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Thursday, May 8, 2014

Emmaus City Liturgy | Sunday, May 4, 2014 – Covenant & Kingdom V: God Gives More


Emmaus City Church Liturgy Covenant and Kingdom First Sermon Series Part 5 Worcester MA Acts 29 Soma Missional Communities


Emmaus City Liturgy – Celebrating Jesus and Being Part of His Story


For previous Covenant & Kingdom liturgies, click on the links below:


These posts will feature the themes, verses, hymns and songs (audio and lyrics), and prayers we enjoy together each Sabbath gathering. Key notes from the sermons will also be included.

Curious to know more? Want to spend some time with us? Don't hesitate. Contact us and come join us. In the meantime, enjoy the readings and listening to the songs below.


WORSHIP THROUGH PSALM, SONG, AND PRAYER

Psalm 5:1-7, 11-12

1 Give ear to our words, O Lord; 
consider our groaning.
2 Give attention to the sound of our cry,
 our King and our God,
 for to You do we pray.
3 O Lord, in the morning You hear our voice;
 
in the morning we prepare a sacrifice for You and watch.
4 For You are not a God who delights in wickedness;
 evil may not dwell with You.
5 The boastful shall not stand before Your eyes; You hate all evildoers.
6 You destroy those who speak lies;
 the Lord abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.
7 But we, through the abundance of Your steadfast love,
 will enter Your house.
 
We will bow down toward Your holy temple
 in the fear of You. ...
11 … let all who take refuge in You rejoice; let us ever sing for joy,
 and spread Your protection over us,
 that we who love Your name may exult in You.
12 For You bless the righteous, O Lord;
 You cover us with favor as with a shield.

  


You are Alpha and Omega.
We worship You our Lord.
You are worthy to be praised.

We give You all the glory.
We worship You our Lord.
You are worthy to be praised.

Welcome and The Lord’s Prayer
From Jesus in Matthew 6:9-13

Our Father in heaven, may Your name be kept holy.
May Your Kingdom come, may Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. 
Give us today the food we need, and 
Forgive us our sins as we have forgiven those who sin against us.
And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from evil.
(For Yours is the Kingdom, the power and the glory forever. Amen.)


WORSHIP THROUGH HEARING, LISTENING, AND DISCUSSING

 God with Us // Covenant and Kingdom V
  God Gives More
  
Scripture Reading


Notes
After the three terrible episodes of human fallenness in Genesis 3-11:

  1. The falling away from trusting God of Adam and Eve in the Garden – God still wants His family
  2. The sinfully destructive generation that began with Cain and concluded with the flood – God still wants His creation
  3. And the sinfully constructive generation of Babel – God still wants to do something beyond our comprehension

“The promises to Abram renew the vision set out in Genesis 1 and 2. He, like Noah before him, is a second Adam figure. Adam was given the garden of Eden: Abram is promised the land of Canaan. God told Adam to be fruitful and multiply: Abram is promised descendants as numerous as the stars in heaven. God walked with Adam in Eden: Abram was told to walk before God. In this way the advent of Abraham is seen as the answer to the problems set out in Genesis 1-11: through him all the families of the earth will be blessed.” – Gordon Wenham


1) Covenant (Relationship): God gives us more by being willing to be severed so He can be our shield // Genesis 15

"“Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great. ... I am the Lord who brought you out ... ” These are the words that Abram had been longing to hear! He had heard the promise; now he would have a Covenant. In common with most of us, Abram needed material evidence of spiritual truths. In the Bible, Covenants are always confirmed and represented in the external, physical world through the shedding of blood. … picture two leaders – chieftains, representing their respective people – standing at either end of the ‘corridor of blood.’ As they each ‘pass between the pieces’ of the sacrificed animals, the leaders move to take their new place, at the head of a new people. The leaders have exchanged places, and their actions state that ‘your people are now united with my people, and my people are united with yours.’ The two have become one. In Abram’s case, this symbolic ‘becoming one’ is visualized by God traveling from one end of the corridor of blood to the other. God clearly took the initiative in creating the Covenant by asking Abram to provide the animals, and as he laid them out, Abram passed between them himself. For a Covenant to work, both partners had to participate; both had to give up their old identities and start new lives. ... When someone passed between the pieces of a butchered animal, the blood symbolized the surrender of the person’s old life. It was a visualization of death. The bloody passageway could also be argued to represent the birth canal and the beginning of a new life." – Mike Breen

 Do we trust that God will meet His side of the promise to be our shield so that we have nothing to fear?

 Where are you hedging your bets with God? Is it with your identity? Is how you view yourself your shield? Abram must have had identity issues. He had a stunningly beautiful wife. So beautiful that a Pharoah and a king took her into their harems upon seeing her. When she was in her 70s and 80s. And his name. Abram means ‘exalted father.’ What is it like to have a beautiful wife and have your name mean ‘exalted father’ and not have any children? What do you think Abram thought he was entitled to with all of the above? How do you think he felt when life didn’t fall into place? And then God comes calling. And Abram was ready to move based on that promise to give him a family. To bless all nations. Even though the last unified thing he had heard of with humanity was the failed tower project at Babel.

Is it with your money? Is money your shield? Abram showed his cards when he gave a tenth of all he had to Melchizedek, the king of Salem in Chapter 14. See, we have even more grace than Abram did in that our King of righteousness and peace doesn’t just meet us on the battlefield during our trials, He goes with us wherever we go. Do you trust Him with not only a tenth of all you have, but with everything you have?

Are you hedging your bets with your time? Is control your shield? Do you ask God how to order your days or are you too busy organizing and scheduling to step back, consider His promises again, and then ask the One who has every right to order your days, “Spirit of God, lead me where You want me today. Even if it’s staying in one place and seeing a vision of what’s next like Abram, help me to be content that You are good and You fulfill all my days”?


2) Kingdom (Responsibility): God give us more giving us His mark so that we know we are His people // Genesis 17:1-14

“In Hebrew, to make a covenant was actually ‘to cut a covenant’ (karat berith). Typically an animal was cut off from life as a ritual sign of the covenant relationship being consecrated and of the judgment deserved for violation of the covenant. In circumcision, the foreskin was cut off to save the whole person from being cut off in God’s judgment. Consequently, the family produced from that individual was also the product of this consecration and was identified with the covenant sign. ... Moses later charged Israel with duplicity, as they wanted to have the benefits of the covenant even while they were resistant to the God of the covenant. He spoke of an inner circumcision of the heart (Deuteronomy 10:16; 30:6). Jeremiah, too, spoke of this spiritual circumcision as a vital ingredient of the new covenant (Jeremiah 31:33; cf. 4:4)." – Willem VanGemeren

“Circumcision was a personal and physical reminder of the Covenant that God made with his people. Abraham and all his male descendants would bear a mark on their bodies to confirm that their old lives were gone (literally ‘rolled away’) and new lives had begun. Many Covenant-making cultures throughout history and around the world have used scars as a way to ratify agreements. We have some knowledge of the ‘blood brother’ rituals of the Native American peoples and the Roman legionnaires. The physical reminder of a scar had an important role in underlining the significance of a relationship. In this case, the scar of circumcision makes a clear statement that the spiritual and physical are interlinked, not separate. ... Interestingly, scars continue as important signs of the New Covenant in Jesus. Remember, Covenant is a relationship of ‘oneness’ and reciprocation. God asked Abraham to bear a scar in order to confirm their Covenant – but in the New Covenant, God himself chose to carry scars. The resurrected body of Jesus bears scars to this day.” – Mike Breen

Do we see that God cares about the spiritual and the physical? Are we ready to wear His identity in baptism as His family and go out into the world with His kingdom responsibilities?

The mark we carry is not only outward, but inward. In fact, the circumcision of the heart is showcased by how we follow this God into acts that require our blood, sweat, and tears for the sake of His glory being showcased above our own. And in our strivings and failings, His grace is still sufficient in loving us as His own and sharing the power of Jesus's death and resurrection with us and others. 

God continues to peel back the layers of our old identity, and He declares to us again and again, "new creation!" We can follow Him and obey Him, approaching His throne of grace with confidence.


3) Covenant and Kingdom: God gives us more by continuing in relationship with us and providing for us what He requires // Genesis 22

"Up to this point, God’s Covenant with Abraham had been largely about confirming identity: an identity that comes from giving up an old life and starting a new one in union with God. But there is another vital component to a Covenant relationship, which is obedience. And this would be revealed as Abraham suffered the ultimate test. ... In our walk with God, our capacity for perseverance in difficulties, and the ability to obey will be determined by how secure we feel in our relationship with him. If we begin with our new identity, given to us in the Covenant we share with God, then we will have security; security will lead to confidence, and confidence to courage.” – Mike Breen

"The Lord called on Abraham to journey to Moriah to sacrifice his son. The choice of Mount Moriah as the place of Isaac’s sacrifice providentially anticipates the location of the temple (2 Chronicles 3:1) and the area of Jesus’ crucifixion. The mountain of the Lord would later on evoke the image of Zion, the special place of God’s dwelling (Psalm 24:3; Isaiah 2:3). The journey toward his son’s death took Abraham three days, and on the third day he experienced the reversal from death to life. He believed that the Lord would provide (Genesis 22:8) through somehow bringing Isaac back to life (Hebrews 11:9). ... The walk of faith involves looking our difficult circumstances in the face and, with the promises of God, defying the discouragements, disappointments, and frustrations that tempt us to abandon hope in God. Nothing is too hard for God. Indeed, He has already done the hardest thing, in becoming one of us and dying for us (Romans 5:9-10; 8:32); shall He fail to care for us in a thousand lesser ways?" – Willem VanGemeren

We do not have a detailed record of the journey home. But as Abraham walked back with Isaac, in relation to the responsibilities of a Covenant, what do you think his thoughts were? 

He had given God his son and God had given Isaac back in return. But did he wonder God Himself, his Covenant partner, would somehow do something as powerful and sacrificial as offering a one and only son to Abraham and his descendants that would be as numerous as the stars?

 "There is a true and better Adam who passed the test in the garden, whose obedience is ascribed to us. ... 
There is a true and better Abel, though innocently slain, has blood that cries out not for our condemnation, but for our acquittal. ...
There is a true and better Abraham who answered the call of God to leave all the comfortable and familiar and go out into the void to create a new people of God. ... 
There is a true and better Isaac, son of laughter, of grace, who was not just offered up by His Father on the mount, but was truly sacrificed for us all. ... " – Tim Keller

WORSHIP THROUGH COMMUNION AND SONGS 

In Genesis 14, Abram meets with Melchizedek, king of Salem. Melchizedek offered Abram a meal – always a sign of friendship in the world – of bread and wine. Then, following the convention of the day in combining priesthood and Kingship, Melchizedek blessed Abram. Abram responded by giving one tenth of his property to Melchizedek. 

In Hebrews 7:1-4, 27, the author writes, “For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him, and to him Abraham apportioned a tenth part of everything. He is first, by translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then he is also king of Salem, that is, king of peace. He is without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God he continues a priest forever. ... He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for His own sins and then for those of the people, since He did this once for all when He offered up Himself." 

Jesus redeems us with His own blood. He gives us everything. He gives us His life. 




Nothing But the Blood
By Austin Stone (original by Robert Lowry)
1876 A.D. 



What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Oh! precious is the flow
That makes me white as snow;
No other fount I know,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Nothing can for sin atone,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
Naught of good that I have done,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

This is all my hope and peace,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
This is all my righteousness,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.


Nothing I Hold Onto
 By Will Reagan and United Pursuit
2011 A.D.


I lean not on my own understanding,
My life is in the hands of the Maker of heaven.

I give it all to You, God,
Trusting that You'll make something beautiful out of me.

I will climb this mountain
With my hands wide open.
There is nothing I hold on to!



Lord, You Are Good

By Israel Houghton and New Breed
2001 A.D.


Lord, You are Good

And Your mercy endureth forever.

People from every nation and tongue

From generation to generation.


We worship You!

Hallelujah, Hallelujah!
We worship You for who You are.


You are good all the time,

All the time, You are good.


WORSHIP THROUGH SENDING

 2008 A.D.

While justly angry, 
God did not turn away
 from a world bent on destruction
 but turned to face it in love.
With patience and tender care
 the Lord set out
 on the long road of redemption 
to reclaim the lost as His people
 and the world as His kingdom. Although Adam and Eve were expelled 
from the garden
 and their days burdened 
by the weight of sin,
 the Lord held on to them in love
 and promised to crush
 the evil forces 
they had unleashed. When evil filled the earth,
 God judged it with a flood 
but rescued Noah and his family
 and animals of every kind.
 He covenanted with all creatures 
that seasons will continue
 and that such destruction
 will not come again
 until the last day
 when the Lord returns 
to make all things new. The Lord promised to be God
 to Abraham, Sarah, and their children,
 calling them to walk faithfully before Him 
and blessing the nations through them.
Prayer of Mission

Benediction 

Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.
Hebrews 13:20-21
 
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