Sunday's coming!

This week we celebrate the 236th anniversary of Keyston URC, and our harvest! I have split the 'sermon' into 2 talks on each reading   Psalm 145: 1-9   Talk 1: Giving thanks The Psalms are the hymn book of the Bible – they are words used to express what people want to say .. or sing.. about the God they believe in, and the way their lives are with God taking care of them.   This Psalm (145) was written in Hebrew as an acrostic – with each line starting with a different letter of the alphabet. In English it would be a line beginning with A, then B, then C and so on.   You have heard how many times that Psalm talks about praising God – or proclaiming how great God is, or thanking God. I think the idea of an acrostic is the writer’s way of amazing us with a great list of things God has done.   Let’s try it! Let’s see if we can think of things to thank God for starting with each letter of the alphabet (or at least the first 9 letters, as we had the first 9 verses of Psalm 145..   A

Psalm 103: 1-13; Matthew 18: 21-25 The shape of Psalm 103 can help us to shape our harvest celebrations today. It starts “Praise the Lord, O my soul… And forget not all his benefits” We have come to this chapel to celebrate harvest because we know that everything comes from God, and without God’s love there would be no world, no life, no harvest. There is so much to give thanks for. Be brave & shout out some of the things you are grateful for – it could be something you see here today, or something else… .. that’s a pretty impressive list of things for which to praise God. After praising God for all the good things with which he has blessed human lives, the Psalmist moves on to talk about what this generous God is like: “The Lord works righteousness and justice for the oppressed…he made known his ways.. he is compassionate and gracious, abounding in love.. “ God is not just a kind of divine vending machine for the stuff we need in our lives, God is love, patience, grace… The harves

 Passover… why do we remember? You might wonder what the release of the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt has to do with us – why should we read it and think about it? But the reading itself not only tells the story of what is about to happen, but tells the people of God that they should always remember it.  God declares what will happen, and tells his people what to do.  They have to act in absolute faith that God is about to help them and they are told how to remember this act of God for generations to come.  God will save his people. His people must never forget it. This is a living story, lived through, recounted, re-enacted, remembered, re-lived for thousands of years – remember the story of Jesus getting lost at the age of 12 and being found in the temple? – it was the feast of Passover that the family were celebrating in Jerusalem.  It is a vital story and for the Jewish people it is still alive to this day. And we, too, have stories which we repeat and re-enact and make in