8 November 2022 – Chapel – Drew Theo Chapel

Gathering Music

“Who You Are” – Words: Lindy Thompson, Music: Mark Miller

Call to Worship

Ren Aguila

Where are you, the God of seeing?

Chaos clamors and politicians promise

Promises of better days

Filled with a false sense of security

Guarded by systems that cause only harm.

As we proudly exclaim, “In God we Trust!”

Where are you, the God of seeing?

As ballots are cast and kingdoms are affirmed

When we pray your will be done

Yet it is the will of profit over people

That builds walls and military might

And we sigh behind the voting machine

Where are you, the God of seeing?

God is in the hearing of silenced voices

God is in the seeing of broken bodies

God is in the hands that vote the common good

God is in the feet that take action after prayer

God is in the heart that remembers

All: Our hope, our strength, our survival is found at the well of the Living One who sees me. Amid all things and in all days, may we do the hard work with God – hearing, seeing, working, moving, believing.

Opening Song

“El Shaddai”

El shaddai, el shaddai
El-elyon na adonia
Age to age You’re still the same
By the power of the name
El shaddai, el shaddai
Erkamka na adonai
We will praise and lift You high
El shaddai

Through Your love and through the ram
You saved the son of Abraham
Through the power of Your hand
Turned the sea into dry land
To the outcast on her knees
You were the God who really sees
And by Your might
You set Your children free

El shaddai, el shaddai
El-elyon na adonia
Age to age You’re still the same
By the power of the name
El shaddai, el shaddai
Erkamka na adonai
We will praise and lift You high
El shaddai

Scripture Reading – Genesis 16

Sam Smith

16Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, bore him no children. She had an Egyptian slave-girl whose name was Hagar, 2and Sarai said to Abram, ‘You see that the Lord has prevented me from bearing children; go in to my slave-girl; it may be that I shall obtain children by her.’ And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. 3So, after Abram had lived for ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her slave-girl, and gave her to her husband Abram as a wife. 4He went in to Hagar, and she conceived; and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress. 5Then Sarai said to Abram, ‘May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my slave-girl to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me!’ 6But Abram said to Sarai, ‘Your slave-girl is in your power; do to her as you please.’ Then Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she ran away from her.

7 The angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur. 8And he said, ‘Hagar, slave-girl of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?’ She said, ‘I am running away from my mistress Sarai.’ 9The angel of the Lord said to her, ‘Return to your mistress, and submit to her.’ 10The angel of the Lord also said to her, ‘I will so greatly multiply your offspring that they cannot be counted for multitude.’ 11And the angel of the Lord said to her,
‘Now you have conceived and shall bear a son;
you shall call him Ishmael,
for the Lord has given heed to your affliction.
12 He shall be a wild ass of a man,
with his hand against everyone,
and everyone’s hand against him;
and he shall live at odds with all his kin.’
13So she named the Lord who spoke to her, ‘You are El-roi’; for she said, ‘Have I really seen God and remained alive after seeing him?’ 14Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; it lies between Kadesh and Bered.

15 Hagar bore Abram a son; and Abram named his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael. 16Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore him Ishmael.

Leader: The Word of God for the people of God.
All: Thanks be to God.