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Loving God, we come on this Harvest Festival day to praise you, to celebrate your great goodness. We come with thanksgiving, joy and wonder, reminding ourselves of the richness of your creation, acknowledging your faithfulness in providing for all our needs and far beyond.
Loving God, for the beauty of the seasons, the constant cycles of day and night, and the vital gifts of rain and sunshine, we thank you. We thank you for the autumn colours that are now beginning to flame across the fields, smoke that curls from ditch and garden, the last cut of barley and wheat, the start of winter ploughing and birds that sing their farewell songs as they fly to far off lands.
We thank you for our food, the crunch of an apple and the juice of an orange; the taste of meat and varieties of fish; the goodness of vegetables and the luxury of fruit; the sweetness of sugar and the sharpness of salt; for milk and tea, seasoned good ale and new bottled wines, and fresh water to quench our thirst.
Loving God, creator of all that is, and has been, and shall be, receive now our worship this festival day, accept our offerings, bless our celebration, and fill us with thankfulness for all you have given to us.
Let us prayer for the coming of the kingdom in the words Jesus taught us.............
Our Father............
For the desert and the barren place where there could have been life-giving waters.
Forgive us and heal us O Lord
For the child crying for a sip of water and the mother with no means of responding
Forgive us and heal us O Lord
For air that is polluted and water that as been poisoned
Forgive us and renew us O Lord
From the times when we seek to keep your bounty to ourselves
Deliver us Good Lord
From our inability to know our thirst for you
Deliver us Good Lord
In lives that have gone dull and dry
Refresh us Good Lord
AmenRay Anglesea 2004
‘Come on in and gather round, I want everyone to see' said Julie the Junior Church leader.
She pulled form her bag a large, red, shining apple and held it up. ‘who knows what this is?' she asked.
‘An apple' replied Peter, ‘I like apples.' ‘Me too.' chorused the children as heads nodded in agreement. ‘Well done' said Julie placing the apple in the centre of the circle, so everyone could see. Next Julie pulled some golden ears of corn from her bag, and the children took turns to feel the rough dryness of the corn before placing this into the centre. Julie gathered some spiky green conkers shells into the centre of the group, but passed around the brown conkers for the children to feel. The polished brown surface was smooth, and just the right size for little hands to hold.
‘Please Julie' said Tim 'We have conkers on string, and we take them to school.'
‘ Well I know of some children who do that too' said Julie. ' Playing conkers can be good fun, only it can hurt when you bash your hands instead of the conker.' Gradually the brown, smooth conkers were placed amongst the other objects with the promise of a conker for all at the end of the story.
The next item to come from the bag was brown and crusty, and noses in the circle began to twitch as the smell of new bread reached them. ‘I know what that is' said Sam the youngest child, ‘It's bread'
‘Well done Sam, you're quite right. It is brown bread.'
‘I only like white bread' replied Caroline. ‘I think brown bread looks dirty.'
‘Well Caroline, white bread is nice too, but brown bread isn't dirty, it's full of good things, and it smells nice.' Caroline sniffed the bread again and had to agree, yes it did smell nice.
‘Perhaps we could all try some before we go home?' suggested Julie. The small brown loaf was placed into the centre.
Julie placed a jar of home-made plum Jam into the middle beside the bread, and placed some plums beside it She explained that she was lucky enough to have a plum tree in her garden, there had been so many plums that she had made jam. Billy said ‘ I like jam, but we buy ours from a shop.'
‘That's fine Billy' said Julie. ‘ Shops sell lots of jam, and I buy it from there too, and I also got my next thing to show you from a shop too.' Julie pulled a tin of soup from her bag, it was vegetable soup and lots of the vegetables could have come from local places or places far away.
Finally Julie brought a bar of chocolate from her bag. Everyone sat eyes glued to the golden wrapper. Julie explained that although she had bought the chocolate from the fair-trade stall at church, the cocoa to make the chocolate had come from a country on the other side of the world. She showed the children the special badge on the wrapper and explained what it meant, that those who grew the cocoa beans were given a fair price for farming. She encouraged the children to look for this badge on other food items on the stall in church or in the supermarket when they next went shopping. ‘I don't think this chocolate might last until the end of our session, so we can all have a square to eat now.' Everyone agreed that was a good idea.
While they enjoyed their chocolate they looked at all the items in the middle - the red apple, the golden corn, the spiky conker shells, and the brown conkers, the loaf of bread, the jar of jam, the tin of soup. Julie had added some autumn leaves, all orange and red some crispy at the edges.
‘And the things we see here' said Julie ‘remind us of the things that grow, and the farmers who plant crops that we can make into food like this soup. We think of people in this country, and people in other countries too, who as the leaves turn crunchy and fall from the trees gather all the food that has grown in the fields, or in our gardens, and allotments. We say thank you God for giving us a world to grow food in, for sending sunshine and rain to help the plants grow. We thank you for Harvest Time Amen.
‘Now it's time to finish our session today, by planting some cress seeds. That way you can all watch a plant grow and harvest it yourself, and share it with your family.'
Hannah Middleton 2004
We thank you Jesus for your big world
Where apples green and red can grow,
Where golden corn and wheat wave in fields
That we can eat at breakfast time.We thank you for the farmers all over yur world
Who plant, tend adn harvest the crops,
So we can have good food to eat
For dinner and tea.We thank you for the people who drive lorries,
taking the food to the supermarkets.
We think of all the people
Who cook for us every day.But most of all, Jesus,
We thank you for autumn
A time of harvest and gathering
and a chance to dance on a crunchy carpet of leaves. AmenHannah Middleton 2004
In our lives plant seeds of hope,
In our homes plant seeds of love,
In your Church plant seeds of joy;
Tell the world about God's love.
Tell the world about God's love.Jesus said "If you have faith
small as a mustard seed,
In my name you'll do great things,
you'll do great things indeed.
In our lives plant seeds of hope...."If a seed falls to the ground,
lies buried like the grain"
Jesus said "Until it dies
it cannot grow again."
In our lives plant seeds of hope....Jesus told the story of
the seed the sower sows,
"Listen to my Father's words
and then your faith will grow."
In our lives plant seeds of hope...."Some words fall among the thorns
and some on stony ground;
Some are carried off an lost
but others find good ground."
In our lives plant seeds of hope....Carol Dixon 2004
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