Week of Prayer for Christian Unity
Sunday, January 20, 2002 - Membership Sunday
In today’s passages we see God entrusting important news to the frailest of means – human beings. It is through the witness of the shattered nation of Israel, the quarrelling community in Corinth, and the curious disciples of John that news of God’s saving purpose is shared with the world. What good news is God communicating through us?
If you would like to stay seated for any or all of the “standing” parts of the service, please feel free to do so.
Prelude
A time of silent preparation—Lighting the Christ Candle
Call to Worship (Responsive)
One: Wait patiently for God.
All: Here we are, God. Hear us.
One: God sets our feet upon a rock and makes our steps secure.
All: Here we are, God. Guide us.
One: God puts a new song in our mouths.
All: Here we are, God. Accept our praise.
One: God’s deeds are wondrous. We put our trust in God.
All: Here we are, God. Fill us with your love.
One: Let us continue to pray
All: God of winter cold and delightful warm spells, we give you thanks for pure white snow and running water, for clear bright skies and the promise of new life. May this house be like a winter thaw in our busy hectic, and worried lives. May we hear a new word for our ever-changing and uncertain lives. Amen.
Junior Choir Anthem “Rejoice in the Lord Always” Traditional, anon.
Time with the Young & the young at heart
The Sunday School & Youth leave for their classes.
We Remain in God’s Presence Through Confession
One: God’s steadfast love and faithfulness surround us. In the safety and certainty of that love, let us confess.
All: Loving God, we confess today that we often put our trust in others rather than in you. We miss opportunities to serve you because we’re just too busy. We miss opportunities to help others, because our own needs have come first. We surround ourselves with so many worries that we become stuck. We fear failure. We fear getting hurt or embarrassing ourselves, so we don’t speak up or act when we should. Faithful God, we know we can trust in you. Forgive us our failures and mistakes and help us move on in your way. Help us delight to do your will…(Silent confession) Amen.
One: God does not withhold God’s mercy from us; God’s steadfast love and faithfulness will keep us safe forever.
All: Thanks be to God for setting our feet upon a rock and keeping our steps secure.
Reception of New Members By Transfer
& Reaffirmation of Faith
Alice Brehmer, Chair of Visitation & Membership: We now welcome into this congregation persons who have already been members of the United Church of Canada and have served within other congregations.
I, therefore, present to you: Anne Bruins, Gordon Bruins, Ray James Yanke and Emma Nelson-Yanke so that they may be received into this congregation.
James: I ask you, therefore, before God and these people, do you profess anew your faith in God who has created you, in Jesus Christ the Word made flesh, and in the Holy Spirit, your Teacher and Guide?
Answer: I do.
James: Do you declare your intention to join with the people of Westminster United Church as we seek the presence of God among us through study and prayer; and do you now express your hope to enter into the life and work of this church as you support it with your gifts and share in its mission to all people?
Answer: I do, God being my helper.
James: Let us rise to receive these new members. (Congregation stands)
Cong: In the name of Jesus Christ we welcome you to the privileges and responsibilities of membership in this congregation. Be among us as eager participants in worship, join with us as seekers after truth and walk with us as co-workers in the struggle for the kingdom of God.
All: As God has called us, we pledge to you our friendship,
our help and our prayers.
One: God who makes all things new, affirming your promises and renewing our hopes, we give thanks for Anne Bruins, Gordon Bruins, Ray James Yanke and Emma Nelson-Yanke, who have been moved this day to declare again the faith that stirs within them. Give us all a renewed vision of your purposes and use our strengths and our weaknesses as our gift to you. For the promise of the gift of peace that we meet in your presence we give you thanks and praise through Christ who makes us one. Amen.
We are not alone,
we live in God’s world.
We believe in God:
who has created and is creating,
who has come in Jesus, the Word made flesh,
to reconcile and make new,
who works in us and others by the Spirit.
We trust in God.
We are called to be the Church:
to celebrate God’s presence,
to live with respect in Creation,
to love and serve others,
to seek justice and resist evil,
to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen, our judge and our hope.
In life, in death, in life beyond death,
God is with us.
We are not alone.
Thanks be to God.
Biblical Notes
1 Corinthians 1:1-9 From the Epistle Pg. 206
Called by a faithful God into fellowship
Hymn #415 “God, We Praise You for the Morning”
Come and see (Read from the New Revised Standard Version)
One: This is the Good News of Jesus Christ
dialogue with Mary WallaceJames: Mary Wallace, would you please join me in front of the communion table……………………..and welcome. I asked Mary to participate in our service today, and so to do that I thought if I were to ask a few questions and hear some responses it would be a way to allow that to happen. So, on that note……Mary, I wonder if you could tell us when you became a member of this congregation?
Mary: I became a member on Dec 10th, 1914 when I was baptized by Rev Watt. I have my enrolment certificate, I will show it. Yes, Reverend Watt performed that. I want to name a number of the people in the congregation at that time. We sat along the left hand side, the LePages and the Hewitts. Mr. Lepage and Mr. Hewitt were treasurers of the church (took turns) and when my father brought the collection home he would let me watch him count it. Every now and then, there would be a paper money like a dollar, only smaller, and it turned out to be a shin plaster, worth twenty five cents, does anybody remember a shin plaster? When I managed to get four of them, I had a dollar and I thought that I was very very wealthy.
Along that same line behind, there were the Wallaces. And later on I married Stewart Wallace and we sat in the same seat and when we had three children, we also sat in the same seat. Behind us were the Jamiesons (I’ve got a list of them here) and the Putnams, Elders, Laytons, C.B., (these are people of the church) Gail Havard, Charlton, Williams, Miln, Luyton, including David, Tufford, Mulholland, Flath, the two girls sat with us, their mother was in the choir Scarlett and Shand, Bagshaw Rolo Nicholson, Jardine, Sept, Aitken, Flo MacLeod Dale and Mary MacLeod Deering. Mrs Singular (Sinclair) and the Church’s, Nimmo, Marg Morris, Reg Johnston, Anderson, Sutherland, Harris, Jim & Ray, Winnie Dale, Marr, Phillips, Scotts, Kents, Jessie and J.C. and Wyman. And the music at that time, Marion Shand has helped me with that. Mrs Novak, Dallas, Havard, Pedersen, Olmstead, Shand, Angle, Carol Kohls Pols. Other musicians included Mrs. Dr. Elder, who played organ for a while. Also, Betty Roach, organist, and choir leaders, Eileen McRae and Dorothy Jones. In connection with that side, I’d like to say that the young boys occasionally rolled their money down the aisle and it went “clank, clank, clank” down the furnace grate and the minister was very stern about that.
I have been here through the ministries of all the ministers, I will name them: Rev. Watt, McLeod, Cann, Layton, Kay, Bell, MacKay, Thompson, Warden, Reids, Farrell. Filling in Grottenberg & Bayne.
The early church had no hall, so dinners were held in the Twaite’s Hall – downtown. Much like we have now, but these were prepared at home and kept warm on a stove down at the Twaite’s Hall. Then a building from the airport was moved by the hall after the war. Dinners and Sunday School held in the hall. The new church, no hall up first, meetings were held in the basement until the old church was moved over to the hall. The UCW that year had a project suggested by Elsie Czember to make booties to make money instead of the tea. So we made 12000 booties that were assembled on a little Styrofoam plate and a blue ribbon and pink ribbon and a glass in each bootie sold to the florist to be given to new moms. That was before the church hall was moved over as the hall. My father had provided the first bible to the church in memory of his mother, Eliza Jane Cruickshank, later after the new church was built someone bought a new bible, they replaced mine and gave it to me, but after a while, I thought it should be kept in the archives. So it was in a small room at the back of the hall, and in the fire and destroyed.
James: So it lived in the area that was destroyed by the fire?
Mary: This window was important in the old church, it shone the light from the east. When it was moved around as the hall to the other facing west and when the fire happened, the panes went out, but the solid wood remained and I asked Jim Harris if he would restore it, which he did, and now it is part of our heritage.
James: And you can see it at any time in the Lounge on your way to the Memorial Hall and it sits up in a little area that I refer to as the sacred corner, and I mean that. The items that are there are part of our sacred history and this sits on top of a cabinet in there and at Christmas, it is lit up . One of the things that I brought and set at the table is this baptismal font says on it “Westminster 1914”. And I believe that the water that would have been in here would have been the water that baptised Mary in 1914. and we keep it as part of our heritage, it’s now been integrated into our new baptismal font and sits within the enclosure of the maple wood one that you see, but it’s a continuum, a piece of our old history, connected with the new creation of the new baptismal font which happened in 1998.
Mary, I wanted to ask you also, and you’ve shared a number of pieces but what do you remember as particular highlights of your life here in Westminster, and I know you’ve already shared some?
Mary: Well I think being
in the UCW was probably the biggest part of my life that I shared. Everything
from... I think we started our unit in 1941 I was married in 1941 and the
ladies suggested that we start a unit, which we did. Later on that unit was
renamed after my mother, the Edythe Hewitt Unit. So we participated in all the
teas and the dinners and our cookie bakes for church teas until the last few
years I haven’t been that active. I did serve on the board of the church at one
time and my husband served on the board and on the pledge drives for money. I
think it’s been part of my life from the very beginning and I have a bible here
for perfect attendance in 1926 which Dr. McLeod (he became Dr. McLeod) signed
and this is very very old.
James: 1926 is just a little bit older than my mother actually. You’ve shared with us some of the ways that you’ve served the congregation. Were there other ways that you’ve served the congregation that you wanted to mention?
Mary: Well, I think it was just mainly through the UCW. I was on the board one year, but mostly it was through the UCW that whatever they were doing we were part of
James: And how do you feel that the congregation has been of service to you over the years?
Mary: Well, it’s been a background and a help whenever I needed it. Which at many times I have. So I think it was always there. I don’t know that many people now mostly our UCW but we still come and are befriended by everybody. It’s been a good life in the church.
James: That’s wonderful, and of course, I am sure there are people wondering, why Mary? Why now? Well, Mary leaves us shortly and so where are you off to at this time in your life and in your faith journey?
Mary: I’m going to a Canmore Senior Lodge which is nicely located and I can walk to my other son and family, or I can walk downtown. And so that makes it very easy compared to here where it’s far to go to any shopping or anything. So I think I’ll be very happy there. I’ll miss my family here of course. Very much so...
James: It dawned on me when I was informed that Mary would be leaving that this little conversation that we have is an opportunity that will never be replaced, there is no one else who has had a lineage of history in constant connection with Westminster for as long as Mary has. I really feel quite privileged to have this opportunity. It’s surprising to me that I could hold a baptismal font that says Dedicated to Westminster United Church, well, it wasn’t United Church at that time, it was Presbyterian – Westminster Presbyterian in 1914 and actually speak with somebody that was one of the first children baptized using that silver font. So, it truly is a privilege and I promised Mary that I wouldn’t embarrass her with too many questions and so in honour of that commitment I would like to thank Mary for being kind enough in sharing with us her reflections on her connections with Westminster United and I think it’s appropriate that we share with her our appreciation of her kindness in taking the time to do that with us.
God for your presence that has accompanied Mary these past 87 years, and all of us we give you thanks. We pray for the warmth of heart that will allow us to experience you in each other on a daily basis as we weave through our lives within this congregation and throughout the faith journey that is life. Amen.
Hymn #348 “O Love, How Deep”
We Respond In Giving And Gratitude
Hymn #424 “May the God of Hope Go With Us”
As we go forth from this place, we go in the strength and love of God who is faithful to us this day and every day. Give thanks to God. Grace and peace from God the Creator goes with us.
Choral Amen
#298 “When You Walk From Here”
When you walk from here, when you walk from here. Walk with justice, walk with mercy, and with God’s humble care.
Postlude
Thought For Today
If you can have just a little fun today, it's a sign that maybe the future will hold even more fun for you.
Fun isn't just fun, it's hope. by Linda Richman