(All our songs this morning are from Singing the Faith (StF) numbers will be given where available)
Welcome to our Sunday Service, today shared on paper across our circuit and with the congregation at Baildon Methodist Church which has been prepared by Rev Rob Drost, Chaplain at Woodhouse Grove, Bronte and Moorlands Methodist school’s
Click on the blue links to follow them for bible readings and associated links
Today we celebrate with Emily James, as she is awarded the Queen’s Guide Award by the District Guide Commissioner. It is also our Harvest Festival Celebrations, and we begin by asking the young people and the not-so-young, what is their favourite foods – I wonder what yours is? A recent survey said that the top 5 UK favourite foods are: 5th place – Soup, Pizza, Curry, Sunday Roast and in first place – Fish & Chips.
We have come to give thanks: Harvest is a time of year where we give thanks for God’s provision in our lives, where we remind ourselves of our connection with the land and nature, and where we recognise that we have a biblical responsibility to use our excess, our bountiful harvests, to serve those living in poverty around the world.
Song – StF 123 – Come ye thankful people come
Prayer for our food donations which are going to Windhill Community Centre.
God of the Harvest, we thank you for all you have provided us this year. We praise you that you are a
God of abundance and not of scarcity. We thank you for all that we have gathered here and for the good it will do for our friends at Windhill Community Centre. Remind us, as we worship, of your desire that every person’s potential might be fulfilled, and of our role in building a world where that is possible. Teach us to be your harvest hands, cultivating the fruits of your Kingdom. In your name, we pray, Amen.
Harvest Senses: We invite our children to use their 5 senses to connect with God’s Harvest.
There are five bags for this children’s activity.
Bag 1. Sight. This has a picture of a field being harvested – beauty of colours.
Bag 2. Sounds. This bag has crunchy crisps – listen to nature around us.
Bag 3. Taste. This bag has Fairtrade chocolate in – can you taste how good the harvest is.
Bag 4. Smell. This bag has some smelly cheese – sometimes food smells different.
Bag 5. Touch. This has soil in it – the riches of the land.
Harvest Memories
I remember each harvest time, going into the woods next to our church with my father, gathering branches, leaves and other decorations for the church windowsills – which would then have tinned goods and fresh fruit and vegetables added to them. I wonder what your Harvest memories are?
Song – StF 125 – Praise and Thanksgiving
Reading:
John 21:1-13 Jesus and the Miraculous Catch of Fish
Have you ever been so attached to a particular line of thinking or way of doing something, that you can’t imagine doing it another way? We live on-site at Woodhouse Grove school – just behind the Methodist chapel, and for 12 months we have used the same entrance/exit in the car to get to our house. There are builders on site, adding some extra space to the 6th Form – which means our ‘usual’ car route is no longer available – yet I still find myself going the old way and having to turn around! You get used to a certain way.
In 1905, physicists understood an awful lot about how the world worked. Almost everything about what we observe in nature could be explained by Newton’s theories of force and motion. However, the behaviour of light, had long defied accurate explanation. That is, until a 26-year-old, who failed his university entrance exam, couldn’t find a physics teaching post, working at the Swiss patent office, changed the way we think about the universe forever. His name – Albert Einstein. He put forward his theory of ‘special relativity’ which claimed that the speed of light was constant in a vacuum and gave us the famous equation E=mc2. A complete change of direction for science.
In 1968, a gangly, 21-year-old engineering student arrived at the Mexico Olympics to compete in the high jump competition. The overwhelming consensus in the world of high jumping was, that the best way to clear the bar was to jump over it, feet-first or front-first. Richard Douglas Fosbury (D: March). Dick Fosbury, however, had been developing a strange-looking technique which involved going over back-first, which had been dubbed the ‘Fosbury Flop’. Despite having been jumping this way for a few years, no one else in the Olympic field decided to replicate the technique. That was, until Fosbury defied expectations, and went on to win gold with a new Olympic record of 2.24 metres – 7.3 feet in old money. By the next Olympics in 1972, 28 of the 40 competitors were already using Fosbury’s technique. What was a sole voice had become the consensus in a matter of a few years.
In around 30AD, another man suggested a very different, seemingly crazy approach to fishing which despite expectations, produced extraordinary results. A miraculous catch which was indicative of how his whole ministry changed everything. In all these cases, the new, better way of doing things was totally contrary to everyday experience and to intuition. In all these cases, it is often a voice from the margins – sometimes a lone voice – that creates a permanent shift in people’s perceptions. Trusting a concept that is at odds with our assumptions about the world can bring about huge progress. But it can feel lonely and vulnerable as well. Jesus reminds us that to envision and inhabit the topsy-turvy / Fosbury Flop-type Kingdom of God, our perspective often needs to totally change.
Perhaps Peter, in our reading, was having similar feeling – having spent 3 years ‘doing things the Jesus way’, now does not know which way to travel. Perhaps he could not see the alternative and rather than carrying on in this topsy-turvy way, where the least becomes the greatest, the richest are told to become poor and the powerful are asked to share that influence.
Peter, always a man who liked practical action, comes up with a very obvious solution: go back to work – go back to what he previous knew as the norm. Back to the practice and the trade he and the others knew so well, that of fishing. These fishermen were real professionals. They knew what they were doing when it came to fish. That was why they went out at night: experience has taught them this was the most productive time. But on this occasion they fished with a singular lack of success. When morning came, their nets were as empty as when they’d begun. We can imagine their feelings: tired, frustrated, tetchy, baffled, hungry.
The simple phrase ‘they caught nothing’ is powerful. It calls to mind all the occasions when we work extremely hard over something and seemingly achieve nothing – I am sure that Einstein and Fosbury knew that same feeling. There is the house that we spend all day tidying up which is systematically untidied by the small child upon their return. We probably have all experienced times like these – a sense of time, money and energy having been wasted.
So exasperated were the disciples, so completely at their wits’ end, that they are ready to act on the advice of a complete stranger, even though this must have been a serious blow to their pride. Who was this clever fellow on the shore who asked the painful question: ‘Friends, haven’t you any fish?’ Never mind, from his vantage point he might be able to see something they couldn’t. They cast their net and this time they really do catch something. The realisation that it is the risen Jesus who is the mysterious stranger rapidly follows.
Jesus does not criticise the disciples for going back to their old occupation. Perhaps what Jesus does is bring success to their working endeavours, to lead their night out fishing to a marvellous conclusion. We believe God can transform our mundane, complex and often difficult situations just as he filled those fishing nets to the bursting point? And we believe that the work of God through the teaching of Jesus and the actions of you and me can, will and do make a difference in peoples lives – especially when it come to food poverty.
In this story there is a fine sense of Jesus and the disciples being co-workers. Admittedly, Jesus provides the decisive piece of information, but the disciples have to haul the fish ashore, and quite a weight it was too. When they reach the beach they find Jesus has already been busying himself cooking a breakfast – has already gone out ahead of them. No doubt the disciples forgot their tiredness, the crossness about the long hours wasted catching nothing, and marvelled at the transformation which had taken place – all because of the risen Jesus in their midst.
We, the church / the Methodist Church have made the decision to put our trust in this transforming Jesus and we are co-workers with him. Much like with techniques before the Fosbury flop and with physics before Einstein – this way of doing ‘harvest’ still achieves results – just enough to keep people thinking it must be working. Before 1968, high jumpers were still jumping very impressive distances, before 1905, physicists were still making impressive discoveries. But it wasn’t until someone came in with a totally left-field, seemingly ludicrous suggestion that they realised how far behind they were, how misguided they had been. Perhaps the ‘net over the other side of the boat’ moment for us in our faith journey is choosing to believe, really believe, that local communities are the experts in their situation. Perhaps, we are encouraged to take the same leap of faith, to put our nets on the other side of the boat, not just in terms of how we view our charitable giving, but also in the way we view our mission and ministry. As a way of embodying this commitment to communities, both local and far from local, we give. And today we give what we can to others who need our support, who can help in ways we are not able to. We are still asked to champion others who need our help – to be as Jesus was to those in need. Today, let’s be more Frosby.
Song – StF 124 – For the Fruits
Intercession Prayers
God of the Harvest, as we celebrate this season of thanksgiving we give thanks for the blessings of food, provision and nourishment. Please grow in us a harvest for the world. Come sow a seed of hope within our souls, that we might yield goodness, patience and kindness in abundance.
God of the Harvest – Hear our prayer
God of Love, sow a seed of peace in our lives, that we might bear the fruits of forgiveness, compassion and righteousness. Come sow a seed of love in our hearts, that others would reap the blessings of family, friendship and community. May each seed of hope, peace and love grow within us into a harvest that can be feasted on by all.
God of the Harvest – Hear our prayer
God of Justice, We offer these prayers in all their breadth and particularity, knowing that you value and uphold the individual and the local, as well as the global and national. Help us all to fulfil our potential in building your Kingdom, on earth as it is in heaven.
God of the Harvest – Hear our prayer
Lord’s Prayer
Song – Harvest Samba
Peace
Jesus stood with his friends and stretched out his hands as a gesture of love and openness, and said, ‘Peace be with you’ and they were amazed.
Just as Jesus shared his peace with his friends, he shares it with us, so let us share that peace with one another.
So, may the Peace of Lord be always with us – let’s greet each other with a sign of that Peace.
Song – StF 130 – We Plough the fields and scatter
Final Harvest Blessing
May the God who turns everything on its head,
inspire you and energise you to put communities
in the driving seat of change this Harvest and beyond.
Amen.
