We held virtual worship on Sunday, April 5, 2020. You can watch above or on Facebook by following this link.
Quote for Reflection:
You’re coming into town on your donkey tonight
You’re coming into town on your donkey
It will permeate across the ages
And you’re wearing your garland
You’re coming into town on your donkey tonight
But you’ll be going out on a cross
Rickie Lee Jones
Donkey Ride
Sermon on Exposition Boulevard
CALL TO WORSHIP
“Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.’”
My heart, my time
my prayer, my imagination,
my faith, my doubt—
The Master needs them!
My thoughts, my voice,
the way I treat strangers,
The Master needs them!
Christ needs our presence
where there is hurt.
Christ needs our risk
in loving those who are hard to love,
our vulnerability in caring for what is heartbreaking,
our hope in the dawn long before dawn.
Christ needs us to convey him into the city,
to bear him into people’s hearts.
Each of us, donkey-plain,
ordinary and waiting,
we are what Christ needs!
Listen:
We have been called!
We have been untied!
The Master needs us!
OPENING TO GOD Roger Dodge
On the outskirts of Jerusalem
the donkey waited.
Not especially brave, or filled with understanding,
he stood and waited.
How horses, turned out into the meadow,
leap with delight!
How doves, released from their cages,
clatter away, splashed with sunlight.
But the donkey, tied to a tree as usual, waited.
Then he let himself be led away.
Then he let the stranger mount.
Never had he seen such crowds!
And I wonder if he at all imagined what was to happen.
Still, he was what he had always been: small, dark, obedient.
I hope, finally, he felt brave.
I hope, finally, he loved the man
who rode so lightly upon him,
as he lifted one dusty hoof and stepped, as he had to, forward.
Mary Oliver
GOSPEL Mark 11:1-11 Debbie Yacovone
When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples and said to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.’”
They went away and found a colt tied near a door, outside in the street. As they were untying it, some of the bystanders said to them, “What are you doing, untying the colt?” They told them what Jesus had said; and they allowed them to take it.
Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it; and he sat on it. Many people spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut in the fields. Then those who went ahead and those who followed were shouting,
Hosanna!
Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!
Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!
Hosanna in the highest heaven!
Then he entered Jerusalem and went into the temple; and when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve.
REFLECTION That Ain’t News!
MUSIC Hosannah, Loud Hosanna Kathryn Parker
June Packard
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
THE LORD’S PRAYER
COMMUNION
BENEDICTION
RESPONSE Go to Dark Gethsemane UMH 290
Go to dark Gethsemane, ye that feel the tempter’s power;
your Redeemer’s conflict see, watch with him one bitter hour.
Turn not from his griefs away; learn of Jesus Christ to pray.
BIRTHDAYS
6 Apr Kathryn Parker
10 Apr Lamar Sanders
10 Apr Donna Holmes
