DANFORTH MENNONITE CHURCH
416-422-2406
Pastor Pieter Niemeyer
We welcome all guests who have joined us.
Danforth Mennonite Church
February 2, 2025 11:00 a.m.
Order of Service
Welcome
Land Acknowledgement
Opening Prayer
Call to worship
Opening Hymn: VT#9 Come Away From Rush and Hurry
Announcements and offering
Offertory Prayer
Hymn: VT#813 Heart With Loving Heart United
Congregational Prayer
Hymn: VT#719 Jesus, Help Us Live in Peace
Scripture reading: I Corinthians 13:1-13,
Luke 4:21-30
Sermon: The Standard of the Spirit Part 2
Closing Hymn: VT 831 Blest Be the Tie that Binds
Benediction
Leading Us in Worship
Sermon Pieter N.
Worship Leader Cindy R.
Scripture reader Bethany W.
Song Leader Dalton J.
Musicians Roger H. (piano), Ray W. (tuba)
Greeters Dalton & Carol J.
Zoom Host Bonnie W.
A/V Technician Don B.
Hymn of the month: VT # 9 Come away from rush and hurry
It’s Hymn Sing Sunday
All are welcome to join us in the sanctuary
at 10:00 a.m.
The adult discussion class returns on February 9. If you would like to receive emails regarding what’s happening in our class, please contact Bonnie.
Call to worship
One: We confess we are sometimes impatient, and often unkind. We are quick to envy and find subtle ways to boast. There are times we are rude and lift ourselves up as we put others down.
All: Loving God teach us to love
One: God of Love, we confess that we are quickly angered. We are quick to record how often we’ve been wronged. There are times we celebrate the misfortune of others
All: Loving God teach us to love
One: God of Love, we confess that we put ourselves first. We are reluctant to give, we are slow to sacrifice. There are times we hesitate to protect.
All: Loving God teach us to love
One: When we are tempted to judge, may love remind us to trust and forgive. When we are tempted to despair, may love remind us to hope. When we are tempted to give up, may love remind us to persevere.
All: Loving God teach us to love.
Scripture Reading
I Corinthians 13:1-13 (NRSVUE)
The Gift of Love
13 If I speak in the tongues of humans and of angels but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all my possessions and if I hand over my body so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable; it keeps no record of wrongs; 6 it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. 7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. 9 For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part, 10 but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. 12 For now we see only a reflection, as in a mirror, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13 And now faith, hope, and love remain, these three, and the greatest of these is love.
Luke 4:21-30 (NRSVUE)
21 Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 22 All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is this not Joseph’s son?” 23 He said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘Doctor, cure yourself!’ And you will say, ‘Do here also in your hometown the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.’ ” 24 And he said, “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in his hometown. 25 But the truth is, there were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months and there was a severe famine over all the land, 26 yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. 27 There were also many with a skin disease in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.” 28 When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. 29 They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. 30 But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.
The Right Rev Mariann Edgar Budde delivering her sermon at the national prayer service at Washington National Cathedral, 21 January 2025
Last week, the bishop of Washington delivered a sermon in front of President Trump urging him to show mercy towards LGBTQ+ and migrant communities. The president condemned it as ‘nasty’.
At church, it was mentioned that people were sending postcards of affirmation and support for Bishop Budde. Here is the contact information:
Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde
Washington National Cathedral
2101Wisconsin Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20016
Praying with the Anabaptists: Five Hundred Years Later
Written by Carol Penner
Reforming Spirit,
you blew through the lives of common folk in Switzerland in 1525.
A realization gradually dawned that what they had been taught from childhood about being a Christian was not the only way to think.
Reading the Bible opened a new way. They envisioned a church not automatically filled with citizens from birth, not led by leaders who bought their positions, not having a hierarchy at all.
And so they knelt and were rebaptized as adults, claiming their own faith in their own time, ready to suffer the consequences.
Your Spirit continues to move today, reform-ing your church in new and myriad ways.
You challenge us to draw close, to read and reread your sacred texts, and to discern where the church is not serving the one who washed feet, not honouring the Creator of all creatures, not tuned to your beating heart of love.
Wake us up to claim our faith in our time,
becoming yielded to your goodness.
Turn us away from sins that vary and multiply in our very souls, and in our beloved communities.
Together we read and listen, together we want to find the footsteps of Jesus and walk in them.
Give us courage to resist what you want resisted; tyranny, callousness, unkindness,
and violence on every level.
Through your power, mold our congregations into true communities of devotion and simplicity, that bring good news of great joy to all people.
The world needs your touch, and we have hands. The world needs your voice, can we speak your truth?
By your grace, we live and move and find new ways of being. Amen.
Copyright Carol Penner www.leadinginworship.com.
Dear Heavenly Father, We come before you with our prayers for DMC’s new pastor, Pieter Niemeyer. We ask that you bless and guide him in his role as a shepherd of the congregation. Grant him wisdom, discernment, and under-standing as he leads and ministers to the people entrusted to his care. Father, we ask that you surround him with a supportive and loving church community. May the congregation rally around him, offering encouragement, prayers, and support as he navigates the challenges and responsibilities of his position. Lord, we pray that you bless Pastor Pieter with good health, both physically and spiritually. Strengthen him in times of weariness and refresh his spirit when he feels drained. May he find rest and rejuvenation in your presence. May our pastor be a vessel through which your love and trust are revealed to the congregation and to the world. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.
DANFORTH ANNOUNCEMENTS
White cane week
February 2 – 8, 2025
It is designed to make the public aware of proper eye care and blindness prevention while focusing on the capabilities of blind people.
Men’s Breakfast
February 8, 9:00 a.m.
We meet on the 2nd Saturday
of every month at 9 a.m. in the Fellowship Hall. It’s from 9-11 a.m.
We share in Food, Fellowship, etc.
This is not limited to the men at DMC,
so please bring a friend.
This is a Potluck Affair 🙂
Worship Schedule reminder
February 9
Message Pieter N.
Worship leader Erma M.
Song Leader Don B.
Musicians Roger H. (piano), Ray W. (tuba)
Greeters Dalton & Carol J.
ZOOM host Bonnie W.
A/V Tech Murray L.
Book study Murray L.
February 16
Message Carol O.
Worship leader Bonnie W.
Song Leader Don B.
Musicians Bonnie W. (piano), Ray W. (tuba)
Greeters Cindy R., Bethany W.
ZOOM host Mike D.
A/V Tech Roger H.
Book study Murray L.
Ladies Walking group
On Tuesday, February 4 at 10:30 am (weather permitting), we will meet at Pine Hills Cemetery in the parking lot by the front entrance (Birchmount & St. Clair).
An email will go out on Monday February 3 to confirm the place and time.
If you need to be picked up or dropped off, please check in with fellow walkers or email Bonnie.
WIDER CHURCH ANNOUNCEMENTS
In This together presents a webinar series…Faithfully at Variance: Engaging with the Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective. Webinar #2
takes place on Sunday February 2, 6pm CT. We will be discussing Queer Relationships to the Confession. Theologian and MCEC Pastor Eliot C. B. will reflect on historical and current impacts of the Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective on Queer Mennonites, followed by responses by Anita F. and Nessa S. For more details and to register, visit inthistogethernetwork.ca/news-and-events.
Hope Starts at Home:
An evening with Phyllis W.
March 24, 2025 at 6 pm, Bingemans Conference Centre, 425 Bingemans Centre Dr, Kitchener
Join us on March 24 along with author and speaker, Phyllis W., the founder and ambassador of the Orange Shirt Society. Phyllis will share her childhood of healing and reconciliation in Canada as we seek to restore justice, foster belonging and address poverty in Ontario. Funds raised at the event will supply MCC Ontario’s new meat cannery. To learn more and order your tickets, go to
mcc.org/evening – with – phyllis – webstad.
In Summary, upcoming events:
At Danforth
February
1 Pastor Pieter joins us as our Pastor
2 DMC AGM
4 Ladies walking group – Pine Hills Cemetery
8 Men’s breakfast
8 Messy Church
11 Ladies walking group
18 Ladies walking group
22 Pieter & Mauricio’s wedding
25 Ladies walking group – Beach Winter stations
Wider Church
February
2 In This Together webinar
March
24 Evening with Phyllis W
Humour is the WD-40 of healing”
Our Little Library is in need of books.