Worship for Sunday 15 August 2021

by Peter Nelson 15 August 2021

Good morning and welcome to our worship today. Our opening hymn is ‘Come let us join our cheerful songs’

Prayer and Lord's Prayer
Oh Heavenly Father, we come to worship you, our creature, our provider, the one who knows our every detail, our thoughts, our feeling, our doubts and our joys.
We bring you our praise and worship, we come before you, not in our own worthiness, but by your invitation, made possible by the sacrifice of your Son our saviour Jesus Christ.
We bring our thanks for your undeserved love, your abiding presence and the comfort and strength of your Holy Spirit.
We bring our prayers in the name of him who is above every name our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen          

His disciples ask Him, ‘Lord, teach us how to pray!’ He answered, ‘When you pray say------

Our Father which art in heaven
Hallowed be your name
Your Kingdom come, Your will be done
In earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread:
And forgives us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For yours is the Kingdom,
The power and the glory  
For ever and ever. Amen

Reading: John 6: 51-58

Hymn: Be still for the presence of the Lord

Prayers of intercession
Take time to bring before God those who need a blessing, He know their names and their need, just ask Him to bless them.

Hymn: All I once held dear

When on holiday in Dorset we were taken to a costal park where there was a stone slab standing erected with these words on it “What will you do now with the gift of your left life?” written by Welsh poet Carol Ann Duffy.

This took on a greater meaning this year as we come out of all the restrictions. Your Left Life!

None of us know how long that may be, but before us we have many opportunities doing things differently, as church, personally, as a family maybe. We need to be open to change. I believe God can weave our past experiences into his plan, because all things work for (some good) to those who love God.      

John 6:33 “I am the bread of life”  

Let me suggest an experiment for you. Have you heard of Lectio Divina?

It is discipline of Bible reading, meditation, prayer and contemplation.

It works like this. Take a simple, may be favourite passage or verse, like John 6;33.

Find a comfortable seat, sit quietly and read slowly your reading.

Then in quietness let the words sink into you mind and heart, let the words speak to you.            

Repeat the process three times and each time, may be a different word, will speak out to you.

That’s it, in it’s simplest form!

It not a Bible study, it’s not a analysis of biblical passages, because when studying you can miss the point, to meet with Jesus! The whole reason for the Bible is to see Jesus in it, this is letting Him speak through it.  

I   - A Noun, a name, not just someone but Me, only Me.

AM - not was or will be but am, present tense, now!

THE - Not one of many, but the one and only.

BREAD - The staff of life, bread, without food we starve and are no more.  

OF - Possession, belonging, of something.

LIFE -  Period of living, the experience of being alive.  

John 5:39-40 Jesus spoke to the religious leaders of his day. “You diligently study the scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life.
These are the scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.”

In John 6:51 “I AM THE LIVING BREAD”
Jesus here develops the statement, when we partake of this Bread of Life we find it is a living Bread. He is alive. Not just someone in the past who we may believe in, but a living God who comes, not only to live with us but lives in us by his spirit.

Why not let Jesus come to you? Why not let him speak to you, be ready for things to change. He never leaves us as we were when he is invited into our lives.
“I am the living bread.”

We sing ‘Guide me o thou great Jehovah’

A Blessing
In the storm of life, may you feel God near.
In the hurts of life, may you find God’s strength around you.
When life feels empty, may God’s presence fill that space.
When the unanswerable question comes, may you just trust Him.
May the love of God, that cannot be explained, fill your heart with peace.
And may God hold your future in the hollow of His hand.
For His promise is “Lo, I am with you always even unto the end of the age, and when all else fails just lean on Me!”

The Storm is Over