The luck of the Irish has returned

Come and celebrate the feast of St. Patrick with a delicious Irish Stew supper March 18th at Freelton Strabane United Church 1565 Brock Road Strabane.   

Open Seating from 4:30 - 6:30 p.m. Pay at the door. 

$20 per person, $10 for children under 12 yrs.

Let us Gather together for worship. 

 Come touch our souls that we may know and love you 

Your quiet presence all our fears dispel 

Create a space for sprit to grow in us

Let life and beauty fill us, 

Come touch and bless our souls. 

Come touch us now, this people who are gathered, 

To break the bread and share the cup of peace;

That we may love you with our heart our soul, 

Our mind, our strength, our all, 

Come touch us with your grace. 

Call To Worship  

One Gather us in Holy God to this time, to this place.

All Gather us in to this place of hope, of calm , of renewal.

One We come to this place a resting place of renewal in the journey.

All We come to your house to worship you, for this is the place we need to be.             

 I can not explain spiritual rebirth.   It can be a faith rebirth, or renewal or discovery, it can the realization of a life change. 

The spiritual rebirth is as mysterious and impossible to see as the wind. We catch glimpses. Yet like the wind the work of the Spirit thought invisible is real. But to try to pinpoint its occurrence is as impossible as trying to catch the wind inside of a bottle and as misguided as Nicodemus looking for signs.

 We see the Spirit by chance or in its passing. Like when we see the trees move or a little dust swirl.   

The witness of the early church is that new life in the Spirit is given to a person at baptism. Yet the fulfilment of the baptism is a lifelong activity.

 It is well known that I have built one or two architectural miniatures over the last several years.   What I have discovered is every time I think one of them is finished and I photograph it, I find something else to add to it or change it. I have come to realize that they are never quite complete, that there will be always something to add to them. 

 Like the miniatures our faith is never quite complete it always needs to worked on stretched grown.  It Changes.

I think that life and life with God is the same.    There are so many details to our lives so many aspects that go into making us who we are.  Some things fall together other aspects of our lives need to be fixed while there might be some scratch building 

We don’t see the progress of our lives until we step back and look.  We progress moving towards that completeness of spirit and understanding. 

Why do people go back to same country or place more than once.   I will talk about someday leading a tour back to Scotland or Costa Rica and folk will say   “Will,  you have already been there.”   Yes but I want to, or perhaps need to go there again because each time I travel to a place I see something new, I see something differently. I add to the experience. 

Nikodemus, was struggling with a whole new way of thinking. In the Passion Play in Germany Nikodemus becomes one of the advocates one of the supporters of Jesus and argues in his defense.  He was reborn.  As we are reborn each time the spirit moves us, causes us to consider to think.

 God moves among us here and there working on our completion giving us insight understanding direction. Sometimes we understand and other times we are confused and sit and wonder how can this be.  We are gifted with free will one of the greatest gifts that God has given us, it is up to us to allow the spirit to move us or we can be closed to the spirit of God and refuse to move ahead.  It is then that we will wither and die. 

 God is still working on me. And on you. You as a community of faith have shown great courage in allowing God through the Spirit to reshape and shape you as Freelton Strabane.  We have seen God’s doing in our lives and yes in the coming times God will move us and we will not  be aware of it. 

Our lives are a journey and we are called to see them from the different angles to work at gaining that greater understanding of how God is moving within us in his spirit. 

As we travel to Jerusalem we are called to trust in God even though it may mean not  necessarily understanding all that there is to know. To let God lead. To accept and know that we are not alone.

Thanks be to God Amen   

Prayers of the people

 When we shiver in despair when the chill of death comes near,

Hold us Spirit, calm our fear while the evening deepens.

Holy Light, warm our night warm the time of winter

Holy night warm our night warm the time of winter 

God who walks with us on this journey . We listen to the news, we see images of what is going on in our world. Our hearts cannot but help be heavy.  It is so easy to loose faith, to become discouraged.  To ask how can this be? Our souls are tired. In that moment as we sit on rock on the side of the road on our journey you come and sit with us looking at where we have been, where we are going putting your arm around us and simple say “I am here. “

You are here God. That brings us great comfort. 

We pray for all those in Ukraine who are living their worst nightmare.   We remember all those people that are displaced by war and conflict. We remember all those that have lost loved ones.   . We pray for all those that struggle with illness, and the unknown. We pray for all those who long for the renewal of Spirit to know the way forward. We pray that your healing Spirit be upon them. We find great comfort knowing that here in this community of faith, we can bring out prayers to you. Prayers for those who we know, and for ourselves and those that we shall never meet. We name before you those who we are walking with.   Hear our prayers O lord. Take our hand once more on this journey, lead us forward for in our faith from the cold into your warmth. We know you hear our prayers. We offer you the great prayer which binds us as one saying…Our Father…. 

Offering

We give thee but thy own.   The work of the Church continues and there are three ways you can continue to support that work.   Consider using PAR, use the donate button on our Web Site or drop your gift at the Manse.   Let us make our offering and give thanks.     

God of all humankind, send our generous gifts where we are unable to go/. Send us to places where we would not venture to witness to your love. We offer these gifts to do your work and rededicate all we hare to your service.                                                                  Amen