Bulletin – Sunday, March 12, 2023 – Third Sunday in Lent

Sunday, March 12, 2023
Third Sunday in Lent

Approach

The Lenten Candles

There is so much during the day that clamours for our attention. Friends, family work, classes, households tasks. And the noise! We are bombarded with sound, from the clock that awakens us to the telephone, the radio, the television, the conversation that we have or overhear. Sometimes is the voice within that becomes so loud that we can’t hear anything else. Where is the time and place to listen for the still, small voice of God? Sometimes it seems that good would have to speak in a whirlwind to be heard above the clamour! Listen now. There is a place of quiet rest, and it is the place where God dwells within you. Close your eyes. Be aware of the place. In Lent we journey to the parts of ourselves known only to God, beneath the clamour. Let the story of Jesus reach us there. Let is teach us wisdom in our secret hearts.

As we extinguish this light, we acknowledge the darkness, pain, and burden of violence in the world and to the Earth.

Draw us together in your love, O God. May our restless hearts not resist you, but continue to search until they find their rest in you. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Call to Worship

One:   We gather in the name of the living Christ to worship God.
All:      Surely, God is in this place and calls us to worship in spirit and in truth.

One:   God’s love is for you and for all people everywhere.
All:      That we may share God’s love and life, may we be renewed in the refreshing Spirit of the living Christ.

One:   The living Christ is with us.
All:      Let us worship and Praise God!

Hymn – “All Who are Thirsty”

All who are thirsty,
All who are weak,
Come to the fountain.
Dip your heart in the streams of life.
Let the pain and the sorrow
Be wash away
In the waves of his mercy
As deep cries out to deep. We sing

Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.

All who are thirsty,
All who are weak,
Come to the fountain.
Dip your heart in the streams of life.
Let the pain and the sorrow
Be wash away
In the waves of his mercy
As deep cries out to deep. We sing

Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.

Holy Spirit come.
Holy Spirit come.
Holy Spirit come.
Holy Spirit come.

As deep cries out to deep. We sing

Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Come, Lord Jesus, come.

Prayer of Approach and Confession

Holy Watering One, Fount of Every Blessing, we come to you this morning, opening our parched places to receive the springs of living water you offer to us. Most of the time, most of us don’t even know we are thirsty. Fill us with your Living Water that will transform our spirits and souls into springs that burst forth with life and love.

If we were completely honest though, God, we come with hesitant steps and uncertain motives because we know that there are those corners where sin has accumulated, and we long to uncover the ways we have strayed from your truth. Expose the empty, parched, and barren places where we don’t allow you to enter. Reveal our half-hearted struggles where we have been indifferent to the suffering of others. Nurture the faint stirrings of new life, where your spirit has begun to grow. Let your healing light transform us into the image of your Son. For you alone can bring new life and make us whole.

Response

I cast all my cares upon You.
I lay all of my burdens down at Your feet.
And anytime that I don’t know what to do,
I will cast all my cares upon You.

Words of Assurance

Response

How deep the peace, the confidence,
Of those whose wrongs are forgiven.
How deep the peace, the confidence,
Of those whose hearts are healed.

Time for All Ages

Anthem – “Fill My Cup, Lord”

Like the woman at the well I was seeking
For things that could not satisfy.
And then I heard my Saviour speaking:
‘Draw from the well that never shall run dry.’

Fill my cup, Lord,
I lift it up, Lord.
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul.
Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more.
Fill my cup,
Fill it up and make me whole.

There are millions in this world who are craving
The pleasure earthly things afford.
But none can match the wondrous treasure
That I find in Jesus Christ, my Lord.

Fill my cup, Lord,
I lift it up, Lord.
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul.
Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more.
Fill my cup,
Fill it up and make me whole.

So, my brother, if the things this world gave you
Leave hungers that won’t pass away.
My blessed Lord will come and save you
If you kneel to Him and humbly pray:

Fill my cup, Lord,
I lift it up, Lord.
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul.
Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more.
Fill my cup,
Fill it up and make me whole.

The Word

Scripture Reading:           Exodus 17:1-7

¹ From the wilderness of Sin the whole congregation of the Israelites journeyed by stages, as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. ² The people quarreled with Moses, and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?” ³ But the people thirsted there for water; and the people complained against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and livestock with thirst?” ⁴ So Moses cried out to the LORD, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” ⁵ The LORD said to Moses, “Go on ahead of the people, and take some of the elders of Israel with you; take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. ⁶ I will be standing there in front of you on the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it, so that the people may drink.” Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. ⁷ He called the place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarreled and tested the LORD, saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”

Scripture Reading:           John 4:5-42

⁵ So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ⁶ Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.

⁷ A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” ⁸ (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) ⁹ The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) ¹⁰ Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” ¹¹ The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? ¹² Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?” ¹³ Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, ¹⁴ but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” ¹⁵ The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”

¹⁶ Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” ¹⁷ The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; ¹⁸ for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!” ¹⁹ The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. ²⁰ Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” ²¹ Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. ²² You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. ²³ But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. ²⁴ God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” ²⁵ The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” ²⁶ Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.”

²⁷ Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you want?” or, “Why are you speaking with her?” ²⁸ Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, ²⁹ “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” ³⁰ They left the city and were on their way to him.

³¹ Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” ³² But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” ³³ So the disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to eat?” ³⁴ Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. ³⁵ Do you not say, ‘Four months more, then comes the harvest’? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. ³⁶ The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. ³⁷ For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ ³⁸ I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”

³⁹ Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I have ever done.” ⁴⁰ So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. ⁴¹ And many more believed because of his word. ⁴² They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”

Hear what the Spirit is saying to the Church.
Thanks be to God!

Meditation – “Our Third Burden!”

Anthem – “For Those Tears I Died”

You said you’d come and share all my sorrows,
You said you’d be there for all my tomorrows.
I came so close to sending you away.
But just like you promised, You came there to stay
I just had to pray.

And Jesus said,
‘Come to the waters, stand by my side.
I know you are thirsty, you won’t be denied.
I felt every tear drop when in darkness you cried;
And I strove to remind you that for those tears I died.’

Jesus, I give you my heart and my soul,
I know that without you I’d never be whole.
Saviour, you opened all the right doors.
And I thank you and praise you from earth’s humble shores.
Take me, I’m yours.

And Jesus said,
‘Come to the waters, stand by my side.
I know you are thirsty, you won’t be denied.
I felt every tear drop when in darkness you cried;
And I strove to remind you that for those tears I died.’

Offering / Response

Praise God throughout these forty days;
Praise Christ, our Lord, whom God did raise;
And praise the Spirit who imparts
God’s love in Christ into our hearts. Amen.

The Response

Prayers of the People

One:   God, like the Israelites in the wilderness, we too have known Your love, and experienced Your care and provision. You invite us to extend that love to the world around us—to care for others as deeply as we care for ourselves. And so we bring the needs of our world before You Now. We now lift up to you those whom we pray for today…Lord in Your mercy,
All:      hear our prayer.

One:   We pray for the many who do not have enough: enough food to eat, or shelter to keep warm; enough employment, or money to pay their bills; enough medicine or medical care. Lord in Your mercy,
All:      hear our prayer.

One:   We also pray for those who have more than enough, but who still struggle to find meaning and purpose in life; who indulge in dangerous or self-serving activities to dull their pain or loneliness. Lord, in Your mercy,
All:      hear our prayer.

One:   God, Your grace reaches out to all of us. You call us to live as citizens of heaven, working together with one heart and mind. Strengthen us to live in a manner worthy of the Good News we have received, offering our lives in service of Your kingdom, where the last are first, and the first are last, and there is grace enough for all. Lord, in Your mercy.
All:      hear our prayer.

One:   In the name of Jesus, the living water, Amen.

Hymn – “I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say”

I heard the voice of Jesus say, ‘Come unto me and rest;
Lay down, O weary one, lay down your head upon my breast.
I came to Jesus as I was, weary and worn and sad;
I found in him a resting place, and he has made me glad.

I heard the voice of Jesus say, ‘Behold, I freely give
The living water; thirsty one, stoop down, and drink, and live.’
I came to Jesus, and I drank of that life-giving stream;
My thirst was quenched, my soul revived, and now I live in him.

I heard the voice of Jesus say, ‘I am this dark world’s light;
Look unto me, your morn shall rise, and all your day be bright.’
I looked to Jesus, and I found in him my star, my sun;
And in that light of life I’ll walk till travelling days are done.

Benediction

God now from this service of worship to the service of God’s people near and far, refreshed by the living water that Jesus offers to you. Listen for the parched voices of the least of these; search out the dry places and the arid souls, and become for them a spring of living water. And as you go, may the blessings of the God of life, the Christ of love, and the Spirit of grace be upon you this day and forevermore. Amen.

Response – “Grace Alone”

Every promise we can make,
Every prayer and step of faith,
Every difference we will make
Is only by His grace.

Every mountain we will climb,
Every ray of hope we shine,
Every blessing left behind
Is only by His grace.

Grace alone which God supplies,
Strength unknown He will provide.
Christ in us, our Cornerstone,
We will go forth in grace alone.