7/4/21 Love Will Guide Us by Rev. Eric Meter

Welcome
We gather this morning as best we can to restore both our sense of commitment as we face the world as it is
and inspiration to act in ways large and small that will foster better days for all. We are more when we are together: wiser, resilient, and more able.

Prelude

 

Chalice Lighting by Gordon B. McKeeman
We are called to worship —
not by words spoken,
but by miracles recalled:
a baby’s first cry,
the petals of a rose,
the templed hills,
the restless tides of the seas,
human love, human hope.
We respond with gratitude,
with joy,
with wonder at life’s boundless possibilities.

 

Hymn #131 Love Will Guide Us Olympia Brown UU Church Choir

 

Gesture of Friendship

 

Message for All Ages 

 

Children’s Blessing

 

Centering Words by Timothy D. Haley
Amid all the noise in our lives,
we take this moment to sit in silence —
to give thanks for another day,
to give thanks for all those in our lives
who have brought us warmth and love,
to give thanks for the gift of life.
Let us open ourselves, here, now,
to the process of becoming more whole –
of living more fully,
of giving and forgiving more freely,
of understanding more completely the
meaning of our lives here on this earth.

 

Time of Stillness and Reflection

 

Reading by the Rev. Dana Worsnop
Often people say that they love coming to a place with so many like-minded people.
I know just what they are getting at – and I know that they aren’t getting it quite right.
I don’t want to be with a bunch of people who think just like me.
I want to be in a beloved community where I don’t have to think like everyone else to be loved, to be eligible for salvation.
I want to be with people who value compassion, justice, love and truth, though they have different thoughts and opinions about all sorts of things.
I want to be with independent-minded people of good heart.
I want to be with people who have many names and no name at all for God.
I want to be with people who see in me goodness and dignity, who also see my failings and foibles, and who still love me.
I want to be with people who feel their inter-connection with all existence and let it guide their footfalls upon the earth.
I want to be with people who see life as a paradox and don’t always rush to resolve it.
I want to be with people who are willing to walk the tight rope that is life and who will hold my hand as I walk mine.
I want to be with people who let church call them into a different way of being in the world.
I want to be with people who support, encourage and even challenge each other to higher and more ethical living.
I want to be with people who inspire one another to follow the call of the spirit.
I want to be with people who covenant to be honest, engaged and kind, who strive to keep their promises and hold me to the promises I make.
I want to be with people who give of themselves, who share their hearts and minds and gifts.
I want to be with people who know that human community is often warm and generous, sometimes challenging and almost always a grand adventure.
In short, I want to be with people like you. What about you?

 

Reflection Love Will Guide Us by Rev. Eric Meter

 

Offering
The Olympia Brown Unitarian Universalist Church is a community of handsome generosity and beautiful abundance.
Especially now, in this challenging time, your generosity is what keeps this community as vital as it is, a beacon of respectful engagement and faith in the power of love.
Each month we share the generosity of our collection with a local partner. This month’s partner is The Holy Communion Food Pantry. The pantry is sponsored by Holy Communion Lutheran Church and supported by increasing support from the community. Here is the pantry’s director to tell us more:

 

Offertory Music Equestrian Dream- Philip Wesley

 

Benediction by Marge Piercy
Two people can keep each other
sane, can give support, conviction,
love, massage, hope.
Three people are a delegation,
a committee, a wedge. With four
you can play bridge and start
an organization. With six
you can rent a whole house,
eat pie for dinner with no
seconds, and hold a fundraising party.
A dozen makes a demonstration.
A hundred fill a hall.
A thousand have solidarity and your own newsletter;
ten thousand, power and your own paper;
a hundred thousand, your own media;
ten million your own country.
It goes on one at a time,
it starts when you care
to act, it starts when you do
it again after they said no,
it starts when you say We
And know who you mean, and each
day you mean one more.

 

Postlude