Sunday Service from Hillside Circuit for July 16th 2023:
Lectionary Theme: The Word of God comes to accomplish mission
Occasion: 7th Sunday after Pentecost
Lectionary readings:
Psalm 119: 105-112
Isaiah 55: 10-13
Romans 8: 1-11
Matthew 13: 1-9, 18-23
[Click or tap on a Bible reference above to jump down the page to the Bible reading to read it for yourself and then click or tap on Back to top to come back here.]
Songs:
Here are the songs for Sunday morning service. Click or tap on a song to open it in YouTube.
Give thanks with a grateful heart.
How great Thou art.
Igama leNkosi malibongwe.
Here l am to worship.
You can listen and join in with prayers from the English Methodist Service Book. They can be found at the Prayers for worship webpage.
Children’s Address:
Sermon:
Bible readings:
Psalm 119
105 Your word is a lamp that gives light wherever I walk.
106 Your laws are fair,
and I have given my word to respect them all.
107 I am in terrible pain! Save me, LORD,
as you said you would.
108 Accept my offerings of praise and teach me your laws.
109 I never forget your teachings,
although my life is always in danger.
110 Some merciless people are trying to trap me,
but I never turn my back on your teachings.
111 They will always be my most prized possession
and my source of joy.
112 I have made up my mind to obey your laws forever,
no matter what.
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Isaiah 55
10 “Rain and snow fall from the sky.
But they don’t return without watering the earth
that produces seeds to plant and grain to eat.
11 That’s how it is with my words.
They don’t return to me without doing everything
I send them to do.”
12 When you are set free, you will celebrate
and travel home in peace.
Mountains and hills will sing as you pass by,
and trees will clap.
13 Cypress and myrtle trees will grow in fields
once covered by thorns.
And then those trees will stand as a lasting witness
to the glory of the LORD.
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Romans 8
1 If you belong to Christ Jesus, you won’t be punished. 2 The Holy Spirit will give you life that comes from Christ Jesus and will set you free from sin and death. 3 The Law of Moses cannot do this, because our selfish desires make the Law weak. But God set you free when he sent his own Son to be like us sinners and to be a sacrifice for our sin. God used Christ’s body to condemn sin. 4 He did this, so that we would do what the Law commands by obeying the Spirit instead of our own desires.
5 People who are ruled by their desires think only of themselves. Everyone who is ruled by the Holy Spirit thinks about spiritual things. 6 If our minds are ruled by our desires, we will die. But if our minds are ruled by the Spirit, we will have life and peace. 7 Our desires fight against God, because they do not and cannot obey God’s laws. 8 If we follow our desires, we cannot please God.
9 You are no longer ruled by your desires, but by God’s Spirit, who lives in you. People who don’t have the Spirit of Christ in them don’t belong to him. 10 But Christ lives in you. So you are alive because God has accepted you, even though your bodies must die because of your sins. 11 Yet God raised Jesus to life! God’s Spirit now lives in you, and he will raise you to life by his Spirit.
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Matthew 13
1 That same day Jesus left the house and went out beside Lake Galilee, where he sat down to teach. 2 Such large crowds gathered around him that he had to sit in a boat, while the people stood on the shore. 3 Then he taught them many things by using stories. He said:
A farmer went out to scatter seed in a field. 4 While the farmer was scattering the seed, some of it fell along the road and was eaten by birds. 5 Other seeds fell on thin, rocky ground and quickly started growing because the soil wasn’t very deep. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched and dried up, because they did not have enough roots. 7 Some other seeds fell where thornbushes grew up and choked the plants. 8 But a few seeds did fall on good ground where the plants produced a hundred or sixty or thirty times as much as was scattered. 9 If you have ears, pay attention!
18 Now listen to the meaning of the story about the farmer:
19 The seeds that fell along the road are the people who hear the message about the kingdom, but don’t understand it. Then the evil one comes and snatches the message from their hearts. 20 The seeds that fell on rocky ground are the people who gladly hear the message and accept it right away. 21 But they don’t have deep roots, and they don’t last very long. As soon as life gets hard or the message gets them in trouble, they give up.
22 The seeds that fell among the thornbushes are also people who hear the message. But they start worrying about the needs of this life and are fooled by the desire to get rich. So the message gets choked out, and they never produce anything. 23 The seeds that fell on good ground are the people who hear and understand the message. They produce as much as a hundred or sixty or thirty times what was planted.
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[Did you miss last week’s Sunday Services? They can now be found at Worship Archive – July 9th 2023.]
Methodist Church: Hillside Circuit 
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