Palm Sunday - Reflections for Sunday 5th April

Palm Sunday
Hello Cheviot Churches! I hope everyone is well and bearing up in these strange times. It is easy to lose track of time, but this is Palm Sunday and the start to Holy Week. Some notices:

• A second podcast is on the website, called (rather unimaginatively) ‘Palm Sunday’. We are still on a learning curve, and there are for some reason long silent pauses after the readings and the ‘reflection’, so please be patient – the podcast finishes with the benediction.
• Short reflections/ podcasts for each day in Holy Week will be posted on the website
• The Roots ‘Live your faith’ sheet can be accessed HERE
• Kelso Food Bank – there has been additional demand on the food bank, so please consider donating items via the basket/ boxes at the Co-op and Sainsbury’s. We are also devising a way in which people may donate money.
  
  

Call to Worship
We tell your story, we follow in your footsteps
Lead us into Holy Week
We walk towards the city, we wait in the garden
Lead us onto Holy Ground
We journey towards death,
we hope for resurrection
Lead us into holy joy
 
For those who wish to reflect on Palm Sunday hymns, the following are appropriate:
364 – All glory, laud and honour
365 – Ride on, ride on in majesty
366 – Come into the streets with me
367 – Hosanna, loud Hosanna
370 – Ride on, ride on the time is right
399 (v. 3) – My song is love unknown
 
Let us pray
Holy and gracious God, the same yesterday, today and forever, We draw into your presence at this strange time, when each day has a sense of sameness and when we continually try to motivate ourselves to get through each day. Help us to be still and know that you are God. (Pause)
   We see you in the new life all around us – in the lambs and calves in our fields, the shoots in our gardens and the blossom on our trees. We thank you for the gift of life, especially when our lives are being so challenged.
   Lead us through the trials and suffering, the fears and struggles, the tired times and hard dark places.
   Forgive our sins and transform us by your love. Transform us to grow and understand and see, that we can be made whole and in wholeness be your hands and heart in our communities and in our world, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who taught us when we pray to say:
Lord’s Prayer.

Readings - Psalm 118: 1-2, 19-29     
                  Matthew 21:1-11

Our weekly prayer from Arthur and Kathleen:
Father God, as we move into Holy Week we commend ourselves and all those whom we live amongst, for whom Christ suffered, to His mercy and protection especially at this time when the coronavirus I so virulent. We join with those long ago who proclaimed " Blessed is he comes in the name of Th​e Lord" as we worship JESUS "the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee", our Saviour and Lord.  Amen. 

Reflection
   Last Thursday evening people stood at their windows or outside their homes and clapped. We wanted to show our deep, heart-felt appreciation for the work of all the NHS workers, of all involved at the frontline of dealing with this coronavirus.
   When Jesus entered into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, no doubt some applauded. Others were maybe less inhibited and waved branches and called out, ‘Hosanna, Hosanna. Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord’. As a child I always loved Palm Sunday. There was always a party atmosphere in church. Palm Sunday is that kind of day.
   I was looking forward to my first Palm Sunday in Cheviot Churches. There had been a proposal that we walk around the churches in the parish -from Hownam to Morebattle to Linton to Hoselaw to Yetholm. It sounded quite daunting really, but I am sure there would have been much chat and good fellowship and even song. Certainly when I was in both Zambia and Israel/Palestine Palm Sunday meant joining with other denominations and processing through communities waving our palm branches – plenty of them in the church gardens there – and being a witness. Palm Sunday was tremendously strengthening. It was coming together, it was carnival time.

• This year – no gatherings of more than 2 people.
• This year – definitely no parties
• This year – no waving of palm branches, and even our palm crosses may have to wait till next year.
• This year Jerusalem will be a ghost town

    So will Jesus just give up on entering Jerusalem. No way! Our Palm Sunday may be simpler and quieter than we could ever have imagined even a few weeks ago, but the Son of God still comes to us. He won’t stop at the outskirts of town or the fringes of our lives, but comes to the centre, to where we are and to our needs, to where we are shaken and where fears assail us. He continues to come.
   And he continues to challenge us, just as he did on that first entry into the city. People were cheering, for Jesus was making a point – he was enacting a prophecy from Zechariah, performing it in a bit of street theatre, riding a donkey, just as Zechariah said the Messiah would do. Here was the Messiah, the people thought, come to rid the city of the hated Romans, come to bring freedom.
   But it was a different kind of freedom Jesus would bring, for he came, not to wield the sword, but as the prince of Peace. ‘Hosanna’, the people cried, It means Save us. And indeed Jesus came to save, but the people only wanted quick solutions, and so their cheers of Hosanna would turn into jeers of Crucify.
   Matthew ends his passage by asking the question Who is this man? As we enter Holy Week, who do we say Jesus is? It will be a hard week ahead, a week of denial, betrayal and death, but one that leads to the unstoppable new life God offers to us all. Amen
Let us pray
O Christ, you entered the city as a poor man
not in style but simply,
yet still you caused uproar, and questions everywhere;
you drew the expectations of a hungry crowd,
and brought buried conflicts to the light.
May we, who are sometimes swayed by the crowd's approval, and who often avoid conflict
for fear of its cost to us,
hold fast to the gospel of peace and justice
and follow faithfully in your way of compassion and solidarity with those who are poor and excluded,
wherever it may lead us. (Kathy Galloway)
 
Holy God, as we enter this most solemn week in the Christian year,
in these extraordinary times,
help us to lament with the psalmist.
As we are restricted in what we can do
and must worship in households rather than in church buildings,
help us to remember that the church is not closed –
for church is people not buildings.
We pray for all with whom we normally worship Sunday by Sunday…
God in your mercy,
hear our prayer.
Holy God, we pray for those in authority as they grapple with the unexpected.
Guide those who are giving the world’s leaders knowledge and expertise in these times.
Give wisdom and courage to all in leadership,
and when this is all over may humankind emerge strengthened.
God in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.
Holy God, as we hear and see the news
and exchange thoughts on social media,
help us to remember all those less fortunate than ourselves, among them:
those who are lonely,
those who are angry,
those who are distressed,
those who are at their wits end,
those who are struggling to get home,
those who cannot get the help they need…
God in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.
Holy God, we remember all those who are working to keep things going:
those working in the NHS and those around it helping to keep things working,
those keeping our streets clean and collecting our rubbish,
those harvesting, delivering and selling the food in our shops,
those keeping us secure and our utilities functioning,
those looking after the children of key workers,
those helping to care for the elderly and vulnerable,
clergy of all religions seeking to minister in difficult times…
God in your mercy,
Hear our prayer.
Holy God, we remember those who have died,
whether from Covid-19 or from other causes.
We pray for their families and friends
especially as they arrange funerals so different from what they expected.
We pray that they and we may come at the last to find peace in your presence.
God in your mercy,
Hear our prayer. Amen
(Dudley Coates – Methodist local Preacher)
 
Benediction
The God of Jesus Christ – who calls us to walk with him to face the principalities and powers, to live the values of the upside-down Kingdom, to work, to challenge, to suffer – be with you this Holy Week. Now and for evermore. Amen