大象传媒

This script cannot exactly reflect the transmission, as it was prepared before the service was broadcast. It may include editorial notes prepared by the producer, and minor spelling and other errors that were corrected before the radio broadcast.<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

It may contain gaps to be filled in at the time so that prayers may reflect the needs of the world, and changes may also be made at the last minute for timing reasons, or to reflect current events.

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OPENING ANNOUNCENT: 大象传媒 Radio 4 It鈥檚 ten past eight. 鈥淭hy will be done on earth as it is in heaven鈥� the theme of Sunday Worship today which comes from Hillsborough Presbyterian Church in County Down.. . The service is led by the Reverend Doctor Bert Tosh and begins as the New Irish Choir sing 鈥撯�楥hoicest Psalmody.鈥�

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CHOIR/PIANO:Choicest Psalmody (J Rea) Psalm 100 and 121

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DR BERT TOSH

Welcome to Hillsborough a very pleasant听village in County Down. about 12 miles south of Belfast just off the main road to Dublin. And听

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while there has been a huge amount of residential development over the past forty years, the village retains its attraction with fine听

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Georgian architecture, In the centre is the Castle- an 18th听century House, her Majesty the Queen's official residence in Northern Ireland听

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and the site of many informal discussions during the Peace Process. On the edge of a large forest park is听 Hillsborugh Fort, where King听

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William III stayed for about a week on his way to the Battle of the Boyne and where he made a grant to Irish Presbyterian ministers.

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And it's in the Presbyterian Church that we're meeting today, continuing our occasional series on the Lord's Prayer, thinking about Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Like most of the petitions of the Lord's Prayer, we can say these words every day without really giving to much thought as to what they mean and more particularly what they should mean or us.

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The psalmist wrote in Psalm 143

Let me hear of your steadfast love in the morning,
for in you I put my trust.
Teach me the way I should go,
for to you I lift up my soul.

Teach me to do your will,
for you are my God.
Let your good spirit lead me
on a level path.

And it's on another Psalm- 117- that our opening hymn is based 鈥淔rom all that dwell belows the skies鈥�

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CHOIR, PIANO AND STRINGS: : From All That Dwell Below the Skies (EASTER SONG)

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DR BERT TOSH

Let us pray:

Lord God, we worship you

By ourselves we cannot know you

no human wisdom can discover you

no enterprise reveal you,

even in the wealth of its knowledge, the world fails to find you.

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But you reveal yourself to us in many ways

Supremely in Jesus Christ to show your love

to bring your help and healing

to save us from our sins

to reveal your will to us

And you give us your Spirit to direct and lead us,

support and strengthen us.

We worship and adore you, God of grace and glory,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

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But we acknowledge that we often ignore what you do reveal to us.

We are slow to discern your will and often slower to obey it.

And when we pray we can pray not that your be done but that it might

be changed for the ease of our living

and to fit in better with our own notions and cherished ambitions.

Sometimes we become so immersed in ourselves

that obeying you becomes relegated to a small corner of our live.

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Lord, you have promised that if we confess our sins, you will forgive us through Jesus Christ. So assure us now, we pray, of your pardon and your peace.

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God of the nations

you have revealed your听will to all people

and promised us your saving health.

Grant us your grace,

both to hear and do what you command,

that darkness may be overcome by the power of your light;

through your Son, Jesus Christ our听Lord

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and for ever AMEN

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DR BERT TOSH

Our first reading from the sixth chapter of the Book of the prophet Micah points out that what God requires that we should do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with him. .

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ANN TRUSDALE

Hear what the Lord says:

Rise, plead your case before the mountains,
and let the hills hear your voice.
Hear, you mountains, the controversy of the Lord,
and you enduring foundations of the earth;
for the Lord has a controversy with his people,
and he will contend with Israel.

鈥極 my people, what have I done to you?
In what have I wearied you? Answer me!
For I brought you up from the land of Egypt,
and redeemed you from the house of slavery;
and I sent before you Moses,
Aaron, and Miriam.

鈥榃ith what shall I come before the Lord,
and bow myself before God on high?
Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings,
with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with tens of thousands of rivers of oil?
Shall I give my first born for my transgression,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?鈥�
He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?

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DR BERT TOSH Before our second reading fro m Matthew Chapter 7, we pray as the New Irish Choir sings The Lord鈥檚 Prayer from David Fanshawe's African Sanctus. .

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CHOIR CELLO PIANO 鈥� The Lord's Prayer

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BARRY MCCLURG
Jesus said: Not everyone who says to me 鈥淟ord, Lord鈥�, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me, 鈥淟ord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?鈥� Then I will declare to them, 鈥淚 never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.鈥�

Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock.听The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock.听And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand.听The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell鈥攁nd great was its fall!鈥�

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DR BERT TOSH In a moment the Rev David Bruce, Secretary of the Presbyterian Church''s Council for Mission in Ireland will reflect on the petition 鈥淵our will be done鈥�, but first , Charles Wesley's hymn O thou who camest from above prays we may be ready for God's perfect will and so complete our acts of faith and love

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CONGREGATION, CHOIR AND ORGAN O Thou who camest from above

REV DAVID BRUCE There is a legal firm in England which specialises in drafting wills. They call themselves 鈥淭hy Will be done鈥�. Now that鈥檚 clever marketing! It鈥檚 not your last will and testament but the words of Jesus we want to think about for a few moments. When teaching his friends to pray Jesus said 鈥淵our Kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven鈥�.

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Your will be done 鈥� on earth. People have puzzled over these words, because they are found in a prayer. On the one hand it might be understandable to say to God, 鈥淵our will be done鈥� because it is a simple statement of what is going to happen. If God is God, then his will, will be done come what may. But if this is a prayer, then how does it work? Does praying make any difference to God鈥檚 will being done? Can we influence world affairs, or even the everyday things of our lives by praying about them?

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Entering into a relationship with God involves two invitations. The first comes from him to us. He invites us to come to him: To come as we are. To come with our burdens and sorrows. To come because we can be sure that we will be accepted. Through Jesus Christ, he invites us into his life 鈥� to share his life today.

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But there is a second invitation to come, which is quite different from his to us. This is when we respond to him - when we invite ourselves into God鈥檚 life. When we deliberately choose to locate ourselves in his life, and with his help and power, to live in such a manner that his will is done where we are 鈥� on earth.

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So this prayer, 鈥淵our will be done - on earth鈥� involves both invitations. It is about him, inviting us into relationship - a Kingdom place where his will is done. And it is about us, committing ourselves to live his life here and now, doing what he wants. It is as much about us as it is about him.

So how do we know if this prayer is being answered? A person who prays 鈥淵our will be done - on earth鈥� may find the answer to their prayer in their own jolted reactions to the places and events where God鈥檚 will is manifestly not being done on earth.

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The person who prays 鈥測our will be done鈥� will not be able to look at the drowning of refugees in the Mediterranean Sea with indifference. Every nerve-ending within them will spark and fizz with indignation that God鈥檚 will is not being done on earth. That these watery graves have no part in his plan.

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A person who prays 鈥測our will be done鈥� invites themselves into God鈥檚 life and will become sensitised to eruptions of evil in the world, which many others will have become inured to, as over time news bulletins press the stories down the schedules 鈥� so familiar, they becomes normal. Here in Northern Ireland during the years of the Troubles we were all inclined to do this 鈥� to normalise atrocity. It was a coping mechanism 鈥� a kind of trauma insulation; but its evil was in making us live as if there was such a thing as an acceptable level of violence. An acceptable level of doing your neighbour to death because they belong to the other tribe. Your will be done on earth鈥�? I feel the need to repent that I said these words thousands of times in prayer through my teenage years and into adulthood, and evidently did nothing about it. I didn鈥檛 invite myself into the life of God 鈥� because that would have required resistance, when acquiescence was so much easier.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer faced this in his own day - and acknowledged the deep mystery at the heart of it when he wrote: 鈥淐hristians鈥� must enter in to the complicated reality of the world鈥� they cannot decide a priori what to do but rather will know only when they have entered into the situation of crisis itself鈥� they must partake of the entire anxiety before the worlds laws (and) must experience paradoxically that the world offers them the choice, not between good and evil but between evil and evil, and that nonetheless even evil can provide a path to God.鈥� Bonhoeffer鈥檚 complicity in the attempted assassination plot on Adolf Hitler resulted in him losing his own life.

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Because resistance is where this prayer surely takes us. We cannot pray 鈥淵our will be done鈥� and do nothing, when all around us God鈥檚 will is manifestly set aside. We cannot pray this prayer, and stand idly by. It requires of us that we become active, that we become participants, that we become citizens, not only of heaven, but of earth.

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Our prayers today must be with those who, because of their heritage and belief are being persecuted 鈥� and indeed to mourn with those whose loved ones have been killed by regimes and militias intent on the destruction of their communities. God鈥檚 will is not being done on earth by the hand of ISIS any more than it is by the hand of the IRA or the UVF. And of course actions of this kind are not always motivated by religious difference, and it is far from the truth that only Christians suffer; it's been quite the opposite in certain periods of history. 听Racial and ethnic difference can provoke the most extreme and prejudiced reactions and God鈥檚 will is not done on earth.

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The witness of history, as of the Bible itself shows that for Christians, to resist and expose evil in all its forms is the way of the Cross. It was the way Jesus himself chose, and he calls us to follow him in scorn of the consequence.

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Perhaps, the most extraordinary thing about this is the stories of love and forgiveness which can emerge in the aftermath 鈥� of people uprooted from their homes and communities, brutalised and traumatized, yet being able to speak of God鈥檚 grace in the midst of the turmoil and even to offer forgiveness to their persecutors.In these dark places, and in these remarkable moments, God鈥檚 will is being done on earth.

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The Church today is seeking to find its voice in a world which does not always welcome its contribution to the conversation. Perhaps if we spoke the time-tested truths of the Christian gospel, worked out in lives that startle and amaze with the power of their example, the conversation would be more authentic. This is what we aspire to, even though we frequently fail. To be those who show God鈥檚 will being done - on earth.

Amen

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SOLO VOCAL, CELLO.PIANO God of justice. (Tim Hughes.)

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DR BERT TOSH God of Justice by Tim Hughes.听

And now Our prayers of intercession.

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ASHLEY PARKES: Let us pray:

We pray, Lord, for your Church and its witness in situations where your claims are often ignored or derided. Give a deeper and more sensitive understanding of people and their needs, obedience to your purpose that your truth may be commended by lives and example. May your will be Done on earth

as it is in heaven.

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IDA ROSS We pray, Lord for your world, that you would give your wisdom and power to the leaders of nations that people everywhere may come to live in peace and freedom from oppression, sharing with fairness the resources of this earth May your will be one on earth

as it is in heaven

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ASHLEY We pray, Lord, for those who are persecuted and in danger because of their beliefs. You are your peoples鈥� refuge and strength in times of trouble, bless those who suffer because of their allegiance to Christ,. Give them courage and patience to endure and may their example and witness influence others to serve Him.

May your will be one on earth

as it is in heaven.

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IDA

We pray for those in need. We commend to your fatherly care, Merciful God, all who sorrow, the sick the discouraged or who are in any sort of trouble. Give them patience and a trust in your goodness. Help those who care for them and stand by them and bring us all into the joy of your salvation.

May your will be one on earth

as it is in heaven..

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DR BERT TOSH And these and all our prayers we offer in the name and for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom with you and the Holy Spirit, one God be glory and praise for ever. AMEN

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Our final hymn 鈥榓sks that we may have the mind of Jesus in all we do and say.

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CONGREGATION, CHOIR, ORGAN : May the Mind of Christ My Saviour (ST LEONARD'S) Music

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DR BERT TOSH The Blessing

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CHOIR A Clare Benediction (John Rutter)

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Sunday Worship came from Hillsborough Presbyterian Church in County Down, The leader was the Rev Dr Bert Tosh and the preacher the Revd David Bruce. The new Irish Choir was directed by Jonathan Rea. The producer was Karl Walker..

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Next week Sunday Worship will come live form Sandringham Parish Church, marking her Majesty the Queen's ninetieth birthday celebrations

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