Sunday Service from Hillside Circuit for July 30th 2023:
Lectionary Theme: In all things God works for good
Occasion: 9th Sunday after Pentecost
Lectionary readings:
Psalm 105: 1-11
1 Kings 3: 5-12
Romans 8: 26-39
Matthew 13: 31-33, 44-52
Additional readings:
1 Kings 17: 7- 9
Matthew 14: 17- 20
Theme: Put trust in the Giver of gifts, not the gift
[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.
Lord, have mercy.
Praise to the Lord, the Almighty.
Amazing Grace (my chains are gone).
He is exalted, the king is exalted.
Hide me now (Still).
Give thanks.
Come thou fount of every blessing.
To God be the Glory.
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 105
1 Praise the LORD and pray in his name!
Tell everyone what he has done.
2 Sing praises to the LORD! Tell about his miracles.
3 Celebrate and worship his holy name with all your heart.
4 Trust the LORD and his mighty power.
5 Remember his miracles and all his wonders
and his fair decisions.
6 You belong to the family of Abraham, his servant;
you are his chosen ones, the descendants of Jacob.
7 The LORD is our God,
bringing justice everywhere on earth.
8 He will never forget his agreement or his promises,
not in thousands of years.
9 God made an eternal promise
10 to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
11 when he said, “I’ll give you the land of Canaan.”
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1 Kings 3
5 One night while Solomon was in Gibeon, the LORD God appeared to him in a dream and said, “Solomon, ask for anything you want, and I will give it to you.”
6 Solomon answered:
My father David, your servant, was honest and did what you commanded. You were always loyal to him, and you gave him a son who is now king. 7 LORD God, I’m your servant, and you’ve made me king in my father’s place. But I’m very young and know so little about being a leader. 8 And now I must rule your chosen people, even though there are too many of them to count.
9 Please make me wise and teach me the difference between right and wrong. Then I will know how to rule your people. If you don’t, there is no way I could rule this great nation of yours.
10-11 God said:
Solomon, I’m pleased that you asked for this. You could have asked to live a long time or to be rich. Or you could have asked for your enemies to be destroyed. Instead, you asked for wisdom to make right decisions. 12 So I’ll make you wiser than anyone who has ever lived or ever will live.
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Romans 8
26 In certain ways we are weak, but the Spirit is here to help us. For example, when we don’t know what to pray for, the Spirit prays for us in ways that cannot be put into words. 27 All of our thoughts are known to God. He can understand what is in the mind of the Spirit, as the Spirit prays for God’s people. 28 We know that God is always at work for the good of everyone who loves him. They are the ones God has chosen for his purpose, 29 and he has always known who his chosen ones would be. He had decided to let them become like his own Son, so that his Son would be the first of many children. 30 God then accepted the people he had already decided to choose, and he has shared his glory with them.
31 What can we say about all this? If God is on our side, can anyone be against us? 32 God did not keep back his own Son, but he gave him for us. If God did this, won’t he freely give us everything else? 33 If God says his chosen ones are acceptable to him, can anyone bring charges against them? 34 Or can anyone condemn them? No indeed! Christ died and was raised to life, and now he is at God’s right side, speaking to him for us. 35 Can anything separate us from the love of Christ? Can trouble, suffering, and hard times, or hunger and nakedness, or danger and death? 36 It is exactly as the Scriptures say,
“For you we face death all day long.
We are like sheep on their way to be butchered.”
37 In everything we have won more than a victory because of Christ who loves us. 38 I am sure that nothing can separate us from God’s love – not life or death, not angels or spirits, not the present or the future, 39 and not powers above or powers below. Nothing in all creation can separate us from God’s love for us in Christ Jesus our Lord!
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Matthew 13
31 Jesus told them another story:
The kingdom of heaven is like what happens when a farmer plants a mustard seed in a field. 32 Although it is the smallest of all seeds, it grows larger than any garden plant and becomes a tree. Birds even come and nest on its branches.
33 Jesus also said:
The kingdom of heaven is like what happens when a woman mixes a little yeast into three big batches of flour. Finally, all the dough rises.
44 The kingdom of heaven is like what happens when someone finds treasure hidden in a field and buries it again. A person like that is happy and goes and sells everything in order to buy that field.
45 The kingdom of heaven is like what happens when a shop owner is looking for fine pearls. 46 After finding a very valuable one, the owner goes and sells everything in order to buy that pearl.
47 The kingdom of heaven is like what happens when a net is thrown into a lake and catches all kinds of fish. 48 When the net is full, it is dragged to the shore, and the fishermen sit down to separate the fish. They keep the good ones, but throw the bad ones away. 49 That’s how it will be at the end of time. Angels will come and separate the evil people from the ones who have done right. 50 Then those evil people will be thrown into a flaming furnace, where they will cry and grit their teeth in pain.
51 Jesus asked his disciples if they understood all these things. They said, “Yes, we do.”
52 So he told them, “Every student of the Scriptures who becomes a disciple in the kingdom of heaven is like someone who brings out new and old treasures from the storeroom.”
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1 Kings 17
7 But after a while, it dried up because there was no rain.
8 The LORD told Elijah, 9 “Go to the town of Zarephath in Sidon and live there. I’ve told a widow in that town to give you food.”
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Matthew 14
17 But they said, “We have only five small loaves of bread and two fish.” 18 Jesus asked his disciples to bring the food to him, 19 and he told the crowd to sit down on the grass. Jesus took the five loaves and the two fish. He looked up toward heaven and blessed the food. Then he broke the bread and handed it to his disciples, and they gave it to the people.
20 After everyone had eaten all they wanted, Jesus’ disciples picked up twelve large baskets of leftovers.
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[Did you miss last week’s Sunday Services? They can now be found at Worship Archive – July 23rd 2023.]
Methodist Church: Hillside Circuit 
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