UNITED
Fifth Sunday in Lent -
Anne G. Cohen
Jeremiah 31: 31-34
In Preparation for Worship:
You desire truth in the
inward being;
therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.
-Psalm 51:6 (NRSV)
There is a grace approaching
that we shun as much as death.
It is the completion of our birth.
It does not come in time, but in timelessness
when the mind sinks into the heart
and we remember who we are.
It is an insistent grace that draws us
to the edge and beckons us to surrender
safe territory and enter our enormity.
We know we must pass beyond knowing
and fear the shedding.
But we are pulled upward
nonetheless
through forgotten ghosts
and unexpected angels
realizing it doesn't make sense
to make sense any more.
This morning the universe danced before you
as you sang - it loves that song!
- Stephen & Ondrea Levine, New Mexico
Prayers for a
Thousand Years (1999) p.17
Signs
of Covenant: The Heart
The days are surely coming... when I will cut a new covenant...
It will not be like the covenant that I cut with [your] ancestors...
When I took them by the hand to bring them out of [bondage]...
I will put my law within [you] and I will write it on [your] hearts;
and I will be [your] God and [you] shall be my people...
{You] shall all know me.
(Jeremiah 31-34 NRSV, 2nd person added)
Page Two
I will cut a new covenant, God said to Jeremiah over 2500 years ago.
I will cut a new covenant on your hearts and you shall know me.
I will engrave your heart with my name, with my being, with the
knowledge of me. You and I will be within one another. We will be
inseparable.
We shall be one being.
This covenant, initiated by God, was to be inscribed upon our hearts.
The heart: the hollow, muscular organ of a vertebrate animal that
receives blood from the veins and pumps it through the arteries by
alternate dilation and contraction - which we understand to be our heart
beat.
The heart: the organ which signifies by that beating sound the existence
of life remaining in the body - which, by it's
silence, signifies death.
The heart: that organ which registers the changing tides of emotion -
beating wildly with fear or anticipation, slowing to a peaceful rhythm
in sleep or contentment.
The heart: any place or part of ourselves that is near to the center,
the essence, the core, the meaning of us, the authentic self.
The heart contains our inner-most thoughts and feelings.
It is consciousness and conscience, the source of self-knowledge and
intuition, the seat of kindness, love, devotion, sympathy, grief.
It is our courage and our motivation, our intention and our regret.
It is the spirit of the self.
It is the whisper of the One who makes us and unmakes us.
The heart: is the strongest and the most vulnerable part of being human.
And when mind and memory are gone - the heart remembers.
The heart does it's work until it is done - and the human returns its
spirit to God.
The hollow, overflowing, tender, muscular heart - is God's signature on
the most important covenant of all.
It is proof of God's promise of INTERBEING, God's universal and
unfailing presence within each and every living thing.
If the heart beats, God is within us.
If the heart stops, we are within God.
In the spaces inbetween - both are true.
Page Three
If we are to know ourselves and our God fully, the mind must sink into
the heart and seek the truth at the center of being, in the chambers of
the heart.
The longing that draws us toward beauty and mystery, the yearning that
fuels our search for meaning and understanding and affection and
acceptance, this heartache of ours - is the road map to the Heart of the
Universe.
***
Oren Lyons was the first Onondagan to enter
college. When he returned
to his reservation for his first vacation, his uncle proposed a fishing
trip on a lake. Once he had his nephew in the middle of the lake where
he wanted him, he began to interrogate him. "Well, Oren," he
said,
"you've been to college; you must be pretty smart now from all they've
been teaching you. Let me ask you a question. Who are
you?" Taken
aback by the question, Oren fumbled for an answer. "What do you
mean,
who am I? Why, I'm your nephew, of course." His uncle rejected his
answer and repeated his question. successively, the nephew ventured
that he was Oren Lyons, an Onondagan, a human being,
a man, a young man,
all to no avail. When his uncle had reduced him to silence and he asked
to be informed as to who he was, his uncle said, "Do you see that bluff
over there? Oren, you ARE that bluff. And that giant pine on the
other
shore? Oren, you Are that pine. And this water that supports our
boat? You are this water."
- Huston Smith, The World's Religions; Brussat p.515
***
Have you ever been touched by the gentleness of a cat caring for
her kittens?
Have you ever been moved to breathlessness by the curves of a tree,
by the color of the sky, by a kiss?
Have you ever ached with desire for an island you remember or a person
who has left you or a meadow you saw once in a dream?
Have you ever helped a child who was struggling with a zipper
or carried someone's bags for them
or given money away
or rescued a trapped animal
or protected something vulnerable -
without even stopping to think about it?
Have you ever allowed the wind to define who you are?
Have you ever placed a small vase of flowers at each place setting at
the dinner table, thinking about how that might affect the person who
would sit there?
Page Four
Have you ever responded to a natural disaster or the sudden evidence of
suffering - with compassion, an aching heart, a generous spirit?
Have you ever broken a law because to abide by the law would injure
someone or something?
Have you ever drawn the line, set boundaries for the protection of
others,
insisted upon a recognition of what is fair or just or merciful?
Have you ever looked at someone very familiar to you - with
intentionality -
searching for something new - a nuance - evidence of growth -
the presence, even now, of mystery in their eyes?
Have you ever sat very, very still, curled up with yourself and a cup of
tea -
and quietly listened for the sounds of God within you?
All of these moments are the leading of the heart - the reading of what
has been inscribed there by the One who made us and covenants with us
again and again and again and again - heart to heart.
***
There was a woman once, not so long ago, who developed a deep and
abiding friendship with several other women in her community and
together these friends shared the challenges and celebrations of one
another's lives. One day this woman died, and her friends came together
in her death, just as they had in her life, to offer support and
nurture.
Since this woman did not have any surviving family, her women friends
sought to make arrangements for her burial in the local cemetery. They
learned that the cemetery was only available to persons of the Roman
Catholic faith and that since their friend was not Roman Catholic, there
was not a place for her to be buried in that town. The friends were
dismayed that they would not be able to bury this woman next to her
neighbors and co-workers of the community. Still, they received
permission to bury their friend adjacent to the cemetery. It was there
that they held a memorial service and laid this friend to rest.
The service was not the end of their relationship with this woman,
however. Under the cover of night, this set of friends returned to the
place of burial and labored through the night to move the cemetery
fence, that it might include the land where their friend was buried.
Not until her resting place reflected her relationship with her friends
and with the community could they feel that they had honored this
woman's memory.
*** Rev. Jake Pomeroy, First Church News 2/15/00 - Co-Pastor, Pasadena UCC
Page Five
What is it that your heart tells you must be done in order to make your
piece of the world a resting place of the Holy?
What fences need to be moved to allow God's heart to beat freely?
What does your heart tell you - about the reason for the existence of
this church - the purpose of its being - the potential it has for the
future - and the placement of it's fences?
What about the state of our national and international affairs is
causing your heart pain or joy - what does that pain or joy lead you to
believe - to
say - to do?
What is your heart whispering about your own desires, your own
happiness, your own dreams for your life?
Listen. Listen.... don't shut down that inner voice.
Listen carefully to your intuition and your sense of rightness or
wrongness. Bring your inner sense of things into speech - into action -
and allow the heart of God to have some influence over how the world -
in and around you - is becoming.
The days are surely coming... when I will cut a new covenant...
I will put my law within [you] and I will write it on [your] hearts;
and I will be [your] God and [you] shall be my people...
{You] shall all know me.
(Jeremiah 31-34 NRSV, 2nd person added)
**************
BULLETIN
Music for Gathering
Welcome and Perspective on the Day
Musical Preparation for Worship - A Time for Centering
+ Call to Worship
O God, my dark, my silence
whose love enfolded me before I breathed alone
whose hands caressed me while I was still unformed
to whom I have been given before my heart remembers
who knew me speechless
whose touch unmakes me
whose stillness finds me forever unprepared
I am listening
+ Hymn of the Heart Hush, Hush, Somebody's Calling My
Name
Hymnal # 604
+ Opening Prayer (unison)
You who are over us,
You who are one of us,
You who are --
Also within us,
May all see you--in me also,
May I prepare the way for you,
May I give thanks for all that shall fall to my lot,
May I also not forget the needs of others.
Keep me in your love
As you would that all should be kept in mine.
May everything in this my being
be directed to your glory.
And may I never despair,
For I am in your hand,
And in you is all power and goodness.
Give me a pure heart--that I may see you,
A humble heart--that I may hear you,
A heart of love--that I may serve you,
A heart of faith--that I may abide in you.
Time for Silent Reflection
One: My soul waits in silence.
All: God is my rock and my fortress. I will be at peace.
Silent
Reflection
The Assurance of Good News (unison)
God loves us recklessly and without limitation.
What wondrous love is this!
Sung Response "Hallelujah. God be praised!"
Conversation with Our Children Remember
Reading from the Jewish
Torah
Jeremiah 31:31-34
+ Hymn of Wonder What Wondrous Love Is
This? Hymnal #223
Teaching and
Proclamation
Signs of Covenant: The Heart
Intercessions, Celebrations and Encouragements
Call to Prayer Be still and know that I am God
Hymnal # 743
Time for Silence
Our Joys and Concerns and an Offering of Prayer
Sung Response "How
Beautiful" T.
Park and L. Larson
Bob Erickson and
We Offer Our Gifts So That Our Lives May Be Our Prayer
Offertory
Olive Branch Offering
Prayer of Dedication (unison)
All gifts have their origin in You, O God, the source of all creative
and healing energy. We rejoice when Your love finds a faint echo in our
lives. We sense our destiny when Your grace moves through us to touch
another. Help us to learn to be open and vulnerable to the needs of
Your world and to respond from our hearts with the generous spirit of
Christ. Amen.
+ Sending Hymn Love Divine, All Loves Excelling Hymnal
# 43
+ Commissioning (unison)
>From the very center of our hearts and our innermost beings, we offer
Thanksgiving for all of life's perfecting experiences, past, present,
and future, with complete faith that all the Sacred Teachings,
Prophecies and Potentialities of the Four Directions will be realized,
while always remembering that the Center of the Universe is Everywhere.
Amen
+ Sung
Response
Hymnal # 433 v.3
In our End is our Beginning; in our Time, Infinity;
In our Doubt there is Believing; in our Life, Eternity.
In our Death, a Resurrection; at the Last, a Victory,
Unrevealed until its Season, something God alone can See.
+ Postlude
WORSHIP NOTES
The cross marks (+) in the order of service are an invitation for those
in the congregation who are able to stand to do so.
The New Century Hymnal or "Hymnal" has a black cover.
The Chapel Songbook is a blue, looseleaf notebook.
Call to Worship is by Janet Morley, All Desires Known (1988) p.84
(adapted)
Opening Prayer is by Dag Hammarskjold,
1905-1961
Commissioning is from "Prayers for the Sacred Directions" by Philip
Lane,
Jr., Yankton Dakota and Chickasaw Nations, North America, found in
Prayers for a Thousand Years (p.145)