Introduction
Holy week includes the events from Palm Sunday through to the resurrection of Christ on Easter Sunday. “Keeping Holy Week” is much more than marking off the events that form the Easter story for the church. There’s a storytelling aspect that recounts the events for those in the church, but there is also an aspect of reminding or grounding the reality of the Easter experience and all that it can mean in the life of the ‘secular’ world. That is, the central story of Christianity is also a central story of human experience, and therefore has a place in the world both inside and outside the church. The events of holy week need to be experienced and ‘lived’ by us in the re-telling. The meaning of the events, and what they have made possible, needs to penetrate and pattern our life and faith. Rituals and services around Easter should facilitate emotional, participatory, and imaginative involvement with the whole redemption event .
The main days that are recognised in Holy Week are Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday. On Maundy Thursday, Jesus’ last supper with his disciples is commemorated. Good Friday centres around the death of Jesus. Some traditions use Saturday, particularly the evening, to hold vigils and watch for the dawning of the day of resurrection. Easter Sunday is a day of joyful celebration, affirming the raising of Jesus from the dead, and the significance of this for Christian hope.
Palm Sunday
This day remembers Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, as his followers waved palm fronds and called out praises. It is a mixed-mood occasion. The celebration begins with expressions of devotion and triumph, with messianic echoes in the symbolism, but it transitions into the Passion narrative in which the enthusiasm of the crowd turns within the week to calls for Jesus’ crucifixion and where the imagery of discipleship changes from shouts of ‘hosanna’ to walking the way of the cross.
Symbols, Colours, Music, Images, Ritual Actions, Miscellaneous Ideas
Colour: Red (the colour of blood, of fire, and of kingship). Palm branches.
Some congregations enact the triumphal entry procession by gathering outside the church space and entering into it waving palm branches and singing songs of praise. Inside the church, the mood is altered by the reading of the Passion gospel. Crosses can be made out of the palm leaves and kept throughout the year.
Video loops from ‘Jesus Movie’ or other films of Jesus’ life.
At Cityside, Palm Sunday is also the service where we affirm our belonging to the community through an annual membership renewal service. It’s an uneasy juxtaposition at times, putting the celebration and commitment of our membership renewal against the somewhat somber backdrop of Holy Week, but in other ways the timing throws up some interesting links. The membership part of the service consists of speaking together a responsive reading, and then individually signing a banner that has been headed with some words of commitment and belonging. These banners hang on the wall of the church, dating back to the early years of Cityside’s formation. One year, due to the fact that a church member owned a ceramic painting business, we each had a small ceramic tile to paint, instead of signing the banner. These were fired and mounted in a frame. After the signing, members of the congregation go out (alone or in pairs or groups) to pray and walk around the local area, followed by a soup and bread lunch. This activity is in response to Jesus looking down on Jerusalem as he was about to enter it, and weeping for the people there. (Luke 19:41, 42)
Below is an order of service for one recent Palm Sunday at Cityside:
SetUp: Table for tile painting.
Call to Worship
Today is Palm Sunday, the Sunday of the year when we particularly remember Jesus’ entering Jerusalem on a donkey, as he heads into what will be the last week before he is crucified.
This story is found in all of the Gospels, by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. This morning I will read Matthew’s account in his story of Jesus’ life, Matthew Chapter 21.
Reading: Mt 21:1-11. Message
We reflect on those words as we listen to Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s twentieth century interpretation in their musical ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’. Some of the lyrics are in your newsletter.
Track: Jesus Christ Superstar, CD 1, #8 Hosanna (2.52)
TVS: clip ex The Jesus Story (NIV)
Responsive Reading: ‘Cry out, people of faith!’ (In newsletter). (Source Unknown)
Song: ‘The Day He Came Riding Into Town.’ (Tune: When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again) Unaccompanied. (Source Unknown)
Prayer of Confession and Words of Forgiveness:
Song: ‘Stay With Us Now’, from Love From Below (John L. Bell and Graham Maule with Wild Goose Worship Group, Wild Goose Publications: Glasgow, 1989).
Hot Text:
Link: This morning we have a somewhat interesting juxtaposition of events in our service. This is Holy Week, the last week of Lent, the traditional 40 day period of preparation for Easter and remembering Jesus’ death and coming back to life again.
So it’s a fairly somber, reflective time.
A time when many mainstream churches remove or cover up the bright icons and paintings in their churches and strip out any surplus furniture.
So we want to participate in this significant time in the church year.
We’re also wanting to celebrate and thank God for the community that is Cityside Baptist Church, to celebrate our life together, and to renew our commitment to one another.
So it’s a very postmodern mix of elements that may not sit comfortably together. And I’m not going to try to make them fit.
We’ll just take them as they come, recognising that God is in all and over all that makes up our lives.
Creche/Children’s Space:
Responsive Prayer of Thanksgiving: (In newsletter)
Commitment Renewal: (see newsletter)
What we do each year in our annual commitment renewal is bind ourselves together by holding ourselves accountable to each other and to our shared vision. This is not an indication of your commitment to me or to an institution. It is an indication of your willingness to walk with and work with this particular family of people known as Cityside. If you wish to do that, whether or not you have returned a letter of commitment, please stand and read responsively with me…
(Take a tile and paint later…)
Affirmation of Callings and Ministries: (4-5 people to read through newsletter list of Citysiders’ occupations rapidly.)
This is a commissioning service to your fulltime ministry. We are all clergy, we are all laity — the people of God. We are all called to belong, to be and to do.
Offering and Offering Prayer:
Welcome and Concerns of the Church:
Prayers for Others:
Luke 19/41,42 records Jesus approach to Jerusalem on what we now call Palm Sunday, ‘When Jesus came closer and could see Jerusalem, he cried, and said, “It’s too bad that today your people don’t know what will bring them peace”’. We usually take Palm Sunday as an opportunity to remember the city and location we are in as a church community and to walk and pray around the area. Remembering that many people around us have not discovered the peace that comes from knowing who they belong to.
(share prayer items now, pray later as you walk)
Take 15 minutes to pray-walk, stay here, or move to another part of the building; return for tea and coffee and the benediction, and to paint your tile.
Prayer Walk
(Return)
Track: replay Jesus Christ Superstar
Benediction
Morning Tea and Lunch (Hot Cross Buns)
Texts, Prayers, Readings
For Lectionary texts consult your lectionary or www.textweek.com
Maundy Thursday
Symbols, Colours, Music, Images, Ritual Actions, Miscellaneous Ideas
The name comes from the Latin for new commandment (see John 13:34): mandatum novum – ties into the idea of love for one another, which is one of the major themes in Jesus’ last supper discourse in the gospel of John.
Colour: Red
Communion – Bread and Wine.
Images of the last supper (paintings, video, visual display)
Re-enactment of Jesus washing his disciples’ feet (hand or foot washing ceremony). Themes of humility and service, and of cleansing.
Garden of Gesthemane – parts of the church could be separated off and decorated as a garden for people to come and keep watch.
Many groups now use this evening to celebrate the Jewish Passover meal.
Texts, Prayers, Readings
For Lectionary texts consult your lectionary or www.textweek.com
Good Friday
Symbols, Colours, Music, Images, Ritual Actions, Miscellaneous Ideas
The three-hour watch – the hours between midday and 3pm when Jesus was on the cross can be used in various ways (meditations, recordings, slides, prayers, readings, hymns) to involve the congregation in being ‘with’ Jesus on the cross.
The Cross.
The Passover lamb.
Abraham’s interrupted sacrifice of Isaac (seen through to its conclusion in the death of Jesus).
There are varied opinions about whether or not to have communion on this day.
In the Southern Hemisphere, Easter coincides with Autumn. Imagery associated with Autumn (getting colder, increasing barrenness, falling leaves, burnished colours, drying out and death etc.) could be incorporated into Good Friday imagery. This foreshadows the hope of returning life in the spring, which can be related to the returning to life of Jesus.
Texts, Prayers, Readings
For Lectionary texts consult your lectionary or www.textweek.com
Easter Day
Symbols, Colours, Music, Images, Ritual Actions, Miscellaneous Ideas
Colour: White or Gold
Service of Light – proclamation of the resurrection. Lots of Alleluias.
Easter Candle – symbolising Christ, the light of the world risen from the darkness of the grave. Sometimes, the Easter Candle is taken among the congregation who light individual candles from it.
Baptism was traditionally linked with Easter in early church history – renewal of baptismal vows might be used on this day – affirmation of people’s unity with Christ in both death and resurrection. Also images of exodus through the Red Sea and overthrow of the oppressor tie into the associations of Easter with the Passover season in Jewish tradition – Jesus leading us from bondage, through the deep waters of death, to the promised land of resurrection life.
Communion – sacramental reunion between the people and the risen Lord.
Some thematic foci: God’s final and full affirmation of the sacrifice of Jesus by raising him from the dead. The ultimate power of God over sin and death.
Texts, Prayers, Readings
For Lectionary texts consult your lectionary or www.textweek.com
An Easter Confession
Risen Lord Jesus, we confess that most of the time we don’t acknowledge
with our lives what your resurrection means for us and for humankind.
Lord, when you appeared before the disciples, you showed them your hands and
your feet so they could believe. Please help your people living now to
accept with the eyes of faith the witness of the first disciples and so
believe you are truly risen.
Lord, when you appeared to your disciples, they did not recognise you at
first. Forgive us when we narrow down our expectations of you so much that
we don’t recognise you even when you are among us and in our lives.
Lord, when you walked with the disciples on the road to Emmaus, you opened
their minds and hearts to the Scriptures, even though they were slow to
understand. Forgive us when we try to create our own understanding of who
you are to suit ourselves and so fail to hear and believe what you are
actually saying.
Lord, you gave to the disciples a commission to make and teach disciples and
a promise of your enduring presence. Forgive us when we are half-hearted
about and neglectful of what that commission and promise means for us now,
in our homes, our city, and our world. Help us to have a right understanding
of what our mission is, and help us to pursue it faithfully.
Lord, when the disciples saw you had risen, they worshipped you and were
filled with joy and praise. Forgive us when we dwell on the hurts, losses,
and disappointments of our lives and don’t open a window for rejoicing also.
May our lives demonstrate a balance between the agony of the cross and the
joy of the resurrection. Restore hope to us Lord, so we can offer hope to
others.
Lord, before you returned to the Father, you took the broken Peter who had
denied you and reinstated him into love and service. Take our sin and
brokenness and restore us also. Your resurrection is a sign to us of your
endless forgiveness and willingness to give us a new start.
Recreate us, God, and bring us into a stronger hope of our own resurrection
to come.
(Brenda Stone)
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