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 Eastern Parkway United Methodist Church

 A warm welcome to each worshiper today. We celebrate you and offer you our friendship and love. We are a congregation of people who seek to grow spiritually, to become more like Christ in His compassion and acceptance of everyone while growing more aware of what it really means to be Christians today.

As a Reconciling Congregation, EPUMC affirms the sacred worth of persons of all sexual orientations and gender identities and welcomes them into full participation in the fellowship, membership, ministries, and leadership of the congregation.

 

 

 

943 Palmer Avenue, Schenectady, NY 12309 / 518-374-4306 epumc943@gmail.com / www.easternparkway.org

Order of Worship

May 28, 2023

Pentecost

10:00 a.m.

*You are invited to rise in body or spirit.

 

Prelude

Greeting and Announcements

Mission Statement:

We are a faith community striving to be, to nurture, and to send forth disciples of Jesus Christ.

Call to Worship:

Sometimes our hearts are shut up like the doors that imprisoned the disciples.
Come, Holy Spirit, with your mighty wind of justice, blow open these doors and release us!
Darkness floods our souls and we wonder if we will ever see the light again.
Come, Holy Spirit, let the flames of fire touch our hearts and our spirits and burn away our fears and frustrations.
We sit, huddled in our own worlds of alienation. When will we ever feel the power of your love again, O God?
Come, Holy Spirit, fill our lives with your love and free us to reach out to others with the good news of your eternal presence. AMEN.

*Hymn Spirit of Gentleness #2120, v 1-2

Prayer of Confession:

Lord of patience and persistence, we live in a broken and shattered world. All around us we see great evidence of hatred and alienation. We cannot help but observe the alienation of your people from each other. We create devices to separate rather than unite; to divide rather than come together in hope. Forgive us for our sins. These sins cause such division and hurt. Remind us today that the disciples, too, lived in a fearful world and that one day you came to them, as they sat huddled in fear, and you empowered them. You gave them hearts of courage and faith. Please bring to us the same hearts that we may serve you well, bringing peace and hope to our world. In the name of Christ, we offer this prayer. AMEN.

Assurance:

Dear ones, fear no more! The power of God’s Holy Spirit has set us free from the prison of doubt and fear! Now is the time to shine with the light of God’s love, given to you by Jesus Christ. AMEN.

Scripture Reading Acts 2: 1-21

The Coming of the Holy Spirit

2 When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

5 Now there were devout Jews from every people under heaven living in Jerusalem. 6 And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. 7 Amazed and astonished, they asked, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? 9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11 Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.” 12 All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” 13 But others sneered and said, “They are filled with new wine.”

Peter Addresses the Crowd

14 But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them, “Fellow Jews[a] and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. 15 Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. 16 No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:

17 

‘In the last days it will be, God declares,
that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
    and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
and your young men shall see visions,
    and your old men shall dream dreams.

18 

Even upon my slaves, both men and women,
    in those days I will pour out my Spirit,
        and they shall prophesy.

19 

And I will show portents in the heaven above
    and signs on the earth below,
        blood, and fire, and smoky mist.

20 

The sun shall be turned to darkness
    and the moon to blood,
        before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day.

21 

Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’

Sermon Hot

John Wesley, who founded what became the Methodist movement back in the 18th Century, wrote, and frequently preached, a sermon that I come back to often in my own ministry, titled “The Almost Christian”. Though Wesley preferred preaching off the cuff, he kept copious notes about all his sermons, and manuscripts, all for the benefit of preachers he was training, so we got to keep his words. This is what he said about an “almost Christian”:

“A…thing implied in the being ‘almost a Christian’ is the having a form of godliness, of that godliness which is prescribed in the gospel of Christ–the having the outside of a real Christian. Accordingly the ‘almost Christian’ does nothing which the gospel forbids. He taketh not the name of God in vain, he blesseth and curseth not, he sweareth not at all…He constantly frequents the house of God…”

He gets personal as he continues:

“I did go thus far for many years…using diligence to eschew all evil, and to have a conscience void of offense…And God is my record, before whom I stand, doing all this in sincerity; having a real design to serve God, a hearty desire to do his will in all things, to please him who had called me to ‘fight the good fight’, and to ‘lay hold of eternal life.’ Yet my own conscience beareth me witness in the Holy Ghost that all this time I was but ‘almost a Christian.’”

Ok, so, a few things. I think it’s really valuable to hear Wesley’s actual words. And for all of you thinking it, I’ll just go ahead and say it out loud–yes, it’s really hard to read through all of that. I have a 600 page book of that at home, and I read it so you don’t have to. Between the old English, the sheer wordiness, the serious tone, and the outdated, patriarchal assumption throughout that we should only use masculine language for both God and the audience we’re addressing–this stuff is incredibly dense. And yet he and his brother Charles launched a religious revival with this stuff, and people showed up in droves to hear it. They stuck it out, partly because this was the 1700s and things were different then, but mostly because people connected with what Wesley was saying. There was a core truth under all those words that they needed to hear.

The same, in fact, can be said for those who were in the crowd around the disciples in this morning’s scripture reading. For those who aren’t as aware of the scriptural details, the book of Acts, which we hear from this morning, starts with the same introduction as the book of Luke, with a dedication to someone that Luke names “Theophilus”. There’s 2 prevailing assumptions about who “Theophilus” was; that he was either a wealthy benefactor of the writings, or this was Luke’s clever way to address those who love God, since that’s literally what Theophilus means in Greek. Either way, since the wording is identical and no one else was writing love letters to Theophilus, we know that Acts is the sequel to the Gospel to Luke, authored by the same person. “Luke 2: Electric Boogaloo” if you will. The narrative picks up with the eleven surviving disciples hanging out in their upper room when suddenly the Holy Spirit decides everyone is being way too polite and quiet, and comes down with a force like fire, driving the disciples into the streets, face to face with the people who have needed their help, the people the disciples have been hiding from. And not only does the Spirit force the disciples to face their neighbors, she compels them to speak the languages their neighbors speak.

The disciples were living in that “almost Christian” territory that Wesley preached about once upon a time. We’ll modify Wesley’s language though, for the sake of the disciples and for us. The disciples were Jewish, and seeking to follow Jesus’ love ethic with integrity and help others do the same. It’s the same thing we’re trying to do–love our neighbors the way Jesus would, and then help them go on and do the same for the next person.

But there’s a pretty big gap between feeling committed to Jesus, at least on paper, and actually carrying out his command to be and make disciples. This gap, and the Spirit constantly pointing it out to Wesley, is what drove him out of the confines of the Church of England, which he had happily served before, and into market square preaching. Wesley saw something disharmonious in himself, and he wanted to fix it, and with his own self the Church and society. And, as he goes on to explain if you read the last three single spaced, tiny font pages of “The Almost Christian”, what closes that gap is love of God, love of neighbor, and faith.

This Sunday is the one our Church calendar designates as Pentecost, this Sunday where we roll out all these boss red sanctuary decorations, but, more importantly, when we remember that time that the disciples were so reluctant to serve their neighbors that the Holy Spirit lit their pants on fire to make them stand up and go outside. The Spirit, in my experience, takes lots of different approaches to help us. She’s the gentleness of a Mother, the strength of Wind, the fluffiness of an Eagle’s Wing, the whisper of a Still Small Voice, or the roar of a Lion. All depends on what will get the job done. In my lived experience, the Spirit’s also got a ton of attitude.

Wesley, prior to his launching of the Methodist movement, felt culpable of a sin many of us white suburban Protestants are quite familiar with. He was going through the motions. He was a good guy, a good citizen, nice, legal, and always pulling his weight as far as his obligations went. But his heart was never completely in the work he did. A Church culture that hinges around duty and obligation starts to look and feel like that in time. We come on Sunday because That’s What’s Done. We serve on our committees because we’re needed, and it’s good to be needed. We raise money at our fundraisers, exchange polite small talk over coffee, fold our hands and bow our heads in prayer, and we’re totally trying, but there’s still something missing. And that’s because we’re serving with all the enthusiasm of Bernie Sanders at the inauguration, with his mittens in his lap. We get sleepy and complacent. 

The Holy Spirit would set these pew cushions on fire to shock us to our feet if she deemed it necessary, but let’s do her, and the local fire department, a favor and not make her go that far to reach us. Wesley already told us how to bridge the gap, the gap from almost Christian to altogether Christian, the gap from room temperature to hot: we need love and faith. I argue that you’ll recognize the love and faith Wesley was talking about within yourself when you focus on something you feel “lit up” about. That’s the Spirit’s fire within you.

This Thursday night, this congregation, along with our Saint John of God friends, will host the Capital Pride Singers for a concert. It will be about hope, love, equality, and making reparations for decades of harm the Christian Church has done to the LGBTQIA community. Those are things I get really, really lit up about, and I hope you feel that way, too. That same weekend, I’m going to Syracuse for our first in-person Annual Conference session since 2019. I’m going to see people I haven’t seen in four years. I’m going to celebrate what the UMC does well, and address the floor to change where we still fall short. Those are things that light me up. Think about what sets you on fire, what compels you to action, what makes you feel like someone just lit a match under you. What gives you that jolt. Follow that energy. It will bring you face to face with people who need your help, and it will make you speak all new words.

Amen.

*Hymn Spirit of the Living God #393

Offering

Offertory

*Doxology #94

*Prayer of dedication           

Pastoral Prayer and Lord’s Prayer

Come, Holy Spirit!

Come, Holy Spirit,

and fill us with your love.

Open our eyes to see the presence of God all around us,

in the stillness of this sacred space,

in the busyness and noise of our city streets,

in the joys and celebrations of our lives,

in the tragedies and struggles that break our hearts.

Come, Holy Spirit,

and comfort those who grieve.

Grant them the peace that only you can bring.

Stir within us a trust in life beyond death,

as we ponder the mysteries of Christ’s resurrection

and the hope we have in new and everlasting life.

Come, Holy Spirit,

and bring wholeness to the sick.

Strengthen those who are weak;

heal the wounded and broken;

give rest to the weary.

Come, Holy Spirit,

and inspire our warring world to seek peace,

to love our enemies,

to put away our weapons,

to remember the price paid for our freedom,

to care for those who have served.

Come, Holy Spirit,

and ignite a fire in our bones,

a passion for justice that cannot be quenched

until all of your children are loved,

until no one is marginalized or oppressed,

until everyone has the opportunity to thrive,

until the world is transformed and renewed.

Come, Holy Spirit,

and revive your church.

Liberate us from complacency and apathy;

inspire us with Christ’s vision for a world reborn;

help us to recognize our gifts for ministry

and to use them in service of others;

transform our hearts and our minds;

fill us with love that overflows;

remind us that there is no greater calling

than to love you with all that we are

and to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Gracious God,

give us a glimpse of your kingdom

emerging around us

and drawing us into the new things

you are doing in the world.

It is for your kingdom that we now pray,

filled with your Spirit,

using the words Jesus taught us.

Our Father…

~ written by John W. Vest, and posted on John Vest. http://johnvest.com/

Our Father, Mother, Creator God, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. Lead us, not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.

*Hymn Pass It On #572

Benediction

Postlude

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Staff

Natalie Bowerman Pastor

Betsy Lehmann Music Director

Joe White Custodian

Cassandra Brown Nursery Attendant