Week beginning August 1st

 If you wish to share in communion during this service, you will need a piece of bread or biscuit and a drink of juice or wine.

Song: Father we love you

Father, We Love You (Glorify Your Name - 3vv) [with lyrics for congregations] - YouTube

Prayer of praise.

Lord, our Lord,  how majestic is your name in all the earth!

This earth, full of your glory, praises your name through unspoken words of beauty and peace,

This earth, full of your glory, reveals your love through hand of stranger and gift of grace.
This earth, full of your glory, praises your provision through living water and bread to eat,
This earth, full of your glory, reveals your Word through daily blessings and breath of life.
This earth, full of your glory, praises your name.

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Old testament Bible reading

Exodus chapter 16: verses 1 - 34

Song: Guide me o thou great Jehovah

'Guide Me, Oh Thou Great Jehovah'. - YouTube

John’s gospel, chapter 6; verses 25- 51 Jesus the Bread of Life

Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah - Lyrics - YouTube

Song: Jesus the Lord said I am the bread

Jesus the Lord said, I am the bread - YouTube

Our daily bread August 16^th 2018

Riding along with my husband on some errands, I scrolled through emails on my phone and was surprised at an incoming advertisement for a local doughnut shop, a shop we had just passed on the right side of the street. Suddenly my stomach growled with hunger. I marvelled at how technology allows vendors to woo us into their establishments.

As I clicked off my email, I mused over God’s constant yearning to draw me closer. He always knows where I am and longs to influence my choices. I wondered, Does my heart growl in desire for Him the way my stomach did over the idea of a doughnut?

In John 6, following the miraculous feeding of the five thousand, the disciples eagerly ask Jesus to always give them “the bread that . gives life to the world” (vv. 33–34). Jesus responds in verse 35, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” How amazing that a relationship with Jesus can provide constant nourishment in our everyday lives!

The doughnut shop’s advertisement targeted my body’s craving, but God’s continuous knowledge of my heart’s condition invites me to recognize my ongoing need for Him and to receive the sustenance only He can provide.

Prayer: , confession

we confess almighty God that we have longed too much for the comforts of this world. We have loved the gifts more than the giver. In your mercy, help us to see that all the things we pine for are shadows, but you are substance; that they are quicksands, but you are mountain; that they are shifting, but you are anchor. We plead your forgiveness on the merits of Jesus Christ.

Accept his worthiness for our unworthiness, his sinlessness for our transgressions, his fullness for our emptiness, his glory for our shame, his righteousness for our dead works, his death for our life. Remind us of our need for Your son’s daily bread of presence in our lives . We pray in Jesus’s name. Amen.

Let us say together the Lords prayer. #

Song: O God of Bethel ,by whose hand.

O God of Bethel! By whose hand • Philip Doddridge (1736) - YouTube

Holy Communion

 Merciful Lord Jesus We come here to remember the last supper, when you broke the bread and shared the cup we think of your body broken for us, as we break the bread

we think of you wounds, your blood shed for us the pain you bore to take away our sins. There is no goodness in us .  We are not even worthy  to eat the crumbs from under your table, yet   you are always rich in mercy and For it is On your loving mercy that we depend. Gracious Lord, enable us by faith  through the power of your spirit to truly love you.   and bring honour to your name . Amen

On the night before He died Jesus took the bread, saying

"This is my body - broken for you"
On the night before He died Jesus took the cup, saying
"This is my blood - it flows for you"For the forgiveness for your sin
Now each and every time You share the bread and wine
Remember, Jesus said I died for you…...pause Remember, I died for you.

by Dave Godfrey abridged by SYoudan

Bread and Wine are eaten and drunk

Thank you Lord that you have fed us with this sacrament united us with Christ and given us a fore taste of the heavenly banquet prepared for all man kind Amen

Man discovered fire half a million years ago and cereals were probably roasted over open fires at least 100,000 years ago. Cereals were first cultivated in the Middle East 10,000 years ago. Wheat and rice were probably the most widespread and still provide 40% of the world's food. Wheat is now the most widely used of all. About 8000 BC grain was crushed by hand with pestle and mortar. In Egypt a simple grinding stone (quern) was developed. All bread was unleavened, there were no raising agents and bread was made from a mixed variety of grains from around 5000 - 3700 BC Egypt developed grain production along the fertile banks of the Nile. Tougher wheat varieties were developed and the baking of bread became a skill in Egypt along with brewing beer.

In this warm climate wild yeasts were attracted to multi-grain flour mixtures and bakers experimented with leavened doughs. The Egyptians invented the closed oven and bread assumed great significance. Homage was paid to Osiris, the god of grain, and bread was used instead of money; the workers who built the pyramids were paid in bread.

500 AD Saxons and Danes settled in Britain and introduced rye which was well suited to cold northern climates. Dark rye bread became a staple which lasted to the Middle Ages.

MEDIEVAL TIMES (1066 – 1666) The growth of towns and cities throughout the Middle Ages saw a steady increase in trade and bakers began to set up in business. Bakers’ guilds were introduced to protect the interests of members and to regulate controls governing the price and weight of bread. Some meals would be served on in or on a trencher * this was stale bread and not a plate or bowl to the common classes a trencher this was not for eating once you finished had trencher was given to the dogs or very poor would be given it.

By Tudor times, Britain was enjoying increased prosperity and bread had become a real status symbol: the nobility ate small, fine white loaves called manchets; merchants and tradesmen ate wheaten cobs while the poor had to be satisfied with bran loaves. .

To day bread is still a staple and is eaten most days.

We even use the phrase “breaking bread together” to indicate the sharing of a meal with someone. Bread also plays an integral part of the Jewish Passover meal. The Jews were to eat unleavened bread during the Passover feast and then for seven days following as a celebration of the exodus from Egypt. Finally, when the Jews were wandering in the desert for 40 years, God rained down “bread from heaven” to sustain the nation as we read earlier in Exodus 16:4

In John 6 when Jesus used the term “bread of life.” He was trying to get away from the crowds to no avail. He had crossed the Sea of Galilee, and the crowd followed Him. After some time, Jesus inquires of Philip how they’re going to feed the crowd. Philip’s answer displays his “little faith” when he says they don’t have enough money to give each of them the smallest morsel of food. Finally, Andrew brings to Jesus a boy who had five small loaves of bread and two fish. With that amount, Jesus miraculously fed the throng with lots of food to spare. Afterward, Jesus and His disciples cross back to the other side of Galilee. When the crowd sees that Jesus has left, they follow Him again. Jesus takes this moment to teach them a lesson. He accuses the crowd of ignoring His miraculous signs and only following Him for the “free meal.” Jesus tells them in ,John 6:27 “Do not labour for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.” In other words, they were so enthralled with the food, they were missing out on the fact that their Messiah had come. So the Jews ask Jesus for a sign that He was sent from God (as if the miraculous feeding and the walking across the water weren’t enough). They tell Jesus that God gave them manna during the desert wandering. Jesus responds by telling them that they need to ask for the true bread from heaven that gives life. When they ask Jesus for this bread, Jesus startles them by saying, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.”
This is a phenomenal statement! First, by equating Himself with bread, Jesus is saying he is essential for life. Second, the life Jesus is referring to is not physical life, but eternal life. Jesus is trying to get the Jews’ thinking off of the physical realm and into the spiritual realm. He is contrasting what He brings as their Messiah with the bread He miraculously created the day before. - That was physical bread that perishes.

He is spiritual bread that brings eternal life.

Now my next point is very important, Jesus is making another claim to deity. This statement is the first of the “I AM” statements in John’s Gospel. The phrase “I AM” is the covenant name of God revealed to Moses at the burning bush (Exodus 3:14).

The phrase speaks of self-sufficient existence , which is an attribute only God possesses.

It is also a phrase the Jews who were listening would have automatically understood as a claim to deity.
This is an invitation for those listening to place their faith in Jesus as the Messiah and Son of God. This request to come is found throughout John’s Gospel. Coming to Jesus involves making a choice to forsake the world and follow Him. Believing in Jesus means placing our faith in Him that He is who He says He is, that He will do what He says He will do, and that He is the only one who can.
In Matthew 5:6, Jesus says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” When Jesus says those who come to Him will never hunger and those who believe in Him will never thirst, He is saying He will satisfy our hunger and thirst to be made righteous in the sight of God.
If there is anything the history of human religion tells us, it is that people seek to earn their way to heaven. This is such a basic human desire because God created us with eternity in mind. The Bible says God has placed [the desire for] eternity in our hearts (Ecclesiastes 3:11). The Bible also tells us Romans 3:23 that there is nothing we can do to earn our way to heaven because we’ve all sinned and the only thing our sin earns us is death (Romans 6:23). There is no one who is righteous in himself (Romans 3:10).

Our dilemma is we have a desire we cannot fulfil -no matter what we do. That is where Jesus comes in. He, and He alone, can fulfil that desire in our hearts for righteousness 

Corinthians 5:21). When Christ died on the cross, He took the sins of mankind upon Himself and made atonement for them. When we place our faith in Him, our sins are imputed to Jesus, and His righteousness is imputed to us. Jesus satisfies our hunger and thirst for righteousness. Jesus doesn’t want to be an optional commodity in our diets; He desires to be the essential staple in our lives, our “necessary” food. As first-century Jews could never imagine life without physical bread, may we never attempt to live without Jesus, our spiritual bread

The prayer Jesus taught us says Give us this day our daily bread. For He is our Bread of eternal Life. Amen

Only spiritual bread satisfies the hunger of the soul.

Song: Allelujah! Sing to Jesus

Alleluia, Sing to Jesus (Tune: Hyfrydol - 3vv) [with lyrics for congregations] - YouTube

Benediction

May the love of God enfold you.

Jesus, the bread of life fill you.

The Spirit of God fill you with peace.

This day and always.

By Susannah Youdan