Seeds in the Dirt

Call to Worship

Come, let us worship God!
Come, let us worship our Creator!

God is the great Sower, scattering seeds of life and abundance across the earth.
We are the soil the Sower plants, created to nurture and sustain the seeds of God’s life-giving love.

God is the great Gardener, tilling and cultivating our soil with love and grace.
We notice the rocks and thorns in our soil and call on the Gardener’s love and grace to transform us into good soil.

God is the great Life-giver, sowing seeds and tending the soil to produce the fruit of abundant life.
May we nurture and grow God’s new reality, bearing the fruit of flourishing and abundance for all God’s creation. Amen.

Written by Dr. Lisa Hancock, Discipleship Ministries, January 2023.

Prayers of the People

This prayer weaves spoken petitions, unison responses, and congregational singing of the hymn “Now Thank We All Our God.” We encourage you to use and contextualize this prayer in the way that is best for your congregation. If you do not wish to sing the hymn, you could also speak the text of the hymn or choose to use only the petitions and unison responses. In addition, feel free to include ministries, events, and/or people that are especially meaningful to your congregation within the appropriate petitions.

Loving God,

We thank you for the ministry of this church. We remember the light this church has been in the neighborhood. The vacation Bible schools, the mission projects, the festivals that have brought life and liveliness to our community.*

Gracious God, we give you thanks for all you have done among us.

We thank you for the gift we have been to one another. We remember the Sunday school teachers, mentors, and pastors who shaped us and formed us in Christian love. We recall the saints who have gone before yet whose care and influence are still so present.

Gracious God, we give you thanks for all you have done among us.

(Sing)
Now thank we all our God,
with heart and hands and voices,
who wondrous things has done,
in whom this world rejoices;
who from our mothers' arms
has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love,
and still is ours today.

We thank you for your provision that never runs out. We attend to your call out of scarcity and into abundance as well as your assurance that we can depend on you, the God who provides. We notice that our community has so much need, and we trust that you will provide the way for us to meet those needs when we follow your voice.

Gracious God, we give you thanks for all you are doing among us.

We thank you for the gifts you are nurturing among us now. We notice the Spirit at work among your people, bringing forth gifts of compassion, justice, cooking, caring for children, really excellent hugs, and kind, encouraging words. We are learning to celebrate the gifts we have rather than despair of the gifts we think we ought to have.

Gracious God, we give you thanks for all you are doing among us.

(Sing)
O may this bounteous God
through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts
and blessed peace to cheer us;
and keep us still in grace,
and guide us when perplexed;
and free us from all ills,
in this world and the next.

We thank you for the dreams you give us, dreams of a new reality where all people can thrive as a community brought together in love. We welcome your invitation to imagine how God-given abundance could transform our neighborhood. Your dream is good and beautiful, even when it feels daunting.

Gracious God, we give you thanks for all you will do among us.

We thank you for the ways you guide us into new expressions of your love in the world. We grieve for the ideas and ministries that gave life in the past that we now set aside to make room for new imaginings to take root. We rejoice that you continue to journey with us as we imagine a new reality into being, because nothing is impossible with God.

Gracious God, we give you thanks for all you will do among us.

(Sing)
All praise and thanks to God
the Father now be given;
the Son, and him who reigns
with them in highest heaven;
the one eternal God,
whom earth and heaven adore;
for thus it was, is now,
and shall be evermore.

*Fill in ministries/events your church performed in the neighborhood or community in the past.

Prayer written by Dr. Lisa Hancock, Discipleship Ministries, January 2023, including Martin Rinkart, “Now Thank We All Our God,” translated by Catherine Winkworth (Nashville: United Methodist Publishing House, 1989), 102.

Prayer of Confession

Invitation

We know for sure that we do not have to talk God into forgiving us. God knows our need before we ask and has demonstrated in Jesus a therapeutic love that can never be exhausted. In confession, we get honest and ask the Spirit God to come in and put things right.

Confession

Let us pray.

Loving God, Sower and Reaper of love,
we admit to you that we are like stony fields,
capable of growing goodness and sharing it around,
but also we allow goodness to wither and weeds to flourish.

Your mercy has taken root in us, but we do not share enough of it with others,
your justice has grown on us, but we have inadequately implemented it,
your truth has showered on us, but we have let it run to waste,
your love has blossomed among us, but we have been slow to set fruit

Most loving God, please open the furrows of our lives to receive again the seeds of your Gospel. Rain your mercy upon us, shine your warmth and light into every dark place, and bring forth in us not the harvest we deserve but the harvest that in your glorious love you have destined for us. Through Christ Jesus our Savior. Amen!

Assurance of Pardon

Listen, to this Word:

“Where sin abounds, love much more abounds.”

Receive from such abundance and give thanks. You, my siblings, are among the richest people in the world. You have the wealth of Christ with you always, even to the end of time.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

Adapted from Bruce Prewer, “Confession and Assurance,” http://www.bruceprewer.com/DocA/44SUN15.htm. Adapted with permission of the author.

Benediction

Beloved, remember: you are dirt. May you go forth and receive the Gardener’s tending so that we may all become good soil ready to receive, nurture, and grow the seed of the gospel wherever we go. Amen.

Written by Dr. Lisa Hancock, Discipleship Ministries, January 2023.