Sunday Holy Communion
Before the service begins an informal welcome is given. Please join in with the words in bold type. The hymn numbers are on the boards at the front of church and on the pew sheet. The parts in italics are instructions or an indication of what is happening. You will find throughout the service there are notes to stand, sit or kneel. These are invitations not commands, so please do whatever helps you to worship.
The Gathering
Our worship may begin with the choir singing an introit or the music group may play a piece of music
Processional Hymn 707: Lift high the cross
All stand to sing the hymn as the organ music begins and the servers and ministers process
Lift high the cross, the love of Christ proclaim
till all the world adore his sacred name.
Come, let us follow where our Captain trod,
our King victorious, Christ the Son of God:
Led on their way by this triumphant sign,
he hosts of God in conquering ranks combine:
Each new-born soldier of the Crucified
bears on his brow the seal of him who died:
This is the sign which Satan's legions fear
and angels veil their faces to revere:
Saved by the cross whereon their Lord was slain,
earth's fallen children their lost home regain:
From north and south, from east and west they raise
in growing unison their song of praise:
O Lord, once lifted on the glorious tree,
as thou hast promised, draw us unto thee:
Let every race and every language tell
of him who saves our souls from death and hell:
From farthest regions let them homage bring,
and on his cross adore their Saviour King:
Set up thy throne, that earth's despair may cease
beneath the shadow of its healing peace:
For thy blest cross which doth for all atone
creation's praises rise before thy throne:
The Greeting
Grace, mercy and peace from God our Father.
and the Lord Jesus Christ be with you
and also with you.
The theme of the service is introduced. We are invited to sit or kneel.
Prayer of Preparation
Almighty God, to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden: cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love you, and worthily magnify your holy name; through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Confession
Our Lord Jesus Christ said:
The first commandment is this:
‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is the only Lord. You shall love the Lord our God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’
The second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’
There is no other commandment greater than these. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
Amen. Lord, have mercy.
Compassion and forgiveness belong to the Lord our God,
though we have rebelled against him.
Let us then renounce our wilfulness
and ask his mercy by confessing our sins
in penitence and faith.
Father eternal, giver of light and grace,
we have sinned against you
and against our neighbour,
in what we have thought,
in what we have said and done,
through ignorance, through weakness,
through our own deliberate fault.
We have wounded your love,
and marred your image in us.
We are sorry and ashamed,
and repent of all our sins.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
who died for us, forgive us all that is past;
and lead us out from darkness
to walk as children of light.
Amen.
May the Father of all mercies
cleanse us from all our sins and restore us
in his image to the praise and glory of his name,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen
The Collect
The priest introduces a period of silent prayer before the Collect for the day is said and all respond
Amen.
The Liturgy of the Word
The first reading
We sit to listen to the first reading appointed for the day taken from the Bible, from the Old Testament or Hebrew Scriptures as it is also known. At the end of the reading we respond:
Here ends the reading
Thanks be to God
Ezekiel 37.1-14
37 The hand of the Lord came upon me, and he brought me out by the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2 He led me all round them; there were very many lying in the valley, and they were very dry. 3 He said to me, ‘Mortal, can these bones live?’ I answered, ‘O Lord God, you know.’ 4 Then he said to me, ‘Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. 5 Thus says the Lord God to these bones: I will cause breath[a] to enter you, and you shall live. 6 I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath[b] in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the Lord.’
7 So I prophesied as I had been commanded; and as I prophesied, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. 8 I looked, and there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them; but there was no breath in them. 9 Then he said to me, ‘Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath:[c] Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath,[d] and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.’ 10 I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude.
11 Then he said to me, ‘Mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.” 12 Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord God: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. 13 And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. 14 I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken and will act, says the Lord.’
Here ends the reading
Thanks be to God
The Psalm: 130
The Psalms are the song book of the ancient Israelites and are recited as part of both Jewish and Christian worship. There are Psalms of joy, of praise and of lament and Psalms that recount the story of God’s saving work. We may say the Psalm, listen to the choir sing the verses and join in with the refrain or sometimes the music group may sing a contemporary setting of the Psalm.
The second reading
The second reading comes from the New Testament, this part of the Bible is mostly made up of letters sent to early Christians communities.. At the end we respond:
Here ends the reading
Thanks be to God
Romans 8.6-11
6 To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law—indeed it cannot, 8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
9 But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10 But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.
Here ends the reading
Thanks be to God
Gospel Reading
We stand and sing together as the Gospel book is carried to the middle of the church and the congregation turn to face the reader. The choir or music group sing a verse and then we repeat the chorus Praise to you…
Hear the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to John
Glory to you, O Lord
John 11.1-45
11 Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother Lazarus was ill. 3 So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, ‘Lord, he whom you love is ill.’ 4 But when Jesus heard it, he said, ‘This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.’ 5 Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, 6 after having heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.
7 Then after this he said to the disciples, ‘Let us go to Judea again.’ 8 The disciples said to him, ‘Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?’ 9 Jesus answered, ‘Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world. 10 But those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not in them.’ 11 After saying this, he told them, ‘Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.’ 12 The disciples said to him, ‘Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.’ 13 Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep. 14 Then Jesus told them plainly, ‘Lazarus is dead. 15 For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.’ 16 Thomas, who was called the Twin, said to his fellow-disciples, ‘Let us also go, that we may die with him.’
17 When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. 18 Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, 19 and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. 20 When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. 21 Martha said to Jesus, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22 But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.’ 23 Jesus said to her, ‘Your brother will rise again.’ 24 Martha said to him, ‘I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.’ 25 Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?’ 27 She said to him, ‘Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.’
28 When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, ‘The Teacher is here and is calling for you.’ 29 And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him. 30 Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31 The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. 32 When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.’ 33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 34 He said, ‘Where have you laid him?’ They said to him, ‘Lord, come and see.’ 35 Jesus began to weep. 36 So the Jews said, ‘See how he loved him!’ 37 But some of them said, ‘Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?’
38 Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39 Jesus said, ‘Take away the stone.’ Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, ‘Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead for four days.’ 40 Jesus said to her, ‘Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?’ 41 So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upwards and said, ‘Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.’ 43 When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come out!’ 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, ‘Unbind him, and let him go.’
45 Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.
At the end
This is the Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, O Christ.
We sing Praise to You, O Christ, Our Saviour as the gospel is carried back.
Sermon
After the sermon there is a brief pause for reflection. Sometimes the choir or music group may sing or play a piece of music and then we all stand to affirm our faith. During this penitential season of Lent we use words adapted from the statement of Inclusive Church, a network to which All Saints belongs.
Affirmation of Faith
We believe in an inclusive church:
A church which celebrates and affirms
every person and does not discriminate.
We believe no –one should be shut out from God’s church
on grounds of disability, economic power, ethnicity,
gender, gender identity, learning disability,
mental health, neurodiversity or sexuality.
We believe in a church which welcomes and serves all people in the name of Jesus Christ;
A church which is scripturally faithful;
which seeks to proclaim the Gospel afresh for each generation;
A church which, in the power of the Holy Spirit,
allows all people to grasp how wide and long and high and deep
is the love of Jesus Christ.
Prayers of Intercession
All sit or kneel for the prayers, which are led by a member of the congregation. One of the following responses may be used or another response may be given.
Lord in your mercy
hear our prayer.
or
Lord hear us
Lord graciously hear us
The prayers conclude with these words:
Merciful Father,
accept these prayers
for the sake of your Son,
our Saviour Jesus Christ.
Amen.
The Liturgy of the Sacrament
We stand
The Peace
Since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, who has given us access to his grace.
The peace of the Lord be always with you
and also with you.
Let us offer one another a sign of peace.
Members of the congregation turn to one another and greet their neighbours by saying ‘peace be with you’ and making a sign of peace.
Offertory Hymn 145: It is a thing most wonderful
During this hymn bread and wine are brought forward and the altar-table is prepared. The offertory plate is presented, symbolic of both the financial gifts of the people and the gifts of time and talent that are offered throughout the week, the president gives thanks for these while the deacon or lay assistant is laying up the altar-table.
It is a thing most wonderful,
almost too wonderful to be,
that God's own Son should come from heaven,
and die to save a child like me.
And yet I know that it is true:
he chose a poor and humble lot,
and wept and toiled and mourned and died
for love of those who loved him not.
I cannot tell how he could love
a child so weak and full of sin;
his love must be most wonderful,
if he could die my love to win.
I sometimes think about the cross,
and shut my eyes, and try to see
the cruel nails and crown of thorns,
and Jesus crucified for me.
But even could I see him die,
I could but see a little part
of that great love which, like a fire,
is always burning in his heart.
It is most wonderful to know
his love for me so free and sure;
but 'tis more wonderful to see
my love for him so faint and poor.
And yet I want to love thee, Lord;
O light the flame within my heart,
and I will love thee more and more,
until I see thee as thou art.
Taking of the Bread and Wine
God of our journey, as we walk with you on your path of obedience,
sustain us on our way and lead us to your glory;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
The president symbolically washes their hands
The Eucharistic Prayer
The Lord be with you
and also with you.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give thanks and praise.
The president praises God for His mighty acts and all respond
The Last Supper is recalled and then this acclamation is used:
Jesus Christ is Lord:
Lord, by your cross and resurrection you have set us free.
You are the Saviour of the world.
The prayer continues leading into the final words of praise
. . . for ever and ever.
Amen.
OR
We worship you, Father almighty, in songs of everlasting praise:
Blessing and honour and glory and power
be yours for ever and ever. Amen
We kneel or sit and observe a period of silence
The Lord’s Prayer
We say this prayer together, each in whichever language is closest to our hearts. It may be led by a member of the congregation using one of the global languages that make up our intercultural community.
As our Saviour taught us, so we pray:
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.
Lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power,
and the glory are yours
now and for ever.
Amen.
Notre Pere…
Vater Unser…
Onze Vader…
Padre Nuestro…
Ojcze Nasz…
Baba Yetu…
E to matou Matua…
Ein Tad...
Breaking of the Bread
Every time we eat this bread and drink this cup,
we proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
While the remaining consecrated bread is broken and the communion assistants come to the front the choir or music group sing a setting of the ancient prayer known as the Agnus Dei or Lamb of God. It may be sung in English or Latin.
Giving of Communion
Draw near with faith.
Receive the body of our Lord Jesus Christ
which he gave for you,
and his blood which he shed for you.
Eat and drink
in remembrance that he died for you,
and feed on him in your hearts
by faith with thanksgiving.
Most merciful Lord,
your love compels us to come in.
Our hands were unclean,
our hearts were unprepared;
we were not fit
even to eat the crumbs from under your table.
But you, Lord, are the God of our salvation,
and share your bread with sinners.
So cleanse and feed us
with the precious body and blood of your Son,
that he may live in us and we in him;
and that we, with the whole company of Christ,
may sit and eat in your kingdom.
Amen.
Please come forward when directed by the stewards. Christians of any church tradition are welcome to receive the bread and wine including children who have been admitted to communion, here or at another church. Alternatively you can come forward for a prayer of blessing, please indicate if this is your wish by crossing your arms across your chest.
As we share communion the choir or music group may sing an anthem or song and sometimes instrumental music will be played. We all join in singing the communion hymn that follows, the number for which can be found on the notice sheet and on the hymn board at the front of church.
Communion Anthem: O Saviour of the world - Goss
Communion Hymn 144: How deep the Father's love
How deep the Father’s love for us,
how vast beyond all measure,
that he should give his only Son
to make a wretch his treasure.
How great the pain of searing loss;
the Father turns his face away,
as wounds which mar the chosen One
bring many souls to glory.
Behold the man upon a cross,
my sin upon his shoulders;
ashamed, I hear my mocking voice
call out among the scoffers.
It was my sin that held him there,
until it was accomplished;
his dying breath has brought me life —
I know that ‘it is finished.’
I will not boast in anything,
no gifts, no power, no wisdom;
but I will boast in Jesus Christ,
his death and resurrection.
Why should I gain from his reward?
I cannot give an answer;
but this I know with all my heart,
his wounds have paid my ransom.
Prayer after Communion
A brief silence is kept. The president says the post communion prayer for the day before we say the following prayer together:
We thank you Lord,
that you have fed us in this sacrament,
united us with Christ,
and given us a foretaste of the heavenly banquet
prepared for all peoples.
Amen.
The Dismissal
Notices including publishing of the banns of marriage.
The Blessing
We stand for the president to give the blessing
Christ give you grace to grow in holiness,
to deny yourselves, take up your cross, and follow him;
and the blessing of God almighty,
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
be among you, and remain with you always.
Amen.
Recessional Hymn 612: Christ triumphant ever reigning
As we sing our final hymn the servers and ministers process. Children are welcome to join the procession. Please turn to face the ministers for the dismissal.
Christ triumphant, ever reigning,
Saviour, Master, King!
Lord of heaven, our lives sustaining,
hear us as we sing:
Yours the glory and the crown,
the high renown, the eternal name.
Word incarnate, truth revealing,
Son of Man on earth!
power and majesty concealing
by your humble birth:
Suffering servant, scorned, ill-treated,
victim crucified!
death is through the cross defeated,
sinners justified:
Priestly king, enthroned for ever
high in heaven above!
sin and death and hell shall never
stifle hymns of love:
So, our hearts and voices raising
through the ages long,
ceaselessly upon you gazing,
this shall be our song:
Go in peace to love and serve the Lord
In the name of Christ. Amen.