How To Do Worship

Sunday 9 FEB 2025

CALL TO WORSHIP

L: All: God calls women and men into relationship with God. God raises up women in every age to offer spiritual leadership.

Let us be grateful for the wisdom and the leadership of women.

L: From the beginning Eve in the Garden of Eden was called to care for creation and show us what it means to be human.

All:Let us be grateful for the wisdom and the leadership of women.

L: When we worship we need every voice to sing and to share God’s ground breaking love.

All: Let us be grateful for the wisdom and the leadership of women. Amen.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF COUNTRY –

L: The Cammeraygal people are the original custodians of the land on which our church stands. The Cammeraygals were spiritual leaders amongst the Indigenous clans of Sydney.

All: We pay our respects to their Elders: past and present. We commit to walking respectfully in this country, and to journeying with them in their quest for justice and reconciliation.

SONG – FOR THE FRUITS OF ALL CREATION

PRAYER OF CONFESSION – Alex

Dear God our Mother & Father, who is full of love and compassion, you formed us from the dust of the earth and breathed your image in us and you placed us in the garden of this world to live in harmony and bring peace into the world. But we failed and often we become the cause of conflicts and quarrels. Our God of compassion, we confess that we really did not celebrate the life of women number of times.

We, very often have caused or through inaction lead to damage to the lives of women and girls. Very often we are silent when our women face violence. Very often we succumb to the abusive culture of the society which is contradictory to the teaching of Jesus for Justice and wholeness for all.

We confess our sins before you Oh Lord our God of compassion. Forgive us Lord! Amen

ASSURANCE OF PARDON

L: Let us remember that we are spiritual beings having human experience! Therefore as spiritual beings, let us be reconciled to God and to people around us and experience the assurance of forgiveness.

All: Thanks be to God

SONG –

BIBLE READING – Genesis 2:4-9 15 – 23

MESSAGE

PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE –

Please join me in the prayers of the people. When I say Lord in Your mercy, you are invited to respond: Hear our prayer.

Lord in Your mercy , Hear our prayer

God who created us all in the divine image, we take a moment to offer our prayers for others. To put ourselves second and others first.

We pray and reflect on Eve. We repent of how Eve has been maligned throughout history. Blamed and seen as at fault. We pray for all women who have been unfairly blamed. For women whose stories and voices have not been heard. We pray that we would always remember your calling on us to see men and women as made in your image.

Lord in Your mercy, Hear our prayer

We give thanks that Eve was called to care for the Garden of Eden. She was along with Adam entrusted with a sacred calling to nurture the place of God’s presence.

We pray for all women in leadership. We pray for a church and a society that values women’s leadership.

Lord in Your mercy, Hear our prayer

We pray for all going through mental health struggles. We pray for all under stress.

Lord in Your mercy, Hear our prayer

We pray for our community. We pray for Neutral Bay and its surrounds. We pray for all the communities everyone here resides in. We affirm our calling to be a light in our communities and to tend and care for our communities just as

Eve was called to care for Eden. We ask these things as we pray the prayer that Jesus taught us in the language of our hearts.

Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us. Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil. For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and for ever. Amen.

OFFERING

BLESSING – Alex

L: All: Go now and find where God dwells. Discover your calling, like Eve to care for where God dwells. We go in peace to love and serve the Lord, In the name of Christ. Amen.

SONG – PRAISES TO GOD