Sunday 15 June 2025
Trinity Sunday
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
Romans 5: 1 – 5
John 16: 12 – 15
Praise – All you that pass by
Prayers
Loving God, Your glory fills the whole earth. When we look at the skies, the stars, the moon, we see Your power and beauty. In the infinite expanse of the universe, You care for us, so infinitely small.
You care about the things that trouble us.
You care about our families and our situations. You welcome us into Your presence, and we are thankful to be here to worship You today.
Help us to lay aside anything that hinders us from knowing You, and focus our minds on Jesus.
Forgive us Lord where we have failed to love You, where we have failed to love others as You love them.
Thank You that through the death of Jesus on the cross You have paid the price for our sins.
Thank You, Lord, for the gift of life and this world You created. You made us with love and gave each one of us a special place in Your world. You never leave us and You remain so very close to us.
Here in this place of worship we receive of you, we rejoice in the offering of your life for us, your rising from death to eternal life, we praise you for sending the Holy Spirit to be with us forever. There is no offering we can make that compares to all you have offered to us, yet what we bring to you now in our worship and devotions, in the offering of our resources and talents is an offering we make from gratitude deep in our hearts. With all we have and all that we are we worship you.
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
Other than being Father’s Day, it is Trinity Sunday. The day in the Christian Calendar that preachers dread. The day that leaves everyone confused; including sometimes, the preacher. Just how do we explain the inexplicable? How do we open up the mystery of God and yet leave mystery intact? Maybe we are simply not meant to understand everything about God. Goodness me, we don’t understand everything about humanity why do we think we should understand everything about the God who created us? Yet, it is in our nature to enquire, to seek, to explore. It is in our nature to desire relationship and without enquiring and exploring we will never know if we want that relationship or not.
In the last couple of weeks, we’ve heard passages from John’s gospel that are complex to say the least; complex to read and even more complex to take in if you are simply listening. “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” says Jesus. “I am in the Father and the Father in is me. Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. You will know that I am in the Father and you are in me, just as I am in you.”
Maybe even Jesus finds it hard to put into words! Just how do you describe a relationship so close, so intense, so perfect other than to say they are as one, indivisible. They think alike, act alike, speak alike. And maybe just as importantly there are no barriers in that relationship, no hurts, no faults, no failings that cause either the Father or the Son to hold back, be cautious, or give reason not to trust each other. It is as if that relationship has a life of its own; so much so that Jesus referred to it as the Holy Spirit; like a third person that is the relationship between Father and Son.
Honestly, we do that sort of thing all the time… talking about relationship as if it had an identity and life all of its own. “The folk next door… they’ve got a bit of a strange relationship!” we are not describing the people as strange; it’s the relationship that is strange. Relationship that is invisible, intangible, inaudible, yet clearly exists.
When people come together in places like church, where we begin to be open to each other, trust each other, know each other, we don’t just form friendships, we create relationship which at it’s very heart is spiritual. Within a gathering like this we might identify smaller groups who spend more time together but there is something greater, broader and deeper going on that holds us all together. Call it communityif you wish but at its heart it is spiritual. It takes on a life of its own, its own character, it has its own invisible, intangible, inaudible, life of its own. This is the presence of God, this is the presence of the Holy Spirit.
Of course, we are not going to say that the relationship that exists here is as perfect and indivisible as that enjoyed by the Father and the Son. We have a way of building barriers to relationship with each other and with God. Let’s call that Sin.
In the Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we are invited to explore and enter into a relationship that knows only love, and to allow that relationship with Father and Son to change the way we enjoy and share in relationships with each other and with God. If we can open ourselves to that perfect love, that perfect relationship, the Holy Spirit, we can begin to be all that God created us to be. AMEN
Praise – King of my heart
Prayers for Others
“What are humans that You are mindful of them,
mortals that You care for them?” (Psalm 8:4)
Loving God, You are our maker, our redeemer and our sustainer. You care for all living things, and Your wisdom surpasses anything that we can understand or create ourselves. In our making and creating, may we be inspired by Your Spirit –
that all we make may be filled with grace and mercy, that everything we build may be life-giving and just, that all we offer to others, may be good and true.
God of love, You have poured Your love into our hearts.
May we be filled to overflowing and in compassion and generosity, share Your love with all. Lord God, in our afflictions will You tend us, Your children, that we may not simply endure, but know life in all its fulness. We hold before You now,
all who are hurting, all who are afraid, all who have had their dignity torn and infringed, all who have no access to the means they need to live safely and without persecution. God in Your grace and mercy, hear our prayers…
God of peace, You have poured Your peace into our hearts. May we be filled to overflowing and in compassion and generosity, share Your peace with all. Lord God, in our conflicts and clashes, will You reconcile us, that we may not only know peace, but be peace makers. We hold before You now, all of our struggles and opposition, all of the violence in this world, all who are oppressed or victims to war or exploitation. Hear our prayers for all Your children…
God of hope, You have poured Your hope into our hearts. May we be filled to overflowing and in compassion and generosity, share Your hope with all. Lord God, in all that we long for, may we know Your Spirit guiding us that we may work for Your kingdom to come and Your will be done on earth as in heaven.
God in Your grace and mercy, hear our prayers for all Your children…
Trinity of love, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, may You be glorified in all that we say and do. AMEN
Praise – Glory be to God the Father
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.