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SUNDAY SERVICE – June 4 Our Summer in the Old Testament – “In The Beginning”
GATHERING MUSIC (Opening Hymn)
Good morning to those present in the sanctuary and those watching online, I am Pastor Mel Nielsen, welcome to Centenary’s worship Service for Sunday, June 4, 2023. On behalf of the whole church, welcome, we are glad you’re here.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Today is the For Heaven’s Sake Breakfast.
I imagine most of you know by now that I will be leaving my appointment here at the end of the month. The Bishop and Cabinet have discerned that my gifts are needed at Beardstown First UMC. This will be the quickest turnaround with only a few weeks to accomplish all that needs to be done. I ask that you trust the process and pray for the person whom God has already selected.
If you did not know, the Rev. Lori Bultemeier, from the Baby Fold, was supposed to preach here in July while I am away on vacation. She will be undergoing medical tests and procedures in July, but she really wanted to come here and and speak to us about how much Centenary and Fox Trust has supported that mission, so she is coming next Sunday, June 11. I will be here as well, so I invite you to come and hear what God has to share through Lori.
OPENING PRAYER
We gather on this Sunday Lord to give thanks for all that is before us. Each of us is on an unknown journey that leads to places that excite us in different ways. Sometimes that excitement is dread and other times that excitement is happiness. We have experienced both and survived both because of your Grace. Be with us on this day as we continue the journey to all the places you call us. We give you thanks and praise that you never leave us alone on the way to where we are going. Amen.
SMALL TALK
Today we are talking about the very beginning of the Bible, when God created the world. Can you name some of the things God created in the very beginning? I brought a dry erase board to help us remember all that God did in that first week. Everything from light and darkness to people, God created them all.
What this tells me is that God is creative, and since we are created in God’s image, we must be creative too. What are you good at, singing, coloring, drawing, building with Legos, tell me how creative you are. What do you like to do?
One way to remind us about being creative like God is making cookies in the shapes of a people. We can take a cookie cutter, since we have time of for the summer, and make lots of cookies can’t we, except they would all look the same, but God creates every person to look special and not like any other person. So, after we bake the cookies we need to make them all look like one of a kind.
So now we can be creative and make all different colors of skin and hair and eyes and almost anything we can think of. Try this at home by making people kind of like God did in Genesis. Then we can see if we are creative like God. Pray Amen.
OFFERING
JOYS AND CONCERNS
JOYS
A joy for the movie and game night.
Rachael Borgman lifted up a prayer for Jack, who will be in Germany for 3 weeks as part of an exchange program. Prayers for safe travel were also asked for.
CONCERNS
We are praying for Grace Oxley and her family as she has moved to Heritage Health for a little while until she is ready to return to Cedarhurst. Grace had two minor stroke last week, and we praise God they did not leave major complications.
Concerns were mentioned for the Summers family.
We are still praying for Bob and Rita Northrop; Junior and Barb Crouse. We are praying for an upcoming medical appointment for Bob Minor and his eyesight challenge.
I want to take a minute to lift up all the concerns going on around the world, whether it is nature or political strife or sin, there is much we can lift up to God today.
UNSPOKEN REQUESTS FOR PRAYER
PASTOR PRAYS FOR ALL JOYS – CONCERNS – UNSPOKEN
And know let us conclude our communal prayer time together by repeating together the Words Jesus taught us. 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 trespasses, As we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, Forever. Amen.
SONG
SCRIPTURE READING
Genesis 1:1-2:3 (Edited for length) 1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.
The second day God created the sky. The third day God created the land and the sea and plants of all kinds on the land. The fourth day day and God created the night and the stars. The fifth day God created the animals of the sea and birds of the air. The sixth day God created animals of the land as well as man and woman who were created in the image of God. 2 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. 2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
SERMON
June 4, 2023 – Our Summer in the Old Testament, “In The Beginning”
We are just one chapter into the Holy Bible and God has created the the universe the earth and everything in it and on it. That is a lot of activity in a short period of time. Often times when we re-read the origin of the world story we recall our childlike questions of creation, like who created God? Why are there two creation stories? After chapter one we move into the another creation story culminating with Adam and Eve. Do you recall your childhood questions?
Let’s focus on the story at hand. In this first account God creates man and woman, no forming man out of clay, no breathing of the breath, no removing of a rib, just two people. Man and woman created in the image of God. Sounds simple enough, despite its magnitude.
The theological trouble appears when questions pop into my head, the same questions I had as a child in Catechism at St. Alexander’s in Elmhurst. Like, why did God need 6 days to create when it could have all been done in 5 minutes or 5 seconds. As we mature, these questions remain, but we find our way to conclusions that maybe only we understand.
My childhood question of when 6 days was answered more or less by God telling me that there was an order and purpose to all things, including the numbering of days, weeks and years.
The bigger answer I received from God in my maturing was that, I can spend my life questioning how and why God does things or I can assume my role as servant, and learn to appreciate all the things God gives including the events I can’t wrap my 10-year-old mind around.
We will learn later in Genesis, from Moses, that the only answer God may give is “I Am.” I have learned that ‘I Am’ is a really good answer, and it means that I am not and I will never fully understand God, at least not while I am here on earth.
One of my favorite comic strips was called “Far Side” by Gary Larson. In this one example we can see the futility of life sometimes. Here, we see a young man who has been invited by the door to enter, he is pushing against a door that reads, ‘pull’.
This cartoon is supposed to be silly and point out our human foibles. This cartoon, for me, goes deeper. We have been invited to enter the gates of Heaven, however, we spend way too much time working against ourselves by not unleashing our potential.
The honest truth my friends is that I do not have answers to my child hood question, at least not satisfactory to an inquisitive, logical adult mind. Then I remember, my job is not to fully dissect and understand every mystery of God, but to grow into appreciating what God is doing in this moment. This cartoon reveals that we can get so caught up in our own intelligence that we miss the heart of the message of God.
We begin our journey through the Old Testament this summer with God creating everything in a way that still baffles us; we know that the Old Testament gives way to the New Covenant God makes with us through Jesus of Nazareth. It was that Jesus who summarized the life of a disciple with two simple, yet profound commandments; stay in love with God and love our neighbor as ourselves. These words of Jesus are another I Am moment.
The greatest commandment was not to spend our time trying to figure out a puzzle that only God can solve. We are to spend our time worshipping the one who created life, all life. In turn we give those lives to God in blessed service that does not require extraordinary answers.
These first two chapters of the Bible are about coming to know God as best we can, feeling God’s presence, following God’s Word and finding our place at the table of grace. It is about us knowing that we have been given domain over a gift that God created out of nothingness.
The opening chapters of the Bible are about starting a journey where God created perfection, it is also about us destroying that perfection. It will eventually lead us to God’s grace overcoming that destruction to resurrect perfection again. This passage, however, is about the order that created and two people who were created to simply follow that order of life.
Following and obeying something that is nearly unexplainable is what non-believers call crazy, it is what Christians call faith and what God calls I Am. Let’s look for a moment at these first two people called man and woman. No names, just two people without temptation, no evil serpent, no discovery of nakedness, no disobeying, no fall from grace, no banishment from paradise.
I believe this is the life that God had originally intended. Simple belief and following, faith without the dissecting questions. This first creation story seems to indicate a life according to God’s order and purpose. The second one, with two named people; Adam and Eve shows what happens we we lose focus on following and obeying, it shows what happens when are questions overpower us and we stop following and sucked into the darkness of this world.
In the first creation story we have tow people who simply walk through the door, and in the second creation story we have people who overthink and push against a door in futility.
Well it is too late to go back and start over, so God starts life over for us with an opportunity to be made whole and perfect again, through Jesus. We look to Genesis and find one creation story where everything seems to remain perfect and a second where things go according to the plans of the tempter.
How quickly we follow temptation once we are introduced to it. Nothing has changed, we are still being tempted around nearly every corner, and we still fall for the promise of being like God if we only eat the fruit of temptation.
We know a day of redemption is coming, but why wait until that day to suddenly sit up and behave. I suggest we tap into that amazingly powerful and creative power of God and discover a new way to approach life. I tell you today, as I have for the past 5 years, that power is in you.
How many times have we looked into the mirror and asked God to help us with something that is not quite right. I believe God’s answer is nearly always the same, I have helped you, I have set you free from death and sin. Jesus has already won the victory for you. Does God sit back and wonder why we spend so much time working against the simple plan of pull.
You have been created in the image of God. I tell you again, I believe that means we have been given the power of creativity to help us overcome and finally claim that victory as our own. God has provided it, now we must accept it and put it to use.
If you are struggling against a door that won’t open, take a step back and look around to what is missing. Your answer may not seem as simple as our example this morning, but I assure you there is an answer. Come to the Altar this morning with your questions.
SERVICE OF HOLY COMMUNION
MISSION SONG
FINAL WORD
Tish Harrison Warren writes this, “We see examples of God like creativity in the Bible. One of those was Isaiah, who envisions a planet teeming with vitality. In it, humans and animals and even predator and prey dwell in harmony with one another:” “The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them”
We understand that Isaiah was seeing the future and the reign of Jesus. Yet, Isaiah also seems to say, life is not about waiting around for the evacuation from the darkness. Isaiah was envision the unleashing of God creativity in the here and now. Isaiah saw the healing and restoration of all life in the here and now.
Isaiah wasn’t telling us that life is only about waiting around for God to usher in a reborn world, but to participate in God’s ongoing work of repair and renewal now. The enemy of God has dulled our creativity to see God’s original creation story and the perfect beauty it held. Now is the time to reach further than you ever have and see that world again, with a little help from Godly creativity.
BENEDICTION
Leader: Go forth in peace, The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
CLOSING HYMN