My name is Denny, and we welcome all of you back, those who are new as well as those who are returning, to this time of worship. Before we begin, I just have a few announcements I’d like to be able to share with you.
Again, the donations for People Helping People are amazing. There was even a picture on the Facebook website that showed a picture of the blessing box and what you folks have been providing, so my thanks—please continue it.
Secondly, the link for the sermons is at the end of the order of worship in the announcements section. If this service blesses you, please make sure to copy and paste that as a text or an email to someone who may be a blessing to them as well.
Third, prayer requests—thank you for sending in your prayer requests and also for some of your praises. If you have any, please make sure to call the office or email me, and we will be sure to get those out to the people in our congregation.
Then one special announcement: provided the state doesn’t maintain its restrictions and guidelines against gathering, at the end of May, those should be relaxed to where it may be possible for us to start worshiping up once again here in the sanctuary on Sunday, June 7th.
I’ll just mention that in those announcements, we have some information to try to help you see what we were doing to maintain safety and caution for people that you can read through. I’ll just mention a couple of things in particular: we will still be practicing social distancing within the congregation, and if not for your sake, then for the sake of someone else. We want to say that you should only attend if you feel safe. We can wait, but we will be starting to reopen things, and you can get more of that information from the bulletin announcements.
We also will be providing free masks for anybody who might want one when they come to worship. Again, take a look at that. A letter will be going out to those who are on our mailing list, which includes our church family, visitors, as well as preschool families. So that’ll give you a bit more information for what will be taking place.
I’m very thankful that we will finally be able to come back together and worship. But before we move into our time of worship, I want to ask you to join me again in confessing our mission statement that we have here because I want us to remember why I come to this church, besides the fact that I’m the pastor. My desire is to lead us in coming together so that we would go back out for the kingdom of God.
Please join me in our mission statement as an act of confession: We serve to build relationships. We build relationships to share the gospel.
Now, if you wouldn’t mind pausing for a moment and just simply telling Jesus this day that you have come to be better prepared to be His child and to be a servant of His kingdom. However you want to do that, just bow your head and say it in your own words to Jesus.
Lord Jesus, on behalf of our congregation, I declare we are here for you, and when we leave, we are also there for you as well. May you be blessed and encouraged, each one of you. And Lord Jesus, we say we come in this time to honor you. It’s in Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
Our call to worship is used to help prepare us to give ourselves to Jesus in this time for better preparation to go back out. Would you please join me in our call to worship from Psalm 133, verses one through three? It’s a responsive reading.
Please join me:
Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers and sisters dwell in unity!
It is like the precious oil on the head running down on the beard, on the beard of Aaron, running down on the collar of his robes.
It is like the dew of Hermon which falls on the mountains of Zion. For there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore.
Part of our response to this call to worship and as a part of our preparation to move deeper into worship is our prayer of confession along with the assurance of pardon. Would you please join with me as we continue in our act of worship and preparation through our confession?
Please, Almighty God, we confess that we are often swept up in the tide of our generation. We dream more of privilege and benefits than of service and sacrifice. We try to speak in your name without nourishing our souls and without relying entirely on you. We fall short in making you, and only you, the Lord of our lives.
We want to know you and serve others while obeying you. Holy Spirit, forgive us and revive us. Make us your people today. In Jesus’ name, we pray, amen.
A key phrase in that prayer of confession is ‘we fall short,’ which is one of the meanings for the word sin. So let’s just pause for a moment, and if there are any particular ways that you might be falling short in what Jesus is calling you and me to do, let’s just pause and confess that to Him right now.
Lord Jesus, I know for me in particular, even though the theme of the sermon for today is about anxiousness, I confess, Lord, that sometimes I get distracted by anxiousness, and it causes me to freeze in doing some of the things I probably should do, as well as not doing things you probably don’t want me to do.
So, Lord Jesus, we offer ourselves to you wherever we’re not doing things we should or doing things we should not; we confess these things to you right now, Lord Jesus. And, Lord Jesus, I’m so thankful that even if we may feel that the darkness in our lives and in our world is great, greater still is your grace.
We are assured by the fact that your promise to forgive and cleanse is given to us, and you never break your promises. May the Lord bless you. May the Lord declare His peace in your heart as you realize His forgiveness. It’s in Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.
A hymn that I learned some years ago— I was raised in a Roman Catholic Church background—when I started to attend Protestant churches, it was like a whole new world of worship music opened up to me. This is one that I want to share with you this morning as we continue on in our worship. It’s called ‘Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus.’
[Music]
So, are you me, redraw [Music]? There’s strange [Music] passed, and we follow [Music] person [Music]. I suppose it is wonderful [Music] and then [Music] in the light of his quarry this word shall not fail you, and all will be well [Music].
Do too [Music] fool. It is wonderful and [Music] strangely dim in the light years, Laurie, turn your eyes apart. Look full in his wonderful [Music].
Those lyrics still get to me—a powerful message as we think about keeping our focus upon who Jesus is, the way that He transforms our perspective on how we view everything else.
One of the things I also want to mention to the folks who have been tithing and donating regularly—it’s such an amazing thing to see the faithfulness of how God is using you, whether it’s tithing online, mailing in your checks, or dropping them off. I really praise God for the encouragement you have given me as you continue to support the ministry for what’s going on in the church.
Whether or not it’s to this congregation and this ministry, find some place that God can let you be a blessing to others, and then simply allow the Lord to use that to sow it, to be something that will spring up in amazing ways.
But I would like at this time to give thanks for the gifts that have come in, so would you please join with me in just simply thanking the Lord for these gifts?
Lord Jesus, we praise you and thank you that you give us such an opportunity. It’s weird to think that the God of the universe actually chooses to depend upon what you give us so that even only a meager portion of that ends up going out in amazing ways to cause dramatic and eternal consequences for people’s lives by what we do.
So, Lord, I give you thanks for those whose hearts you have touched. I thank you, Lord God, for the amazing things that you will do with these gifts. We speak the Lord’s blessing upon them, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. It’s in Jesus’ precious name that we pray, amen.
This morning, we get to end this series of what we’ve been looking at in Matthew chapter 6, and it’s been a real joy for me to do this study because I admit that I’m learning a lot at the same time as I look at familiar passages of Scripture, and God seems to help open them up to me in new and deeper ways to transform my life. I hope that’s also been true for you.
This morning, we end with our text from Matthew 6:25-34, and I think it’s a really good text because next Sunday, we will be celebrating Pentecost as we prepare to launch—we hope—and relaunch coming together in worship, but also ending with a very good message on what will prepare us as we deal with today’s worries but also look forward to what God has in mind for us.
This message is looking at what Jesus said about anxiousness and the question, ‘What about tomorrow?’ But before I read this text to you, I just want to mention again that there is a sermon outline near the end of the order of worship. I hope you will use that to write down notes for things to remember.
The second thing is let’s pray first. Let’s ask the Holy Spirit to be our counselor and teacher in preparation.
Holy Spirit, I say you are welcome here and in our homes and in our lives. Only you, Holy Spirit, can teach us in ways that no human words can speak, but you still choose to use our human words to work through. So, Holy Spirit, we offer our heart, soul, strength, and mind to you that you would speak to us now those words of life that Jesus will speak to us through this Gospel message.
In Jesus’ name, I pray, amen.
Hear Jesus’ words in Matthew 6:25-34:
‘Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. 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 which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious 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 arrayed like one of these.
But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
Therefore do