Prayers 3 4 2012
*Welcome! Welcome Richard Chung back to FCBC!
*Women’s Retreat next weekend—last minute registrations?
*Men’s Fellowship, this Saturday, 9:00, Dr. David Louie on Men’s Health in our Matured Years; contact Nelson Wong
*3 on 3 Basketball, next Sunday, 1:00-4:00, YMCA, sign up with John Tom
*America for Christ Offering in the month of March—home missions
Prayer Concerns
*Bill Chin’s sister, Helen had a mild heart attack
*Charcoal Choy had an angiogram on Wednesday with 2 stents
*Tommy Lim’s optometrist friends in South Carolina, Bill Jenkins had a heart attack a month ago and his wife, Linda Jenkins will be having a small blockage clear in 3 weeks
*Lillian Siu’s father, John Yee is in hospice care at home, 74, former member of our church
Prayer of God’s People
O God, you are the inspiration of our living, the author of every breath drawn in and released, you who have known us before we were born and who charts our course through all the days of our living, cherishing us in every moment and beyond. May we see your love and your guidance in every automatic action of our bodies, every choice made by our wills, and in the circumstances which challenge us to greater obedience and discipleship. Be present in this time of worship that we may hear your word for us today.
In this season of Lent when we ask ourselves to examine our priorities and commitments, lead us to confess our sins with a repentant heart in order for us to be restored into a right relationship with you. Show us that your will that calls us to a life of peace and reconciliation with our enemies is to follow the way of Jesus the peacemaker. Grant us your mercy and grace that when we are disobedient to your plan for us that we find ourselves in alienation from the love of Christ. But because of your wondrous love found only in Jesus Christ, we pray that we can accept your love and to be faithful today and the days to come. May we become more disciplined to know you both in our minds and in our hearts.
We pray for those who are in special needs for your healing powers. Be with Bill Chin’s sister Helen and with Charcoal Choy that their strength and health improve. Watch over Tommy Lim’s friends, Bill and Linda Jenkins as they address potentially life-threatening concerns. Grant your loving assurance to Lillian Siu as her father, John Yee who is in hospice knowing that as our Creator you have made everyone of us in your image. We pray for…
We thank you, God as our source of our thanksgiving, the breath we take without thinking, the coursing in life through our veins which you inspire, the renewal of cells within our body. All this is your doing. This is a part of your care for us, and not the result of our will and intent. You are in our sleeping and in our waking, in our every sense and in activities we cannot even see. We thank you for this gift of life and are resolved that in each and every day we might love you, serve you, and know you more fully. We pray these things in the name of Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together, “Our Father…”
The Lord’s Supper
There’s a familiar phrase “truth in advertising.” This means that all advertising claims to be telling you the truth, but sometimes it takes a special law to make people reveal the whole truth, not just the easy part.
Even then, they make it hard to catch the truth. It may fly across a TV screen, almost impossible to read. Like those ads for special diets. You see a person smiling, announcing that they lost over 100 pounds on the program they are advertising. And in very small type, running fast along the bottom of the screen, you might read—if you are a speed reader—“Results not typical.”
Then there are those print ads for new medications. There’s a beautiful photograph of someone enjoying freedom from pain, and the claims are so wonderful, and since this is not a television ad you don’t have to worry about the words flying by too fast at the bottom of the screen. Except that the warnings are buried inside two full pages of extremely fine print. Much of it is in medical language that only —- can understand.
That’s why I have to admire Jesus. He had a warning to give, and he gave it. There was no fine print, and the words didn’t speed by too fast for us to read. Not only that, but Jesus spoke in plain and clear language so we could understand his warnings. But his message offended his disciples.
Jesus told them that being the Messiah, the Christ, the one sent by God, meant enduring great suffering, rejection, and death at the hands of the religious authorities. As Mark puts it, “He said all of this quite openly” (8:32). That’s the Lenten road to glory—and it can be a rocky road sometimes. But you have been warned.
There’s no fine print in this invitation to come to the Lord’s Table. There’s no so-called truth in advertising that speeds by too fast. We must all pick up our cross and follow. Sometimes this means challenging ourselves to give more from what we have if we want to be a part of God’s reign.
You may reject God’s call. But you can’t say later you weren’t told what Jesus expects.
Benediction
Take up your cross and follow in hope, without fear.
Receive the blessing of the God who shares in your suffering.
Be prepared to share in God’s glory.
Amen.