Fall 1989: Learning from Work

 

SEEKERS WORSHIP CELEBRATION

Fall 1989

Learning from Work

 

REFLECTION

 

"The three purposes of human work are to provide useful goods and services; to enable every one of us to use and thereby perfect our gifts like good stewards; and to do so in service to, and in cooperation with, others, so as to liberate ourselves from our inborn egocentricity.  This threefold function makes work so central to human life that it is truly impossible to conceive of life at the human level without work."

 

                                           E. F. Schumacher

                                           Good Work

PRELUDE

 

CALL TO WORSHIP

 

Leader:   O planet and atom, look to your Maker.

 

People:   O incandescent warmth and unimaginable cold, look to your Maker.

 

Leader:   O familiar sun, and cloud, and living earth, look to your Maker.

 

Unison:   O people of God, look to your Maker, and praise aloud the works of Creation.

 

INVOCATION

 

HYMN

 

TIME WITH CHILDREN

 

SILENCE

 

LITANY

 

Leader:   What is our commitment regarding work?

 

Unison:   We believe that the Holy Spirit, as the empowering presence and breath of God, confronts us and inspires us to do God's work in the world.

 

Leader:   How are God's work and our work related?

 

Voice 1:  Our work can contribute to the common good.

 

Voice 2:  Our work can challenge us and nourish our development as followers of Jesus Christ. 

 

Voice 1:  Our work can draw us into relationships so that we know that what we do matters — in our families, in our community, in the world. 

 

Voice 2:  Our work can be a satisfying part of our lives.

 

Unison:   We reach out for the good news that Jesus has redeemed work from being a curse, and offers it to us as a blessing, that God's work and our work can be the same. 

SILENCE

 

COMMUNITY PRAYERS

Confession 

 

(Our confession is of things for which we need not feel personally guilty.  Rather, we are acknowledging what work is like in an imperfect world.)

 

Leader:   We often think of work as simply making a living — just earning a salary or a paycheck.

 

People:   That's how it is.

 

Leader:   Often we cannot see that our work is from God.

 

People:   That's how it is.

 

Leader:   We experience joy and fulfillment in our work less than we would like.

 

People:   That's how it is.

 

Leader:   Often we do not find a happy balance between work and rest.

 

People:   That's how it is.

 

Leader:   We seldom wonder what God is teaching us from our work.

 

People:   That's how it is.

 

Unison:   Holy God, forgive us for trying to keep our work in a box, separate from your creative love. 

 

Individual confessions

 

Assurance

Leader:   Even when we do not believe it, God is at work in us, bringing us to a deeper understanding of our connection with all of creation and the work to which we are called.

 

Continuing prayers

 

HYMN

 

THE WORD

Scripture

Sermon

Silent Reflection

 

OFFERING

Offertory Music

Prayer of Dedication

 

SHARED REFLECTIONS

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

 

HYMN

 

BENEDICTION

Leader:   Whichever gift each of you has received, use it in service to one another, like good stewards dispensing the grace of God in its various forms.  Amen.