WelshRev: DIY Sunday Service Kit

Welcome to Palm Sunday worship with the DIY Sunday Service Kit.

This week we have a mix of traditional and more contemporary hymns and songs to celebrate as we come close now to the events of Easter week up at Jerusalem at that epoch-changing Passover time.

We're concluding this week our look at the psalms the Lord sang in the Upper Room with His disciples immediately before going out onto the Mount of Olives and into the Garden of Gethsemane where He would meet powerfully with His Father and await there arrival of His betrayer ...and in that contact, it's a very powerful psalm that Psalm 118 turns out to be ... here's a taster:

But first let's sing a very traditional Palm Sunday hymn.

Lord and Father we thank you for those fixed points in the year that remind its of key time and events in the history of salvation.

As we contemplate today the beginning of the last week before Christ's crucifixion, would you once more turn our hearts from our sins and weaknesses to him and re-orientate our minds to His service.

We ask for Jesus' sake.

AMEN.

This Palm Sunday we pray for Israel, for the Chinese province of Henan and for the Democratic Republic of Congo (the DRC) where believers continue to follow the Lord into the sort of hostility and persecution that He entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday to face.

Israel

Israel has been shaken by days of protests by tens of thousands of Israelis taking to the streets to protest controversial proposed judicial reforms.

The controversy of the reforms centres on the newly elected government coalition's proposal to prevent the Supreme Court from striking down laws of the Knesset (Israeli Parliament) that it deems undemocratic.

The controversy has led to nation-wide strikes and resulted in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is in favor of the judicial reforms, calling for a pause in pushing forward the reforms until the next Knesset session in an effort to preserve national unity.

On 28th. March new legislation was published in the Israeli parliament to punish any conversions to Christianity with imprisonment.

The law proposes a 1-year imprisonment for “someone who solicits a person, directly, digitally, by mail, or online in order to convert his religion”. It also stipulates a 2-year imprisonment for the same act towards a minor.”

Considering past failed attempts to pass similar legislation, it appears unlikely at this point that the law will pass. It does come at a significant time when the current governing coalition are attempting controversial and large-scale overhauls to the judicial system in response to their own frustrations at the Supreme’s Counts historical blocking of more extreme initiatives made by parties such as UTJ, including on religious freedom issues.

Efforts to reduce the power of the Supreme Court to strike down “undemocratic” laws have long been pushed by more radically leaning religious Jewish groups that have recently gained unprecedented influence in the newly formed coalition government, perhaps the most radically religiously Jewish leaning government in Israel’s history.

Encouragingly, in response to the expressed concerns of Christians’ freedoms in Israel, Prime Minister Netanyahu tweeted “We will not advance any law against the Christian community”, but prayer is nonetheless very much needed for the peace of Jerusalem.

Lord have mercy.

Henan Province (People's republic of China)

In March, news broke about a Chinese government requirement that people in the Henan province register before attending worship services. They’re supposed to use a “Smart Religion” app, which records each person’s name, address, date of birth, occupation, and government ID number.
Ever since COVID, the lockdown policy has given power to a lot of government agencies. Many church gatherings were broken up in the name of COVID.
We’re also seeing an increase in house church pastors charged with financial fraud because they collect tithes. In the eyes of the government, the only legal pastors belong to the Three Self Church. They say it’s cheating to call yourself a pastor and receive money from people if you aren’t officially registered.
Because of government pressure, and because ideas of church aren’t very solid in China, we’ve seen many churches adopt online gatherings as their normal way of meeting. The government will stop any streaming services if they can detect them, so churches have been developing their own video streaming services and encouraging their congregations to use that for Sunday services. People will gather in small groups and watch together.
In some provinces, like Henan, it’s now extremely hard to find a church gathering in person.
The main tool the Government use to teach nationalism and atheism is the school system. Because of that, some Christian families have been opting to send their children to classical Christian schools.
However, the persecution against these schools has been severe in the past two years.
Before 2020, there were a number of Christian schools. Now it’s very hard to find any.

Lord have mercy.

Democratic Republic of Congo

In just two weeks, 72 Christians have been killed in Nord Kivu, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) by the Islamist rebel group, the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).

Mulinde Esemo, a key church leader in Butembo, DRC, confirmed that the past two weeks have been a period of “great anguish” for the body of Christ in Congo.

He said, “We are living in a very tense situation here in Eastern DRC, both in towns and in the villages. Scores of believers have been killed in cold blood by the ADF rebels. It is a massacre like one killing animals.”

These attacks are happening just two months after twenty-three people were killed in Makungwe on January 23, 2023. Unabated, the ADF militants have been on a killing spree as they push their agenda of the Islamization of the majority Christian Eastern side of the DRC.

Here is the two-week chronology of the attacks as reported by Mulinde Esemo, the leader of the Nord Kivu diocese.

On March 9, the ADF rebels attacked the Mukondi area and butchered thirty-six people.

On March 12, nineteen people were killed in Kirindera village, and houses were set on fire by the same group, the ADF.

Earlier this week, on March 14, seventeen Christians were killed in Mabuku, among them an Episcopal priest who was leading service when the attackers raided.

All these villages are about 20 km from Butembo town, which has led villagers to flee to save their lives. Defiling the Pope’s call for peace and respect for human dignity during his trip to the DRC a month ago, the ADF has left thousands of displaced and living in deplorable conditions with no one to help.

Mulinde Esemo continued,“Families that fled from all those villages are now living as refugees here in Butembo, despite the fact that the town and the suburbs are overpopulated. Women and children are the most affected since they are most vulnerable. You will occasionally hear them crying for the lack of food, as the men look for casual jobs to buy something for the families.”

Bishop Mulinde has sent out a word to believers asking for help to the Congolese believers that have been left by loved ones due to the persecution and have fled their homes for fear of being killed.

Lord have mercy.

So, Father we pray for your people throughout the world who are living with the threat and with the experience of persecution.

We pray for the peace and security of the people we have just mentioned in Israel, China and the DRC.

We pray in particular for the calming of violence, the protection of the young and vulnerable and for those who lead the people of God and their churches through difficult times.

We ask that at this Easter time the power of the risen Christ to transform human life might be cleary seen, and that His light will yet shine in the darkest and most dangerous of places.

And we ask for Jesus' sake.

AMEN.