Sunday 04 April 2025
3rd Sunday of Easter
Welcome!
We know not everyone who is part of Westwood Church is able to be in church on Sunday morning however, we thought it would be good to offer some excerpts from the Sunday morning service. Where we can, we offer parts of the service in text and audio, whichever works best for you. If you want to plug in headphones to your computer, tablet or mobile phone now is a good time to do it ! If you want to offer some comment or feedback just use the comment box at the end of this post.
Your Weekly Church Notices
Scripture
John 21: 1 – 19
Praise – I the Lord of sea and sky
Prayers
Loving God, Thank You for bringing us together today.
We’ve come from different places but we each carry our joys, worries, hopes, and questions to this place. We come to You with all that burdens us for you have promised to share our load. We lay everything we have and everything we are at your feet and open ourselves to You.
As we worship, remind us why we’re here – to lift up the name of Jesus, the Lamb who was slain, the One who gave everything so we could be made new. No one is like you; You alone are worthy of our praise, worthy of our trust, and worthy of our lives.
This day, teach us to be like you; a reflection of all you are. Renew our minds so we see the world through Your eyes, eyes of love and compassion, not hatred or division. Soften our hearts where they’ve grown hard. Shape our lives so that everything we do points back to Your grace and goodness.
As we sing, pray, and open ourselves to Your Word, move among us. Challenge us, comfort us, and change us. Make us more like Jesus in how we love, how we serve, and how we live each day.
Loving God, You know all there is to know about us, our deepest thoughts, desires, and passions are open to You. You know when we are being true to our calling and when we act to please others. Forgive us for when we have chosen the praise of others instead of listening to the still small voice calling us to higher things. Let our community be one which inspires others to walk with You, to dance with You, to eat with you as we discover together the joy of life lived in faith.
Then let this be our gift to you, our offering this day and every day, to live a life that pleases you, a life of joy and praise, a life of prayer and worship that speaks of Christ crucified and risen.
Hear us as we join in the words of the Lord’s Prayer saying…
Our Father who art in Heaven Hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, for thine is the Kingdom, the Power and the Glory forever. Amen.
Address
Gone Fishing is an expression I’ve heard often enough although it’s not one I’ve used myself basically cause I don’t go fishing. It wasn’t until I looked it up online that I found out it’s an expression associated with end of life. When someone has passed away, they’ve Gone Fishing.
Honestly, I thought Gone Fishing had more to do with just getting away from it all, taking time for yourself, chilling out away from the crowd, a quiet place to be by the water’s edge. Maybe that’s all the disciples went looking for when they went fishing. Goodness knows what emotions the appearance of the Risen Christ might have evoked in them. Just how do you resolve in yourself the experience of seeing someone risen from the dead, to see and touch the wounds that had led to their death yet know them to be alive. There was exhilaration and there was the come down afterward that left them emotionally wrung out. Just going fishing seemed like a good thing to do. And yes, they were of course fishermen, familiar activity brought normality, the ordinary, back into life after all the challenging emotions of the previous days.
Not that they had caught anything. Were they really expecting too? Were they all that bothered that their nets were empty? They were together, still living in the common bond of that experience of the Risen Christ. The only people they could talk to about witnessing the risen Jesus was each other and that’s all that mattered. They were together and they were in a quiet familiar place on Lake Tiberias, they had Gone Fishing.
And then something happened that was again familiar to them from the very first day Jesus called them. That day the Lord stood on the shores of Lake Gennesaret and after a fruitless night’s fishing told them to cast their nets to the other side of the boat … and the catch was enormous! Now on the waters of Lake Tiberias with words that echo that first call to follow him they instantly knew it was the Christ. Just like before, the nets were full to over flowing. 153 big fish and still the nets did not tear. It was a joyful moment that broke the silence, it broke into their sense of isolation and uncertainty. And it was ordinary. It was eating together like family round the dining table. Jesus breaking the bread and offering it to them; he did the same with the fish.
I cannot help but feel, and you may be the same, that there is something deeply meaningful about Jesus breaking the bread and the fish and offering it to his disciples. I can’t quite put my finger on it, I can’t quite explain why that simple action comes across as so meaningful, so poignant. It is such a simple everyday action, the kind of thing we do for each other all the time around the table sharing, serving, giving. Yet, when it is Jesus that shares, serves, gives, it takes on a whole new depth of meaning. A simple action in itself ordinary that becomes telling and moving and transcends the ordinary.
There are more echoes of past events when Jesus speaks with Peter. Three times Peter is asked if he loves Jesus, an echo of the three times that Peter denied Jesus at the time of his arrest. Three times that Peter states that he does love the Lord, each like an act of repentance.
I wonder how many times Jesus has come to us in the ordinary stuff of life? How many times he has drawn near or spoken to us through echoes of past experiences? How many times has he called to us in echoes of that first time he called us to be His disciples?
And why is it that we think God is distant because He is not filling our lives with miracles, signs and wonders? Why do we find is so hard to see him in the face of another as we pour tea and pass the milk? Christ is present in the ordinary; present in the echoes of life’s experiences and every one of those moments is an opportunity to tell Him that we love Him.
Praise – Look forward in faith
Prayers for Others
Pupils and exam time
Gracious Father in Heaven, we all know that in life we face times of pressure, times when we have to prove ourselves and show that we are able. Some respond to these times with confidence, some do not.
We all know that in life we can face times of failure, times when it feels like we have let ourselves down or let others down. Life is full of disappointments.
We remember in our prayers pupils who are now on study leave or in their exam time. It can be an exacting and anxious time for young people who are not always ready to face life’s pressures. We hold them before you in prayer that whatever comes, success or disappointment, they may know you are watching over them now and in the days to come. Lord hear us in our prayers for pupils in their exam time…
Christian Aid Week
Christian Aid committees prepare for another campaign highlighting the needs of others around the world. And we are glad to take the time to consider others whose needs are greater than our own in particular those of Guatemala who struggle to produce a living. But as we pray for them, we also realise that help and support is diminishing. US Aid is vastly reduced, aid from the UK is curtailed and even Christian Aid does not do as well on Christian Aid Week as once it did. We know Lord, that we who meet within the church do not have the resources to answers the world’s problems of poverty and justice but we can open our hearts to do and give as we can and pray that you might touch the hearts of many many others to do the same. We might not change everything but we can change something; for the better. Lord hear us in our prayers for the forthcoming Christian Aid Week…
General Assembly
Two weeks until the General Assembly gets under way. We anticipate painful news about finances and the future of congregations and ministry within the church. Even now, at this early stage, we offer our prayers for the decisions to be made at General Assembly. We pray for the new Moderator Rev Rosie Frew; we pray for compassion in decisions made that they might consider people not just finances. Where our own actions and decisions seem to accelerate decline help the church to reflect and find a new pathway that offers hope and encouragement. Lord hear us in our prayers for the upcoming General Assembly…
Praise – I want to walk with Jesus Christ
The Grace
And now… May the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Love of God and the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you and all whom you love, now and for evermore. AMEN.