Bulletin

GRACE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH

3700 COTTAGE GROVE
DES MOINES, IOWA 50311
(515) 255-2131
www.gracedesmoines.org

SUNDAY MARCH 7, 2010
THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT
HOLY COMMUNION
8:00 A.M. 10:15 A.M.

Please ask an usher if you need a large print hymnal or bulletin.
Hearing aids are also available at all services.

The music marks the beginning of our service. Please quiet your thoughts for meditation, prayer and worship.
*Please stand as you are able.

GATHERING AND PRAISE

PRELUDE (8:00) Polonaise, Op.40, No.1 F. Chopin

(10:15) Prelude and Fugue, Op. 18 César Frank

*CALL TO WORSHIP (Isaiah 55, Psalm 63) Rev. Kathye Harrington-Taber
Leader: The table is set. The banquet is laid.
People: Our souls hunger and thirst for God!
Leader: The Host is ready to welcome us here.
People: Our souls hunger and thirst for God!
Leader: “Return to me, return to me,” says the Lord.
People: Our souls hunger and thirst for God!

*HYMN OF PRAISE No. 578 God of Love and God of Power CWM RHONDDA

*PRAYER OF CONFESSION (Isaiah 55) Rev. Jill Flyr
Hospitable God, you invite us again and again to the table of abundant feasting in your love, but we seem immune to the aromas of your lovingly prepared bounty. We choose instead to be satiated for the moment-but never satisfied long- by empty, easy offerings around us. We so often settle into the comfort of convenience, failing to notice that our lives have run dry. Sometimes we deprive our lives with guilt, reducing the dimensions of your mercy to our own. As we pause to know who we are, O God, bring to us the echoes of your gentle words down the ages, we pray.

*WORDS OF ASSURANCE Rev. Jill Flyr
God has set a glorious table laden with abundant pardon and forgiveness, calling us to receive it and live once again. Taste now the peace the lies within grace. Drink to the full all that God offers us. Let us lift up our hearts in thankfulness.
Thanks be to God. Amen.

*CHORAL AMEN (10:15)

PROCLAMATION AND RESPONSE

FIRST READING Psalm 63
Dawn Morgan, soprano

ANTHEM (10:15)

Jiu shi zhi shen (The Bread of Life for All is Broken)
Music by Su Yin-Lan. Words by Timothy Tingfang Lew; trans. By Walter Reginald Oxenham Taylor. The Wesley Choir; Becky Orfield, Pianist; Jon-Philip Olson, Director
Translation: The bread of life for all is broken!
Christ drank the cup on Golgotha.
God’s grace we trust, and spread with reverence
This holy feast, and thus remember.

CHILDREN’S MESSAGE Children are invited to come forward. Please join in singing the refrain of No. 593 “Here I Am, Lord” as the children come to the altar. All children are invited to be in worship. Child care will be provided each Sunday morning (7:45-12:30) in the Nursery. During the 10:15 worship service, child care will be provided for infants 0 - 2 year olds in the Nursery. Children ages 3 – 4 may attend Preschool Sunday school in Room 201 if their parents wish. (Children may leave after Children’s Time if their parents walk them to their rooms.)

SECOND READING Isaiah 55:1-3

This is the Word of God for the people of God.

SERMON “Ho, Everyone Who Thirsts, Come!” Rev. Bill Steward

PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
Leader: Lord, in your mercy,
People: Quench our thirst for you.

SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM No. 38 (10:15) Henry Matthew Wilcoxson, born 11/23/2009
Parents Timothy and Heather

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES FOR SERVICE

OFFERTORY
(8:00) Something for Thee

Music by Robert Lowry. Words by Sylvanus Phelps.

(10:15) Thee Will I Love

Music by Kenneth Jennings. Words by Johann Scheffler. Trans. Charles Wesley. Catherine Winkworth, alt. The Chancel Choir; Josh Morgan, Organist; Jon-Philip Olson, Director.

Please sign and date the attendance register located at the end of the pew and pass it along. When it reaches the end of the pew, please return it.

*OFFERTORY RESPONSE

Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise God all creatures here below. Praise God above ye heavn’ly host. Praise Creator, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.

THANKSGIVING AND COMMUNION

INVITATION

THE GREAT THANKSGIVING

Leader: This is the joyful feast of the people of God.
People: Let us rejoice and be glad.
Leader: Creator God, we bless you and praise you. You spoke and the earth was formed. You
drew a breath and the sea rose.
People All of creation sings your praises.
Leader: From the dust of the earth, you created our bodies. You gave us our senses and blessed
us with the power of reason and love. Yet we turn against our covenant with you, with one
another and with creation.
People: Have mercy on us, gracious God.
Leader: Jesus the Christ came to show us how to love you. He announced good news to the poor,
release to the captives, sight to the blind, and freedom to the oppressed.

People: Through all his life and death, he reconciled us to you and to our brothers and sisters.
Leader: Witnessing to that reconciliation, on the night he was arrested, Jesus took bread. After
giving thanks, he broke it and said,
People: “Take. Eat. This is my body, which is given for you. Do this, remembering me.”
Leader: After supper, he took the cup and said,
People: “Drink this, all of you. This is the new covenant, sealed in my blood; whenever you
drink it, do this, remembering me.”
Leader: Remembering Jesus, we ask you to send the power of the Holy Spirit upon this bread and
wine that these gifts may be for us the sacrament of your healing presence among us in a
broken world. Feed us with your power; fill us with your peace; lead us, reconciled and
redeemed, into the world for the liberation and reconciliation of all peoples.
People: In the name of God, creating, redeeming and sanctifying, we pray. Amen.

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 trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

BREAKING THE BREAD

RECEIVING THE ELEMENTS
Station Communion Servers
West Sanctuary The Rev. Kathye Harrington-Taber Roger Witke
Center Sanctuary The Rev. Bill Steward Darlene Witke
East Sanctuary The Rev. John Bailey The Rev. Mara LeHew Bailey
Balcony The Rev. Jill Flyr Todd Witke
Choir The Rev. Jim Nelson Coreen Witke

SENDING FORTH TO SERVE

*HYMN OF DEDICATION No. 629 You Satisfy the Hungry Heart GIFTS OF FINEST WHEAT

*DISMISSAL WITH BLESSING

*CHORAL RESPONSE (10:15)

*POSTLUDE As the Deer Martin Nystrom