Student Life in Lockdown

Intro: Sarah & Paul
SARAH: Good morning and warm welcome to you from the city of Manchester. We’re in an area of Manchester that has been on the news a lot recently. Some of those stories have been linked to the many university students that we have. Not so long ago we were a corona virus hot spot. Then there were scenes of students being kept inside university halls. In the past few weeks there were times when infection rates were going up and fences were coming down! Most recently we’ve had students occupying abandoned local university halls. And news of one student alleging he was racially profiled. The autumn term is usually busy and full, but this has been one like no other!
PAUL: And that’s all set against a national scene that’s felt quite up and down lately. We’re now over a couple of weeks into a second lockdown. And our Prime Minister has had to isolate. But we’re beginning to hear encouraging news about potential vaccines. And there’s hope that people might be able to visit loved ones in care homes.As a church we’ve missed not being able to meet together in person, but we’re doing all we can to stay connected through online worship and video calls. 
SARAH: Our opening song reminds us that no matter what the ups and downs of life bring we have an amazing God, who knows and looks after the world he created and sustained. 

Music 1: Indescribable (From the highest of heights)
Confession
PAUL: One of things the Bible tells us is that we can come to God no matter who we are or what we’ve done, no matter how far away we feel, or how messy, broken or sinful we feel. We can come to God and seek his forgiveness and his healing.
Lord our God,in our sin we have avoided your call.Our love for you is like a morning cloud,like the dew that goes away early.Have mercy on us;deliver us from judgement;bind up our wounds and revive us;in Jesus Christ our Lord.Amen.
Absolution
PAUL: May the God of all healing and forgivenessdraw us to himself,and cleanse us from all our sinsthat we may behold the glory of his Son,the Word made flesh,Jesus Christ our Lord.Amen.
SARAH: How encouraging to hear of God’s forgiveness in the midst of change and uncertainty - a theme that we’ll hear in our next hymn Great is thy Faithfulness

Music 2: Great is thy faithfulness

SARAH: Manchester has the largest student population outside of London. Each year there’s well over 100,000 students in the city, from Manchester itself, from all over the UK and around the world. Our church is right in the heart of student land. The main road nearby our church is often said to be one of the busiest bus routes in Europe! People arrive here ready to start a new chapter, make new friends, have new experiences, sometimes to experience life in a big city for the first time. Many come expecting to have the time of their lives. Maybe some of us remember going to Uni and the dreams and aspirations we had or the sense of trepidation and excitement that came with leaving home and beginning a new stage in life . 
At our church we look forward to welcoming new and returning students into the church family. Many young people find a home from home within our church community. There’s a student bible study on a Thursday evening, and many smaller group opportunities to meet up and to make friends. All of these work best in person and face to face! So this year has been more of a challenge.
We’re going to hear from a first year student, here in Manchester for the first time about her experiences. 
First-year student story - Cerys Reeves 
My name is Cerys and I’m from Wrexham, North Wales. I’m currently studying adult nursing at the University of Manchester as an undergraduate. Living in student halls in Manchester has been a crazy experience this year. From having fences put up around our campus, to 3 or 4 protests happening, it has definitely been an intense atmosphere here yet there’s a real sense of community between the students on campus. I know there are many students here who are feeling lonely and struggling to adjust to life in a new city.
The main thing I looked forward to at university was getting to know new people from different regions of the world and different backgrounds. Something that has been difficult to do during this pandemic. I was also looking forward to joining the Christian union and being able to meet new friends there who are a similar age to myself. This term has been very different from what I had imagined. Learning has been online and no in-person teaching has taken place but also socialising has been limited to only your household. 
I’d been in Manchester for a week when the majority of our flat tested positive for coronavirus and we were forced to isolate. It was definitely frustrating not to be able to go out and meet new people but it was also an opportunity for our flat to get to know each other, something that may not have happened as quickly if we weren’t in isolation together. 
I’m fortunate to be in a flat full of lovely girls who I get along with well. The biggest blessing has been having another Christian in my flat, who is a midwifery student. Being able to encourage each other and attend Christian Union calls together has been so beneficial to my faith.
Despite the challenges that come with being a student in the pandemic, I’ve enjoyed my experience so far very much. Going to church was a big part of my first few weeks at university. Now, online services, on a Sunday and also student bible study on a Thursday have been a real encouragement and have helped me focus on Jesus during these uncertain times. 
University is meant to be about meeting new people but in times like this it’s been difficult to do so. It feels like the chance to socialise with people outside my flat is almost non-existent. That’s why I’m so thankful that I’ve had had opportunities to meet other people from Trinity Platt church in person through walks in the park, and walking to and from church, but being 2m apart . It’s reassuring to know there's a wider network of people - and I’m looking forward to the day when I can meet them properly for a coffee, indoors. The one verse that has helped me through the move to university but also the current restrictions and uncertainty is Jeremiah 29:11. “For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” 
Knowing God is in control during ever changing times is such a comfort and peace to have.
SARAH: Our next song reminds us Jesus can break the power of sin and darkness in our lives. What amazing news that is! and after that we’ll have our Bible readings. They are read by Lydia, a member of our church family, who was a student here in Manchester and has stayed on and is now in her first year of teaching. 

Music 2: Who breaks the power (this is amazing grace)

Lydia: Readings
Our first reading is Psalm 13.
1 How long, Lord? Will you forget me for ever? How long will you hide your face from me?2 How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?
3 Look on me and answer, Lord my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death,4 and my enemy will say, ‘I have overcome him,’ and my foes will rejoice when I fall.
5 But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation.6 I will sing the Lord’s praise, for he has been good to me.

Our second reading is Romans chapter 8 reading from verse 31.
31 If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all – how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died – more than that, who was raised to life – is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written:
‘For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.’
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
SARAH: We come together this morning to worship the one who stepped into this world, our next song is Light of the world, afterwards, our Rector Paul Mathole will preach.
Music 4: Light of the world (Here I am to worship )
PAUL: SermonA national newspaper has been running a video advertisement lately. It’s very clever... It shows a series of world leaders, politicians or business people And it’s a series of clips from different press conferences or interviews. And each of them ‘aah’ when they didn’t know what to say... So it’s a collection of “Ums”, “Ers” “Ahs”....!
Then the narrator says: “If you’re feeling a bit lost right now, you’re in good company”.
The message is really effective! Many of us are feeling lost right now. Whether that’s what’ll happen next with the lockdown?, What will Christmas look like?, What’ll happen when the vaccine arrives?, How do I plan for next year?
And we’ve talked in this service about the students here in Manchester. It’s been a tough first term at university - here and all across the country. For many, a precious time of university adventure has been harshly hemmed in. 
But it’s more than that too. When the fences went up in Manchester there was real fear. Many of us may know a student who’s felt alone and scared. And I’m sure there are parents or grandparents around the country who just want to jump in the car and go and bring them home.
And so understandably in the midst of all this, we might be feeling a bit spiritually lost too. Whether we’re young or old. Where is God? Has he forgotten me in my circumstances? Am I on my own? 
Maybe even a few world leaders are wondering that(!) 
It’s a feeling King David would have recognised. In Psalm 13, he puts it in three ways: 
First, David feels lost in his relationship with God. “How long, Lord? Will you forget me for ever? / How long will you hide your face from me?” He feels like God isn’t there. One writer says it’s the feeling of “a friendship that has clouded over”.
Second, David feels lost in relation to himself. “How long must I wrestle with my thoughts / and day after day have sorrow in my heart?” David is restless in his mind. Plagued by anxiety. It’s amazing how thoroughly modern David sounds.
Third, David feels lost in the face of external forces around him.“How long will my enemy triumph over me?” This might have been an enemy figure or the threat of disease. Either way, David feels the threat to who he was and his role as king. A sense that outside events were in control of him and not the other way around. So strong is David’s feeling that he’s physically weak and ill. “Look on me and answer, Lord my God. / Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death, and my enemy will say, ‘I have overcome him,’ / and my foes will rejoice when I fall”. David needs the Lord. He fears being overwhelmed by his enemies - by the forces outside him.

David is asking big spiritual questions here: “Why are you absent, God? Why does my mind plague me?” 
And instinctively we might think, “that’s a bad thing”. That it’s not a good place to be.
And it might not be an easy place. But the Bible doesn’t shy away from voicing that feeling of being spiritually lost. 
What if these questions are not a lack of faith in God, but signs of longing for God. Signs that David longs to be known and seen and helped by God himself.
Consider the questions we’re asking at the moment. Why do we feel the pandemic has taken something precious from us? Why do we long to be re-connected with others? Why are we missing gathering at concerts and sports matches? Why are we so fearful of losing Christmas? These questions are telling us something about how we’re made and what we’re made for. 
For relationship, for intimacy, and together to be connected to something greater.These things we’re looking for - yearning for… the BIble would say they’re all pointing us to Jesus Christ. In Jesus, God draws close to us; in Jesus, God comes to know us; in Jesus, God comes to rescue and help us. 
And in Jesus we can be connected to someone much greater and more wonderful than we are: At the end of the Psalm, David says “I will sing the Lord’s praise, / for he has been good to me.” It’s fascinating - he’s saying he wants to worship. From our desire to “clap for carers”, to longing to be able to sing Hark the Herald Angels Sing, I wonder if we spot how much we’re wired to join in praise of something greater than us.
There were all those world leaders, all struggling, all a bit lost. I wonder how much they would value the help from someone greater even than they are. I wonder if they could hear in their own uncertainty, a need for God. 
The advert said, “If you’re feeling a bit lost right now, you’re in good company.” Perhaps more than we realise.
[Straight into:]Music 5: Still, my soul be still
SARAH: X singing “Still, my soul be still”. Our prayers today are led by Adam Jones. Adam is the Universities and Colleges Christian Fellowship Team Leader for the North West and a part of our church family. He works with staff, volunteers and students who run Christian Union on university campuses in Manchester, Liverpool, Lancaster, Chester, Preston and Carlisle.
Prayers
ADAM : How long oh Lord? Will you forget me forever? Oh Lord, the words of the Psalmist speak for so many of us, as we wrestle with the challenges, the uncertainties and indeed the sorrow of these days. We thank you for our university students like Cerys and for university staff, who have persevered through such difficult circumstances during this term. We pray for the many students isolated and struggling with life away from home and for the mental and spiritual health of students and for others in society, paralysed with loneliness and feelings of lostness. Thank you for Christian Unions and church communities who have passionately held out your message of hope, words of truthful comfort, the gospel of Jesus; a shining beacon in dark days. Indeed, from these great places of learning and research, we thank you for the tireless work of scientists and researchers and for recent great news regarding the development of a series of vaccines. And so we pray for our own government and for world leaders as they plan for the swift and fair distribution of these vaccines, worldwide. Finally, as the thoughts of many turn towards the Christmas festival, thank you that Christmas reminds us just how much You are for us and not against us. Lord help us to discern what is best for all our communities, as we seek to live and serve one another, as Christ showed us in his life. Thank you for these great words from Romans, that there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. May we each know the tenderness, the kindness and the enduring truth of the Lord Jesus Christ in our lives, as those who are not lost, but have been found by you, and Lord help us to continue to bring his love and comfort to all in these difficult days.
The prayer for this week in the Church of England’s month of prayer:Loving Father God,be with us in our distress;be with our families, friends, and neighbours,our country and our world.Give health to the sick,hope to the fearful,and comfort to mourners.Give wisdom to our frontline and key workers,insight to our Government,and patience to us all.Overcome disease with the power of your new life,through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.Amen.
We now join together in the words Jesus taught us… 
Our Father in heaven,hallowed be your name,your kingdom come,your will be done,on earth as in heaven.Give us today our daily bread.Forgive us our sins,as we forgive those who sin against us.Lead us not into temptationbut deliver us from evil,for the kingdom, the power,and the glory are yoursnow and for ever.Amen.
SARAH: Thank you for joining with us this morning. May the words that we have heard this morning encourage us as we go into a new week. It’s helpful to be reminded that we have a God who knows and understands the distress we feel, and who stepped in. What a saviour we have in Jesus, worthy of all our praise.
Final blessing 
PAUL: The Lord bless you and watch over you,the Lord make his face shine upon youand be gracious to you,the Lord look kindly on you and give you peace;and the blessing of God almighty,the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,be among you and remain with you always.Amen.
Music 6: Be thou my vision

Instrumental play out