Contrasting images, big point: the mustard seed is so tiny, but small is all we need to plant the reign—the kin-dom— of God, which grows beyond our comprehension.

Join us for outdoor worship (weather permitting), and the Lord’s Supper, all in the Liberty Avenue Parking Lot at Union Presbyterian Church. Worship video is available online by 1:00 PM.

You are invited!

10th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Union Presbyterian Church

June 6, 2021

God’s Story and Our Story: Rooted and Grounded in Love

Sharing the Light of Christ, Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

Liturgist: Doug Moore Preacher: Rev. Pat Raube

Prelude Heather Ingraham, Piano

Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus – Arr. David Hamilton

I Love to Tell the Story – Arr. Bill Wolaver

Announcements Doug Moore

Prelude Heather Ingraham, Piano

“I Know Whom I Have Believed,” Lloyd Larson

Reprinted with permission under ONE LICENSE.  

Welcome Rev. Pat Raube

Call to Worship Doug Moore

We are here at the invitation of God:

We are all God’s children.

We are held in the love of God:

How can we comprehend its vastness?

We are here in the presence of God:

Let blessings flow; let God’s love rain down.

Hymn #444 W & R

“Rain Down,” Jaime Cortez

Reprinted with permission under ONE LICENSE.  

Refrain:

Rain down, rain down, rain down your love on your people.

Rain down, rain down, rain down your love, God of life.

Faithful and true is the word of our God.

All of God’s works are so worthy of trust.

God’s mercy falls on the just and the right;

Full of God’s love is the earth.

Refrain

We who revere and find hope in our God

Live in the kindness and joy of God’s wing.

God will protect us from darkness and death;

God will not leave us to starve.

Refrain

God of creation, we long for your truth;

You are the water of life for our thirst.

Grant that your love and your peace touch our hearts,

All of our hope lies in you.

Refrain

Call to New Life

God is here: ready to welcome, console, strengthen and renew us. Let us offer our hearts and lives for God’s healing.

Prayer for Wholeness and Peace

God of tender heart; God of lovingkindness:

You are our true home, but we wander far.

You are our guiding light, but we turn towards the shadows.

You are our tower of strength, but we try to go it alone.

Plant in us, O God, the seeds of constancy and trust,

that we might delight in your will, and walk hand in hand with you.

We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

~silent prayer~

Assurance of God’s Grace

The rich glory of God is beyond our imagining.

Even now, we are being strengthened in your inner being

through power of the Spirit.

We are being rooted and grounded in the love of God. 

Thanks be to God!

Sharing of the Peace

God’s healing opens in each of us an expansiveness,

a space for welcome of our siblings in faith.

By God’s grace, we are able to be gracious with one another.

Let us offer one another a sign of peace.

Scripture Mark 4:26-34  Doug Moore

[Jesus] also said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.”

He also said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.

With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.

Children’s Message Rev. Pat Raube

Dear God,

Thank you for seeds that grow.

Thank you, that you can show us your kingdom

in ordinary things.

Let our hearts be good soil,

and help us to love one another.

We pray in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

“Hymn of Promise,” Natalie Sleeth

Reprinted with permission under ONE LICENSE.  

Scripture Eph. 3:14-21  Rev. Pat Raube

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Response Holy Wisdom, Holy Word:

Thanks be to God!

Meditation Rev. Pat Raube

Anthem

“Lord, Let My Heart Be Good Soil,” Handt Hanson, Jeff Jeffries

Reprinted with permission under ONE LICENSE.  

In person

Kathy Bartlette, voice
Pat Raube, guitar
Heather Ingraham, keyboard

Lord, let my heart be good soil, open to the seed of your Word.
Lord, let my heart be good soil, where love can grow and peace is understood.
When my heart is hard, break the stone away.
When my heart is cold, warm it with the day.
When my heart is lost, lead me on your way.
Lord, let my heart, Lord, let my heart, Lord, let my heart be good soil.

Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper/ Prayers of the People

The Invitation

The Great Thanksgiving

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 our thanks and praise.

…Archangels sound their trumpets,

angels teach us their song,

saints pull us into your presence,

and this is our song:

Holy, holy, holy God,

our life, our mercy, and our might.

Heaven and earth are full of your glory.

Save us, we pray, you beyond all.

Blest is the One who comes in your name.

Save us, we pray, you beyond all.

The Words of Institution

… Your grace our path to rebirth.

And so we cry Mercy: Mercy!

And so we cry, Glory: Glory!

And so we cry, Blessing: Blessing!

Prayers of the People

Invocation of the Spirit

… And so we cry, Come, Holy Spirit:

Come Holy Spirit!

And so the church shouts, Come, Holy Spirit:

Come Holy Spirit!

And so the earth pleads, Come, Holy Spirit:

Come Holy Spirit!

And so we cry, Amen: Amen!

We pray in the name of Jesus Christ, praying as he taught us,

debtors, trespassers, and sinners together:

The Lord’s Prayer

Our Father, 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 debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.

The Communion

Jesus said, blest are those

who hunger and thirst for righteousness,

for they will be filled.

The Table is ready: the meal is for you.

Communion Meditation

“Break Thou the Bread of Life,” Larry Shackley

Reprinted with permission under ONE LICENSE.  

Prayer After Communion

Holy and eternal God, Holy One, Holy Three:

You are as far away as the distant stars,

and as close as our breath.

You meet us at this table,

and we discover our hearts burning within us.

Go with us as we leave this place,

so that your light and your life

may shine brightly for all to see. Amen.

Hymn #706 W & R

“I Come With Joy,” Brian Wren, Austin C. Lovelace

Reprinted with permission under ONE LICENSE.  

I come with joy, a child of God, forgiven, loved and free,

The life of Jesus to recall, in love laid down for me,

In love laid down for me.

I come with Christians far and near to find, as all are fed,

The new community of love in Christ’s communion bread,

In Christ’s communion bread.

As Christ breaks bread, and bids us share, each proud division ends.

The love that made us, makes us one, and strangers now are friends,

And strangers now are friends.

The Spirit of the risen Christ, unseen, but ever near,

Is in such friendship better known, alive among us here,

Alive among us here.

Together met, together bound by all that God has done,

We’ll go with joy, to give the world the love that makes us one,

The love that makes us one.

Benediction

Go into the world in peace.

Have courage!

Hold fast to what is good.

Return no one evil for evil.

Strengthen the faint-hearted,

support the weak,

help the suffering.

Honor all people.

Love and serve the Lord your God,

rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.

And may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,

and the love of God,

and the sweet communion of the Holy Spirit,

be with each and all of us,

This day and forevermore.

God is with us, so go in peace.

Thanks be to God.

Postlude

“Christians, We Have Met to Worship,” Mark Hayes

Reprinted with permission under ONE LICENSE.  

Worship With Us

Ordinary Time: Rooted and Grounded