SCHOOL OF FAITH
ASSEMBLY OF CONFESSING CONGREGATIONS
OF THE UNITING CHURCH IN AUSTRALIA
DEVOTIONAL SACRED SEASON
DAY 10 and 30 - 14th June, 4th July
PRAYER TIME FOR DAY 10 and 30 - JUNE 14th and 4th July
Especially designed for zoom prayer times during the Sacred Season of Prayer and Fasting but can be used in face to face prayer times as well. Spontaneous prayer is offered in times of prayers of praise and confession from group members using if possible some of themes in the psalm or scripture reading. The prayers for others can also be prayed spontaneously and can weave in thoughts from scripture reading, passage from Basis of Union and devotional reading.
TRUE INTIMACY
REV JONATHAN BUTTON
Rev Jonathan Button is Minister in Placement at Golden Grove Uniting Church, South Australia.
OPENING PRAYER
KEY VERSE: 1Corinthians 11: 26
Leader
For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
PRAYERS OF PRAISE AND ADORATION
PRAYERS OF CONFESSION
BIBLE READINGS: 1 Corinthians 11: 23-26
Reader 1
For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.”
Reader 2:
25 In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
Reader 3
26 For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
PARAGRAPH 8: BASIS OF UNION
The Uniting Church acknowledges that Christ signifies and seals his
continuing presence with his people in the Lord’s Supper or the Holy
Communion, constantly repeated in the life of the Church. In this
sacrament of his broken body and outpoured blood the risen Lord feeds
his baptized people on their way to the final inheritance of the
Kingdom. Thus the people of God, through faith and the gift and power
of the Holy Spirit, have communion with their Saviour, make their
sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, proclaim the Lord’s death, grow
together into Christ, are strengthened for their participation in the
mission of Christ in the world, and rejoice in the foretaste of the
Kingdom which he will bring to consummation.
REFLECTION
Reader 1
Martin Luther called the sacraments visible Words. He was echoing St
Augustine here. The Sacraments are the Word of God – the Gospel, made visible – so that you can touch and taste it. When He instituted Holy Communion at His last supper, He said, this broken bread is my body broken in death for all, and, this wine is my blood shed for all. The bread and wine “speak” the truth of His saving, healing, redeeming death for the world, for us.
Reader 2
Just as the Word of God is actually God Himself present, living, active, powerful, effective (Is 55:11; Jer 23:29), likewise in its visible form in Holy Communion, Jesus Christ Himself is present, active, doing afresh in our lives what His Word is declaring in the bread/body, and wine/blood. In the bread and wine, Jesus Christ is there as flesh and blood, walks among us, caresses our cheek, kisses us, and puts His life within us as we eat and drink.
Reader 3
In Holy Communion, Christ ministers to us in “real time” His abundant grace, in which is contained the fullness of our liberating hope. This shows all of us our profound need of His grace – i.e., our sin and helplessness, and also at once the gift of Christ’s abundant supply of grace. His abundant grace forgives us, and liberates us from all our sin and brokenness, and frees us into a new life of loving, and living for God and His good will - embracing His truth, and loving all people – holding out to them the same grace that we have received. In Holy Communion, we come to Christ empty – as we always are!; and He who has received all fullness from the Father is there, and fills us with Himself to overflowing!
PRAYER
Dear Father, we are always needy. We thank you that our true Lord and
Shepherd, Jesus Christ, risen from the dead forever, promises to be continually with us, and feeds, nourishes and refreshes us, meets all of our need here and now, and brings us into the new heaven and the new earth. There we will taste and enjoy the fullness of the feast of His abundant grace, promised in the rich foretaste of it in Holy Communion.
PRAYERS FOR OTHERS
CONFESSION FROM BASIS OF UNION
Leader:
Within this fellowship of the Uniting Church in Australia, and as part of the Christian church around the world, let us confess Christ in the following words from the Basis of Union.
Reader 1:
Today we ‘confess Jesus as Lord over (our) own life’ and ‘Head over all things, the beginning of a new creation, of a new humanity’.
Leader:
We joyously proclaim that ‘in Jesus Christ "God was reconciling the world to himself" (2 Corinthians 5:19 RSV)’,
Reader 4:
and that ‘in love for the world, God gave the Son to take away the world's sin.’
Leader:
With the gracious help of God our congregations are committed to serve the world for which Christ died, and…await with hope the day of the Lord Jesus Christ
Reader 4:
on which it will be clear that the kingdom of this world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of the Christ, who shall reign for ever and ever.’ Amen.
Nb. The words in quotation marks are direct quotes from the Basis of Union
Prepared by Rev Rod James.