Scattered Worship Reflection Discipleship Mission 19th April 2020

"Stand in Line" INTRODUCTION and excerpts from the Resource Handout
   ‘Worship at Home’ during a time of ‘personal distancing’ is different to an experience in ‘gathered community,’ yet there are practices, prayers, music and reflections offering ‘time with God.’ As we move beyond Easter perhaps this can be a space fostering resilience and ‘tools’ to not only survive, but to grow and to emerge from ‘the long now’ in new ways. In your current surroundings, rhythms and the changes impacting your life or indeed in a space where for you it hasn’t been very different… what next?

Anyone should be able to view and download the Resource Handout from Google Docs without need to log in here

VISUAL RESOURCES Audio-visuals online (or DVD)
Week by week audio-visuals for this material here (scroll for the date)
Or here on Youtube Channel here
Adamstown Uniting Church weekly videos here
Project Reconnect Preaching freely available now into May 2020 here
These and many others across the Uniting Church here

BUT now...
Worship ‘at home’ for Sunday or to ‘dip into’ at any stage                                      
For this week the invitation is to firstly,
Pray in the words below or your own thoughts
Read the Bible Story John 20:19-31
Then, WATCH/LISTEN to the Video or DVD                    
(either pause before the Song + come back to it at the end)
Return to the Reflection Questions 

Share in the Sending Out  

Prayer
God of life,
In these strange days now stretching into weeks – we remember
We remember a summer of heat and fires, drought and insecurity
We remember the seasons and this is a unique one, yet it will turn
We remember the promise of light in the darkness
We remember stories of hope, the promise of abundant life

Help us live in this moment, however uncertain
Help us live in a time we know will come to an end
Where although we are unable to gather, we share faith
We read stories of Easter, of people scattered by events of their day
We pray thinking of those struck by fear and grief or anxiety and we wonder
From where will our hope come, how can we strengthen our ‘following'?
God, assure us of love and of a time in the future we will again gather
We lament this interruption to our efforts to share love and work for justice

In the silence or the clatter, God speak to us
Send your Spirit of calm and comfort
Inspire us to be kind and to offer love to all others
In a time we can scarcely believe,
 We know you are here with us and we are thankful
In silence, hear the prayers of our hearts and the things on our minds (a silence is kept)
God, send us into this time, to shape faithful lives. Amen

Reflection Questions
Whether we identify with Adam after a pretty rough Easter (remembering he offered to lend a wooden cross) weighed down by his efforts to keep a small struggling congregation going OR we see how Thomas has traditionally gotten ‘a hard time’ down the centuries, for his honesty… here are some questions for reflection
What do you read in the story as evidence Thomas gets a hard time in our retelling of this story?
What does Jesus ‘peace’ and sending look like in a time of restricted contact die to COVID-19?
When we ‘have not seen yet come to believe’ how does faith in Jesus help in a time like now?


Video Resource for 19th April 2020

Sending Out
Let us go as those who God has called
to bear witness to God’s love and justice
to seek the Spirit of God for the transforming of the world
Amen