Harvest Festival celebrations in the Church of Scotland are joyful, community-focused events that give thanks to God for the provision of food and the blessings of creation.
Greenbank Parish Church traditionally holds a Harvest Thanksgiving service in late September or early October, when the sanctuary is decorated with seasonal fruits and flowers, and sometimes sheaves corn or bales of hay! In 2025 the service was ‘all-age’ and was held on the morning of Sunday 5th October.
Order of Service
Sunday 5th October 2025
Harvest Thanksgiving
Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
In-Person and Livestreamed All-Age Worship, 10.30am
Order of Service
(Hymns are from CH4 and readings are from NRSV)
Organ: In a Monastery Garden, by Albert Ketèlbey (arr. Massimo)
Welcome and Intimations
Call to Worship
Hymn 229: We plough the fields and scatter [Tune: Wir pflügen]
Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer
Talk 1
Hymn 232: Pears and apples, wheat and grapes [Tune: Pears and apples] (The Band)
Reading: Exodus 23: 10–16 (OT p71)
Hymn 230: Praise God for the harvest of orchard and field [Tune: Stowey]
Reading: Luke 17: 5–10 (NT p77)
Talk 2
Hymn 231: For the fruits of all creation [Tune: East Acklam]
Prayers of Thanksgiving and Intercession
Hymn 233: Come, you thankful people, come [Tune: St George’s Windsor]
Benediction, with sung Amen at Hymn 822
Organ: Heaven and Earth display the Glory of God, by Felix Mendelssohn (arr. Dicks)
Weekly newsletter
Here is an extract from the Greenbank weekly email newsletter published on the Friday before Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday:
To support the work of greening Greenbank, the Eco-Group welcomes donations of home grown produce and preserves etc. for a stall after the Harvest Thanksgiving service at 10.30am on Sunday 5th October. Donations may be handed in to the Church Office, or brought along on the day.
If anyone would like their donations to be collected please get in touch. Many thanks.
Eco-Group
oOo
On Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday your generous donations of non-perishable food are also very welcome. Our usual box will be at the front door and the donations are used to help feed homeless people or given to the food banks throughout the city.
Help The Homeless Group
After the morning service
As usual, coffee, tea and biscuits were provided in the Main Hall after the service. That day the Eco-Group also had a stall selling home grown produce and preserves.
Traditionally on Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday, after worship a greetings card and pot plant are delivered to all housebound members and those in care homes. Volunteers to deliver the plants are always appreciated.
Afternoon service
Every quarter Greenbank holds a short dementia friendly afternoon service with a celebration of Communion. Lifts are provided for those who would otherwise have difficulty in coming to church. Tea, cakes and live musical accompaniment follow in the Main Hall.
As there was a dementia friendly service held on the afternoon of Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday, before leaving those present were handed their pot plant and greetings card.