Sunday School meets in St Stephen's School
Sunday Youth meets in the Glebe Maisonette
Small Children are welcome to play in St Thomas's Chapel, near the porch
Baptised Communicants of other Churches are encouraged to receive communion
Children and other non-communicants are invited to come to the altar for a blessing
The Ministry of Healing is offered in the Chapel, after Communion is given

Lent is a forty-day season of preparation for the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ on Easter Sunday. The season begins with Ash Wednesday, when pastors mark the foreheads of Christians with ashes as a reminder that we are created from dust and to dust we shall return.
During Lent we follow Jesus from his adult ministry through his suffering during Holy Week and his crucifixion and death on Good Friday. And we read the Psalms that foretell what would happen during that week.
Holy Week begins with Palm Sunday, also called Sunday of the Passion, and continues through Holy Thursday (when Holy Communion was instituted at the Last Supper) and Good Friday, when Jesus was tried, crucified, and buried.
Because the Last Supper was celebrated during the Feast of the Passover, which is calculated on the phases of the moon, Easter is called a movable feast. Lent is scheduled backwards from Easter. Easter falls on the first Sunday after the full moon after the spring equinox. The forty days of fasting and penitence during Lent do not include Sundays. Christians always celebrate Sunday as the day Jesus rose from the dead, so it is never a day of fasting.
Many Northern Europeans celebrate the day before Ash Wednesday, mardi gras (French for Fat Tuesday, also called Shrove Tuesday), by eating up everything good in the house that medieval Christians believed was inappropriate to eat during Lent (eggs, butter, cream, meat). This celebration has expanded into all sorts of festivals all over the world, although most modern Christians do eat some - or all - of those foods during Lent.Lent is a time of stripping down to essentials, as each Christian focuses on his or her individual relationship with God. It is a time when Christians remember our baptisms, when Jesus washed away our sins, giving us newness of life to celebrate in the triumph of Palm Sunday and the glory of Easter.
Because Lent is a time of letting go of the bondage of sin, it is also a time of celebrating the freedom from the bondage of slavery. At the Feast of the Passover, all Jews give thanks for their freedom from the captivity of the Egyptians.
The colour of Lent is purple.

Processional Hymn                    95

Collect of the Day
Almighty God, whose Son Jesus Christ fasted forty days in the wilderness, and was tempted as we are, yet without sin: give us grace to discipline ourselves in obedience to your Spirit; and, as you know our weakness, so may we know your power to save; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

First Reading                 Deuteronomy 26.1-11                      (p.818)
Moses spoke to the people, saying: 1When you have come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance to possess, and you possess it, and settle in it, 2you shall take some of the first of all the fruit of the ground, which you harvest from the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you shall put it in a basket and go to the place that the LORD your God will choose as a dwelling for his name. 3You shall go to the priest who is in office at that time, and say to him, ‘Today I declare to the LORD your God that I have come into the land that the LORD swore to our ancestors to give us.’ 4When the priest takes the basket from your hand and sets it down before the altar of the LORD your God, 5you shall make this response before the LORD your God: ‘A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous. 6When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labour on us, 7we cried to the LORD, the God of our ancestors; the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. 8The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; 9and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. 10So now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground that you, O LORD, have given me.’ You shall set it down before the LORD your God and bow down before the LORD your God. 11Then you, together with the Levites and the aliens who reside among you, shall celebrate with all the bounty that the LORD your God has given to you and to your house.

GOSPEL                         Luke 4.1-13                                         (p.821)
1Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, 2where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing at all during those days, and when they were over, he was famished. 3The devil said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.’ 4Jesus answered him, ‘It is written, “One does not live by bread alone.”’
5Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. 6And the devil said to him, ‘To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please. 7If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.’ 8Jesus answered him, ‘It is written,  “Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.”’  9Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10for it is written,  “He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you”, 11and  “On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.”’  12Jesus answered him, ‘It is said, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”’ 13When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.

INTERCESSIONS
Please pray for
- The sick and suffering: especially Felix Okike, Lucilda Bernard, Joan Andrew, Elizabeth Dorsett, Clive Heywood, Ron & Ivy Smith, Susie Leach, Norbert Edwards, Brother Paul Anthony, Sylvia Steed, John Asbridge, Caroline Nevill, Ruth and Tracey Davies.

Offertory Hymn                            538

Communion Hymn                     383

Post Communion Prayer
Lord God, you have renewed us with the living bread from heaven; by it you nourish our faith, increase our hope, and strengthen our love: teach us always to hunger for him who is the true and living bread, and enable us to live by every word that proceeds from out of your mouth; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Recessional Hymn                     496

Coffee in church after the service

Some material included in this service is copyright: ©  1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ, USA. Some material included in this service is copyright: ©  The Archbishops' Council 2000. Collect (1st of Lent) ©  The Crown/Cambridge University Press: The Book of Common Prayer (1662)

NOTICES

THIS WEEK:

NEXT SUNDAY:        4 March 2007             Second Sunday of Lent

10 am SUNG EUCHARIST
Celebrant and Preacher – The Reverend Dr Bob Mayo
Genesis 15.1-12,17-18 (p 822), Luke 13.31-35  (p 826)

NEXT MONTH
11th    PCC Meeting           (after the St Michael’s Service)
4th      St Michael’s Annual Church Meeting
18th    Mothering Sunday    Bring and Share at St Michaels for Sarah’s last Sunday
24th    Bingo Evening at St Stephens School
25th    St Stephen’s Annual Church Meeting

What about Today’s Gospel Reading?

1. Where did Jesus go right after his baptism?
2. How long did Jesus stay there?
3. How did the devil ask Jesus to prove he was the Son of God?
4. What did the devil promise Jesus if he would worship him?
5. What was the second way the devil asked Jesus to prove that he was the Son of God?
6. How did Jesus answer the devil?
7. Did Jesus do anything the devil asked him to do?

Home Communion – Available to any unable to come on a Sunday.  Talk to Father Bob (8743 3166) if you or anyone else might be interested.

Any enquiries about pastoral concerns, baptisms, weddings or funerals please get in touch with either Bob Mayo, the vicar, or Sarah Archer, the Associate-Vicar at St Michaels. The only time that Bob will be unavailable is between Friday pm and Sunday am.

Visit the church web site at www.ststephensw12.org