The Way of Peace - Worship Resources

Opening words

One of the little routines we have at my house is that the children like me to sing from the hymnal after they're tucked into bed. In recent months we had gotten out of this routine, but shortly after Sept. 11 my children asked me to sing again. And so that night I sang a dozen, maybe two dozen numbers out of the hymnal, many of them from the sections called "praying for health and healing," and "praying for the world." I sang songs of lament and songs of hope.
This morning, let us sing and read from the hymnal, weaving together music and words that move us toward hope. Please pray with me:

Prayer

756

Hymn
Come, ye disconsolate
497

Sunday was World Communion Sunday. On a day normally set aside to celebrate Christian unity around the world, I stepped out of Sunday school and learned that the US had begun bombing Afghanistan. Our first hymn this morning begins with our anguish and concludes with words of love feast and communion.

Responsive reading

697

Hymn
O healing river
372

Responsive reading
Micah 4:1-4
833

Hymn
Where cross the crowded ways of life
(stanzas 1, 2, 5, 6)
405

Responsive reading

733

(Women read lightface type; men read bold.)
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.
O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled, as to console,
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.

Hymn
My life flows on
580

Affirmation of faith and hope

711

Benediction

Earth has no sorrows that Heaven cannot heal.
This is our faith.
This is our hope.
Go and make peace. Amen.

This service was prepared by Wendy McFadden, publisher of Brethren Press, for chapel at the Church of the Brethren General Offices, Oct. 10, 2001. Hymns and worship resources come from Hymnal: A Worship Book.


By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace. Luke 1: 78-79

Responsive reading		733
	(Women read lightface type; men read bold.) Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console, to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; *it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.*

Benediction
	Earth has no sorrows that Heaven cannot heal. This is our faith. This is our hope. Go and make peace. Amen.