Sunday 03 May 2026
5th Sunday of Easter
Welcome!
Welcome to excerpts from the worship held within the newly formed Westhills Church of Scotland Congregation. We know that not all members of the congregation are able to be in church on Sunday morning; offering these excerpts from the Sunday morning service might help you feel included. Where we can, we offer parts of the service in text and audio, whichever works best for you.
If this post helps you explore what happens within an act of worship then please read on…
The Psalms
Psalm 31: 1 – 5 & 16
Live recording
Your Weekly Church Notices
Scripture
1 Peter 2: 1 – 10
Live recording
John 1: 1 – 14
Live recording
Praise – It only takes a spark
Prayers
Live recording
Father God, we approach you with joyful hearts. We raise our spirits ready to give you praise and adoration for all the good things you have done. When we were lost you found us. When we lived in the slavery of sin you redeemed us. When we were alone you came to us and comforted us. When we were in darkness you filled our lives with light and joy.
Then let our worship of you reflect these things. Let our lives be in your image and be filled with grace, forgiveness and the strength of the spirit of God. It may seem that we ask too much for ourselves but your pleasure is to give all good things to your children. We are not ashamed to ask for what we need for our prayers and requests bring us closer to you and You closer to us.
Help us Lord to treasure these moments spent in prayer; moments where our very soul acknowledges the existence of God, moments where our hearts begin to seek, explore, ponder the impossibility of God and learn that with God all things are possible; for You are the God who brought all things out of nothing and gifted to us all things in heaven and on earth for our enjoyment.
Generous God, who gave us the beauty of creation, who gave us Your only Son, we lay our gifts before you seeking to be generous, seeking to be loving, seeking to honour your name and the faith within us by the gifts we bring. Imperfect as we are, imperfect though our gifts may be, by your boundless grace you accept all we bring. Use these gifts to the Glory of Your name and the building up of Your church.
In obedience and with joy we join in the words of your prayer saying…
Our Father who art in Heaven Hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, for thine is the Kingdom, the Power and the Glory forever. Amen.
Address
Live recording
As much as they loved her, her husband and two children were embarrassed to be seen with her. It was all too common a pattern. What should have been a quiet evening in a nice restaurant would eventually descend into an unpleasant scene.
Mary was a senior lecturer in Catering and Hospitality. Make no mistake she knew her stuff. Mary expected the best of service when she went out for a meal. Trouble was she just couldn’t leave her sometimes unrealistically high expectations and comprehensive knowledge of the catering industry at home and just enjoy a night with the family. First she would be having a quiet word with the waiter, then she would progress to the restaurant manager and eventually the chef would be dragged into the argument. It got to the stage where there was hardly a local restaurant where they were welcome for Mary had complained to management in virtually every place they had ever been.
There’s always one, isn’t there! Wherever you are, in a restaurant or a class somewhere or just taking the bus to go shopping, there’s always one. There’s always one person who’s loud or awkward or difficult. Someone who finds something to complain about, someone who has the knack of being really irritating, especially if a quiet meal is interrupted by some awkward individual at the next table constantly complaining.
But at other times those who ask awkward questions are so valuable. They’re the ones who aren’t afraid to challenge us, the ones who ask those pertinent but embarrassing questions that nobody else dares ask; the ones who say straight out when they don’t understand. Whether they’re aware of it or not, they so often speak on behalf of other people.
Thomas seems to have been one of those awkward irritating people. He refused to accept anything at face value, but prodded and poked and tested until he found an answer which was satisfactory to him. When the disciples were gathered in the Upper Room after that first Easter, it was Thomas who brought them all down to earth by refusing to believe that Jesus could be alive. The fact that he was outnumbered didn’t seem to bother him. Thomas was a lone voice saying, “ I won’t believe unless I see for myself”
Yet, it was his very questioning which allowed him to meet with Jesus. It was because he was determined to get to the truth of the matter for himself that Thomas met with his risen Lord. He could have simply accepted what others told him; it would have been easy to have been swept along in their obvious excitement at having seen Jesus, but Thomas needed to be certain for himself. By his refusal to accept anything until he had tested it out for himself, Thomas has given all of us permission to ask questions and to search for the truth no matter what others might be saying or where that search leads.
In today’s reading from John’s Gospel it’s Thomas who asks the obvious question, but the question which no one else dared to voice. “You know the way to the place where I am going,” said Jesus.
Thomas said, “Lord, we don’t know where it is you are going so how can we know the way?”
I don’t think that even Google Maps would have helped Thomas. Electronic maps certainly help you get to where ever you are going. But you have to know where you want to go, you have to know your destination before it can work out how you get there. Replying to Thomas, Jesus doesn’t talk about a destination; it’s not about knowing the place; Jesus talks about knowing the way.
Jesus said to Thomas, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one goes to the Father except by me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” Words which are not so much about arriving at a destination so much as about our way of living, our journeying and our desire to struggle with the truth in the midst of our journeying and living.
Thomas’s directness allows the others to discover their own questions, and it becomes apparent that Thomas was not the only one who had precious little idea what Jesus was talking about. Philip put it into words. Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”
Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?”
What unfolds is an insight into the work of the Holy Spirit. Jesus doesn’t at this stage use the words ‘Holy Spirit’, but he begins to talk about God being within him. And he also talks about himself being within God. He says too that all his actions and words are determined by the God within.
Later, Jesus talks about God within us as the Holy Spirit, the comforter. He promises that all his friends will be able to experience the God within, although not until after he himself has moved on from this life.
We cannot, and do not, spend our lives holding onto our mother’s apron strings. The time comes when nurturing relationships have served their primary purpose and we must move on from childhood to adulthood. Jesus nurtured his disciples in matters of faith and showed them by teaching and miracle what a life lived in oneness with God could be like. “I am telling you the truth: whoever believes in me will do what I do – yes, he will do even greater things,” This isn’t about getting to heaven, it’s about how we live this life now. How will faith shape who we are and how we respond to our neighbour.
Through Christ we too seek oneness with the Father. We seek the God who comes to dwell within us and allow ourselves to dwell within him. It has been said so many times before, I tell you nothing new, we follow Christ in order that we may continue the work he began. This is the Way; we feed the hungry, heal the sick, welcome the stranger, free the oppressed, forgive our debtors. This is the Way, this is the Kingdom of God where all are valued, loved and restored. We know this because Thomas dared to ask the question.
Praise – There is a redeemer
Prayers for Others
Live recording
Serving Others
Lord Jesus, you taught us to serve our neighbours, for in serving others we are serving you. Your words sound wonderful and so straightforward until we stop to think what they mean and suddenly the depth of the challenge confronts us. Discipleship can be so costly giving so much of our time and effort and resources to other people – we wonder how on earth we can respond to the overwhelming needs of our neighbours. Reassure us of this; that us that we cannot do everything but that we can do something. Teach us that even a little offered by many can achieve wonderful things through your grace. Fill us with love for you and love for our neighbour that in serving others we might serve You. Hear us as we pray…
Young people facing exam time
Lord Jesus, we offer our children into your care that they might grow in faith and know the tenderness of your love within their lives. We pray for those who are working towards exams at school or university and feeling the pressures of study, pressures from within themselves to do well. Lord give them the maturity to cope with the stresses of life and the demands, which we all face at different times in life. Give them the grace to acknowledge their limitations, to acknowledge success and failure as part of life’s pattern. Lord hear us in our prayers…
Life of Society
Lord Jesus, we pray together with open hearts and open minds for the life of our society and for those who shape it’s direction in political circles. Help us and guide us as we seek to control the very thing we have created. For society is of our making. It is our rules and our decisions that make it what it is. It is our own waywardness that destroys the values we holds to be the most important and lasting. Fill the life of our society with the leading and guiding of the Holy Spirit, showing us how to look beyond self and self-interest. Allow the values of the Kingdom of God to take root again within our society; a new way of living where there is Good news for the poor, liberty for the captive, recovery of sight for the blind and freedom for the oppressed. Hear us in our prayers for the life of society…
Praise – What a wonderful change
The Grace
And now… May the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Love of God and the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you and all whom you love, now and for evermore. AMEN.