Marsden
Road Uniting Church Carlingford
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What About God and Science?
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.
Call to Worship
(The Abingdon
Worship Annual 2020)
Sisters
and brothers, we meet to worship God, to give thanks for the vocation of us all
as the beloved of Jesus Christ, to remember our roots in the teaching of the
Wesley Family and to remember the commitments we have made, and to reflect upon
our life and ministry.
God
gives the Word
Great
is the company of the beloved of Jesus Christ.
Young
and old, from all walks of life,
blessed
with experience, imagination, compassion
Great is
the company of the beloved of Jesus Christ.
Warmed
by the Word within,
Worshipping
God in Spirit and Truth
Great
is the company of the beloved of Jesus Christ.
God
gives the Word
Great
is the company of the beloved of Jesus Christ.
Hymn AHB 229: Let
Heaven and Earth Combine
(Tune – St John) two extra verses not in AHB.
1. Let earth and Heaven combine,
Angels and men agree,
To praise in songs divine
The incarnate Deity,
Our God contracted to a
span,
Incomprehensibly made man.
2. He laid His glory by,
He wrapped Him in our clay;
Unmarked by human eye,
The latent Godhead lay;
Infant of days He here
became,
And bore the mild
Immanuel’s name.
3. See in that infant’s face
The depths of deity,
And labour while ye gaze
To sound the mystery
In vain; ye angels gaze no
more,
But fall, and silently
adore.
4. Unsearchable the love
That hath the Saviour
brought;
The grace is far above
Of men or angels’ thought:
Suffice for us that God, we
know,
Our God is manifest below.
5. He deigns in flesh to appear,
Widest extremes to join;
To bring our vileness near,
And make us all divine:
And we the life of God
shall know,
For God is manifest below.
6. Made perfect first in love,
And sanctified by grace,
We shall from earth remove,
And see His glorious face:
His love shall then be
fully showed,
And man shall all be lost
in God.
Author: Charles Wesley
St. John (13355)
Composer (Attributed To): W. H. Havergal 1850
Opening prayer
Living
God whose Word became flesh in Jesus and whose Spirit of Truth speaks into our
hearts all honour and glory and worship belong to you. As our praises pronounce
your wonder may our lives overflow with love, that our words and deeds might
tell of your goodness and declare your infinite grace. Amen.
A Prayer of Confession
Holy God hear us as we confess our sins.
If we have taken too lightly the call to proclaim
your gospel: Gracious God forgive us.
Help us to live your Word.
If we have been complacent in our preparation
and forgetful of your people’s needs: Gracious God,
forgive us.
Help us to live your Word.
If we have put our own ideas and concerns
before the good news of your love. Gracious God
forgive us.
Help us to live your Word.
If we have failed to listen to the promptings of
your Spirit. Gracious God forgive us.
Help us to live your Word.
If we have not lived the message, we have voiced.
Gracious God forgive us.
Help us to live your Word.
Silence
May the living God forgive and renew us, give us
victory over sin and set us free in Christ. Amen.
Declaration of Forgiveness
Gracious
God with gratitude and gladness we hear your promise of liberation: that in Christ
we are forgiven and set free and restored to serve you.
Thanks,
be to God! Amen
The
Peace
Let us share the joy, the freedom, and the rest we
find in God’s love, as we greet one another in the grace and peace of Christ.
The peace of Christ be with you.
The peace of Christ be with you always.
(You may like to exchange a sign of peace with
those around you.)
Offering Prayer
Receive these gifts we
now bring, God of gifts, and bless them to be gifts for your world. Through our
giving, renew others, that they too may know the comfort and rest of living in
the arms of your compassion and your love. Amen.
(Tune – Kingsfold)
From you all skill and science flow,
all pity, care and love,
all calm and courage, faith and hope
O pour them from above!
all pity, care and love,
all calm and courage, faith and hope
O pour them from above!
And share them, Lord, to each and all,
as each and all have need;
so let your gifts return to you
in noble thought and deed.
as each and all have need;
so let your gifts return to you
in noble thought and deed.
And hasten, Lord, that perfect day
when pain and death shall cease,
and your just rule shall fill the earth
with health and light and peace:
when pain and death shall cease,
and your just rule shall fill the earth
with health and light and peace:
Whenever green the grass shall be,
and ever blue the skies,
and our destruction shall no more
deface your paradise.
and ever blue the skies,
and our destruction shall no more
deface your paradise.
Charles Kingsley (1819 -
1875)
Tune: Albano
The
Service of the Word
The Gospel Reading: Matthew 14:13-21 NEB page 738
Readings: NRSV Translation
Romans 9.1-5
9. I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience
confirms it by the Holy Spirit— 2I have great sorrow and
unceasing anguish in my heart. 3For I could wish that I myself
were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my own people, my kindred
according to the flesh. 4They are Israelites, and to them
belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the
worship, and the promises; 5to them belong the patriarchs, and
from them, according to the flesh, comes the Messiah, who is over all, God
blessed forever. Amen.
Matthew 14:13-21
13Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there
in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they
followed him on foot from the towns. 14When he went ashore, he
saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick. 15When
it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place,
and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the
villages and buy food for themselves.” 16Jesus said to them,
“They need not go away; you give them something to eat.” 17They
replied, “We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.” 18And
he said, “Bring them here to me.” 19Then he ordered the crowds
to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up
to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples,
and the disciples gave them to the crowds. 20And all ate and
were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve
baskets full. 21And those who ate were about five thousand men,
besides women and children.
Preaching
of the Word: What About God
and Science?
The
eighteenth century challenged Christians to adapt their ways to new ideas. Many
intellectuals in John Wesley's England embraced a widening gap between the
natural and the supernatural, natural law and providence, and rational faith
and piety, which had roots in the mechanistic interpretations of nature
epitomized by Sir Isaac Newton's accomplishments. The study which began our
final of five series on John Wesley and the twenty first century offers an insight
of Wesley's interaction with science and the challenges which the new
understanding of nature and the physical world brought to believers.
Wesley's intellectual
horizon included a lifelong interest in the progress of science and the ways
that science could serve Christian purposes. Although he occasionally dabbled
in the field or recommended projects to others, Wesley never had the interest
(or time) to devote to serious experimental study and cannot be compared with
contemporary scientist-clerics such as Joseph Priestley, Stephen Hales, Bishop
Samuel Horsley, or William Derham. Mainly, John Wesley focused on science to
serve his single goal and purpose of furthering the gospel and helping the
sick. He also wrote inexpensive works on natural science for his constituency.
Wesley's sermons and other writings point to an enthusiasm for the natural
world as "God's World which could be exploited for humanitarian as well as
traditional religious purposes.
Wesley's student days at
Oxford indicated a more than ordinary attention to science. He was interested
in such disparate questions as the nature of "vacuums, the Chain of Being,
and the ability of animals to reason."1 In later travels, he
would meet and comment on the work of many individuals working in science. He
was particularly concerned with unusual natural phenomena and would often
speculate on their causes. An insatiable reader, Wesley read scientific works
throughout his life, often from the back of his horse.
From his own reading and
the advice of others, he developed short lists of scientific works for his
correspondents, schools, and lay preachers. These collections included older
works by John Ray, Cotton Mather, and Jonathan Edwards as well as current works
by Benjamin Franklin, Charles Bonnet, John Hutchinson, and Oliver Goldsmith.
Wesley followed the debates that swirled around the various interpretations of
Newton's ideas.
As we heard in our study for Wesley scientific
facts about the heavens, for example, are not dependent on Scriptural
authority. When Scripture makes claims about the world that science has
disproved, Scripture must then be interpreted in a non-literal way. One
wonders, in that light, what Wesley might have said about the age of the earth
and the evolution of life, if he had had at his disposal the data of modern
scientific findings.
What would he have said,
if he had seen the data, about the rich fossil record for the development of
life, spanning hundreds of millions of years? What would he have said about the
much sparser, but no less fascinating, fossil record of the development of
humans? Would he have said that Genesis 1 and 2 need to be interpreted in a
non-literal way? We have no way of knowing, definitively, what he might have
said. In the light of the way he interpreted Scripture in relationship to the
scientific data of his own day, however, we can guess he might have said, “Yes,
we need to reinterpret Genesis 1 and 2.”
Hymn AHB 556: Creator of the
earth and skies
(Tune –
Plaistow)
1.
Creator of the earth and skies,
To whom all truth and power belong,
Grant us your truth to make us wise;
Grant us your power to make us strong.
2.
We have not known you: to the skies
Our monuments of folly soar,
And all our self-wrought miseries
Have made us trust ourselves the more.
3.
We have not loved you: far and wide
The wreckage of our hatred spreads,
And evils wrought by human pride
Recoil on unrepentant heads.
4.
We long to end this worldwide strife:
How shall we follow in your way?
Speak to mankind your words of life,
Until our darkness turns to day.
Words by: Donald Hughes
Music by: Jeremiah Clark
Music by: Jeremiah Clark
Pray for the Church
throughout the world – that the Spirit will revive and refresh the Church in every
part; •
Pray for your local
church and the churches in your area – that you may be waiting attentively for
the ways God is speaking through the Spirit; •
Pray for those who
come to your church, and for those on the fringes - that they may have an assurance
of God’s love and know that they are saved through Christ; •
Pray for those who
are in leadership in the Church - that they may be strengthened & upheld in
their ministries; •
Pray for those who
you know who do not know of God’s love – for friends or family, for neighbours
or colleagues, that God’s Spirit may fill their hearts; •
Pray for the Kingdom
of God - that it may break through in us & among us, that the earth may be
filled with the glory of God; •
Pray for yourself -
that God’s Spirit will speak in your heart, that you may be bold to proclaim
the gospel in your words and actions.
THE LORD'S PRAYER
Hymn AHB 297: Come, let us with our Lord arise
(Tune – Surrey) extra
verse not in AHB
Come, let us with our Lord arise,
Our Lord, Who made both earth and skies;
Who died to save the world He made,
And rose triumphant from the dead;
He rose, the Prince of life and peace,
And stamped the day for ever His.
‘This is the day the Lord hath made’ −
That all may see His love displayed,
May feel His resurrection’s power,
And live again to fall no more;
Their heart and mind and will renewed,
And filled with all the life of God.
Then let us render Him His own,
With solemn prayer approach the throne,
With meekness hear the Gospel word,
With thanks His dying love record;
Our joyful hearts and voices raise,
And fill His courts with songs of praise.
Honour and praise to Jesus pay
Throughout His consecrated day;
Be all in Jesus’ praise employed,
Nor leave a single moment void;
With utmost care the time improve,
And only breathe His praise and love.
Text: Charles Wesley | Tune: Surrey
Benediction
(Tune – Aubrey)
May
the feet of God walk with you, and his hand hold you tight.
May
the eye of God rest on you, and his ear hear your cry.
May
the smile of God be for you, and his breath give you life.
May
the Child of God grow in you, and his love bring you
home.
