Posted 1003 days ago
Weaving A Community
from Worship Alternative, Abbotsford Parish Church, July 2000
We’re going to take you on something of a journey. This is designed to be a meditative service where we’ll be taken back to the first Christian Communities and reaffirm that we are there with the ancients and they are here with us.
There will also be an opportunity, if people wish, to affirm our part in this sacred society recognising that we are woven into this timeless community by placing strands on the tapestry here.
Journey
Let me take you back
Through time
Imagine yourselves moving through the stars
Being pulled backwards
Before this evening and before this week
Further into God’s own time
Beyond the events that have shaped our generation
And further back still
Watching as faces pass by
Of the people who have moulded our world’s future
Back
Leaving the contemporary world behind
It’s stress
It’s pressure
Further back
Sucked through seasons and generations, and eras
Back
Beyond these shores
Into a warm country
Sandal-shoed people
Darker skinned
Brown eyed
Wide opened to a new movement
That has rocked an ancient faith
And is spread by rumour and story telling
To people in small communities gathered
To learn
From eye-witnesses
Dust still fresh on their feet
After following their Master
Sharing bread and passing wine
And new insights and truths for life
Huddled yet free
Searched for yet liberated
And you are sitting beside them now
You know their faces
You recognise their expressions
You even know their names
Welcome to the Early Church
The Act’s Community
This is where you belong
(PAUSE)
The Acts Community
(Scripture Reading for two voices)
Through the work of the apostles, many God-signs were set up among the people, many wonderful things done. They all met regularly and in remarkable harmony on the Temple porch. But even though people admired them a lot, outsiders were wary about joining them.
(pause)
On the other hand, those who put their trust in the master were added right and left, men and women both.
(pause)
They even carried the sick out into the streets and laid them on stretchers and bedrolls, hoping they would be touched by Peter’s shadow when he walked by.
(pause)
The whole congregation of believers was united as one – one heart, one mind!
(pause)
They didn’t even claim ownership of their own possessions. No one said, ‘That’s mine; you can’t have it.’ They shared everything. The apostles gave powerful witness to the resurrection of the Mast Jesus, and grace was on all of them.
(pause)
And so it turned out that not a person among them was needy.
(pause)
Those who owned fields or houses sold them and brought the price of the sale to the apostles and made an offering of it. The apostles then distributed it according to each person’s need.
(pause)
Weaving a community
A framework for a tapestry was set up with different colours and widths of material.
Take a ribbon of paper and place it on the tapestry on the table. Commit yourself to being part of the community by doing so, but also, if you wish, stay where you are, knowing the support of that community. While the music plays I invite you to do these things now.
Statement
A community is a resource of life
In it, and through it, people find the purpose the Creator designed them for
It is a sanctuary of promise
And a deep, deep well of love
It is home
(Chant)
Place of heaven
Place of love
Place of future
Rainbow making
Place of promise
Place of hope
Place of God’s own weaving
A community is a vision of the kingdom
It is the reality of heaven on earth
Where angels tread through life in whispers of love
And acts of trust
It is home
(Chant)
A community is an anchor in an unstable world
It is a picture of how things can be
The hope of heaven played out in this world
An open place where the future is spun
It is home
(Chant)
A community is love’s workplace
It is the space for creativity and care
For support and suffering
A deep down place of life
It is home
(Chant)
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