GATHERING MUSIC

Hyerim Yu

CALL TO WORSHIP

Paola Márquez

Leader: Don’t beg.
All: My mother told me.
Leader: Don’t whine.
All: I tell my children.
Leader: Be polite.
All: The key to civil society.

Leader: The foreigner approached the rabbi.
All: Her need was great, her daughter ill,
Her desperation complete.

Leader: She begged.
All: She whined.
She was impolite.

Leader: Faith emboldened by need
All: Shouting.
Leader: Heard.
All: Healing.

Leader: Uppity faith and
All: Fiesty women
Leader: Annoyance rewarded.
All: Challenge inspiring.

HYMN OF PRAISE – Down by the Riverside

Negro Spiritual

I’m gonna lay down my burden
Down by the riverside…

I’m gonna lay down my sword & shield
Down by the riverside…

I’m gonna make peace with justice
Down by the riverside…

I Ain’t gonna study war no more…

PRAYER POEM

MaryBeth Doctor

O Most-Nourishing-One, if I asked you for bread,
would you hand me a stone?
I’d believe in the stone,
if it came from you!

Oh, God, where is the bread?
I’ve sat with open hands for hours.
Is my heart as open as my hands?
Or is this just an empty symbol,
devoid of meaning
devoid of reality?
Is my closed heart laughing at my open hands?

I hear the songs they sing in churches:
You satisfy the hungry with gift of finest wheat…
And I wonder, where is this gift of finest wheat?

Have I become the Canaanite woman to you, Lord?
Are you afraid to throw your bread to dogs,
to the unworthy
the blind
the outsiders?

Well then, I’ll put on her mind instead of yours.
I’ll wear her faith instead of your arrogance.
Even the dogs get the crumbs, Lord.

God, you cannot hide from me.
You cannot scare me with your face of absence.
I scare myself with this hunger for your presence.
I will break all rules to possess you.
To be nourished by you,
I would go to every table in the world.
I would leave no stone unturned to find you
lest when I turn it over
it be changed to bread.

I come looking for bread,
But if you’re saving it for your children,
don’t worry.
I’ll gather up the crumbs if you insist.
I’ll make a meal on leftovers
and rejoice that I have been so blessed.

O Most-Powerful-One
I feel so powerless
so little and so poor
so vulnerable
so terribly wide open
so seen.
It hurts to be so hungry
so dependent on your bits of grace.

Even the dogs get the crumbs, Lord
I’ll gather up the crumbs
and live.

SONG – “Welcome to God’s Love”

Words: Lindy Thompson, Music: Mark Miller

SCRIPTURE – Mark 7:24-30

Domingos Fernando

24 From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, 25but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. 26Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. 27He said to her, ‘Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.’ 28But she answered him, ‘Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.’ 29Then he said to her, ‘For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.’ 30So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

SERMON

Dr. Arthur Pressley

BLESSING

Dr. Pressley

SENDING FORTH SONG – “All My Days”

Words: Laurie Zelman Music: Mark Miller

Worship Notes: Call to Worship adapted from Liturgies Outside by Katherine Hawker.
Prayer/poem by Macrina Wiederkehr, from the A Place for Prayer/RevGalsBlogPals blog.