North Queensferry Church

3rd. April. 2022. Service.

Inverkeithing Parish Church linked with North Queensferry Church

Worship April 3rd 2o22

 Fifth Sunday in Lent

Prelude Glorious things of thee are spoken”

 Bible Introït 782 “Lord of Life we come to you!”

 Opening Prayer

Almighty God, you alone can bring into order the unruly wills and affections of sinners: Grant your people grace to love what you command and desire what you promise; that, among the swift and varied changes of the world, our hearts may surely there be fixed where true joys are to be found; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for evermore. Amen.

Hymn 139“Praise the Lord, you heavens adore him”

Call to Prayer

I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers flow in the desert.
The Lord has done great things for us, and we rejoice.
Do not remember the former things or consider the things of old.
The Lord has done great things for us, and we rejoice.
God says to us: I am about to do a new thing.
The Lord has done great things for us, and we rejoice.
We worship God with songs of joy and prayers of thanksgiving.

Prayer of Adoration and Confession
Thank you, Lord God, for the opportunity of worship,
for the freedom to be amongst your family meeting together in your house, and in the warmth of your embrace

Thank you that in worship we can put aside, the uncertainties of this world and rest upon the certainties of the Kingdom, or your promises are not changeable as those of a human leader might be, but immovable and eternal

Thank you that we can bring to your feet all the hurts and fears that trouble us, and leave them there, knowing that your strength and assurance are all that we require

Thank you that as we draw near in worship, we are transported from a world of concerns and fears to a place where we can be at peace in your presence, find healing, wholeness and refreshment.Thank you Lord God for the opportunity of worship. In Jesus’ name.
You are the one who leads us from darkness into light, from captivity into freedom, from anxiety into peace, from despair into joy. Yet we long to break free, choosing independence, convinced of our own wisdom, forgetting your love and grace.
Forgive us, draw us nearer to you and embrace us once again
in your loving arms, assuage our guilt, free our minds, and enable us to follow you in worship and grateful service every day that we live.  Your grace offers to us forgiveness, liberty from all that binds us; and our prayers, joining together, rising as a fragrant offering to the heart of the divine. Stream meets stream and river flows, emptying into Ocean’s store.

Guide us into your word, gracious Lord, as we make our way
through this week, your presence revealing safe paths to follow,
your calming voice giving confidence to continue, through
unfamiliar, challenging and often beautiful places that we may honour you through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Our Father, which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy Name. Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done in 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, The power, and the glory, For ever. Amen.

 Intimations

The funeral of Mr Jim Cook will take place in Inverkeithing Parish Church on Thursday, 7th April 2022 at Noon and then to Hillend Cemetery for 1:00pm.

Holy Week services will be held on Maundy Thursday, April 14th Communion at 7:00pm in Inverkeithing Parish Church and Good Friday, April 15th at 7:00pm in North Queensferry Church.

Coffee mornings will be held in Inverkeithing each Tuesday at 10:00am and in North Queensferry on Wednesday 13th April at 10:30am.

Invitation to the Offering

 At the dinner party for Jesus in Bethany, Mary anointed Christ with expensive perfume, pouring out her love and devotion. Jesus accepted Mary’s gift gladly and graciously.

Trusting that Christ will never reject our gifts, offered with love and devotion, let us present our offering with glad and generous hearts.

Prayer of Dedication

Gracious God, even as Mary poured out her love for Jesus, he was preparing to pour out his life on the cross for her and for us all.  We are grateful for such love, given and received, then given again.  Accept the gifts we bring and anoint them with your Spirit that they will flow into the world, refreshing other peopele with your mercy and love. Amen.

All Age Talk

Today, we’ll learn from the Bible that Jesus was invited to His friend Lazarus’ home for a party in His honour! After they ate, His friend, Mary, took out a big bottle of perfume and poured it on His feet.

It was surprising, but not only because it was expensive, but also because Mary wiped the perfume on Jesus’ feet with her hair. Judas, the disciple who would betray Jesus, was angry she did that. He said she could have sold the perfume and given the money to the poor.

Judas was right, it could’ve been sold, and the money given to the poor, but Judas had been stealing the disciples’ money; so maybe it would’ve gone into Judas’ pocket. Regardless, Jesus said it was good because Mary gave her best to Him. It was honouring and Jesus said it made Him ready for His burial after His crucifixion that He knew was coming.

If Mary’s best was to give her expensive bottle of perfume to clean Jesus’ feet, I wonder what our best could be. Today we’ll learn about giving our best to Jesus.

Dear God, help us understand what it means to give our best to You, and give us excitement to do it. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Here is a video about this story

Chorus: Joy is the flag flown high

 Isaiah 43:16-21

16 This is what the Lord says –
he who made a way through the sea,
a path through the mighty waters,
17 who drew out the chariots and horses,
the army and reinforcements together,
and they lay there, never to rise again,
extinguished, snuffed out like a wick:
18 ‘Forget the former things,
do not dwell on the past.
19 See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
and streams in the wasteland.
20 The wild animals honour me,
the jackals and the owls,
because I provide water in the wilderness
and streams in the wasteland,
to give drink to my people, my chosen,
21     the people I formed for myself
that they may proclaim my praise. Amen.

 123 “God is love let heaven adore him”

 John 12:1-8

Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. 2 Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honour. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. 3 Then Mary took about half a litre of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

4 But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, 5 ‘Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year’s wages.’ 6 He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.7 ‘Leave her alone,’ Jesus replied. ‘It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. 8 You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me.’ Amen, this is the word of the Lord, to Him be all glory and praise.

 Hymn 502 “Take my life and let it be consecrated”

Sermon

I have a strange habit. When I receive a gift that could be described as beautiful or sensuous, I don’t want to use it. I like to keep it intact. It may be a bottle of cologne, a tray of coloured pastels or paints, a bar of soap, bottles of ink or paint, a beautiful candle, a box of drill bits. It may be a phrase in a piece of music, sometimes just a few notes that I will play repeatedly. Nothing worse than using up something beautiful. I suppose this means that I am a sensually aware person who enjoys the perfections of the experience of the senses, but sometimes I feel unable to use them up for fear of the loss of the beauty they contain. What about you, are you a sensually aware person?

Today we are in a home in the Jerusalem suburb of Bethany, in the days before Jesus entered the great city for the last time. We will celebrate that next Sunday on Palm or Passion Sunday.

But today, Jesus is in the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. In a room today, made familiar, by those who are gathered there, for we are familiar with their story from our childhood. Jesus, we know for we have listened to Him for a long time, but we did not touch on the various stories associated with the others this Lent. Mary and Martha in their understanding of what was important in life, both dedicated to Jesus in a different way.

There was also the meeting with Mary and Martha in all their desperate grief, mingling his tears with theirs when their brother died. And his calling Lazarus out of the grave and commanding that the cloths covering his face, his hands, his feet be removed in the final miracle that was too much for the religious authorities. Not because Lazarus’ revival happened, but because it proved that Jesus, much of whose teaching went too far for the unco’ guid, was indeed from God.

By raising Lazarus from the dead, Jesus traded His life for the life of His friend—giving us a foretaste of what’s ahead—and has graduated from the category of “manageable nuisance” to “serious threat” in the eyes of the Sanhedrin. It was the final straw for the religious elite. It has made Jesus’ popularity soar among the ordinary people and Jesus knows His days are numbered. Knowing that this was the final straw, if you will, for those in power who were not going to tolerate it. There is often a blindness that affects people with power that confirms their refusal of the way of God such that they can only deny his claim on them.

So finally, they all went into hiding, knowing that this wondrous act had been disruptive in ways that were somehow now too threatening in a world where the separation between life and death had always seemingly been so clear before.

All of this is fresh in our minds and heavy on our hearts as we stand in the background now, just hours, really, from another death, another life resurrected which would mean the end of all humanity had ever known and the beginning of what perhaps we cannot even today fully begin to imagine. All of this is just under the surface even now as we see them gathering for a meal, something that had been shared countless times before in the home of these beloved friends. This is a moment of beauty and calm before the final onslaught of evil and Jesus’s final battle on earth.

Finally, supper is on the table, and everyone sits down to eat with Lazarus sitting next to his friend and Saviour a silent witness to Jesus’ testimony about the life of the kingdom of God.

No one seems to notice that Mary has slipped away until she comes back holding a clay jar in her hands. Wordlessly, she kneels at Jesus’ feet and breaks the neck of the jar. The smell of the extremely expensive perfume, which was probably left over from her brother Lazarus’ funeral, fills the air.

  1. S. Lewis captured the essence of this passage of the gospel in a strange and compelling way when he wrote: “The allegorical sense dawned on me the other day. The [pint of pure nard] which one must break over Jesus’ holy feet is one’s heart … and the contents becomes perfume only when it is broken. When they are safe inside, they are more like sewage.”

This struck me as odd. How can a powerful perfume be like sewage if it is not opened? The answer came in a strange way. The other day Carol mentioned that her perfume smelled off when she put it on. I noticed that it was overly strong and somewhat bitter.

Then I remembered that I noticed something similar with some cologne. Both bottles were nearly empty, and Carol’s had been left on the bathroom windowsill. The concentrated dregs of the bottle had been affected by the heat of the sun and had not been used for a while. I am sure the ladies know that perfume can become rancid like anything else with organic origins. It needs the freshness of the air to be most sensuous. The beauty is only released when it is used.

Back to Lewis. We may ask how much sewage do we carry around in our hearts because we don’t open them up to Jesus?

How much pride; how many resentments, how much anger and envy do we carry around like gnawing worms—internalized and under pressure?  It all stinks…contaminating our lives, infecting those around us.

But when we have the courage to crack open our hearts and pour them out at the feet of Jesus the sludge of life become the fragrance of faith and everything changes.

Mary was a rare soul who understood Jesus. Unlike many of his disciples she seems to have managed to hear what Jesus had been saying all along, that he was going to Jerusalem, not to conquer the Romans, but to conquer death. Perhaps she did not understand fully, but she had heard him speak of dying and rising, and she knew that the crisis was approaching, and she had all the agony of her love stored in her heart. The agony of anticipation of a terrible end for Jesus, the agony of wondering how she would go on without him. The sense of loss of all she had gained from his teaching and his friendship. She needed to express it somehow, otherwise it would be like poison in her mind. She was grieving in advance as people often do when a death is anticipated.

Jesus was not wasting away from cancer, or tuberculosis or leprosy. He was fit and strong, but going on a dangerous final journey, and she needed to let the pain of her love out. What better way to do this than by using the nard left over from Lazarus’s funeral, let Jesus experience its luxurious fragrance beforehand, share in its sensuous pleasure whilst he was still alive.  In Sacred Heart Hospice in Sydney, we often used fragrant oils and lotions while people were still conscious and could enjoy their comfort. Not everyone could cope with it, so we always asked first.

After breaking the neck of the clay bottle of perfume over Jesus’ feet, as everyone in the room watches her, Mary does some remarkable things.
First, she loosens her hair in a room full of men, which a (supposedly honourable woman in that day never did).
Then she pours the perfume on Jesus’ feet, which was also not usually done…
…the head, maybe—people did that to kings—but not the feet.
Then she touches Jesus’ feet—a single woman rubbing a single man’s feet was also not done, even among friends.
Then she wipes the perfume off with her hair—the totally bizarre end to an all-around bizarre act.
Perhaps the Holy Spirit was guiding what Mary was doing for the love of God was working through her.
I don’t think Mary knew exactly why she was doing this, but Jesus knew.
Jesus replied to the astonished onlookers: “Leave her alone. It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial.”

When we think about it, there is nothing economical about Jesus’s death.
It cost Him everything and although Jesus was a homeless nomad, there was nothing economical about His life.
God emptied Himself completely to become One of us—to call us brothers, sisters, friends, and children of God. In Jesus, the extravagance of God’s love is made flesh. In Jesus, the excessiveness of God’s mercy is made manifest.
This bottle, like Jesus’ life, will not be held back to be kept and admired.
This precious substance will not be saved, it will be opened, offered, used, at great price. It will be raised up and poured out for the life of the world, emptied to the last drop.
Before that happens, Jesus will gather His friends together one last time.
At another banquet—the Last Supper—which we will remember and celebrate again on Maundy Thursday, after the supper, Jesus will tie a towel around his waist, kneel and wash His disciples’ feet. Then He will give them and us a new commandment: “Love one another, as I have loved you.” How much more intense can this be?

At home in Bethany, Judas, who doesn’t care a hoot about the poor, scoffs at Mary’s extravagance.  I can understand that too. I recall being perplexed when two children were killed in Prince Edward Island. A little girl from a poor family was drowned. They dressed her in a beautiful new dress and surrounded her with soft toys for her funeral, things she had never had in her life. That seemed so strange to me, so sad, so unfair. The other, a teenager killed in a car crash, whom they buried in a hand painted enamelled casket with three ministers taking part. It seemed so extravagant. Of course, I realised that they were expressing their love in grief, but like Judas, I thought well why not do that for another living child instead?

But this is a sign, that whatever Jesus’ followers need—love, courage, the indwelling of the Spirit—there will always be enough to go around.
Whatever they spend, there will be plenty left over—like the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000.
There is no reason to fear running out—of nard or of life or love or the Spirit—for where God is concerned, there is always more than we can ask or imagine.
Mary’s worship of Jesus is from her heart and for it to mean anything it must be openly expressed. To her, the opinions of others regarding her behaviour toward Jesus meant nothing. She had heard Jesus Words: “I am the resurrection and the life,” spoken before Jesus restored the life of her beloved brother and she understood.

A little girl needed a life-saving operation that would also require a blood transfusion. She had a rare blood type and only her brother could give her the blood she so desperately needed. So, the parents and the doctor explained the procedure to the girl’s brother and the little boy agreed to give his sister his blood.

After the blood was taken from him and transported to the operating room the boy turned to his mother and asked, “When do I die?” It was only then that they realized that the little boy thought that by giving his blood to his sister he would be giving up his own life and he was willing to do just that. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer is quoted as saying, “When Christ calls someone he calls that person to come and die,” but in doing so, Christ is calling that person to come and live. True life is found in giving our lives for others. Greatness is found in humility. Mary gave Jesus everything she had to give; in doing so she shows us a supreme example of worshipping God with all our heart.

How can we be like that? Mary’s life had been so deeply touched by Jesus, so much so that she wanted to do something precious for Jesus—not caring what others would think of her. Can that be possible for us?

Can our lives be so deeply touched by the living Christ that we want to respond in some special way? Can our lives be so deeply forgiven by Christ that we want to give Jesus our everything, our all? They can.

Let us all fall at the feet of Jesus and worship Him, regardless of the cost.

Let us worship Him with our lives—giving everything we are over to Him, even if other people don’t understand.

We are called to give and not count the cost.

We are called to follow the path of the Cross so we can be Christ to one another—and to those who have never met Jesus. We are called to follow the path to the Cross so that we can also gather in celebration beyond the Cross—at the empty tomb.

We are called to be extravagant in our loving so that in us and through us the fragrance of Christ can overcome the fear, the sin, the evil that is in this world, and so that—together as the Church the poor in spirit and the poor financially–will be able to share the extravagant love of Christ—that gives and gives and gives without a thought of the cost!  Amen.

 Prayers of Thanksgiving and Intercession
Lord, the blessed in your eyes are not those who have everything
but those who have nothing. Not the rich in earning but the rich in spending who give their all for you as Mary did when she anointed your feet. Your ordinary saints being your hands, feet, and words in their ordinary lives, doing extraordinary things for you. The blessed in your eyes are not those who desire honour, but those who merely seek to serve. Thank you for the servants in your kingdom, especially those whom we have known and loved and give us grace to follow them. We thank you for the wealth of your love and providence in our own lives and ask for grace to surrender it to you for the blessing of others in the opportunities we have.
We pray for all whose lives have been touched by tragedy, by accident or deliberate act as in Ukraine and other war zones
For those who mourn, immerse them in your love and lead them through this darkness into your arms, and light. For those who comfort, be in both the words they use and all that’s left unspoken; fill each heart with love. We ask this through Jesus Christ, whose own suffering brought us life, here and for eternity.
Bless the hands that bring wholeness to lives blighted by sickness. Bless the saints who in sad and desperate places bring a sense of hopefulness. Bless the Christians facing daily opposition showing a faithful witness.
Bless the generosity of the rich and powerful for the gift of thoughtfulness. Bless the peacemakers working in conditions that are often hazardous.
Bless the politicians whether good or bad for decisions affecting all of us. Bless our words and actions as we carry your light
into places shrouded in darkness Bless your children whoever they might be with the warmth of your love and grace.
Bless our families; mothers, fathers, daughters, sons.
Protect them from all that might harm. Prosper them in times of hardship. Instruct them in the ways of goodness.
Prepare them for both joy and sorrow.
Unite them within your arms of love.
Sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, bless our families Lord, we pray in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
mothers, fathers, bless our families Lord, we pray. Amen.

500 “Lord of Creation, to you be all praise”

 Benediction
Go in peace and may God’s peace go with you. Bring hope and healing to all whom you meet.
May God the Father bless us; may Christ take care of us,
the Holy Ghost enlighten us all the days of our life,
The Lord be our defender and keeper of body and soul,
both now and for ever, to the ages of ages. (Æthelwold c 908-984)

“May God’s blessing surround you each day”

 Postlude: “Harbour”