It's been a few years since we've had a Sunday with enough snow to keep people away, so for many of you, this is your first experience with "North Street @ Your Street". What you will find below is a short order of worship that you can walk through in your home either by yourself or with family. Listen to the songs on the videos (my apologies if you have to endure a commercial at the beginning of a video) and read the passages and know that even though we're physically separate today, we are yet together in Christ. This might take about 20-25 minutes.
While the Body of Christ is her best in worship when together, what a blessing it is to have technology to "keep us together" every great once in a while through things such as this.
(If some of these videos are not showing up in your email, you may alternatively visit our North St. News page instead.)
Praying,
Pastor Jeremy
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Greetings in Christ!
The Lord be with you.
The Collect-Prayer for this Last Sunday after Epiphany:
O God,
who before the passion of your only-begotten Son
revealed his glory upon the holy mountain:
Grant to us that we,
beholding by faith the light of his countenance,
may be strengthened to bear our cross,
and be changed into his likeness from glory to glory;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Song: Breathe
Our psalm during this series: Psalm 92 (from The Message):
A Sabbath Song
What a beautiful thing, God, to give thanks,
to sing an anthem to you, the High God!
To announce your love each daybreak,
sing your faithful presence all through the night,
Accompanied by dulcimer and harp, the full-bodied music of strings.
You made me so happy, God I saw your work and I shouted for joy.
How magnificent your work, God!
How profound your thoughts!
Dullards never notice what you do; fools never do get it.
When the wicked popped up like weeds and all the evil men and women took over,
You mowed them down, finished them off once and for all.
You, God, are High and Eternal.
Look at your enemies, God!
Look at your enemies—ruined!
Scattered to the winds, all those hirelings of evil!
But you’ve made me strong as a charging bison,
you’ve honored me with a festive parade.
The sight of my critics going down is still fresh,
the rout of my malicious detractors.
My ears are filled with the sounds of promise:
“Good people will prosper like palm trees,
Grow tall like Lebanon cedars; transplanted to God’s courtyard,
They’ll grow tall in the presence of God, lithe and green, virile still in old age.”
Such witnesses to upright God! My Mountain, my huge, holy Mountain!
[pause for reflection]
A Song: The Love of God
A reading from the Gospel: Matthew 6:25-34
‘Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? Therefore do not worry, saying, “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?” For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
‘So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.
[pause for reflection]
A Word from Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor on Sabbath:
Snowstorms are like a forced sabbath. With all that humans can do today to control and predict and "know," a blizzard, while predictable with technology, cannot be stopped by engineering, technology, or any other will of humanity. While annoying at the least and deadly at the worst, storms can serve for us as a reminder that we are...human.
As we enter into Lent this week, it seems an appropriate reminder.
[pause for reflection]
Benediction - Take to the World
And finally, our weekly song of benediction. Some very nice girl used it to make a video with memories from her trip to Kenya, but you can just listen instead of watching if you'd like.
"Go in his grace and peace...you are [already] dispersed."
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We do have a special gathering of worship this week on Wednesday. Be sure to join us for our Ash Wednesday service at 7:00 PM. Hope to see you then!
