A Service for Trinity 1, 6th June, 2021
Preparation:
Before beginning to read this short service, you may wish to find a space for prayer in front of a cross, a candle, or a special place.
May the light of Christ, rising in glory, banish all darkness from our hearts and minds.
The Acclamation of Christ at the Dawning of the Day
O Lord, open our lips
and our mouth shall proclaim your praise.
May Christ, the true, the only light
banish all darkness from our hearts and minds.
O come, let us sing to the Lord; •
let us heartily rejoice in the rock of our salvation.
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving •
and be glad in him with psalms.
For the Lord is a great God •
and a great king above all gods.
Come, let us worship and bow down •
and kneel before the Lord our Maker.
For he is our God; •
we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.
Glory to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit;
as it was in the beginning is now
and shall be for ever. Amen.
Blessed are you, Sovereign God, creator of all,
to you be glory and praise for ever.
You founded the earth in the beginning
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
In the fullness of time you made us in your image,
and in these last days you have spoken to us
in your Son Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh.
As we rejoice in the gift of your presence among us
let the light of your love always shine in our hearts,
your Spirit ever renew our lives
and your praises ever be on our lips.
Blessed be God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Blessed be God for ever.
The Collect
Silence is kept.
O GOD, the strength of all them that put their trust in thee, mercifully accept our prayers; and because through the weakness of our mortal nature we can do no good thing without thee, grant us the help of thy grace, that in keeping of thy commandments we may please thee, both in will and deed; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
The First Hymn
Hymn 162 Jesus, Where’er thy people meet: https://youtu.be/_XPUfhq6kss
1 Jesus, where'er thy people meet,
there they behold your mercy seat;
where'er they seek thee, thou are found,
and every place is hallowed ground.
2 For thou, within no walls confined,
inhabitest the humble mind;
such ever bring thee when they come,
and going, take thee to their home.
3 Dear Shepherd of thy chosen few,
thy former mercies here renew;
here to our waiting hearts proclaim
the sweetness of thy saving name.
4 Here may we prove the power of prayer
to strengthen faith and sweeten care,
to teach our faint desires to rise,
and bring all heaven before our eyes.
5 Lord, we are few, but thou art near;
nor short thine arm, nor deaf thine ear;
O rend the heavens, come quickly down,
and make a thousand hearts thine own.
The First Reading:
Genesis 3: 8-15
They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, ‘Where are you?’ He said, ‘I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.’ He said, ‘Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?’ The man said, ‘The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.’ Then the Lord God said to the woman, ‘What is this that you have done?’ The woman said, ‘The serpent tricked me, and I ate.’ The Lord God said to the serpent,
‘Because you have done this,
cursed are you among all animals
and among all wild creatures;
upon your belly you shall go,
and dust you shall eat
all the days of your life.
I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will strike your head,
and you will strike his heel.’
Psalm 130
Refrain: My soul waits for the Lord.
1 Out of the depths have I cried to you, O Lord;
Lord, hear my voice; ♦
let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication.
2 If you, Lord, were to mark what is done amiss, ♦
O Lord, who could stand?
3 But there is forgiveness with you, ♦
so that you shall be feared. [R]
4 I wait for the Lord; my soul waits for him; ♦
in his word is my hope.
5 My soul waits for the Lord,
more than the night watch for the morning, ♦
more than the night watch for the morning. [R]
6 O Israel, wait for the Lord, ♦
for with the Lord there is mercy;
7 With him is plenteous redemption ♦
and he shall redeem Israel from all their sins.
Refrain: My soul waits for the Lord.
Father, we commend to your faithful love
those who are crying from the depths;
help them to watch and pray
through their time of darkness,
in sure hope of the dawn of your
forgiveness and redemption;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen
The Second Reading:
2 Corinthians 4: 13- 5:1
But just as we have the same spirit of faith that is in accordance with scripture—‘I believed, and so I spoke’—we also believe, and so we speak, because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and will bring us with you into his presence. Yes, everything is for your sake, so that grace, as it extends to more and more people, may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God.
So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure, because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen; for what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal.
For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
The Gospel:
Mark 3: 20-end
The crowd came together again, so that they could not even eat. When his family heard it, they went out to restrain him, for people were saying, ‘He has gone out of his mind.’ And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, ‘He has Beelzebul, and by the ruler of the demons he casts out demons.’ And he called them to him, and spoke to them in parables, ‘How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but his end has come. But no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his property without first tying up the strong man; then indeed the house can be plundered.
‘Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin’— for they had said, ‘He has an unclean spirit.’
Then his mother and his brothers came; and standing outside, they sent to him and called him. A crowd was sitting around him; and they said to him, ‘Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside, asking for you.’ And he replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.’
Homily
It is easy to get sucked into the detail of the verses that form the Gospel reading today, and begin to ask questions around what we understand by Jesus’ family, or possession by Beelzebub, or blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, or eternal sin and how does all this fit with Mark’s picture of the family of God? Plenty of challenging verses for today’s preachers, there is no doubt.
In these brief notes let me try and sketch the passage as whole. Jesus is dealing with blindness here; the blindness of those who are unable to see what he is trying to show to those who one might expect to understand him: his own family and the religious leaders. Now, we know, from our reading of the Gospels, that whilst the crowds took our Lord’s words at face value and flocked to him, others close to him at his home in Nazareth struggled, as did those within the hierarchy of the faith.
The interesting thing, demonstrated by Mark in today’s Gospel reading, is that Jesus, in response to this misunderstanding and misrepresentation, chose to speak in parables. He was seen by both his family and the religious authorities as either insane or demon-possessed, something that he must have found hard to hear, but he answered in pictures. The starkness of our Lord’s words concerning ultimate sin and forgiveness have been interpreted by the Church, from early times, as virtually impossible: as indicating someone who has eventually reached the point of seeing evil actually as good, and falsehood, in fact, as truth.
Passing on from this difficult concept, let us consider just how revolutionary was Jesus’ view of his new band of followers. It never ceased to amaze the early Church that Jesus referred to them as his brothers and sisters and mother. We have become so familiar with this Christian family description that such impact is easily lost. Today we remind ourselves of this wonderful thought!
John Mann
Second Hymn
Hymn 117 Praise to the Holiest: https://youtu.be/5skPId8qY5E
1 Praise to the Holiest in the height,
and in the depth be praise:
in all his words most wonderful,
most sure in all his ways.
2 O loving wisdom of our God!
When all was sin and shame,
a second Adam to the fight
and to the rescue came.
3 O wisest love! that flesh and blood,
which did in Adam fail,
should strive afresh against the foe,
should strive and should prevail;
4 And that a higher gift than grace
should flesh and blood refine,
God's presence and his very self,
and essence all-divine.
5 O generous love! that he, who smote
in Man for man the foe,
the double agony in Man
for man should undergo;
6 And in the garden secretly,
and on the cross on high,
should teach his brethren, and inspire
to suffer and to die.
7 Praise to the Holiest in the height,
and in the depth be praise:
in all his words most wonderful,
most sure in all his ways.
Prayers
Almighty God, our Heavenly Father, King of kings and Lord of lords, bless we pray, your Church in all the world. Bring to that part of the Church in this land the benediction of your Holy Spirit, that fearlessly and tirelessly, your people may show forth your love for all people, and share the good news of the Kingdom of God with everyone. As today, we read of your Son sending forth his followers into the world, may we, in our day, know what it means to step out in faith, and so to pray and work for the furtherance of Christ’s presence and teaching in our community.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.
As, slowly, countries recover from the health crisis of these days, and towns and villages and large city communities come to terms with new situations; bring your comfort and strength, O Lord, to those whose whole lives have been shaken by traumatic experience in recent days and weeks. Encourage all people to have an understanding ear and a searching heart, to discover how each in their own way may help to relieve the plight of those in distress. Bring hope to the war torn parts of this world, and to all peoples locked in perpetual strife; teach those, who now know no other way but that of aggression, truly to find a path that includes the interests and desires of others and a mutual intent for peace. Within the countries of the regions of the world whose situation is made worse by poverty, shed in the hearts of men and women a deep longing for wise leaders, who can bring lasting settlement and an end to violence.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.
Father, we pray for the town of Swanage; for its Mayor and Town Council and all its institutions. Especially today we give thanks for the schools, that, as staff and pupils continue to adjust to the changing circumstances of their school, they may continue to be enriched and fulfilled. Bless our streets with peace, our zoom and other gatherings with good humour, our roads with safety, our relationships with love. Help us to hold consciously in our prayers those, who this, and every, community overlooks: the hidden sufferers whose quality of life is such that they are never out and never seen. May they be especially aware of your presence; in the quiet and the lonely moments, during hours of anxiety, in the night-time of fear or when facing the unknown.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.
Lord Jesus, as you stretched out your arms upon the Cross to draw us all to yourself, you also bade us come to you; we do so now with the whole community of St Mary’s, St Mark’s, All Saints’ and St Nicholas’, with those who join our services via the website, for whom we ask your particular blessing, as well as those unable to be with us today. Comfort the bereaved and support the weak; bring new life to those experiencing changes in their condition, and new direction for those faced with hard decisions. Above all, in the fellowship of all who in this world and the next are united with you in love, may we glorify and praise your name, for ever and ever.
Lord, in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.
The Lord’s Prayer
A few moments of silence before we pray:
Peace to us all from God our heavenly Father.
Peace to us from his Son Jesus Christ who is our peace.
Peace to us from the Holy Spirit, the life-giver.
The peace of the triune God be always with us.
Almighty and eternal God,
you have revealed yourself as Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
and live and reign in the perfect unity of love:
hold us firm in this faith,
that we may know you in all your ways
and evermore rejoice in your eternal glory,
who are three Persons yet one God,
now and for ever.
Amen.
After a moment of silence:
Conclusion
The Lord bless us and keep us:
Amen.
The Lord make his face to shine upon us,
and be gracious to us:
Amen.
The Lord lift up his countenance upon us
and give us peace:
Amen
Numbers 6.24-26
The Lord God almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
the holy and undivided Trinity,
guard us, save us,
and bring us to that heavenly city,
where he lives and reigns for ever and ever.
Amen.
Piece D’Orgue - J.S.Bach: https://youtu.be/gjcw2XSWT3E