PostScript: Laughter and music



Welcome to ROOTS at home for adults31 May – 6 June 2020 Let anyone Related Bible reading(s): Acts 2.1-21 Worship-at-home resources to help you read and reflect on this week's Bible passagesROOTS is?a partnership of denominations and other Christian organisations and has been publishing lectionary-based worship resources online and in print since 2002.CopyrightYou are welcome to copy this material for use in your own resources?e.g. printed sheets or web pages including audio/video recordings. If you do so, please include this acknowledgement to ROOTS:? ROOTS for Churches Ltd () 2002-2020.Reproduced with permission.NEW! The world ablaze:Prayers for difficult times?Opening prayerHoly God, your Spirit is poured out all over the world.We pray for all those with whom we are connectedby our faith in Jesus.May your Holy Spirit fill them – and us. Amen.?In many languages and tonguesUse the opportunity of being at home – e.g. with time, and internet! – to find out how other Christians celebrate Pentecost. e.g. Find a prayer such as the Lord’s Prayer in another language and:pray it in that language;listen to a recording of it.Or learn how to sign the Lord’s Prayer.As you do so, think about – and pray for – Christians across the world, many of them like you, celebrating today in their own homes. Remember that a church building is a place to meet; church is people!?PostScript - reflection for the week:?PostScript: Laughter and musicA reflection for Pentecost?ReflectionPodcasting is a medium that is fairly new to me, both as a practitioner and a listener. It is a medium that is closely related to radio, with the advantage of being able to listen whenever you like. There is an intimacy in radio and podcast – emphasised when using headphones – which means that the listener feels that the speaker is addressing her and only her. This sense of intimacy requires a different style of preaching – less like Martin Luther King and more like Alistair Cooke – the broadcaster, not the former England cricket captain.?It is not only churches that have had to adapt to the pandemic – television and radio broadcasters have done so too. We have become used to the breakfast TV presenters looking like they have had a row as they sit at opposite ends of a sofa. Interviewees speak via video conference calls – sometimes forgetting to unmute. The television schedules are beginning to be filled with repeats as the supply of new shows runs dry. Even The Archers on BBC Radio 4 has been affected. For weeks Ambridge was virus-free as episodes recorded at the beginning of the year were broadcast. There was then a period of ‘best of’ episodes while the cast recorded new material at home. These began broadcasting this week and offer internal monologues as the characters share their thoughts.One of the podcasts to which I have subscribed is 99% Invisible which looks broadly at design. An episode from early 2018 was about Charles Douglass, the man who invented the ‘audience response duplicator’, otherwise known as the ‘laff box’. It was therefore Douglass who was the man behind what is sometimes called ‘canned laughter’.Charles Douglass’s machine was needed when shows began to be recorded in studios rather than theatres. He recorded various laughs – from titters to guffaws and timed them so that there were laughs that came slowly as if someone was getting a joke after everyone else.While people have different senses of humour, laughter is often a shared experience, so that one person’s laughter sparks off another’s. I still cannot hear Charles Penrose’s ‘Laughing Policeman’ without laughing a little. To demonstrate the importance of third-person laughter in our finding something funny, the podcast plays a clip from Friends with the laughter track removed. It is hard to see why it was funny. We need the laughter to tell us. Is a pie in the face funny if no one laughs?When I listened to this podcast my thoughts went to the way in which the Holy Spirit changed the lives of the women and men on whom it came. They knew Jesus had been raised. They knew he had been taken up to heaven. Yet there was something missing. The Spirit that would transform them from a group of people into the Body of Christ – the Church – had not yet come. It was this vital element that was missing. The Holy Spirit had yet to come, like fire, wind…and laughter.?A musical suggestionA different, musical, analogy is the way in which the flowing, soaring saxophone of Jan Garbarek rises above the ordered harmonies of the Hilliard Ensemble on the album Officium. My favourite example is, Sanctus. I have found that the sound of the saxophone intertwined with the men’s voices a helpful picture of God’s Spirit working with God’s people. – at times barely audible, while at other times soaring, as if riding the crest of a wave.?PrayerCome Holy Spirit! Come fill our lives! Come light us with fire! Come stir us with wind! Come shake us with holy laughter!May your presence unite us when we are apart and as we look forward to your presence filling us as we meet together again.Amen.?Simon Carver is a Baptist Minister in St Albans and takes a particular interest in film, sport and US politics.?This week's Live your faith sheet(Bible notes, prayers, a picture and questions for reflection, a live your faith action)?Where is the Spirit?Reflect on times when you have experienced – or witnessed – the breaking in of the Holy Spirit.What were the circumstances?Was the setting a ‘religious’ one, or entirely secular?How did it feel?What was the immediate impact?What have been the consequences in the longer term?How far do they show the Holy Spirit at work outside formal church structures and activities??His Spirit is with usYou will need three different colours of wool or thread, and some gold-coloured thread. Make – i.e. braid – a bracelet or bookmark with a gold thread running through it, to remind us that, according to John’s Gospel, the Spirit is always with us.?A simple worship activity This can be done on your own, or with a group. Ideal for young and not so young together!?In the beginning your Spirit hovered over the waters.(make two fingers on each hand do a walking motion)Thank you, God, for your ever-present Spirit.(make wave motions with hands)?Later your Spirit called to Sarah and Abraham to a new journey with you.(blow as hard as you can)Thank you, God, for your ever-present Spirit.(make wave motions with hands)?As time went on your Spirit spoke through the prophet Ezekieland brought dry bones to life.(make a beckoning motion)Thank you, God, for your ever-present Spirit.(make wave motions with hands)?At the dawn of a new era your Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness.(create a heart shape with your hands)Thank you, God, for your ever-present Spirit.(make wave motions with hands)?Jesus promised that your Spirit would never leavethose who love him and keep his commandments.Thank you, God, for your ever-present Spirit.(make wave motions with hands)?A prayer of adorationHow shall we speak the name beyond all names?We will light a flame and proclaim God is amongst us.How shall we praise the onewho knew the embers of death for us?We look into the consuming flame and say'Behold the Lamb of God'.?How shall we celebrate the Mystery,the Spirit, the Companion among us?We clap the hands of our hearts,for she it is who makes each one a home for Christ.God of fire, we shrink from your justicebut adore the love which fuels it.Christ, the blaze of God's fire spent on our darkness,we are stilled and silenced by your passion and death.Dancing Spirit flame,you awaken us to the risen Christ,you invite us to sing and dance in our heart;and for this -we open the most secret places of our beingin adoration and wonder. Amen.?A prayer of praise for the whole worldMay God be praised across the world.Africa, lift up God's name,from Johannesburg to Cairo, from Freetown to Nairobi.Bless our God.Praise and extol him for ever and ever.May God be praised across the world.All the Americas, lift up God's name,from Seattle to Managua, from Kingston to Santiago.Bless our God.Praise and extol him for ever and ever.May God be praised across the world.Islands of the Pacific, lift up God's name,from Singapore to Wellington, from Vanuatu to Perth.Bless our God.Praise and extol him for ever and ever.May God be praised across the world.Europe, East and West, North and South, lift up God's name,from Dublin to Bucharest, from Helsinki to Athens.Bless our God.Praise and extol him for ever and ever.May God be praised across the world.Across all Asia, lift up God's name,from Madras to Beijing, from Tokyo to Jerusalem.Bless our God.Praise and extol him for ever and ever. Amen.?A prayer of approachLoving God,whether you come to us in the unexpected or the familiar,we are glad of your presence.We want to live well in the life you have given to us.We long to experience the fullness of your love in our lives.Loving God,whether you come to us with a challenge to take risks or the offer of comfort,we welcome you into our lives.We want to understand more about you.We long to experience the fullness of your grace in our lives.Loving God,whether you come to us like a rushing wind or on a quiet breath,we reach out to you.We want to enjoy the gift of your Spirit.We long to experience the fullness of your power in our lives. Amen.?Listen and singPreview songs on YouTube, buy online and download.Fall afresh, feat. Jeremy Riddle, Bethel music on The loft sessionsHoly Spirit, feat. Kim Walker-Smith, Jesus culture on Live from New YorkSpirit move (live), feat. Kalley Heiligenthal, Bethel music on Have it all (live) Traditional hymn(s): Bind us together, Lord? ROOTS for Churches Ltd () 2002-2020.Reproduced with permission. ................
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