PIONEER
PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
Worship
via Blog Easter Sunday April
4, 2021
ADORNING
THE CROSSES
PROCLAMATION
HYMN: “Jesus Christ is Risen Today” Glory #232
WELCOME AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
Welcome to Pioneer’s blog worship service.
Though we are accessing this remotely and unable to look each other in the eye,
we are still the Pioneer faith community, gathered as children of God to
worship, to be spiritually fed, and to be equipped to go out to serve in
Christ’s name—though we do it differently during this pandemic.
Pioneer offers worship in several modes:
a)
The
blog.
b)
The
blog service mailed through US Postal service.
c)
Sermons
only, mailed to those who so request.
d)
Zoom
services at 10:00 Sunday mornings.
e)
Live
worship with masks and social distancing has plenty of room for additional
worshipers.
f)
We will share the
Lord’s Supper as part of this worship service. So please pause
and gather your choice of bread and beverage. While the bread and grape juice
served in community and led by the pastor in person is our tradition, we are
facing times that call for us to do worship in new ways rather than being tied
to rigid tradition—much like the early church.
-
Women’s
Spirituality 10:30 a.m. Tuesday
-
Men’s
Prayer Group 8:30 a.m. Thursday
-
M&M
Meets next Sunday Following Worship
Now allow yourself a brief time of silence
as you open your hearts and feel God’s presence with you, right where you are.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
BAPTISM: Friends, remember your baptism … and be thankful.
CALL TO WORSHIP
Christ has risen!
He is present among us.
The tomb is empty.
Love has conquered death.
Today is a new day!
Hope is born again.
PRAYER OF THE DAY
Amazing God, we greet the dawning
brightness of this special day with hopes renewed. We have known grief and
sorrow, loss and tears, fear and failure, conflict and despair. Meet us here,
living Christ, for we need this time of resurrection. We need your healing
presence. We need your word of greeting that welcomes us into the community of
faith in spite of our doubts and faithlessness. You are the risen Lord. In you
we find life. Amen.
HYMN: “Christ
is Risen! Shout Hosanna!”
Glory #248
CALL TO CONFESSION
Doubters, believers, disciples, deceivers: come to the
one who makes all things new. God has always been there for us, loving us and
calling us to be all that we can be. Come before God now, trusting in God’s
grace.
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
God of the empty
tomb, you offer us new life and new hope in the resurrection of Jesus. Yet we
are slow to embrace that life. Save us from the calamity of our selfish ways.
Rescue us from all hurtful and destructive habits. Forgive our broken promises,
heal our broken relationships, lift our broken spirits, so we may share in the
resurrection of Christ. (continue with personal prayers………..) Amen.
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
Anyone who is in Christ is a new creation.
The old life has gone; the new life has
begun.
Friends, believe the Good News!
In Jesus Christ we are forgiven and
restored to new life!
PASSING THE PEACE
May the peace of Christ be with you.
And also with you.
Let us extend the peace of Christ in heart
and prayer to one another.
GLORY
BE TO THE FATHER
SPECIAL
MUSIC: “Easter Alleluia” medley
SCRIPTURE 1: Isaiah 25:6-9
On this mountain the
Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of
aged wine--the best of meats and the finest of wines. On this mountain he will
destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations;
he will swallow up death forever. The Sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears
from all faces; he will remove the disgrace of his people from all the earth.
The Lord has spoken. In that day they will say, "Surely this is our God;
we trusted in him, and he saved us. This is the Lord, we trusted in him; let us
rejoice and be glad in his salvation."
SCRIPTURE 2: John 20:1-18
Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early,
while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the
tomb. So she ran, and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom
Jesus loved, and said to them, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb,
and we do not know where they have laid him."
Peter then came out with the other disciple, and they went toward the tomb.
They both ran, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first;
and stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go
in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb; he saw the
linen cloths lying, and the napkin, which had been on his head, not lying with
the linen cloths but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple,
who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet
they did not know the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the
disciples went back to their homes.
But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to
look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of
Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her,
"Woman, why are you weeping?" She said to them, "Because they
have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him."
Saying this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that
it was Jesus.
Jesus said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you
seek?" Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, "Sir, if
you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him
away." Jesus said to her, "Mary." She turned and said to him in
Hebrew, "Rabboni!" (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, "Do
not hold me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brethren
and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and
your God." Mary Magdalene went and said to the disciples, "I have
seen the Lord"; and she told them that he had said these things to her.
EASTER
REFLECTION "Love Lies in Wait for You" Rev.
Jean Hurst
A cry of joy echoed from the people as hope grew. A man
born blind could see. A widow’s only son was restored to life. A man who was
crippled for 38 years walked. A woman caught in adultery was given a second
chance. A man in a despised occupation found new life and purpose. A crowd of
over five thousand was fed. A raging storm was calmed. The poor, the oppressed,
the sinful and the marginalized found acceptance and love. Power structures
were challenged. The people were taught to be salt and light, to love their
neighbors and their enemies, to not judge, to forgive, to share, to trust, to
have faith, to love God. And God’s light in the world grew brighter.
A cry echoed from a cross and hope was abandoned. Crowds
had changed shouts of hosanna to calls for death. Friends betrayed, deserted,
and denied him. An innocent man was mocked, beaten, hung on a cross, and died.
The sky turned black and God’s light went out of the world.
It was in the darkness of that third day that a
grief-stricken Mary went to sit by the tomb of Jesus. The Gospel of John tells
us Mary was alone. She comes, expecting to see everything as it was when Jesus’
body was laid inside and the great stone rolled across the opening. Instead she
sees the open tomb, and according to the narrative, immediately runs to tell
the disciples.
Peter and an unnamed disciple race to the tomb. Finding it
empty and seeing the discarded burial cloths, each responds differently. Peter
returns home, not understanding. The other disciple believed even though he
didn’t fully understand. He, too, returned home.
Mary lingers, weeping and heartbroken. Stooping to look
inside the tomb, she sees two angels sitting where the body has been. “Woman,
why are you crying?” they ask. Mary, in her grief and confusion, doesn’t
question the appearance of these two in the empty tomb. She answers, “They have
taken my Lord away and I don’t know where they have put him.” She realizes
someone is behind her and turns, not knowing it is Jesus. The same question:
“Woman, why are you crying? Who are you looking for?” Blinded by tears, she
thinks the man speaking to her is the gardener and that he’ll have the answers.
We might wonder how it is that Mary didn’t recognize Jesus.
He had healed her, casting out seven demons, giving her back her life. She had
been one of his followers. She had loved him dearly. She had been accepted by
him, loved by him, changed by him. She’d been there at the end, watched the
crucifixion. How could she now not recognize him?
But remember other stories of the resurrection--the
followers on the road to Emmaus who didn’t recognize Jesus until he broke bread
with them or the disciples who had gone back to fishing who didn’t recognize
Jesus until he performed yet another miracle. For each, a specific action
triggered recognition.
This time, it was in being named. “Mary.” It is spoken
quietly, gently. Her eyes hadn’t told her the man before her was Jesus. Her
ears hadn’t told her that the words spoken to her were spoken by Jesus. But
when he spoke her name, her heart told her it was Jesus. And her world
changed.
Jesus had told his followers that he would die and on the
third day live again, but they didn’t understand. Mary didn’t understand. She
wasn’t looking for a living Jesus, she was looking for his body. She came to
the tomb to try to come to grips with his death and with her loss. A part of
her had died on that cross as well. But when he spoke her name, when her heart
recognized that voice, she knew. He was alive!
Mary was the first witness to the resurrection. She was the
first to the tomb and found it empty. She didn’t encounter Jesus then. She went
and brought two disciples back to the tomb. They didn’t encounter Jesus. But
love lay in wait for her. At her darkest moment, in her deepest pain, Jesus
came to her, and spoke her name, and she knew him. Hope was reborn. Mary went
from there and proclaimed it to the disciples. He is risen. I have seen the
Lord!
The empty tomb didn’t convince anyone. Presbyterian pastor
and author Frederick Buechner, in The Faces of Jesus, writes about Saint
Paul’s discussion of the resurrection, saying,
“... he makes no mention of an
empty tomb at all. But the fact of the matter is, that in a way, it hardly
matters how the body of Jesus came to be missing because in the last analysis,
what convinced the people that he had risen from the dead was not the absence
of his corpse but his living presence. And so it has been ever since.”
We believe that Christ has risen from the dead. We didn’t
see the empty tomb. We didn’t even have the experiences of Mary or the other
followers who encountered a real, physical Jesus after the resurrection. And
yet we believe. Perhaps it is because we have been told over and over again,
from the time we were little children, that Christ died on the cross and rose
from the dead. And yet I think it is
more than that. It isn’t in doctrine or theology that we know Jesus. It is in
relationship.
I believe that, in one way or another, each of us has
experienced the very real, living presence of Jesus in our lives. It may have
been like Mary, when at the hour of our deepest pain and despair, he spoke our
name and our hearts knew.
It may have been like the followers on the road to Emmaus,
that we recognize Jesus in the breaking of bread or as the disciples returned
to fishing, we may follow a command we don’t understand and then experience
Jesus in the unexpected result.
Like the disciples in hiding, we may close and lock the
doors to our hearts, yet somehow Jesus gets through and says, “Peace be with
you” and that peace is felt. Or, as with Peter, we may have faced the One we
denied and been forgiven, restored, and set on a new path.
Try as we might, we cannot shut out the living presence of
Jesus. Love lies in wait. It is the love that was born in a stable as Emmanuel,
God with us. It is the love that taught and healed and forgave and accepted and
restored. It is the love that hung on a cross. It is the love that walked from
an open tomb, the love that death could not conquer.
Hope may have died on the cross that dark day, but with
that act of love, with the resurrection, hope was reborn. It is the hope that
evil will not win. War will not prevail.
Greed and power and oppression will not rule. God’s light in the world will not
be extinguished. God’s love will triumph.
And we are the vessels that carry that love. Reports of an
empty tomb two thousand years ago will not convince a skeptical world. The love
that we experience in our risen Lord will. Jesus told his followers during his
last meal with them that he gave them a new commandment, to love as he loves.
He said that the world would see that love and know that we are followers of
Jesus. And the world will be changed. And hope will continue to grow and God’s
light will get ever brighter.
Friends, love has triumphed. The tomb is empty. Death is
not the end. Listen to your hearts. What do they say? Jesus Christ is risen!
HYMN: “Fill
My Cup” #699
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE AND
THE LORD’S PRAYER
Holy
and amazing God of promises fulfilled, it is Easter and our hearts are glad! It
is Easter and memories of fear and denial, loneliness and death are reshaped by
the gift of life, the significance of love, and the peace which goes beyond
human events to the very heartbeat of existence. It is Easter and Jesus is
risen! The grave is empty. Let his light shine into us and through us into the
darkness of the world. Make us beacons of hope and life, we pray. Let this day
be the beginning of new life in us and make us witnesses to that life in a
hurting world.
We pray for that world, Lord, beginning
with those close to us—for Jack and Carolyn Bauer ... Lari Higgins … Summer Bauer … Bill Kaesemeyer … Tasha
Sizemore … Stephen Meinzinger … Beverly Patterson … Lois White
… Virginia … Cherry … John Matthews …
Margaret Dunbar … Darlene … Trisha … Dave … Jacob … George and Joyce … Jennifer
… Chuck … Courtney … Ethel … Helen. (Additional prayers …………)
We pray for our
world--for justice, for peace, for wisdom for our leaders, for transformed
hearts, for wholeness, for the healing of your people, for hope for the lost
and wounded in heart.
We pray for those with
whom we differ, those who are hard for us to accept and love, those near and
far that we call enemy. Heal our relationships. Bless our enemies and help us
to turn them into friends.
Heal the wounds of
our own hearts—the past, the actions and the inactions, the memories. Help us
to love the person in the mirror. Let this truly be a new day dawning—a new way
of being. Help us to see each person, those we love and those we struggle to
love as your name, your image, your child. Seeing that, grant us lovingkindness
toward them. We pray in the name of the risen Jesus who taught us to pray: Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be
thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give
us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the
kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.
CALL TO OFFERING
What shall we give in the name of One who
gave everything for us? What do we offer in thanksgiving for the steadfast love
proclaimed in Jesus Christ? How will good news be carried to those desperate to
hear it? What we give will make a difference.
DOXOLOGY
PRAYER OF DEDICATION
What you have done for us is beyond our understanding,
gracious God. Our gifts can never match your goodness toward us. Your saving
grace, your healing light, your personal sacrifice are so far beyond our
imagining! We can only offer ourselves, all we have and all we are, in response
to the coming of Christ Jesus. Receive, O God, our humble service and bless
these gifts we pray. Amen.
THE LORD’S SUPPER
Song of
Preparation: “Let Us Talents and Tongues Employ” #526
Invitation to the Table
The
Lord’s table is not a piece of wood with clay dishes, but a place in our hearts
that connects us to our Lord Jesus. It is a place to which we come as we
remember his sacrifice, as we seek to experience his presence, as we are
nourished to continue his work, as we recognize our community in him despite
whatever distance or disease or obstacle that might separate us. It is the
place we come to renew our commitment to continue his ministry and mission. Our
Lord invites us to the table without condition, simply because we are loved.
Come with grateful hearts. Come with joyful hearts.
The Great Thanksgiving
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our
God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.
It is indeed right, O Holy God, to
give thanks for your amazing grace, to praise you for who you are, for who you
created us to be. We marvel at the truth that you are with us wherever we may
be. Though we worship from home, separated and for some, isolated, it is still
in you that we find life and purpose. We are children of grace and nothing can
separate us from your love.
You have given us the gift of your
Holy Spirit who unites us, binding us together as one body across the miles. By
your Spirit of grace transform our social isolation and distance into a holy
community, connecting us to each other by your sacred presence.
Bless the elements we each have
gathered, elements common to our ordinary lives. Let them represent for us the
body and blood of our Savior who gave himself for us. Amen.
Words of Institution
As we share these symbols of bread and
cup across the distance, we remember the story of Jesus with the disciples that
last night before he was arrested. He took the bread and blessed it and broke
it and gave it to them saying “Take, eat, this is my body, given for you.” And
with the cup he said, “This cup is the new covenant, my blood poured out for
you for the forgiveness of sins. Whenever you drink of it, remember me.”
And so we do. As we lift up many
pieces in scattered places rather than sharing the same loaf and as we drink
from separate cups instead of one, we do so remembering that throughout history
God’s people have often been scattered and in exile. Through the power and
mystery of the Holy Spirit, we are made one in Christ Jesus. These are the
gifts of God for us the children of God.*
The Bread of Life……………..
The Cup of Salvation …………….
*portions of
prayer adapted from prayer by Rev. Steve Kliewer, Interim General Presbyter,
EOP
Unison Prayer of Thanks
Gracious God, you have made us one with all
your people in heaven and on earth. You have fed us with the bread of life, and
renewed us for your service. Help us who have shared Christ’s body and received
his cup, to be his faithful disciples so that our daily living may be part of
the life of your kingdom, and our love be your love reaching out into the life
of the world; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
CLOSING HYMN: “Christ
is Alive” Glory
#246
CHARGE AND BENEDICTION
You
are a child of the Resurrection. Believe it. Embrace it. Live it.
As you do the grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit is with you now
and always. Amen.
CHORAL RESPONSE
May the Lord, Mighty God, bless and keep you forever.
Grant you peace, perfect peace, courage in every endeavor. Lift up your eyes
and see his face and his grace forever. May the Lord, Mighty God, bless and
keep you forever.
~~~~~~~~~~
LOOKING
AHEAD
April 6 10:30 a.m. Women’s Spirituality
April 8 8:30 a.m. Men’s Prayer Group
April 11 following worship M&M
April 18 following worship Worship & Music
April 18 1:00 p.m. Prayer Shawl Ministry
April 20 10:30 a.m. Women’s Spirituality
April 22 8:30 a.m. Men’s Prayer Group
April 25 following worship Deacons
April 27 12:00 noon PPW
PRAYER
CARE:
Jack and Carolyn Bauer (death of Phyllis), Lari Higgins
(breast cancer), Summer Bauer (breast cancer), Linda and Bill Kaesemeyer, Tasha Sizemore (Krohn’s?), Stephen Meinzinger (Covid-19), Lois White
(lymphoma), John Matthews (cancer), (Jacob Cunningham, Trisha Cagley (health
problems), Dave Clark (kidney cancer), Virginia DesIlets (age 99!), Margaret
Dunbar (aging issues), George Sahlberg (infection in knee), Joyce Sahlberg
(health issues), Jennifer Schirm (Parkinson’s), Chuck VanHise (leg/walking
rehab), Darlene Wingfield (heart valve, pulmonary fibrosis, breast cancer), and
Courtney Ziegler (Huntington’s).
LECTIONARY
FOR 4/11/21
Acts 4:32-35;
Psalm 133; 1 John 1:1 – 2:2; John 20:19-31
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