The sermon should say in words from the texts the same thing the bread and cup say in sign: “the body and blood of Christ, given and shed for you. Take. Eat. Drink. Believe. Live.”
Gordon Lathrop, The Pastor, p. 47
LitBit: In worship, we speak to God in a direct way, in praise and adoration, intercession and thanksgiving, confession and lament. It is the primary speech of the community to God, rather than speech about God, the secondary speech of reflection and discussion. It is also God’s speech to us – for example, in the word of grace at the declaration of forgiveness, in the proclamation of the Scriptures, in the blessing that rings in our ears as we leave. …the speech of worship is nonverbal as well as verbal, including such things as gesture and movement, colour and sacrament, silence and music. Uniting in Worship 2
LitBit: When we cross the threshold into a service of worship, we bring with us the concerns and joys of our lives. In other words, we bring the concerns and joys of the mission field in which we live. The Sunday service does not provide ‘time out’ from our daily mission; liturgy and mission are integrally related. The word ‘liturgy’ (in Greek, leitourgia) literally means ‘the work of the people’; yet it is primarily the work of God, in which God graciously enables us to participate. It is our graced response to God’s gracious acts; through it we are brought into relationship with the triune God, and we offer worship as the body of Christ, in the Holy Spirit.
Uniting in Worship 2
Bread and forgiveness, the matters alive at the centre of the Lord’s Prayer, are “practices.” They involve us in enacting the things that we believe God is doing. That enacting is first of all ritual, communal, repetitive: in the prayer itself, but also in ritual acts of mutual forgiveness and in the ritual meal. But then our hearts and lives are invited to follow—in forgiving others, in exercising hospitality at all of our meals, in sending “portions …to those for whom nothing is prepared,” as Nehemiah 8:10 has it. Such practices are nondistancing, nondistinguishing. They still do not separate us from the rest of humanity, the condition of which the prayer so eloquently articulates. On the contrary. They connect us, in bread and forgiveness.
From Gordon Lathrop, The pastor: a spirituality, p.33f
LitBit: To say “peace be with you” is not to say hello but is to utter a prayer, so that the passing of the peace in church is in fact a practising of prayer, and a preparation for the serious work of praying for each other. We might, then, speak of the passing of the peace as a kind of sacrament of intercessory prayer.
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The setting of the table demonstrates first and foremost God’s offering to us: the gifts of bread and wine are the signs of God’s work for our salvation in Jesus Christ.
Uniting in Worship 2
The centrepiece of this part of the liturgy is The Great Prayer of Thanksgiving. The origins of this central Christian prayer lie in Jewish prayer at Passover and in the grace at every meal. Jesus built on these at the Last Supper. Our present sacrament also derives meaning from other meals hosted by Jesus – e.g. after the resurrection at Emmaus (Luke 24), or by the seashore (John 21). Its essence is thanksgiving for the mighty acts of God. It is a ‘Great’ Prayer because it is the expression of all the gifts of God for our salvation, above all in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Uniting in Worship 2
…the meal that we keep, in its intensity and focus, its staple food and festive drink, its ceremonial welcome of a wide circle, might suggest that we are consuming magical food, food of the angels, a heavenly banquet, food that will grant us immortality. Then we hear the content of the feast: “the body of Christ, the blood of Christ, given for you.” A specific, real death is proclaimed, and if “immortality” is given, then this is a new kind of freedom from death, coming in a world-affirming, bounded, palpable, and mortal way, here.
From Gordon Lathrop, The pastor: a spirituality, p.4
The basic baptismal paradoxes include these: here, in this bath, we are united with the weak and foolish One who is God’s very wisdom and strength; so, here we are put to death in order to live; here we are identified with the death of Christ in order to be raised with him; here our dry bones take on flesh and are made to breathe with the Spirit; here we are washed in a purity bath that makes us dirtier — that is, here we are joined to Christ who is joined with all the unclean ones of the world. For Christians, life in vocation always involves immersion in these paradoxes.
From Gordon Lathrop, The pastor: a spirituality, p.17
This saving Bath that joins us to the holy assembly is an act that identifies us with the crucified Jesus Christ and so with all those with whom he identifies: the little, neglected, oppressed, poor, dying, sinful, marginal ones of the world.
From Gordon Lathrop, The pastor: a spirituality, p.5