I'm going to try to do something new--as time permits--I want to start doing a Sunday preview to help us get prepared for worship. I'll do a bit of writing about the service and things to watch for...
This week we are starting a new series called "American Jesus". The full description of the series is on the getting dusty notes. If you look closely you'll see that the font used for "getting dusty" resembles the font from American Idol. Instead of American Idol our focus is on pictures of Jesus that Americans have used over the past 200 plus years. When you walk in the auditorium you will see five different pictures of Jesus that come from actual drawings/paintings of how people have tried to represent Jesus. One of the questions to ask yourself as you look at each picture is "do I agree with the picture?"
The pre service video during this series is from the History Channel, it's called "Christmas Unwrapped". The video will be running about 10 minutes prior to the service starts and tells a very different story of Christmas traditions than we might have imagined.
After we go into live music you will see more pictures of Jesus on the screen, the last one is perhaps the most well known --we'll talk just a bit about it as we move into the service.
As you join in singing praises to God this week notice the theme that focuses in on the attributes of God. The text for Sunday is from Psalm 102.25-27. The music seeks to connect with both the mood and message of those verses.
Psa. 102:25 In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
26 They will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
Like clothing you will change them
and they will be discarded.
27 But you remain the same,
and your years will never end.
At the end of the time of worship in Song we will be spending time in prayer for local concerns and in praise to God.
At the first service we are celebrating God's gift of leadership to the church. We will be installing elders and deacons. In the other two services we will introduce you to your new elders and deacons.
During the offering (which is a part of worship as we give back to God) we will be watching a short video on the work we are connected with in Colima, Mexico. Our corners offering this month is for Terry Carter and Crew as they head for Colima in Feb., the money will be used for supplies for the construction work and other needs of the orphanage.
After the offering its time again for prayer. This prayer will focus on the needs of our world. We have a strong desire to see not only our corner of the world, but God's rule over all and his power to change a world. Part of that is asking.
A Video "man on the street" interview comes next. Pay special attention to how people answer the last question that is asked.
The message for the day is "American Jesus: From Here to Eternity". You'll want to get out the message notes on Dusty as we take a closer look at Jesus in a way that makes some people's eyes glaze over at Christmas. Kids, watch for Pixar's Ratatouillie to show up in the sermon (on screen).
After we've learned about Jesus Christ, we will celebrate his supper this Sunday. Take a moment before the service to prepare for the supper.
See you for worship!
Friday, November 30, 2007
Monday, November 26, 2007
Archers
After yesterday's message (you can download the roughest of drafts at www.egm.org) some people felt the difficulty of pursuing God's standard of absolute righteousness. There was the true sense that we can never achieve the standard--which, of course, we can not. But our inability to reach the standard or in the language of yesterday, become the best archers we can, does not stop our striving for that goal. The Heidelberg Catechism says it well,
Q & A 127
Q. What does the sixth request mean?
A. "And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one" means,
By ourselves we are too weak
to hold our own even for a moment.^1
And our sworn enemies—
the devil,^2 the world,^3 and our own flesh—^4
never stop attacking us.
And so, Lord,
uphold us and make us strong
with the strength of your Holy Spirit,
so that we may not go down to defeat
in this spiritual struggle,^5
but may firmly resist our enemies
until we finally win the complete victory.^6
^1 Ps. 103:14-16; John 15:1-5
^2 2 Cor. 11:14; Eph. 6:10-13; 1 Pet. 5:8
^3 John 15:18-21
^4 Rom. 7:23; Gal. 5:17
^5 Matt. 10:19-20; 26:41; Mark 13:33; Rom. 5:3-5
^6 1 Cor. 10:13; 1 Thess. 3:13; 5:23
I also quoted John Calvin yesterday about the need for us to take moving forward in our faith seriously, ,"The gospel is not a doctrine of the tongue, but of life. Let nominal Christians cease from insulting God by boasting themselves to be what they are not, and let them show themselves disciples not unworthy of Christ, their master. We must assign first place to the knowledge of our religion, for that is the beginning of our salvation. But our religion will be unprofitable, if it does not change our heart, pervade our manners, and transform us into new creatures."
What I didn't quote of Calvin was his understanding of how difficult this can be and the celebration we should have when we make small steps, "But let everyone proceed according to his given ability and continue the journey he has begun. There is no man so unhappy, that he will not make some progress, however small. Let us not cease to do the utmost, that we may incessantly go forward in the way of the Lord; and let us not despair because of the smallness of our accomplishments. Though we fall short, our labor is not lost if this day surpasses the preceeding one."
The only quibble I have with Calvin is I think we should not look at days, but longer term. We all know that not every day is better than the one before. But there should be a movement forward in the years of our lives so that we see a greater following after Christ now than we did last year or 10 years ago.
Q & A 127
Q. What does the sixth request mean?
A. "And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one" means,
By ourselves we are too weak
to hold our own even for a moment.^1
And our sworn enemies—
the devil,^2 the world,^3 and our own flesh—^4
never stop attacking us.
And so, Lord,
uphold us and make us strong
with the strength of your Holy Spirit,
so that we may not go down to defeat
in this spiritual struggle,^5
but may firmly resist our enemies
until we finally win the complete victory.^6
^1 Ps. 103:14-16; John 15:1-5
^2 2 Cor. 11:14; Eph. 6:10-13; 1 Pet. 5:8
^3 John 15:18-21
^4 Rom. 7:23; Gal. 5:17
^5 Matt. 10:19-20; 26:41; Mark 13:33; Rom. 5:3-5
^6 1 Cor. 10:13; 1 Thess. 3:13; 5:23
I also quoted John Calvin yesterday about the need for us to take moving forward in our faith seriously, ,"The gospel is not a doctrine of the tongue, but of life. Let nominal Christians cease from insulting God by boasting themselves to be what they are not, and let them show themselves disciples not unworthy of Christ, their master. We must assign first place to the knowledge of our religion, for that is the beginning of our salvation. But our religion will be unprofitable, if it does not change our heart, pervade our manners, and transform us into new creatures."
What I didn't quote of Calvin was his understanding of how difficult this can be and the celebration we should have when we make small steps, "But let everyone proceed according to his given ability and continue the journey he has begun. There is no man so unhappy, that he will not make some progress, however small. Let us not cease to do the utmost, that we may incessantly go forward in the way of the Lord; and let us not despair because of the smallness of our accomplishments. Though we fall short, our labor is not lost if this day surpasses the preceeding one."
The only quibble I have with Calvin is I think we should not look at days, but longer term. We all know that not every day is better than the one before. But there should be a movement forward in the years of our lives so that we see a greater following after Christ now than we did last year or 10 years ago.
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Thanksgiving
"There is not one little blade of grass, there is no color in this world that is not intended to make men rejoice.
In herbs, trees, and fruit, besides being useful in various ways, he planned to please us by their gracious lines and pleasant odors.
Should the Lord have attracted our eyes to the beauty of flowers, and our sense of smell to pleasant odors, and should it then be a sin to drink them in?
In one word, has he not made many things worthy of our attention that go far beyond our needs? Ps. 104.15
-- John Calvin
In herbs, trees, and fruit, besides being useful in various ways, he planned to please us by their gracious lines and pleasant odors.
Should the Lord have attracted our eyes to the beauty of flowers, and our sense of smell to pleasant odors, and should it then be a sin to drink them in?
In one word, has he not made many things worthy of our attention that go far beyond our needs? Ps. 104.15
-- John Calvin
Monday, November 19, 2007
Dog, Sicker than Part 2
Dropped by the doc today. I have bronchitis and possibly pneumonia. Since the treatment is the same for both we didn't do any more checking on the pneumonia side of things. A ten day run of antibiotics should do the trick.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Music that....
* It may be that when the angels go about their task praising God, they play only Bach. I am sure, however, that when they are together in family they play Mozart. --Karl Barth
* Mozart tells us what it's like to be human, Beethoven tells us what it's like to be Beethoven and Bach tells us what it's like to be the universe.
~ Douglas Adams
* Mozart tells us what it's like to be human, Beethoven tells us what it's like to be Beethoven and Bach tells us what it's like to be the universe.
~ Douglas Adams
Friday, November 16, 2007
The short and the long of it
As my wife Linda can attest I usually have more material to cover on Sundays than I have time--she often has to endure all the footnotes and tidbits that I didn't get to say. This week is no exception. We are celebrating professions of faith, baptisms and new folks joining egm so I felt it best to make the sermon a bit shorter. But for those of you who are gluttons for punishment you can find the full printed version (but never the full version since I'm not completely done with a message until I preach it) in the downloads section of EverGreen's website www.egm.org
Dog, Sicker than a
Sorry about the lacks of posting for the last couple of weeks. I've been battling whatever the crud is that's popular right now. I was planning on being over it by now, but instead I keep coughing and hacking. Alas, I now plan on being better by Sunday. So soon I should be back full strength in the blogging world.
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