TO KNOW CHRIST AND TO MAKE HIM KNOWN
Dear Sisters and Brothers in Jesus Christ,
During these challenging times the church, both locally and globally, continues its mission of proclaiming the Gospel and caring for its members and neighbors.
Attached please find the pastoral letter of the Bishops of the Moravian Unity living in the Northern and Southern Provinces of the Moravian Church in America.
Blessings and prayer for good health for you and your loved ones,
Pastor Derek
Dear Church Family,
Out of an abundance of caution and love for those who are most vulnerable in our congregation and community, we will not be holding worship, Sunday school, or other events tomorrow, Sunday, March 15th.
We will share more information regarding how will we continue to carry out our ministry under present circumstances with you via email, the web, text messages, and voice.
Peace, grace, and good health to you and all your loved ones,
Pastor Derek
Help support our preschool through our ongoing fundraiser with Primary.com, an online store that sells great children’s clothes at affordable prices. Shop our special site: primary.com/school/easthills. Use the code EASTHILLS when checking out. Information about registering for Primary.com is available in the narthex and once you register through this program, you are eligible for an extra 25% off your first order. What’s not to love?
Thanks, so very much, for your ongoing support of the Northeast Community Center Foodbank. Food supplies are constantly changing, and in order to help keep all the shelves filled, it is best to focus on those most-needed items. At the present time, the greatest need is 100% juice, as well as pasta sauce, and non-spaghetti type pasta. There is also a need for reusable grocery bags, in addition to the plastic bags already being donated. Please also refer to our Facebook page for the most current updates.
We are offering lilies, daffodils, and tulips for purchase to place in the sanctuary for Easter. The cost of the lilies is $10.00. Tulips and daffodils are $8.00.
Order deadline is March 22nd, 2020
There are times, such as in moments of extreme frustration, when non-believers join followers of Jesus in referencing God. We use the expression “for the love of God” to express our vexation as we implore a person to act out of basic human decency or common sense. Usually the one uttering the phrase is not actually thinking theologically about love for God, or God’s love for us. Yet since February is the month we celebrate love with Valentine’s Day, now is as good a time as any to consider the implications of taking this common saying literally. What would it mean to act for the love of God in all things?
Does it mean, for instance, that we are to act because God loves us, because we love God, or both? And how are we to act? We can find an answer to these questions in the 4th chapter of the 1st Letter of John. “God,” says the author, “is love” (4:8).
God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.
To act for the love of God is, therefore, to extend Christ-like love to others in response to God’s love for us. It is to seek the deepest, the truest good for others rather than our own advantage or satisfaction. It is to be patient, kind, respectful, and humble toward others. At times it means being flexible to preserve relationships. It means insisting on right-doing and truth. (See 1 Corinthians 13: 4-7).
In the final analysis, to act literally “for the love of God” is to live out one’s life with far more than basic human decency or common sense. It is to pattern one’s life after the Incarnation of God’s love – Jesus Christ. I am tempted to say: “For the love of God, what part of Jesus saying, ‘Follow me’ don’t you get?” There is an urgency in our Lord’s words that we often miss in the context of worship or Bible study. Love, says Paul, is patient and kind, but that doesn’t rule Jesus’ disappointment when his followers fail to act for the love of God.
Pastor Derek French
Writing to new Christians, in what today is southern Turkey, the Apostle Paul summed up the central miracle and mystery which began with Jesus’ birth: “In him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.”( Colossians 1:19) For the duration of his earthly life, Jesus was God with us.( Matthew 1:23) Through faith we can still experience him as such, but this relationship is difficult for those who have never encountered anyone sincerely seeking to embody Christ’s teachings in daily life. It is our calling to help make the Christmas miracle real for them.
I have a magnetic cling which reads “Keep Christ in Christmas.” I keep it on my refrigerator where it serves as a reminder to myself rather than an admonishment to others. If Christ is to remain in Christmas – or indeed become a part of Christmas for those who have not encountered him – then he must be born again and again in the hearts of his followers. The fullness of God may not dwell in us, but it must flow through us collectively as Christ’s Church. I am reminded of the words of St. Theresa of Avila:
“Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks with compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now on earth but yours.”
St. Theresa of Avila
With the passing of years, I am ever more convinced that the essence of Christmas lies within each of us. It is not to be found in the exchange of gifts, the sounds of carols, or the hanging of lights and greens, but rather in the quiet birth of God’s Spirit into each of our hearts. It is this which gives joy and peace, this embodiment of God’s Word which births hope into the world.
O holy Child of Bethlehem
Descend to us, we pray
Cast out our sin and enter in
Be born to us today
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell
O come to us, abide with us
Our Lord Emmanuel
Wishing you and your loved ones a blessed Advent, a Merry Christmas, and a Happy, Healthy New Year.
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
(Col. 3: 15-17)
Gratitude plays a central role in the lives of those who choose to follow Jesus as his disciples. Paul, writing to new Christians in Colossae (modern-day Turkey), notes that cultivating gratefulness is essential if one wishes to live a life transformed, redeemed, and blessed by Jesus Christ. Being thankful draws us closer to God and makes it possible for the peace of Christ to find a home in our hearts.
Being thankful is not hard, but it does take a bit of intentionality and determination. In our current context, it’s easy to embrace negativity. There’s plenty of it to go around on the news and social media. Like a bad cold, negative emotional energy can be transmitted from one person to another, and that negativity can lead persons ever deeper into self-isolating, protective stances rooted in the primitive human psyche. Such a response to life can lead to dysfunction and illness of mind, body, and spirit.
Yet, we can take action which will increase our resistance to society’s malaise and confer numerous benefits as well. Recent research indicates that gratitude decreases anxiety, depression, and aggression, increases physical health, and improves the quality of sleep, the number and quality of relationships, mental strength, and self-esteem. Gratitude begins when we choose to look for the positive, affirmative, beautiful, or life-giving stimuli in the world around us and then pause to offer thanks to God and contemplate these blessings.
I often envision gratitude – and the resultant expression of generosity – as the opening of a hand, with the palm facing upwards in an expression of release and thanksgiving. A clenched fist can hold onto what one already has, but it cannot be filled to overflowing with further blessing. When we approach life with gratitude and respond with generosity, then with the psalmist we can say: “my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord my whole life long.”