Past Services

Choral Evensong Rite I at 5:00 p.m. sung by the Youth Choir.

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Holy Eucharist Rite II at 10:30 a.m. sung by the Youth and Adult Choirs, sermon by Rabbi Michael Pincus.

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Voluntary
Tuba Tune on Laudate Dominum    June Nixon (b. 1942)
Andantino    Charles Tournemire (1870-1939)

Processional Hymn 432    O praise ye the Lord!    Laudate Dominum

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Psalm 2     Plainsong Chant, Mode VIII.1, sung by the choir

Sequence Hymn 137    O wondrous type! O vision fair    Wareham

Offertory Anthem   Come, renew us    Eleanor Daley (b. 1955)
Words: David Adam

Come, Lord, come to us. Enter our darkness with your light,
Fill our emptiness with your presence,
Come, refresh, restore, renew us.
In our sadness come as joy, in our troubles, come as peace,
In our fearfulness, come as hope, in our darkness, come as light,
In our frailty, come as strength, in our loneliness, come as love,
Come, refresh, restore, renew us.

Eleanor Daley is a Canadian composer, performer, and accompanist. She received her Bachelor of Music Degree in Organ Performance from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, and holds diplomas in both organ and piano from the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto and Trinity College in England. She has been the Director of Music at Fairlawn Heights United Church in Toronto since 1982. During that time she has established a thriving choral program for which much of her choral music has been composed. This lovely anthem was commissioned for Christ Church, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Stuart Forster, Director of Music and Organist, in celebration of the 250th anniversary of the Dedication of the Church, 2011.

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Motet    O nata lux    Thomas Tallis (c. 1505-1585)

O nata lux de lumine, Jesu redemptor saeculi, dignare clemens supplicum laudes precesque sumere.
Qui carne quondam contegi dignatus es pro perditis, nos membra confer effici tui beati corporis.

O Light born of Light, Jesus, redeemer of the world,with kindness deign to receive the praise and prayer of suppliants.
You who once deigned to be clothed in flesh for the sake of the lost, grant us to be made members of your blessed body.

Hymn in Procession 618    Ye watchers and ye holy ones    Lasst uns erfreuen

Voluntary    Fugue in C Major, BWV 547/2    Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

The Fugue in C Major demonstrates a concentration of material with its extremely short subject, similar to its companion Prelude, heard last week. Although it is a five-voice fugue, Bach withholds the entrance of the pedal until the end of the movement—an unusual practice during the Baroque period. Shortly after the pedal entrance, the detached chords of the prelude make an appearance to announce the final return of the subject in the home key.

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Holy Eucharist Rite II at 10:30 a.m. sung by the Adult Choir, sermon by the Rev’d Walter McKenney.

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Voluntary    Chorale and Aria on Abbott’s Leigh     Carl D.N. Klein, 1991

Processional Hymn 525   The Church’s one foundation    Aurelia

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Sequence Hymn    As we gather at your table    Raquel

Offertory     Teach me, O Lord    William Byrd (c. 1540-1623)
Words: Psalm 119: 33-38
Elizabeth Proteau, soloist

Teach me, O Lord, the way of thy statutes: and I shall keep it unto the end.
Give me understanding, and I shall keep thy law: yea, I shall keep it with my whole heart.
Make me to go in the path of thy commandments: for therein is my desire.
Incline my heart unto thy testimonies: and not to covetousness.
O turn away mine eyes, lest they behold vanity: and quicken thou me in thy way.
O stablish thy word in thy servant: that I may fear thee.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son: and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, and is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.

This Psalm setting was apparently not designed as an anthem, but as a truly liturgical piece, a festal Psalm to be sung after the Preces; it was popular enough to have found its way (usually as an anthem) into several sources. The piece might almost have been written to exemplify the Royal Injunction that required “a modest distinct song, so used in all parts of the common prayers in the church, that the same may be as plainly understood, as if it were read without singing.” There is a new intimacy, partly due to the verse idiom, in which a soloist alternates with the full choir. A modern listener used to hearing Evensong cannot help noticing the similarity of the full sections, with their regular cadential formulae, to Anglican chant. (Notes courtesy Robert Quinney)

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Anthem    Deep river    Gerre Hancock (1934-2012)

Deep river, my home is over Jordan, Deep river, Lord, I want to cross over into campground.
Oh, don’t you want to go to that gospel feast, that promised land where all is peace?

Hymn in Procession 379    God is Love, let heaven adore him    Abbott’s Leigh

Voluntary    Prelude in C Major, BWV 547     Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

The Prelude in C Major is an example of Bach’s use of concentrated material within a work. The entire musical fabric of the movement is presented in the first eight measures. The rest of the prelude explores various combinations of this material in a number of keys, often in quick succession. A sustained pedal note and several detached chords announce the return of the home key and final statement of the opening theme. Stay tuned for its companion Fugue, next week!

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Holy Eucharist Rite II at 10:30 a.m. with hymns and organ, sermon by the Rev’d Hope Eakins.

Worship at Home:

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NOTE: Choirs were cancelled for the morning due to inclement weather. The music listing below reflects the service as it took place.

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Voluntary    Aria      Flor Peeters (1903-1986)

Flor Peeters was organist of the St. Rombaut Cathedral, Mechelen, Belgium, and a renowned teacher and performer. Aria is his best known organ piece with its plaintive melody set against pulsing chords.

Processional Hymn 474    When I survey the wondrous cross    Rockingham

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Sequence Hymn 674    “Forgive our sins as we forgive”    Detroit

Offertory     Preambule    Louis Vierne (1870-1937)

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Music    Berceuse    Louis Vierne

Hymn in Procession    I will trust in the Lord    Trust in the Lord

Voluntary     Prelude in G Major    J. S. Bach (1685-1750)

Full Sermon Text:

While you were shoveling and plowing snow this week, my husband and I were visiting a friend – in Florida. One of the things we anticipated with delight was our host’s invitation to a book group discussion of Small Great Things, a novel that focuses on modern day racism. We had read this story of an exceedingly compassionate and competent black nurse who is removed from the care of a white baby because the child’s parents refuse to let a black nurse touch him. In the discussion of this racial intolerance, several book group participants questioned whether the nurse was just a little too hypersensitive about losing her job because of her race. “It depends on how you see it,” they said, one way or another. “Two people can have the same experience and interpret it different ways – it’s like alternative facts.”

Jesus didn’t think much of alternative facts. “ Let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes’ and your ‘No‘ be No’,” he said.

Just before Jesus preached the sermon in this morning’s Gospel, he told the folks on the hillside why he was preaching it. He said, “Do not think that I have come to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I have … [come] to fulfill them.” (Matthew 5:17)

The Law meant a number of things to the Jews. First of all, the law was the Ten Commandments given to Moses. Secondly, the Law was the sacred Torah, the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Scriptures. Finally there was the Oral Law, carefully repeated and finally written down by the Scribes.

Just like pious Christians, pious Jews, the ones known as the Pharisees, found it hard to keep the Ten Commandments not only because it was difficult but also because the commandments were confusing. And so the attorneys of their day, the Scribes, piled up law books ceiling high with thousands of regulations spelling out what the Ten Commandments actually specify. An example: the Commandments say, “Do no work on the Sabbath.” But how do you define work?

The Scribes said that carrying a burden was work. But then what was a burden? It was “Food equal in weight to a dried fig, ink enough to write two letters of the alphabet, honey enough to put on a wound.” But you couldn’t actually put honey on a wound because healing was forbidden on the day of rest – remember how much trouble Jesus got into for healing on the Sabbath? The Law said that, on the Sabbath, you could prevent a patient from becoming worse, but you couldn’t promote healing, so you could put a plain bandage on a wound but certainly not any honey.

It was to a people caught up in this kind of exhausting legalism that Jesus said, “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” On that basis, we are all convicted, because none of us seems to keep Ten Commandments, let alone thousands of Scribal additions. So when Jesus continues, “You have heard it said, ‘You shall not kill,’ but I say that if you are angry with a brother or a sister, you will be liable to judgment,” we cringe because we all have been angry. And when Jesus persists, “You have heard it said, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ but I say that it is better to pluck your eye out that to look lustfully at another,” we want to say, “Oh Jesus, I can never be more righteous than the Pharisees for not only Jimmy Carter but I have done that myself.”

So Jesus explains to the people and to us that obeying the laws is not as complicated as we make it. He says that we should start by living the law of love, a matter that goes beyond legal observance to the habits of the heart. When a lawyer asked Jesus, “Which commandment is the greatest?” Jesus told him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:35-39). Jesus didn’t pick his favorite law; he summarized the essence of the Law as respect for people, for the earth, and for truth. Jesus says that keeping the Law is not so much a matter of justice as a matter of mercy, not so much narrow legalism but abundant love and care and respect for all creation.

We need the Laws of Moses, because we don’t do a very good job of living the law of love. The commandments come first, before the Good News, because we always need help figuring out what is right and what is wrong, but Jesus says that following the law, obeying the commandments, doesn’t make us holy, it just keeps us honest. It’s a waste of our lives, he says, to worry about dotting our i’s and crossing our t’s, because even if we follow every jot and tittle of the Law, we are condemned if we fail to love.

Here’s how it works. Jesus says that a man can divorce his wife if she has committed adultery, because there is no love left in that marriage, but … that a man cannot divorce his wife because he has grown tired of her, for that would break his marriage vows. Now I know a divorced man who married a divorced woman – and you probably do too. Their prior marriages failed for good reasons, and they have been happy for decades now, and their love spills out and blesses the world. But one of their children has become a fundamentalist Christian and he quotes this morning’s Gospel. The son says that these people are both adulterers, and his father should leave the stepmother so his parents can get remarried. Jesus says that the Law is bigger than that. Jesus says that the law of love trumps the holiness code, and commands us to live where love is, to weep whenever love fails, and to do all we can to birth love in this world.

Over and over Jesus quotes the Law and extends it beyond the words to the heart of the matter. “You have heard it said, ‘You shall not kill,’ but I say to you everyone who is angry with his brother is liable to judgment.”   But how do we keep from becoming angry. Sometimes anger just washes over us, and sometimes folks who don’t get angry get ulcers instead. Too often Christians have misinterpreted Jesus’ dictum as saying that Christians should put on nice faces along with their nice clothes and cover up what troubles them. But Jesus tells us to address our anger and be honest, to bring it out into the light of day and deal with it fairly. Jesus isn’t talking about an indignant blast of fury, but about anger that festers and seeks revenge. We once saw this kind of anger on a visit to Sardinia where vendetta is a pivotal social value and many hillsides are blasted by explosions set by angry enemies. As we stood inside a church there, we watched one woman sneak inside while another woman was lighting a votive candle. As soon as the first woman left, the second woman grabbed the candle, spat on it and blew it out. Sardinian vendetta even permeates prayer.

Another woman in another place harbored a terrible anger toward her brother for 65 years. She was sodomized by this brother when she was ten years old, and she kept her terrible secret until his death. She never told her sister or her husband or her children or her priest; she just let the shame and fear and anger gnaw at her. Oh there were reasons for the secret, the reasons of any incest victim, but, as Jesus knew, the anger festered and killed a part of her life. Once she let the secret out, her anger disappeared. “Why did I carry this for so long?” she asked. The victim who won’t forgive is forever in bondage to the victimizer.

“You have heard it said, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ but I say to you that if you have looked lustfully you have already committed adultery in your heart.” Jesus was not naïve. He knew about lusts of the heart. But it is not the momentary passion, the quickening of the breath, that Jesus condemns – after all, physical desire is God’s gift to us. Rather Jesus condemns the choice to enjoy a lust that might lead to infidelity, and he warns us that adultery starts long before the affair.

“You have heard it said, ‘You shall not swear falsely,’ but I say to you ‘Do not swear at all.” Jesus is not referring to profanity. He is talking about swearing in the name of God. So what is the matter with that? Jesus is saying that we don’t need to put God behind our oaths because God is already there. It doesn’t matter if we swear by God because even liars can do that. What matters is the integrity of our word. There can’t be one kind of integrity in the boardroom and another in church. All promises are sacred because all promises are made in the presence of God. Let your ‘yes’ be ‘yes’ and your ‘no’ be ‘no,’ Jesus says; no one’s word should need an oath to guarantee its truth. And although there can be alternative interpretations, there can never be alternative facts.

Jesus makes it very simple. Don’t harbor anger; don’t destroy someone’s good name through gossip; be faithful to your spouse; tell the truth. And above all, first of all, most important of all, live the law of love. Not a bad idea for Valentine’s Day and for all the days ahead.

Holy Eucharist Rite II at 10:30 a.m. sung by the Adult Choir, sermon by the Rabbi Stephen Fuchs.

Worship at Home:

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Voluntary   Prelude on Leoni    Richard Proulx (1937-2010)
Meditation on Slane    June Nixon (b. 1942)

Processional Hymn 372    Praise to the living God    Leoni

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Sequence Hymn 543    O Zion, tune thy voice    Eastview

Children’s Anthem    This little light of mine   Traditional

Offertory   O for a closer walk with God    Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924)
Words: William Cowper (1731-1800), found at Hymn 683

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Anthem     Ubi caritas    Maurice Duruflé (1902-1986)
Words from the Maundy Thursday communion rite

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est. Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor.
Exsultemus, et in ipso jucundemur. Timeamus, et amemus Deum vivum.
Et ex corde diligamus nos sincero.

Where charity and love are, God is there. Christ’s love has gathered us into one.
Let us rejoice and be pleased in him. Let us fear, and let us love the living God.
And may we love each other with a sincere heart.

This is perhaps the best known work of french composer Maurice Duruflé, and the most moving and finely wrought harmonization of this ancient Gregorian Chant. The beautiful harmonies and repeated moment on the word “sincerity” make it a perfect reminder that God’s central message is one of love.

Hymn in Procession 488    Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart    Slane

Voluntary    Fantasy on St. Anne    Christa Rakich, 2011

Christa Rakich is an internationally recognized concert organist and recording artist, and Director of Music/Organist at St. Mark the Evangelist Church, here in West Hartford. She has won particular acclaim for her interpretation of early music and the works of J.S. Bach. This delightful fantasy is from a set of variations written in the style of Johann Pachelbel (yep, the Canon guy). Stick around for the 12:30 Pipes Alive! concert and you’ll get to hear the whole work!

 

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Choral Evensong at 5:00 p.m. sung by the choir of Center Church, Hartford, William Ness, organist/choirmaster

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Holy Eucharist Rite II at 10:30 a.m. sung by the Youth Choir, sermon by the Rev’d Susan Pinkerton.

Worship at Home:

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Voluntary    Prelude Robert    Paoli, 1991

Processional Hymn 556 st. 1-5    Rejoice ye pure in heart!    Marion

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Psalm 15   Gregorian Chant sung by the choir

Sequence Hymn 593    Lord, make is servants of your peace    Dickinson College

Offertory   My eyes for beauty pine    Herbert Howells (1892-1983)
Words: Robert Bridges (1844-1930)

My eyes for beauty pine; My soul for God’s grace; No other care nor hope is mine;
To heaven I turn my face; One splendour thence is shed from all the stars above;
Tis named when God’s name is said; Tis love, ’tis heavenly love;
And every gentle heart that burns with true desire
Is lit from eyes that mirror part of that celestial fire.

Whether for voices or organ or orchestra, Herbert Howells could most certainly write grand, sweeping musical phrases. As the Youth Choir sings, note the crest of the phrase on the word “eyes” from the outset. The highest note of the first section occurs on the word “heaven” not by accident, indeed. In the middle section, not only does he write another high passage for “heavenly Love,” he even slows down the tempo and harmonic rhythm to make sure we pay close attention to the use of “Love” (capitalized) as an equivalent name for God. He then uses similar tempo and rhythm techniques with the words “celestial fire” at the end with similar sublime effectiveness. (Notes courtesy David Perry Ouzts)

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Anthem    Nunc dimittis    George Dyson (1883-1964)

Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace:
according to thy word;
For mine eyes have seen thy salvation:
which thou hast prepared before the face of all people,
To be a light to lighten the Gentiles:
and to be the glory of thy people Israel.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son:
and to the Holy Ghost:
As it was in the beginning is now, and ever shall be:
world without end. Amen.

Hymn in Procession 438    Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord!    Woodlands

Voluntary    Processional    Robert Paoli, 1991

 

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Holy Eucharist Rite II at 10:30 a.m. sung by the Adult Choir, sermon by the Rev’d Helen Moore.

Worship at Home:

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Service Music:

Voluntary    Prelude on Land of Rest    George Shearing (1919-2011)

Blind from birth, George Shearing was one of the most well-loved of the 20th century jazz pianists. Wanting to express his faith through his music, he composed a set of jazz preludes for organ, including this prayerful setting of Land of Rest, the hymn-tune for I come with joy. This hymn text, written in 1968 by living hymn-writer Brian Wren, gradually changes perspective from the inward “I come with joy to meet my Lord” to the outward togetherness in Christ that is embodied in communion. Through the singing of this hymn, we are molded into the body of Christ in worship and return to the world to witness, not as individual Christians, but as Christ’s “people in the world.”

Processional Hymn 304    I come with joy to meet my Lord    Land of Rest

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Sequence Hymn    Lord, you have come to the seashore    Pescador
Sung in English.

Written in 1979, “Tú has venido a la orilla” is based on the parallel passages found in the synoptic gospels on Jesus’ calling of his first disciples (Matthew 4:18-20; Mark 1:16-20; Luke 5:1-11). As found in the Scripture, the hymn-writer captures the total obedience of disciples and their willingness to give up everything. The hymn entreats us to follow Christ with the same obedience and commitment. The refrain is a call to surrender to Jesus in response to his command to follow him. The gentle melody, Pescador de Hombres (Fisher of Men), is reminiscent of a rocking boat by the lakeshore. This hymn was used in the 1993 movie Alive, based on a book about the survivors of the Andes plane crash in 1972, and the Spanish film Camino (2008), about a girl who died of spinal cancer in 1985 who is in the process of canonization by the Catholic Church. (Notes courtesy C. Michael Hawn)

Offertory   Before the morning star begotten    Ned Rorem, 1988
Words from the Liber Usualis

Before the morning star begotten,
and Lord from everlasting,
Our Saviour is made manifest unto the world today.

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Anthem    Hide not thou thy face from me, O Lord    Richard Farrant (1525-1580)
Words from Psalm 27

Hide not thou thy face from us, O Lord, and cast not off thy servant in thy displeasure;
For we confess our sins unto thee and hide not our unrighteousness.
For thy mercy’s sake, deliver us from all our sins.

Hymn in Procession 550    Jesus calls us; o’er the tumult    Restoration

Voluntary    Fanfare     John Cook, 1952

 

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Jazz Eucharist Rite II at 10:30 a.m. sung by the Youth and Adult Choirs, sermon by the Rev’d William Eakins.

Worship at Home:

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Voluntary    Hymns by the Hot Cat Jazz Band
Just a Closer Walk with Thee
What a Wonderful World
This Little Light of Mine

By now you have noticed that things are a little different this morning! Our music today is led by the Hot Cat Jazz Band, a local Dixieland-style band that specializes in Jazz Worship – they do many of these services throughout Connecticut every year. The service music responses continue to be our traditional music with organ to provide an anchor in our traditional worship style; but everything else, including and especially the hymns, are a time for you to tap your toes, move about, and sing praise with freedom and joy. Don’t be afraid – join in and sing loudly!

Processional Hymn    How great thou art    O Store Gud

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Sequence Hymn    Take my hand, precious Lord     Precious Lord

Offertory   Amazing grace   arr. Jack Shrader, 1998
Words: John Newton (1725-1807), found at Hymn 671.

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Anthem    Agnus Dei (from A Little Jazz Mass)    Bob Chilcott (b. 1955)
Latin words from the Eucharist liturgy, at the Breaking of the Bread.

Hymn in Procession    I have decided to follow Jesus    Assam

Voluntary    When the saints go marching in

 

Full Sermon Text:

Now is a time of looking ahead.  It is the time of New year’s resolutions when we make lists of what we are going to do differently in the future – things like losing weight, exercising regularly, spending less and saving more.  The days are getting longer.  Seed and plant catalogues have started to arrive, and gardeners are beginning to think about what they are going to grow when spring comes.  Travel brochures get us dreaming about where we might go on vacation.  Year-end financial statements signal the beginning of the tax season and the run-up to April 15. As a nation, we will enter this week upon a new era with the inauguration of Donald Trump as our 45^th President.  Who knows what lies ahead for America in the next four years?  Now is also the season of annual meetings like the one we will have at St. John’s in two weeks.  What lies ahead for this parish in the coming year?  What are the challenges and opportunities for us as people of God? And what do we need to do about them?

 

Now is a time when we might well ask ourselves the question that Jesus asks in today’s Gospel: “What are you looking for?”  It is the most fundamental question in life.  All of our busyness, all of our plans – where are they taking us?  To what purpose and to what good?  Unless we know where we are headed and why, we might end up losing our way.  We might even end up crying like Isaiah, “I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity.”

 

Jesus knew how vital it is for us to get the right priorities and put them in the right order.  In this morning’s Gospel two men are following Jesus.  There was something about him that had caught their imagination and awakened hope.  Could he indeed be the Messiah, God’s Promised One?  And so they follow Jesus at a distance, perhaps out of shyness, perhaps just waiting to see what would happen next.  It is then that Jesus turns and looks them in the eye and asks them, “What are you looking for?”  Are you following me because, like the scribes and Pharisees, you want to get me to debate fine points of the Law?  Are you following me because, like the Zealots, you are looking for a political demagogue and military commander to overthrow Roman rule?  Are you perhaps looking for a position of power and privilege in the new order that Messiah will usher in?  Or are you simply men of prayer looking for God?  If that’s what you are, if God’s light and love is what you seek, then come follow me.  The two men answer Jesus’ question, “Rabbi, where are you staying?”  We want to be where you are and learn whatever you have to teach us.  And Jesus invites them to “Come and see.”

 

“What are you looking for?”  Jesus’ question is the essential question for us as well.  What’s your aim and goal in life?  What are you really trying to get out of your years on this earth?

 

Some people are searching for security.  They want to have enough money to take care of any need they might have.  They want to feel safe from danger, and they try to stay as healthy and fit as possible.  In our hearts, however, we know that there is no complete safeguard against the changes and chances of life.

 

Some people are searching for love, for someone who will understand and cherish them as they really are.  Others are looking for someone to love, someone to dedicate their life to.  However, like wealth, safety, and health, all human relationships are imperfect and transitory.  In the end, even the best of loves is interrupted by death.

 

Some people are searching for a career – somewhere and someplace to use their abilities and talents in a way that gives personal satisfaction.  Some people are looking to achieve recognition, prestige, power, and wealth.  Others work to make the world a better place.

 

I wonder, though, if any career, any relationship, or any other aspect of our life can be as deeply meaningful and satisfying as it might be if we are not also searching for God.  This is the quest in which we wonder about the whys and wherefores of our existence and look for that which is of enduring value.

 

This is the path that Christian people – and all seekers – have travelled throughout the ages, the path that Martin Luther King took when he left being a pastor of his church to become a civil rights activist, a vocation that led both to the Nobel Peace Prize … and to his assassination.  It is the path that a man I’ll call John took when he left his law career to fight for justice another way – to work as a priest.  It is the path a couple took when they sold their house to share their wealth with a land trust that preserves our environment.  It is the path a young woman took when she decided to dedicate all her energy and her talents to be an artist.

 

Matthew Arnold describes this quest movingly in his poem The Buried Life:

But often in the world’s most crowded streets

But often, in the din of strife,

There rises an unspeakable desire

After the knowledge of our buried life. …

A longing to inquire

Into the mystery of this heart which beats

So wild, so deep in us, to know

Whence our lives come and whence they go.

 

Isn’t that why we are here this morning?  We want to “know where our lives come from and where they go.”  And like those two disciples of long ago, we want to be where Jesus is because we believe that Jesus has answers to our questions.  There is something we can learn from being in his presence.  And did not Jesus promise, “Wherever two or three are gathered together in my Name, there I am in the midst of them”?  So we gather here with other Christian seekers after God to meet the One we call Lord.  We come to read together from God’s Word and consider together what God is saying to us now.  What is God calling us to do with our lives?  How is God calling us to use the resources that God has placed into our care both as individual Christians and as a congregation of Christian disciples?  We come to ask, as Martin Luther King did, what is God is saying to us as a nation?  So we come to offer our prayers for the needs of the world around us and for our political leaders whether we voted for them or not.  We come to share with Christian brothers and sisters the joys and sorrows, the perplexities and wonders of our lives.  We come to tell each other stories of where we have found God.  And we come to do what Jesus told us to do for the remembering of him.  In thanksgiving for all that God has given us, we eat the broken bread and drink the cup of wine that are sacraments of God’s love for us.  And then we go out as the people of God to be Christ’s continuing presence in the world.

 

“What are you looking for?”  Jesus asked the question of his disciples long ago.  And Jesus asks the same question of us today:  “What are you looking for?”   Let the question resonate in our hearts and minds in the days ahead and let us take careful stock of our priorities and consider where our lives are headed.   Jesus invites us, like those disciples of old, to “Come and see.”  If we do that and follow him, who knows what he has in store for us?  Who knows where we will be led as a parish?  But of two things we can be certain: Christ will be with us always as he promised, and following him will be well worth the journey.

Holy Eucharist Rite II and Holy Baptism at 10:30 a.m. sung by the Adult Choir, sermon by the Rev’d Helen Moore.

Worship at Home:

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Full Service Audio:

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Service Music:

Voluntary    Prelude in E-flat, BWV 552   Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Chorale: Schmucke dich

Opening Hymn 76    On Jordan’s bank, the Baptist’s cry    Wincester New

Gloria S280     Robert Powell (b.1932)

Sequence Hymn 339    Deck thyself, my soul, with gladness    Schmucke dich

Offertory   What cheer? Good cheer!    Peter Warlock (1894-1930)

Lift up your hearts and be ye glad, in Christ His birth the angels bade.
Say each to other if any be sad:
What cheer? Good cheer! Be merry and glad this good new year!
The King of Heaven His birth hath take: now joy and mirth we ought to make.
Say each to other for His dear sake:
What cheer? Good cheer! Be merry and glad this good new year!
I tell you all with heart so free, right welcome ye be all to me;
Be glad and merry for charity.
What cheer? Good cheer! Be merry and glad this good new year!

Sanctus  S130    Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Fraction anthem S164    Jesus, lamb of God     Franz Schubert

Communion Anthem   Away in a manger   Normandy Tune, arr. Reginald Jacques (1894-1969)

Closing Hymn 435    At the name of Jesus    King’s Weston

Voluntary    Carillon    Herbert Murrill (1909-1952)

 

Full Sermon Text:

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