What's happening at Pilgrim this week

Monday, December 6th 6:00 PM Property Meeting in Library
Tuesday, December 7th 7:00 PM Children's Practice
8:00 PM Choir Practice
Wednesday, December 8th 1:00 PM The Pilgrim Circle visits Abbotts Creek Rehab with gifts for residents to give to family members.
7:00 PM Finance Meetinc in Library
Thursday, December 9th 4:00 PM Senior trip to Tangelwood
7:00 PM Choir Practice
Friday, December 10th 4:00 PM Senior Trip to Tangelwood
Sunday, December 12th 9:15 Sunday School Opening
9:30 Sunday School
10:30 Worship Service including our wonderful Cantata.
Sermon: "Would You Please Listen To Me" John 1:6-8,19-28

BIRTHDAYS THIS WEEK
Monday, December 6th ..... Doris Cranford
Tuesday, December 7th .... Chip Edwards
Thursday, December 9th.... Rita Hodges




THIS PASTOR’S VIEWPOINT

“You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours” is a common saying. In many ways, perhaps, it is the very foundation of our everyday lives and if we were to stray too far from this concept society, as we know it, would most certainly crumble.

This kind of reciprocal arrangement, however, is not something that humankind invented although many seem to think they came up with the idea. Economists use the “law” of supply and demand as the basic tenet of commerce. Nor did scientists invent the idea or “law” that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Expressed in our everyday lives I am willing to give $2.77 cents for a gallon of gas or $24.95 for a shirt simply because I have need of what I am purchasing and feel the exchange is fair. When this equation becomes too one sided commerce stops. Either we refuse to buy or the other refuses to sell. In business both sides must be satisfied.

A successful marriage has this same concept as its foundation. There must be at least reasonably equal giving for a relationship to last. This, of course, also has the benefit on the flip side, there is equal receiving.

But how does this work in our daily religious life? Are we givers as well as receivers? The apostle Paul addresses this idea in the very beginning of his letter to the Romans. He writes in Romans 1:12 (NLT) I’m eager to encourage you in your faith, but I also want to be encouraged by yours. In this way, each of us will be blessed.

This powerful Christian knew that faith had to be shared to be successful. Even as strong a believer as Paul was he needed the encouragement of others. He knew that the church could only survive where people were willing to be blessings to each other and in equal measure.

So, how do we measure up? Do we bless others only as we are blessed by them? Do we pray for others as we would have them pray for us? Do we love others as we would have them love us? If not, we had better “get with the program” because the future of the church depends on it.



Sermon,December 5, 2010

EXPECTANT LIVING
Sermon Text: 2 Peter 3:8 15a

The Advent season is a season, a time of preparation for the coming of Christ. Unfortunately, most see it as a time of getting ready for….Christmas.

At this time of year, many children have already written, or are just sitting down to write, their letters to Santa. It’s exciting trying to fit all your wishes into one well-worded little note. Maybe it would sound something like these letters:

Dear Santa, Please give me a doll this year. I would like her to eat, walk, do my homework, and help me clean my room. Thank you, Jennie

Dear Santa, Thanks for the race car last year. Can I have another one, only this time one that is faster than my best friend’s race car? Roger

Dear Santa, I wish you could leave a puzzle under the tree for me. And a toy for my sister. Then she won’t want to play with mine and I can have it to myself. Merry Christmas, Cassie.

Dear Santa, You can send me one of everything from the boys’ section of the Sears catalog. But nothing from the girls’ section. I can’t wait for Christmas to come. Kent

Dear Santa, Could you come early this year? I’ve been really super good, but I don’t know if I can last much longer. Please hurry. Love, Jordan.

Doesn’t that sound familiar? To children, Christmas seems to take forever to arrive. And it is so hard trying to be good while you wait for Santa to come. Like little Jordan, we are tempted to ask Santa to hurry up and get here earlier, before we break under the strain of all that unnaturally good behavior.

Children can relate to today’s Bible passage. The Christians in the early church are waiting for Jesus to return. They are excited. They are ready. But days pass, and then months, and then years. They are still waiting. People around them begin to mock their faith. False teachers infiltrate the church and fill their minds with doubt.

“So, where’s this Jesus you’re waiting for? Do you think he forgot about you?” They go so far as to suggest that God no longer works in human history. Maybe God just set this world in motion and then went out to lunch. And never came back.

And sadly, many Christians start to believe them. Maybe Jesus isn’t returning. Like little children at Christmas time who get tired of being good, some of these early believers go back to their old ways of life.

So Simon Peter, a follower of Jesus, writes this letter to reassure the believers in the early church.

But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. 9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare.
11 Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives 12 as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. 13 But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness.
14 So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him. 15 Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation.

So, waiting for Christ’s return became an important element in Christian life. The final chapter in God’s love affair with humanity has not yet been written. Christ is coming again to take us unto himself.

Some of you may remember writer James Thurber’s story of a thin and lanky prophet who went around Thurber’s boyhood hometown crying, “Get ready! Get ready! The world is coming to an end!” The community called him the Get-Ready Man. Many citizens ignored him; most thought he was a kook.

Simon Peter knew what that was like. The society of his day didn’t want to believe him either. But the Bible tells us very clearly that someday, the Get-Ready Man and Simon Peter will be proved right. And will any of us be ready for that day?

Phillips Brooks, the 19th century Christian leader who composed the beautiful Christmas carol, “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” once wrote: “The coming of the Lord has been the inspiration of the Christian world. The power of any life lies in its expectancy.”

“The power of any life lies in its expectancy.” What are you expecting this Christmas season? Are you expecting crowds of people, jam-packed schedules, family tensions, stress-filled shopping expeditions?

Are you expecting a big Christmas bonus, or a Martha Stewart-inspired party? Or are you expecting to meet Jesus?

THE POWER OF EXPECTANCY STARTS WITH SEEING LIFE THROUGH GOD’S ETERNAL PERSPECTIVE. If you and I are discouraged, downhearted, dispirited it is because we are looking at the world through human eyes and not Divine eyes.

Pastor Ron Mehl counseled a young woman who was deeply disillusioned with her life. This woman had bought society’s concept of who she should be. She had done all the things that her friends were doing.

And she was miserable. She cried, “I’ve lost my virginity. I’ve lost my sense of values, I’m twenty-one years old, and I’m just tired. I don’t want to live like this anymore. I thought it was going to be so good.”

Here is a young woman who made the mistake of living with an earthly perspective. She bought the lie of the “good life” that is promoted so successfully in our movies and magazines and commercials. She thought that the purpose of her life was to “grab all the gusto” she could get. And at just twenty-one, she is already tired and hurt and disillusioned. She is not alone.

There are many people in this world, especially young adults, who have given up on achieving a fulfilling life. They are afraid of relationships. They live as virtual loners. They’ve done it all and have nothing left to show for their experience, except a bad case of disillusionment.

These are exactly the people that Peter is talking to in this letter. They started out as Christ-followers. But the ways of the world looked so attractive to them.

“Come on, everybody’s doing it.” “If it feels good, do it.” “Life is short. Play hard.” “All the beautiful people do it.” Looking at the world through human eyes.

But how do we take on an eternal perspective? How do we see the world as God sees the world?
WE DO IT, FIRST OF ALL, BY ACKNOWLEDGING THAT EVERYTHING IN THIS WORLD WILL EVENTUALLY PERISH, EXCEPT GOD.

Nothing in this world is permanent. Our favorite car will rust out. Our nice house will decay. Our best pair of jeans will fray and fade. Our money will be passed on to our heirs and the IRS. And when Jesus returns to claim his kingdom, everything we strive for and hold dear will be destroyed. ---- Everything. ----- Only the soul is eternal.

As Peter says in this letter, “Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be?”

Journalists Bill and Judith Moyers did a documentary on death and dying in the U.S. They discovered that many of the terminal patients they interviewed found peace in the face of death. In fact, many of them found greater meaning and beauty in life after learning that they would die. One man lived four years past his doctor’s prognosis. In that time, he learned to cherish every moment of life. As he said, “If you are told you will never see spring again, and you live to see spring, spring takes on a whole new life.”

Nothing focuses our priorities quite like the knowledge of our own mortality. Advent is not a season for focusing on a morbid subject like death. But it is a season for looking beyond the present moment to the eternal, and then evaluating our life in the perspective of eternity.
So the question for this Second Sunday in Advent is, what do you want to do with your life?
For the Christian, there is only one answer: to live in a loving relationship with God and with everyone else with whom we share this planet.

THAT’S WHAT ADVENT AND CHRISTMAS ARE ABOUT--CLAIMING THE MOMENT--TAKING TIME TO NURTURE THOSE RELATIONSHIPS THAT MATTER MOST.

The Qiché Indians of Guatemala take the concept of purposeful living very seriously. Each Qiché tribe has a person who serves as a “day keeper.” The day keeper’s job is to show the other members of his tribe how to use each day well, making every moment count.

To the day keepers, living each day well is an art form, and it requires concentration and guidance. The day keepers remind the people to do every job, no matter how mundane, with a sense of purpose.

Let’s take this message from the apostle Peter and use it as our “day keeper,” to remind us of how we should live holy and fruitful lives. The Christmas season, as most of us experience it, seems almost designed to distract us from God-centered living. There is so much pressure to shop, - shop, - shop and rush, - rush, - rush and spend, - spend, spend.

And all for what? How many of us remember the Christmas presents we got last year? The gifts of Christmas are temporary; the message of Christmas is eternal. The Almighty God came to earth in the form of a man.

Christ lived among us and shared our suffering and pain. He died a horrible death in order to save us from our sins. He opened up the way to eternal life for us. And someday, he will come again to establish his perfect and eternal kingdom here on earth.

Until that day, our job is to share the love of Jesus Christ with everyone we know.
Our greatest legacy will be the lives of those who know God’s love because of our efforts. Whose life will be transformed because you shared with them the love of Jesus?

Claim this moment for God. Let that be the true present you give this Christmas. The present of a life lived out in service to God and service to others

Amen