Preparation for Worship. We are beginning the season after Pentecost which will last us until Advent. Green is the color of this season symbolizing growth in our Christian faith. We invite you to adorn your worship space with green. If you want to celebrate communion, have some food and drink to share. The type of food and drink does not matter for they are merely symbols which help us celebrate the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We encourage you to have two candles to light at the beginning of worship–one candle to represent Jesus’ humanity and the other to represent Jesus’ divinity.
The Worship of God
Light two candles in recognition of the presence of Christ.
Gathering for Worship
Passing the Peace
Say to one another, “May the Peace of Christ be with you.”
Respond by saying, “And also with you.”
Call to Worship
Summer has arrived.
The sun shines brighter and the warmth of its light stays longer.
So we shake free of our routines.
In this new moment,
We wander about the wilderness:
Hoping God will open our eyes
Praying God will make us worthy
Wanting to grow with God.
Let us grow together in the wild ways of God.
Opening Prayer. We praise and adore you, O God, for doing wondrous things in our lives – for loving and forgiving us. Even when we become distracted by the events of our daily existence, we are aware of your divine activity in our lives, prompting us to deepen our trust in you. Your desire for us to live full and abundant lives has been realised in and through Jesus, your most wondrous gift of all. He is surely the everlasting sign of your steadfast love towards us, and all people. He is the assurance that we are known intimately and valued by you in ways beyond our human understanding. May our praise and adoration for such goodness towards us be visible, as we respond to Jesus’ appeal to take up our cross and follow him. This we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen
Songs and Psalms of Praise and Prayer
Song of Praise
Praise to the Living God
1. Praise to the living God, the God of love and light
Whose words brought forth the myriad suns and set the worlds in flight.
Whose infinite design which we but dimly see,
Pervades all nature, making all a cosmic unity.
2 Praise to the living God, from whom all things derive
Whose Spirit formed upon this sphere the first faint seeds of life;
Who caused them to evolve, unwitting, toward God’s goal,
Till humankind stood on the earth, as living, thinking souls.
3 Praise to the living God, who knows our joy and pain,
Who shares with us our common life, the sacred and profane.
God toils where’er we toil, in home and mart and mill;
And deep within the human heart God leads us forward still.
4 Praise to the living God, around, within, above,
Beyond the grasp of human mind, but whom we know as love.
In these tumultuous days so full of hope and strife,
May we bear witness to the Way, O source and goal of life.
A Reading from the Psalms
Psalm 86:1-7
Lord, listen closely to me and answer me,
because I am poor and in need.
2 Guard my life because I am faithful.
Save your servant who trusts in you—you! My God!
3 Have mercy on me, Lord,
because I cry out to you all day long.
4 Make your servant’s life happy again
because, my Lord, I offer my life to you,
5 because, my Lord, you are good and forgiving,
full of faithful love for all those who cry out to you.
6 Listen closely to my prayer, Lord;
pay close attention to the sound of my requests for mercy.
7 Whenever I am in trouble, I cry out to you,
because you will answer me.
Prayers for Others
God of the impossible,
we pray for justice, peace and reconciliation;
when the challenges seem too many,
remind us of your resurrection power;
when the task seems overwhelming,
remind us of the miracle of love;
and when apathy threatens us,
remind us of your vision of a world made whole.
Help us to hope that the impossible can happen
And live as if it might do so today.
Amen.
A Second Reading from the Psalms
Psalm 86:8-10
8 My Lord! There is no one like you among the gods!
There is nothing that can compare to your works!
9 All the nations that you’ve made will come
and bow down before you, Lord;
they will glorify your name,
10 because you are awesome
and a wonder-worker.
You are God. Just you.
Celebrating Communion
Communion. (Bread and wine were common foods during Jesus’ day. As we celebrate communion at home, use common food and drinks you have. The type of food and drink is not what matters, but it matters that you remember Christ as you share, eat, and drink.)
A Reading from the Gospels, Mark 14:22-24. While [the disciples and Jesus] were eating, [Jesus] took a loaf of bread, and after blessing it he broke it, gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he gave it to them, and all of them drank from it. He said to them, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.”
Share what you have to eat. Before everyone eats, have someone say,
“This food represents the body of Christ. As we eat, we remember Jesus.”
Share what you have to drink. Before everyone drinks, have someone say,
“This drink represents the covenant Christ made with us that our sins will be forgiven. As we drink, we remember Jesus.”
Prayer of Thanksgiving. Dear God, thank you for your abounding compassionate love. Thank you for guiding and leading us through these difficult times. Thank you for always being with us. Amen.
Song. End communion by singing a hymn. You may want to sing Amazing Grace.
Amazing grace how sweet the sound
that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now I am found,
was blind but now I see.
The Gospel Lesson
A Reading from Matthew 10:24-39
“Disciples aren’t greater than their teacher, and slaves aren’t greater than their master. 25 It’s enough for disciples to be like their teacher and slaves like their master. If they have called the head of the house Beelzebul, it’s certain that they will call the members of his household by even worse names.
26 “Therefore, don’t be afraid of those people because nothing is hidden that won’t be revealed, and nothing secret that won’t be brought out into the open. 27 What I say to you in the darkness, tell in the light; and what you hear whispered, announce from the rooftops. 28 Don’t be afraid of those who kill the body but can’t kill the soul. Instead, be afraid of the one who can destroy both body and soul in hell. 29 Aren’t two sparrows sold for a small coin? But not one of them will fall to the ground without your Father knowing about it already. 30 Even the hairs of your head are all counted. 31 Don’t be afraid. You are worth more than many sparrows.
32 Therefore, everyone who acknowledges me before people, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven. 33 But everyone who denies me before people, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.
34 “Don’t think that I’ve come to bring peace to the earth. I haven’t come to bring peace but a sword. 35 I’ve come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. 36 People’s enemies are members of their own households.
37 “Those who love father or mother more than me aren’t worthy of me. Those who love son or daughter more than me aren’t worthy of me. 38 Those who don’t pick up their crosses and follow me aren’t worthy of me. 39 Those who find their lives will lose them, and those who lose their lives because of me will find them.
Reflection “Take Up What?” from Jeffrey
Listen to Jeffrey reflection and/or read below.
In the Roman Empire in the year 250, the Emperor Decius finally made Christianity illegal. I say “finally” because it took a series of small and increasingly restrictive legal decisions to get there. For example, under Emperor Domitian, around the year 96, Christians were arrested if they refused to pray to the emperor’s statue in the public square. It was okay to be a Christian but not to be unpatriotic to the emperor. About 100 years later during the time of Emperor Septimius Severus, it was not against the law to be Christian but he made it illegal to convert to Christianity and be baptized. At various times in the first two centuries, Christians were kept from holding civil office, owning property, teaching small children, and serving in the army. That last restrictions was due, it seems, to the idea that a Christian might not follow the order of his commander in battle due to the fact that the loyalty of a Christian was to Jesus first rather than the military.
All of that changed in the year 311 when Galerius was Emperor and gave Christians their freedom to worship and own land and bury their dead. After Galerius died that same year and Constantine ended up in Rome as Emperor, Christianity had even more recognition and freedom and, some have even said, privilege. Constantine’s reforms included giving his own summer palace in Rome for Christians to use as a church. He appointed Christians to positions of influence, gave them titles and jobs. All of this favoritism led to a great number of new converts to Christianity. But that in itself led to lots of questions. Who were the genuine Christians? Was it those who were willing to be Christian before it was legal? Did those who converted after Constantine started making his reforms do so just to get ahead, or be in the in-crowd, or to secure a job or title or position of power? If Christianity was difficult before Constantine and some people only converted to Christianity after it was expedient personally for them to do so, can their conversion be trusted as genuine?
I have tried to imagine what Jesus’ words in Matthew 10 must have sounded like to Christians before Galerius and Constantine. I find that I can’t do it. I am like the Christian who was born after it becomes easy and even practical to become a follower of Jesus. I have never lived in a place where religious freedom is not secured. I have had all the privileges of being white and male and non-poor all my life. No matter how many times I read Jesus telling his disciples these things, I recognize that I’m hearing them from a majority culture and a place of privilege. I have never been in a minority, never been singled out as non-normative, or seen as under suspicion, or treated as second class because of something that I either chose to believe or an attribute that is inherent to my identity. And so I have to be careful that I don’t read what Jesus says in the Gospels as congratulating me for making it, patting me on the back for a job well done, or justifying my life of ease.
Maybe that means for me I have to take up a mirror before I take up Jesus’ cross. Honest self-examination is hard work for a majority population. We simply accept our place because it’s easy and we don’t ask why. We forget to question the basic things we have come to accept as right and wrong. Being Christian in a country in which Christianity is normative and rarely questioned, we may be at risk of Christian faith by assumption rather than choice. Perhaps Jesus’ words in Matthew 10 will help us look in that mirror honestly.
Guilt by Association. In verses 24-25 Jesus begins a discussion of guilt by association for his disciples. He uses the social realities of teacher and student, or master and slave. In his day, these relationships were so intertwined that it was presumed a student reflected the teaching of the rabbi. And the slave did the will or acted on the orders of the master, thus making the slave’s actions a reflection of the master’s wishes. The disciples of Jesus understood this connection, but they may have been shocked when he said something that sounds a lot like this: “Look guys, if they think I’m a problem and they are plotting to kill me, they will assume you are like me too. If you follow me, it will make you look guilty of lots of things because I did them or said them, except that people in power will accuse you of doing and saying them too. You should follow me anyway.” Verse 28 adds that Jesus’ followers are not immune to people wanting to kill them! Yet they should not be afraid. Sounds crazy, right? Jesus’ point seems to be that if one is right to fear God, but lives in accord with God’s love, then there’s nothing to fear from any human authority. Others may, and can, and did, and still might, kill the followers of Jesus. But being killed for doing what is godly is not the end of the life of a disciple, or the faithful witness of her life. No act of law or violence or death can take away God’s salvation and glory. I think this means that we should seriously consider whether we want to follow someone who upsets power and speaks truthfully against injustice and acts out of compassion rather than compulsion. At the same time, it seems clear that we don’t do so out of a sense of getting something out of it for ourselves. Following Jesus is not about kickback, payoffs, and returns on investment.
No Secrecy from God; Be Boldly Yourself. Jesus goes on to tell the disciples that they can expect no secrecy (vv. 26-31). What we say will be known. How we live will be recognized by others. Our lives are transparent, being watched both by God and by others. I’m not talking about an invasion of privacy, but an invitation to boldness. If we are living like Jesus, displaying the love of God, then let’s not be shy. We are proud of God’s justice. We are right seek forgiveness rather than revenge. We are supposed to speak out when we are troubled. You know that Jesus said, “let not your hearts be troubled.” Please know that Jesus was speaking about death when he said that. In death, don’t be troubled. But in life, we are called to confront many things that should trouble us: poverty, violence, racism, sexism, hypocrisy, self-righteousness, the misuse of power, greed, injustice…the list seems endless. Jesus pushes us to be bold enough to let what we believe inform what we say and what we say compel what we do with the full knowledge that all of these will be known, should be known by God and others. Live the Gospel in full view of the world. Not to seek attention, but so that what we believe, say, profess, or advocate for or against can sound forth from the followers of God. If we do these out of the conviction that they are part of God’s call and will for our lives, then we should do them with pride.
The Priority of Identity. I fear I make Jesus sound too easy. Being honest with ourselves is work. Being honest with others makes us vulnerable. Knowing that God is not fooled by our justifications or self-imposed limitations is unsettling. Jesus meant to disturb our ease. He did live as a religious minority, a man of no wealth, in a culture without any sense of civil or human rights. Jesus knew that getting the Gospel right in the lives of his followers was urgent. It still is. Although today the barrier to the Gospel may be Christians rather than Romans. The name itself has become so diluted with … take your pick … money/politics/influence/culture that we can no longer just claim to be Christian without offering a list of defining qualities. At a gathering of Muslim and Christian scholars in Boston in 2009, we all laughed when the Muslim convener began the conference with “we’re Muslim but not that kind of Muslim.” After which his Baptist counterpart started his remarks with “we’re Baptist but not that kind of Baptist.” Far too much sin and greed and dishonesty has been publicly displayed in the name of Christianity. It is the power of culture over faith that we are hearing and seeing in far too many people who claim to follow Jesus. It is the curse of being in the majority. Perhaps when Jesus says to take up his cross and follow him, he’s asking us to leave our presumptions about American culture to die.
Jesus doesn’t let us off the hook, in other words. We must steadfastly refuse to let the Gospel of God become co-opted by those who mistake national identity for Christian character, or who spew political platforms as though they are Christian proclamation, or who promote exceptionalism and wealth as God’s blessing and welcome. The Gospel will not be cheapened by culture if we are committed to the Gospel first.
When Jesus asks us to acknowledge rather than deny him, he’s not asking us to order another box of Christian t-shirts to wear publicly so we can go around and “God Bless” everyone who scowls at us. When he acknowledges out loud that families will sometimes hamper the Gospel’s work in our lives, he’s letting some of us know that peace has a price and not everyone is willing to pay it. I may both love God and others in the radical way the Gospel requires, but people who love me may not love what I do and say about following Jesus. In this very church, family members have actively worked to keep their spouse or children or grandchildren from participating in the worship of God and the discipleship of their family member. We have seen Christians have to choose between pleasing their family and following God. It’s always difficult, and sometimes the family wins. But the Gospel continues, because many of those who hear God’s call to go and do and say are just stubborn enough to follow God regardless. May that be me. And you. And together with the fellowship of the saints and the blessings of God, the one more person will experience God’s grace and peace.
Questions for Reflection
- What are your identities? They may be personal, social, etc. How does following Jesus help define your identity?
- What are the difficulties of living in a place where the majority of the population is also Christian?
Prayer of Thanksgiving. Offer a prayer of thanksgiving for God’s love and ask God to help our church family grow deeper and deeper in love.
Song of Commitment
Christ to the World We Bring
1 Christ for the world we sing;
the world to Christ we bring
with loving zeal:
the poor and them that mourn,
the faint and overborne,
sin-sick and sorrow worn,
whom Christ doth heal.
2 Christ for the world we sing;
the world to Christ we bring
with fervent pray’r:
the wayward and the lost,
by restless passions tossed,
redeemed at countless cost
from dark despair.
3 Christ for the world we sing;
the world to Christ we bring
with one accord:
with us the work to share,
with us reproach to dare,
with us the cross to bear,
for Christ our Lord.
4 Christ for the world we sing;
the world to Christ we bring
with joyful song:
the newborn souls whose days,
reclaimed from error’s ways,
inspired with hope and praise,
to Christ belong.
Sending Out
May the steadfast love of God surround you;
The vulnerable love of Jesus Christ inspire you;
The penetrating power of the Holy Spirit surprise you.
Closing Song. In our tradition, we close worship by singing the first verse of Blest Be the Tie. Mindy starts us each week, and so she does today as well.
Blessed be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love;
The fellowship of kindred minds is like to that above. Amen.
Credits: The Call to Worship is from The United Church of Christ’s Worship Ways, Year A, Pentecost 3 – June 21. The Opening Prayer and Sending Out were written by Rev. Moira Laidlaw. Praise to the Living God was written by Curtis Beach (1993) and set to the tune DIADEMATA composed by George J. Elvey (1868). The Prayer for Others comes from Creation Sings Your Praise, edited by Annabel Shilson-Thomas, Canterbury Press, 2010. Amazing Grace was written by John Newton (1807) and played by Aidan on the piano. Christ for the World We Sing was written by Samuel Wolcott (1869) and sung to the tune ITALIAN HYMN composed by Felice de Giardini (1796) at the request of Selina Shirley (1791), the famous evangelically minded Countess of Huntingdon, England. The tune and three others were contributed to Martin Madan’s Collection of Psalm and Hymn Tunes (1769), published to benefit the Lock Hospital in London where Madan was chaplain. Permission to podcast / stream the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE with license #A-724755. All rights reserved. All writings have been used by permission from the posting sites or authors.
Cullowhee Baptist Church 
Beautiful seevice!
Thank you Debbie! We are blessed with such a wonderful church family.