Celebration Service April 27, 2025 9:30am

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Prelude Recit de Tierce en Taille                                  de Grigny

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Introit “How Majestic is Your Name”​

 

Welcome & Announcements               Amanda Song   

 

Call to Worship (Iona Community)

The world belongs to God.

The earth and all its people.

How good and how lovely it is

To live together in unity.

Love and faith come together.

Justice and peace join hands.

If Christ’s disciples keep silent

These stones would shout aloud.

Open our lips, O God

And our mouths shall proclaim your praise!

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Hymn       “Come, Ye Faithful, Raise the Strain”                  #215

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Silent Meditation                                                       Patience Whitman

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Responsive Invocation (Iona Community)

Turn us again, O God, and offer us new life in Christ

That your people may rejoice in you.

Make in us clean hearts, O God

And renew a just Spirit within us.

Give us again the joy of faith refreshed

And with your Spirit sustain us.

 

The Lord's Prayer                                                               #307​

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Children’s Message​​ 

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Psalm 150                                                      Rev. Dr. Michael Caldwell

Praise the Lord! Praise God in his Sanctuary; praise him in his mighty firmament!

Praise him for his mighty deeds; praise him according to his surpassing greatness!

Praise him with trumpet sound; praise him with lute and harp!

Praise him with tambourine and dance; praise him with strings and pipe!

Praise him with clanging cymbals!  Praise him with loud clashing cymbals!

Let everything that breathes praise the Lord! Praise the Lord!

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Gloria Patri                                                                              #35

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Anthem  “O Praise God in His Sanctuary”                    Matthews​

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Prayers of the People

 

Hymn             “That Easter Day with Joy Was Bright”                                 #229                  

     

Reading          John 20:19-31   Lay Reader: John Rains           page 115 

           

Message        “Touch His Wounds”              Rev. Dr. Michael Caldwell

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Offering

     Click here to make an online donation                    

 

Offertory  “Ave Maris Stella”                                           de Grigny

 and organ)  

Doxology*                                                                                      #46

Offertory Prayer* Giving God, we give You thanks and praise for all of Your gifts to us. We know that you are the source of every good thing, light and love come from You. As we dedicate this offering, we offer ourselves too, for these gifts of money are but tokens of ourselves. Take and use us, that our hands may reach out in service,

our feet may walk the difficult path of reconciliation, and that our words may be words of peace. For this we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen. ​​​

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Hymn*           “God, Whose Giving Knows No Ending”           #606

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Benediction​

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Closing:      “Make Me a Blessing”             Handel

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Postlude “Basse de Trompette”                                      de Grigny           

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Calendar of Events

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Monday, 4/28                Noon AA meeting in Fellowship Hall

Tuesday, 4/29                7:30 AA meeting in Fellowship Hall

Wednesday, 4/30          Noon AA meeting in Fellowship Hall

                                         5:30 Choir Rehearsal in Organ Loft

Saturday, 5/3                 9:00 Green Up Day starting at SCC

                                   

Happy Birthday this week to:

Matthew Blauvelt and Sandy Godin today 4/27

Andrew Bennett, Sara Espey and Lee Elizabeth Helmken on 4/28

Sara Percy on 4/30

Hamish Fucile, Robert Johnson, Lisa Nelson, “Skeeter” Austin, Annamay Brown and Dillan Cobaugh and Louisa Percy on 5/1

Derek Wentz on 5/3

 

Announcements

The ushers today are Annie-Vera Frye and.  Thank you for helping today.

 

Congratulations to Sandi and Philip Kuhl, proud grandparents of Grayson Wilder Pearce born on April 16, 2025 weighing in at 8 lbs. All are doing well.

 

Thank you so much Michael for leading us in worship today. Rev. Dr. Michael Caldwell is a retired UCC pastor and sugarmaker in North Wolcott. He and his wife, Patience Whitman, are members of the international ecumenical Iona Community.

 

 

Centering Prayer

            Classical prayer in Christian tradition takes many forms. “Centering Prayer” is one of the most ancient and enduring ways to pray.

            Centering Prayer, as practiced in Egypt as far back as the Desert Fathers and Mothers 1700 years ago, is silent prayer. The practitioner prays in quiet with each breath, sometimes repeating a “mantra” (word) to focus breathing. According to modern interpreter and teacher Father Basil Pennington, our recovery of this ancient practice helps the Church regain its original authentic spirituality in three ways.

            First, seekers of God’s peace through Centering Prayer transcend the noise, clutter, distractions, and grief of life.

            Second, we go like Christ into the quiet desert to recover from the vicissitudes of what Walter Wink calls “the domination system” of worldly empires.

            Third, the Hebrew word for “Spirit” – ruach – also means “breath.” So when we focus in prayer on our breathing, rather than on words (as with spoken prayer), we literally inhale the Spirit and exhale stress.

            Rev. Michael’s wife, Patience Whitman, will lead us this morning not into twenty minute normative practice (!) of Centering Prayer, but into a three minute experiment to give us the experience and power of this ancient practice which we can continue as a daily prayer practice.

 

Please come down to Fellowship Hall following the service today. Rev. Michael will read the essay “Rocking Chair Lift” from his Tao of Snow collection. The essay recounts a story from Rev. Michael’s, Winter 2001, nine-week sabbatical interim with us at SCC. Signed books will be available for purchase.  Refreshments will be provided. 

 

SCC Green Tip April 2025

As the snow melts, my mind is turning to gardening and farmers markets. . . which has me thinking about my food sources. Did you know that conventional farming practices strip the soil of nutrients, accelerate erosion of top soil, and contribute to algae blooms in waterways through fertilizer run off.? The aim of conventional farming is efficiency and productivity. Organic farming on the other hand bans synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and genetically modified organisms and uses centuries old alternatives such as crop rotation, companion planting, and composting. Regenerative farming goes further still by prioritizing soil health to combat climate change.  Practices include cover cropping, crop diversity, and shallow or no till cultivation, all of which contribute to soil, plant, and pollinator health.  The aim of regenerative farming is to improve the land and to work in harmony with living species above and below the soil. Regenerative methods create a healthy soil environment for microbes to thrive. And microbes, as it turns out, propagate topsoil by breaking down dead plant matter. Amazing, right?! 

It is not possible to know the farming practices of most grocery store items, which is why supporting your Farmer’s Market is a good summer shopping option.  Buying locally sourced, regeneratively farmed food is just another way you can go green! 

On behalf of the Stowe Community Church and our Green Team Initiative, we would like to encourage and inspire members of our community to stand up for our planet- on earth day, and throughout the year. Spring is the perfect time to get outside and become active in whatever ways- big or small- to help advocate for, be a steward of, and take care of our environment, starting with our beautiful little corner of the world.  A great place to start is with Vermont’s annual Green Up Day, which this year will be taking place on Saturday, May 3rd. For anyone interested, there will be a crew departing from Stowe Community Church around 9 am, helping to beautify and clean up along Main Street, and heading out along the Rec Path. There was a great turnout in town  last year- and it was inspiring to see families taking part in this activity together! Whether you join SCC, or venture out on your own- it feels really good to be a part of a collective act of service and love for our community. 

GREEN BAGS can be picked up at locations in most towns. In Stowe, you can pick up your green trash bags as early as 8 am on Green Up Day at the Alchemist. Please see the link for details for Stowe, along with locations around Vermont.  https://greenupvermont.org/towndetails/

Happy Spring, Happy Earth Day, and let's work together to show up to help keep our roads, trails, waterways, yards, and environment clean of trash and debris! See you out there!

 

Save the Date :

New Member Orientation on May 18, 2025 following the morning worship service  in Fellowship Hall in person or Zoom meeting on Monday 5/19/25 at 6pm. These are for anyone interested in learning more about our church or

wanting to become members.  We will welcome new members on Sunday, June 15, 2025 at our 9:30 worship service.

 

Southern U.S. Civil Rights Interfaith Trip 

Your local interfaith community invites you to join us for a transformative journey through the American South. Embark on a powerful exploration of the Civil Rights movement.

Walk in the footsteps and hear from courageous leaders and activists

Visit iconic sites and pray at landmark faith institutions

Engage in meaningful discussions and reflections

Dates: November 4 to November 9, 2025
Destinations: Birmingham, Montgomery, Selma, and Atlanta

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Musical Notes by Karen Miller

Prelude, Offertory, and Postlude:  Nicolas de Grigny (1672-1703) was born and died in Reims, France and came from a family of organists.  His father and grandfather were both organists in Reims.  Nicolas de Grigny went to Paris and became the organist at the abbey church of Saint-Denis from 1693 to 1695, while also studying under N. A. Lebegue, a noted classical French composer/organist in Paris.  But de Grigny returned to Reims and in 1697 was appointed cathedral organist.  In 1699 he composed his only organ collection Livre d'Orgue which contained a mass, hymns for the principal feasts of the year, and free compositions such as duets, trios, fughettas, tenor solos, and dialogues between various voices and registers.  Some consider his works to be the height of the French classical period.  His compositions achieve a stricter, more serious method of expression compared to his Parisian contemporaries.  His writing has a profundity, a heightened contrapuntal interest, more skillful embellishments of the melody, a full use of the organ's resources including pedals, and a greater spirituality.  What else could he have written if he had been granted more than his 31 years on this earth? 

            The organ pieces heard today are from his 1699 collection.

   Prelude:  Recit de Tierce en Taille - a quiet piece with a solo line in the tenor voice

Offertory:  Ave Maris Stella - a hymn that is in a four- or five-part arrangement of a chant melody with the Gregorian cantus firmus mostly developed as a tenor part in the pedals

   Postlude:  Basse de Trompette - a three-voice piece with the principal                               melody on a reed stop in the bass line

   Anthem:  "O Praise God in His Sanctuary" is a bold piece with a text based on Psalm 150.  Thomas Matthews (1915-1999) was a professor of organ at the University of Tulsa from 1960 and also organist of Trinity Episcopal Church in Tulsa from 1960.  The text reads:

            O praise God in His sanctuary.  Praise Him in the firmament of his power.  Praise him in his noble acts.  Praise Him according to His excellent greatness.  Praise Him in the cymbals and dances.  Praise Him upon the strings and pipe.  Praise Him on the well-tuned cymbals.  Praise Him on the loud cymbals.  Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord.

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