Welcome
Welcome to our service from Craigmillar Park and Reid Memorial churches in Edinburgh. As we look forward to the coming day, and further relaxations of restrictions around the pandemic, we reflect on how it may have affected us and how we may find the resources to move forward.

Call to Worship (from Psalm 34: 1-3)
I will bless the Lord at all times;
his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
My soul makes its boast in the Lord;
let the humble hear and be glad.
O magnify the Lord with me,
and let us exalt his name together.

HYMN 43 O God, you are my God alone (Ps 63)

(from Ballykeel Presbyterian Church)

Prayer

Loving God
You seek us out, and bring us together
that we may be Your people
and so come before You in worship.

We gather,
seeking Your presence,
coming in search of hope
and promise.

As King of Kings,
and Bread of Life,
come to us now
that we may rejoice in Your presence.

Cleanse our hearts from all hurt.
Renew our minds with hope and creativity
that we may serve You this day
and lift high Your Holy Name.

Restore us that we may be transformed;
transform us that we may be renewed.
In newness of life may we bring hope,
and offer wholeness to Your world.

Lord’s Prayer:
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.

Scriptures

1 Kings 19:4-8
But he (Elijah) himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die: ‘It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.’ Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, ‘Get up and eat.’ He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, ‘Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.’ He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food for forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.

John 6:35; 41-51
Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

Then the Jews began to complain about him because he said, ‘I am the bread that came down from heaven.’ They were saying, ‘Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, “I have come down from heaven”?’ Jesus answered them, ‘Do not complain among yourselves. No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; and I will raise that person up on the last day. It is written in the prophets, “And they shall all be taught by God.” Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. Very truly, I tell you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live for ever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.’

HYMN 251 I the Lord of sea and sky

(from St. Andrew’s Metropolitan Cathedral, Glasgow)

Reflection

Tomorrow sees a further relaxation of the restrictions we have been experiencing around the current pandemic. For some it will feel like a time of freedom; for others it may come as a relief. For all of us, though, there is likely to be a sense of weariness after almost eighteen months. In today’s reading from I Kings we find the prophet Elijah feeling both weary and dejected after living in difficult times. It is a passage that has something to say to us as we move forward.
We encounter Elijah between two extraordinary events in his life. He has not long defeated the prophets of Baal atop Mount Carmel; soon he would encounter the still, small voice of God on Mount Horeb. Between these great spiritual highs, he must first go through a time of both challenge and refreshing. Jezebel’s threats against him cause his flight in terror, deserting his homeland, and giving up the ministry to which he had been called by God. For those of us prone to swinging between spiritual highs and lows, the knowledge that a great servant of God experienced this may prove reassuring.

The response of God in sending an angel with food and drink is both gracious and compassionate. It reminds us of the reality of the presence of God sustaining us, even in the darkest times, when we may feel alone and abandoned. In his despair Elijah is comforted by God and prepared for the journey ahead to where he will meet the Almighty in a new way. There, the nourishment he receives from heaven enables him to journey to Horeb, where he will encounter the still, small voice of God and be commissioned once again for God’s work. There is a link, here, between being nourished by God and growing in acceptance of His will. We see it, too, in today’s Gospel reading. In both stories we find encouragement to seek sustenance from God when things are challenging.

‘I am the bread of life’ is the first of the seven famous ‘I am’ sayings of Jesus in the Gospel of John. These are sayings which make significant claims about the relationship of Jesus to God, and that bring into sharp focus the implications of accepting or rejecting his message. As the bread of life, Jesus is the one who nourishes us, the one on whom we are to depend for life everlasting.

Note what Jesus says about this offer of divine love and sustenance. On the one hand, the offer is made to those whom God chooses. It is about His grace and mercy; it is not about genealogy, birth right, or history. On the other hand, this is balanced by the stress on our responsibility to come to God through Christ. In other words, there is an element of free will. God chooses us and calls us to come to him. The initiative is His, yet we must still freely respond to that gracious call.

Understanding the relationship between the sovereign will of God, and free human response is not easy; it has been the subject of theological debate throughout the history of the church. We are not left alone, as Jesus offers us help; He recalls the prophecy of Isaiah that when God restores Jerusalem, ‘they will all be taught by God’. That promise is then applied to the new community which trusts in Jesus, the church. Through the indwelling Spirit, God teaches us and gives us insight so that our will becomes more attuned to His. The sovereign will of God and our free response working together in harmony.

In scripture it is the coming together of the human and the Divine that makes the difference. When things are hard or difficult, we are to use our God-given gifts to get through, yet we are also reminded today that we are, first and foremost, to rely upon God. In relying upon God, Elijah is refreshed and prepared for the journey ahead. In Jesus we find the bread of life as both gift and giver. As we come out of the challenge of pandemic and face the challenge of the restructuring of the Kirk we need, more than ever, to rely on that life-giving bread. For He is the bread of heaven, the very life everlasting that will see us through.
Amen.

Prayers for the World:

Jesus said to them: ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.’ (John 6.35).

Lord Jesus, You are the Bread of Life.
Remind us this day,
of the world for which You died.
Lead us this day,
that we may bring healing in Your name.

Bread of life, given for the world this day:
Lord, hear our prayer.

For the nations in turmoil:
Lord, hear our prayer

For our warming planet:
Lord, hear our prayer.

For our cities and neighbourhoods:
Lord, hear our prayer.

For our neighbours in sorrow:
Lord, hear our prayer.

For our suffering sisters and brothers:
Lord, hear our prayer.

For all the households represented here today:
Lord, hear our prayer.

Bread of Life, Giver of Life;
hear our prayer.
Amen.

HYMN 167 Guide me O thou great Jehovah

(Note that the last verse is in the original Welsh)

Benediction

Go from this time and place
in the ways of the One who gives us life.
And as you go,
may the blessing of God Almighty,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
go with you
now and always.
Amen.

Acknowledgements:
Bible Quotations taken from: New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition, copyright © 1989, 1995 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

English translations of The Lord’s Prayer, © 1998, English Language Liturgical Consultation (ELLC), and used by permission. www.englishtexts.org