Order of Service – 16th February 2025

The Order of Service follows below.

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Brougham Place Uniting Church
Kardlayirdi Karnungga
A Light on the Hill

Date. 16^th February 2025
Preacher: Trevor Phillips
Liturgical week: Epiphany 6. Green

We acknowledge the Kaurna people as the traditional carers of the land on which our church is built.

As you wait for worship to begin, please turn your phone to silent.

Prelude

Welcome and Acknowledgment of Country

Naa marni?
(Are you all good?)
Marni Ai!
(Good I am)

Call to Worship

Come, all who are gathering in this place.
A home for the hurting and hoping.
A meeting place for all those aching for freedom
and longing for God-alive community.
Jesus meets us here in this place saying,
‘Another world is on the way!’
Come! Let us sing our songs of praise and worship.

Lighting of the Candles

We sing: Jesus Call Us Here To Meet Him.

Jesus calls us here to meet him
as, through word and song and prayer,
we affirm God’s promised presence
where his people live and care.
Praise the God who keeps his promise;
praise the Son who calls us friends;
praise the Spirit who, among us,
to our hopes and fears attends.
Jesus call us to confess him
Word of Life and Lord of All,
sharer of our flesh and frailness
saving all who fail or fall.
Tell his holy human story;
tell his tales that all may hear;
tell the world that Christ in glory
came to earth to meet us here.
Jesus calls us to each other:
found in him are no divides.
Race and class and sex and language
such are barriers he derides.
Join the hand of friend and stranger;
join the hands of age and youth;
join the faithful and the doubter
in their common search for truth.

Opening Prayer

Come Holy Spirit,
Open our hearts,
Widen our imagination.
Let us become flourishing trees,
rooted in love and wisdom,
strong in the presence of divine care.
Amen.

Prayer of Confession

O God, we want the world to change,
but if we’re honest, we do not want to change.

We want lives untouched, wherever possible, from the raw and brutal realities of life. That is until we are on the wrong end of things. And then we want someone to stand with us, to rail against all that is not right and just. We’re sorry, God.
We’re sorry for the resistance, the inertia,
the indifference we often feel.

Words of Assurance/Grace

There are always fresh chances in the reign of God, always new opportunities to move towards love, to open up. And it always starts with receiving love, with God’s forgiving embrace of our lives.
Friends, you are forgiven.
Thanks be to God.

Passing of the Peace

The peace of our God be with you.
And also with you.

Community News and Notices

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Children’s Time

Children may go downstairs for Sunday School. Parents, you are welcome to join your child in Sunday School if you feel your child may need your assistance. Alternatively, you may wish for your child to remain with you for the duration of worship. Activity packs are available at the entrances.

We sing: Now thank we all our God

Now thank we all our God
with hearts and hands and voices,
who wondrous things has done,
in whom the world rejoices;
who from our mothers’ arms
has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love,
and still is ours today.
O may this bounteous God
through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts
and blessed peace to cheer us.
Lord, keep us in your grace
and guide us when perplexed,
and free us from all harm
in this world and the next.
All praise and thanks to God
who reigns in highest heaven,
to Father and to Son
and Spirit now be given:
the one eternal God,
whom heaven and earth adore,
who ever was, is now,
and shall be ever more.

Scripture Reading: Luke 6:17-26

He came down with them and stood on a level place with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon. They had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases, and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. And everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him, for power came out from him and healed all of them.

Blessings and Woes

Then he looked up at his disciples and said:

“Blessed are you who are poor,
    for yours is the kingdom of God.
”Blessed are you who are hungry now,
    for you will be filled.
“Blessed are you who weep now,
    for you will laugh.

“Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice on that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven, for that is how their ancestors treated the prophets.

“But woe to you who are rich,
    for you have received your consolation.
”Woe to you who are full now,
    for you will be hungry.
“Woe to you who are laughing now,
    for you will mourn and weep.

“Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.

From this shines forth the Word of God.
Thanks be to God.

Message

We sing: Beauty for brokenness

Beauty for brokenness,
hope for despair,
Lord, in the suffering,
this is our prayer.
Bread for the children,
justice, joy, peace,
sunrise to sunset
your kingdom increase.
Shelter for fragile lives,
cures for their ills,
work for the craftsmen,
trade for their skills;
land for the dispossessed,
rights for the weak;
voices to plead the cause
of those who can’t speak.

    Refrain:
    God of the poor,
    friend of the weak,
    give us compassion we pray;
    melt our cold hearts,
    let tears fall like rain
    Come change our love
    from a spark to a flame
Refuge from cruel wars,
havens from fear,
cities for sanctuary,
freedoms to share,
peace to the killing-fields,
scorched earth to green;
Christ for the bitterness,
his cross for the pain.
Rest for the ravaged earth,
oceans and streams,
plundered and poisoned,
our future, our dreams.
Lord, end our madness,
carelessness, greed;
make us content with
the things that we need.

    Refrain:
    God of the poor,
    friend of the weak,
    give us compassion we pray;
    melt our cold hearts,
    let tears fall like rain
    Come change our love
    from a spark to a flame
Lighten our darkness,
breathe on this flame
until your justice burns,
brightly again;.
until the nations
learn of your ways,
seek your salvation
and bring you their praise.

    Refrain:
    God of the poor,
    friend of the weak,
    give us compassion we pray;
    melt our cold hearts,
    let tears fall like rain
    Come change our love
    from a spark to a flame

Prayers of the People

Gather around Jesus, he is with us here, standing on level ground, and all who are struggling and unwell may come to him, for healing, for connection, for community, for a word that uplifts.
We pray at this time for all those
on our hearts whose spirits are troubled.

troubled by illness,
troubled by conflict,
troubled by uncertainty
troubled by hunger or some other need.
We lift up in prayer those we know
who long for your care, loving Jesus.

May your healing power go forth, dear Jesus.
We pray for those around the world whose lives
are endangered or displaced by war.

Keep people safe, somehow.
Bring peace, God.
Bring hope God.
Turn weapons of war into instruments for connection, for healing and hope, for feeding those who are hungry.
Teach all of us the things that make for peace.

Let your jubilee dream come,
let your will be done,
in all of these desperate places,
as it is in heaven.
May your healing power go forth, dear Jesus.
Amen.

The Lord’s Prayer

And now with the confidence of the children of God, let us pray the prayer Jesus taught us saying…

Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be Your name,

your Kingdom come,

your will be done,

on earth as in Heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.

Forgive us our sins,

as we forgive those who sin against us.

Save us from the time of trial

and deliver us from evil.

For the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours

now and forever. Amen.

Offering

To give electronically please go to bpuc.org/give

Alternatively, there is an offering bowl near the lectern on the left-hand side as you exit the church.

Offering Prayer

We sing: Channel of peace

Make me a channel of your peace.
Where there is hatred let me bring your love;
where there is injury, your pardon, Lord;
and where there’s doubt, true faith in you.

    Refrain
    O Master, grant that I may never seek
    so much to be consoled as to console,
    to be understood as to understand,
    to be loved, as to love with all my soul.
Make me a channel of your peace.
Where there’s despair in life, let me bring hope;
where there is darkness, let me bring your light;
and where there’s sadness, ever joy.

    Refrain
    O Master, grant that I may never seek
    so much to be consoled as to console,
    to be understood as to understand,
    to be loved, as to love with all my soul.
Make me a channel of your peace.
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
in giving of ourselves that we receive,
and in dying that we’re born to eternal life.

Sending Forth and Benediction

We sing: May the Feet

May the feet of God walk with you,
and his hand hold you tight.
May the eye of God rest on you,
and his ear hear your cry.
May the smile of God be for you,
and his breath give you life.
May the Child of God grow in you,
and his love bring you home.

R. Mann. A.W.Podlich, Together in song 779

Extroit

The people may leave as the Extroit is played.

Come and share morning tea together, in the basement. There are stairs behind the organ and a ramp between the church and the car park. All are welcome!

Compiled with the assistance of:

Liturgy, Learning & (purposeful) Life. Worship resources (MediaCom). Writer: Jesse Size

The Scripture Readings are from the NRSVUE. New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Cover Photo by By PJakopin https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vranja jama Entrance from Inside 2019.jpg, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode