsdenroadunitingchurch.org.au

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MRUCC082016/



Thursday 7 October 2021

Marsden Road Uniting Church Worship Pentecost 20 - 08 October 2021

 


Marsden Road Uniting Church Carlingford

------------------------------------------------------------


Possessions

Sunday 10th October 2021

Pentecost 20 Sunday year of Mark 9.30 am

 Gathering God’s People

 Acknowledgement of First Peoples

We acknowledge the first people who have cared for this Land, where we worship, the Wallumedgal. 

May our worship join with the voices of the First Peoples of this Land. 

Theme Focus

Families make demands on us, and Jesus talks about giving up earthly families’ demands and focusing on being part of his family with all its blessings. Job in all his suffering, stays close to God and God’s word, which is sharper than a two-edge sword. God, as our creator understands, as we pour out our pain. A wealthy man walks away from the cost of discipleship and Jesus calls us to keep faith and follow him, as part of his new family, trusting in God’s love and provision. 

Call to Worship

        Come and be blessed in God’s love. Put your trust in Jesus and his promises. We are the Jesus’ family, beloved sons and daughters of God. Let us worship God. 

In times of trouble, in times of joy ...

we call upon the name of God.

With steadfast faith, with wavering doubt ...

we call upon the name of God.

Basking in God’s presence, aching in God’s absence ...

we call upon the name of God. 

Hymn TIS 613: Lord of all hopefulness

                       (tune – Slane)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKo0jZuNjds 

     Opening Prayer

     Loving God, Parent of all creation, you welcome our prayer and praise as your beloved children. We come as individuals and as a community of faith, to worship you. We come with all our dreams and needs, trusting in your kindness and forgiveness. Our great desire is to draw near to your presence, to know your love more deeply and to be nurtured in our Christian life and witness. 

Prayer of Confession

Mysterious One, we cry out in our times of need—

for hope in times of despair, for faith in times of doubt, for comfort in times of grief, for grace in times of sin, and for love in times of loneliness. Answer our cry.

Be our refuge and our help. Restore our lives.

Revive our hope. Return us to the path of discipleship, where we may walk with you anew in confidence and joy.

In the name of Christ, our rock and our redeemer, we pray. Amen. 

Declaration of Forgiveness

Draw near to Christ, who is our mercy and our grace, for in Christ, we are restored and made whole. In the name of Christ, we are forgiven and reconciled to God.

Thanks be to God! 

The Peace

Creating us all as equals, and calling us to be generous in our faith, the Lord invites us to offer gestures of welcome as we share the peace of Christ.

Peace be with you!

And also, with you!

(You may like to exchange a sign of peace with those around you.) 

Offering Prayer

How do we respond to your love and gracious to us O God?

With hearts filled with gratitude, we return these gifts from the abundance we have been given and pray that they may help build the church up, provide for the needs of all who seek justice and compassion. Amen 

Hymn TIS 589: Jesus calls us! O’er the tumult

                 (tune – St Catherine (Jones))

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5IxbPK8Ow4                  

The Service of the Word 

The First Reading:                                            Hebrews 4:12-16

The Gospel Reading:                                        Mark 10:17-31

After the final reading the reader will say            For the Word of the Lord

Please respond by saying                                    Thanks be to God. 

Readings: NRSV Translation 

Hebrews 4:12-16

12 Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And before him no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account. 14 Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession.15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. 

Mark 10:17-31

17 As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, ‘Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ 18 Jesus said to him, ‘Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. 19 You know the commandments: “You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honour your father and mother.” ’ 20 He said to him, ‘Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.’ 21 Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, ‘You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.’ 22 When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions. 23 Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, ‘How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!’ 24 And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, ‘Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.’ 26 They were greatly astounded and said to one another, ‘Then who can be saved?’ 27 Jesus looked at them and said, ‘For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.’ 28 Peter began to say to him, ‘Look, we have left everything and followed you.’ 29 Jesus said, ‘Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, 30 who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. 31 But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.’ 

Preaching of the Word - Possessions - Mark 10:17-31

In today’s Gospel, a man with many possessions encountered Jesus. His wealth of possessions is central to the message.

Possessions – are they good or bad? Blessings or hindrances? Deficits or potential assets?

Like many aspects of life, it all depends. But, perhaps, the more important questions are: What is this Gospel story all about? How does Jesus use the possessions to teach his disciples about God? How can possessions or anything else make all the difference in our seeking ultimate answers about the meaning of our lives?

The man with many possessions started off with a question: “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” He was looking for an inheritance – not a gift or a payment or an allowance or a reward – but an inheritance.

The Greek word quoted by Mark seems to convey exactly what it does to us. Did the man with many possessions see himself as a child of God who was due a birthright like one might expect from a parent?

Yet, the dialogue that followed his question seems more like an exercise in earning something rather than inheriting it.

Whatever the case, he wanted Jesus to tell him how to secure the benefits of God’s most fundamental values – and to find the key to a meaningful, contented, and fulfilling life.

Jesus’ initial response to “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” is also quite interesting. Referring to the Ten Commandments, he offered a list of what the man had to do to qualify.

But when the man with many possessions testified to his lifelong practice of following the commandments, Jesus sought to provoke in him, as he provokes in us, a whole new level of understanding about eternal life in God. With love for him, the Lord said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”

Eternal life does not mean life until the end of time. It is not about quantity, but quality. Eternal life means a deep connection with the ageless and invincible values of the Kingdom of God. Eternal life describes the quality of relationship between human beings and Christ, bringing us into a present knowledge and experience with the loving and living spirit of God.

As we consider our Lord’s encounter with the man with many possessions, we can imagine Jesus’ insight into his heart and soul. He had followed the specific, outward regulations that were spelled out in the scriptures of those of the Abrahamic tradition – but Jesus perceived that something still blocked him from total obedience to God – his many possessions. Material belongings stood in the way of his following Christ, because, having heard Jesus’ opinion that he needed to give them up, he went away shocked and grieving, stunned and defeated – perhaps with a broken heart. He could not meet the ultimate measure of obedience to God. His love of possessions blocked him from totally loving God and following Christ.

Many scholars are quick to say that this is not necessarily a teaching by Jesus against a Christian’s having material possessions, in whatever quantity. They remind us that the crisis for the man with many possessions was not how much he owned, but that the property owned him, blocking his way to unity with God.

Thinking about such views is a necessary beginning for each of us to examine in our own lives the relevance of today’s Gospel story.

Would Jesus have said to another person, “One thing you lack,” and then listed something quite different from selling possessions and giving the income to the poor? What does Jesus say to you and to me – about the one thing more that we lack? What do we need to give up, to rid ourselves of, to put behind us, that would allow us completely to follow Christ? What can blind us and deafen us from connecting with God?

What is the radical reorientation of our lives that will lead us to follow Christ? What is it that stands in the way of our becoming what God intends us to be?

It is almost certainly selfishness of one sort or another because putting ourselves first puts God second

or third. Because we do this, we become separated from the Holy Spirit’s resources.

What is it that we need to give up in order to gain what is much more valuable? Is it greed or prejudice – ignorance or pride – anger or the need to control others, the inability to acknowledge our sins of hurting others or the “things we have left undone” or something else?

Or is it, after all, a love of possessions that stand in our way of connecting with the eternal life that we can find only in God? It the fate of the man with many possessions at least in part potentially our fate? Is what stood in his way also at least in part what stands in our way, preventing us from totally connecting with God and following Christ?

We live in a culture of materialism in which we measure too much in monetary terms. We are inundated day after day, hour after hour, by advertising that insists that if we buy one thing or another that we will be happier and better off. The push for more and more material possessions insinuates itself into our lives constantly.

For the majority of us who are not impoverished – for those who do not live with severely limited resources, this is a question we must examine.

An Anglican bishop from Africa once declared to an American audience that it was much easier for the Christians of his diocese to truly know God than for those living in the United States. This is so, he stated, because most in his diocese are very poor and that condition leads them to know the need for God in every way. This is so, because their prospects of becoming rich are so remote that they focus on deeper,

more spiritual values.

Americans in contrast, he suggested, have a chance to gain nearly every material possession they want. So, we often become convinced, at least subconsciously, that we can buy happiness and meaning. This delusion can leave us void of the lasting, deep-down joy that possessions cannot bring.

Finally, it seems ironic that the man with many possessions asked about “inheriting” eternal life. The truth is, he had already inherited it – as a child of God. The God-within-him existed as a part of the created order – because he, like each of us, was created in the image and likeness of God. He had inherited God’s spirit already – he just didn’t know it. Jesus tried to open him to understanding that reality – to instruct him how to break through what blocked him from recognising and utilising the very spirit of God that he only

had to put before all else in his life.

What must we do, what must we give up, in order to recognise and put to use the eternal life that each of us has inherited?

 Hymn TIS 387: Christ is alive! Let Christians sing

                       (tune – Truro)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2JEwda8G0U 

Intercessory Prayers  

      After the words:            In your mercy,

      please respond with:     hear our prayer. 

Pentecost 20 Sunday – Year B

God of every family, we pray for your worldwide family

and the great creation in which you have placed them all.

We pray for places where climate change is raising sea levels,

threatening village life and food production.

May we be mindful of our contributions to climate change and be willing,

as Jesus’ disciples to be the stewards that this earth needs.

We pray for those affected by natural disasters, including the Coronavirus pandemic.

Enable the generosity needed in us and others

that will encourage the vaccines and health practices

to contain the spread and destruction caused by COVID-19.

In this moment hear too our silent prayers for the world.

A moment of silence

Jesus our brother, we pray for your Church here in our community, on this land of the Eora Nation, who first cared for this place.

Help us to be mindful of the needs of our First Peoples.

We pray for the Congress Church within the Uniting Church.

Help us find a destiny together as your people.

We pray for the Uniting Church in Australia.

We lift before you our President, our Moderator and for our Presbytery.

We pray for all the churches in our local community that our work together may reflect our commitment to serving the ways of Jesus. Bless our congregation and our mission work together.

Prayers for specific mission projects or groups

Holy Spirit, we pray for all who are sick, living with disease or infirmity; those who are lonely and in isolation, those who are in grief.

We bring to mind those we know in these situations

Give them courage to face their time of trial, comfort to deal with their pain, strength to face tomorrow and confidence to share their burdens with others.

Finally, we pray for ourselves and for those we love.

Help us with our need and share our burdens, that we will not lose hope. We pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen. 

The Lord's Prayer

Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us. Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil. For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and for ever. Amen. 

Hymn TIS 665: Jesus Christ is waiting

                        (tune - Noel Nouvelet)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CSzEviUc_o 

          Benediction 

        Go out as brothers and sisters in faith, ready to share generously the love you have received this day, with all you meet. Go now, in hope. Go now in love. And may the peace that passes all understanding guide you along the way. Amen 

Hymn 779: May the feet of God walk with you                              (tune – Aubrey)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rw1sjc3JVrw



Marsden Road Uniting Newsletter - November 2021

Marsden Road Uniting Church 203 Marsden Road Carlingford November 2021 Our mission : Reflecting Christ Alive in the Community ...