The Creator, Redeemer, and Guardian: A Quote from the Pentecost sermon by James D. Curran

“The counselor that was assigned to me, for the sake of anonymity, we will call him Joe, worked very close with me… in one of our sessions he said, “I saw you brought a Bible with you, are you a Christian?” I said, “Yes sir.” He said, “Do you believe in God the father almighty?”  I said, “Yes sir.” He said, “Do you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior?” I said, “Yes sir, I do.” He said, “ And have you welcomed the Holy Spirit into your heart and surrender to His will?” I said, “ yea, I think so?” He said, “That’s a no.” God's eternal invitation to a relationship with His grace and majesty, is dependent upon our acceptance of, congress with and worship of Him in all three forms, Father, Son and Holy Spirit the blessed Trinity of Creator, Redeemer and Guardian, and when we invite the Holy Spirit into our hearts, that His will be done through us, how can we not have hope. Hope that with the Holy Spirit working through us, we will fulfill God’s kingdom purpose in our lives.” James D. Curran

Making Family Memories as Overnight Family Promise Host by Lacy Ngo

 

My 5 year old, 2 year old, husband, and I just finished spending the night at St. John’s as the overnight host of our Family Promise guest. This was one of the highlights of our summer, and we have had an eventful summer. Our experience of staying overnight at the church was even more special than eating dinner with Cinderella and Prince Charming at Disney World! When the evening began, we loaded up our car with our luggage, some fun books, and family games, and headed over the church.  As soon as we walked into the building, a friendly young boy greeted Hilt, my son, and asked Hilt if he wanted to play cars with him. They were friends in an instant. When dinner began, the same little boy asked if Hilt could sit with him. Later, this young man noticed that I did not have a chair, and without a word, he walked to the other side of the room to get me a chair. I was amazed at how thoughtful this little 7 or 8-year-old boy was. He not only, generously shared his toys with Hilt, but was observant to the fact that I did not have a chair. It was an honor and joy to spend time with such thoughtful and kind hearted people. After dinner, our guest headed off to get ready for bed, and my little family headed to the lobby to play some of the family games we had packed. We snacked and played our games together. Then, we headed to our room. The fun didn’t end there. We pushed our air matrices together and read books before dosing off to sleep. Our room was comfy and came with a TV and DVD player. We noted that next time we would bring a DVD along with our games. The next morning we packed up our things and headed to Hardees for a special breakfast treat. All of us made such fun memories as a family that night, and we are ready to volunteer for our next overnight stay at our church.

A Lesson From Crosswalk Sunday School Class (Paraphrase from James Williamson)

Sometimes our children go through pain, and as parents, we want to keep them from it.  But then I think back on some of my hard times and how much I have grown from it.  I sometimes even realize later that I am glad I went through the hard time, because I see how God used it.  I think, God as our parent, may feel the same way.  He doesn’t like when we go through pain, but he knows sometimes it will help us.

A Quote from Lauren Reinhardt

“No one can be super mom, super man, super dad, super anything until we recognize that our power to do anything first comes from our relationship with Christ who strengthens us….In all our going and doing, we get distracted from God unless we sit down with God first…I challenge all of us to seek Him daily throughout he word…This is a lifestyle choice that is going to mean saying no to some things, so that we can say yes to better things.  When we work intentionally at keeping Him the center of our lives, we really do become kinder; we can love better, and in the end that is really what we are called to do.” Lauren Reinhardt

A Quote from Lollie Haselden

"When I am not sure what to do or what Jesus would want me to do, I err on the side of compassion." Lollie Haselden

Mother’s Day Prayer—The Wide Spectrum of Mothering

 Adapted by Rev. Jonathan Tompkins from The Wide Spectrum of Mothering by Amy L. Young,
http://www.messymiddle.com/2012/05/10/an-open-letter-to-pastors-a-non-mom-speaks-about-mothers-day/

God our ultimate Mother,

We thank you for the wide spectrum of mothering:

We celebrate with those who gave birth this year to their first child

We mourn with those who lost a child this year

We appreciate those who are in the trenches with little ones every day and wear the badge of food stains

We grieve with those who experienced loss through miscarriage, failed adoptions, or running away

We pray for strength for those who walk the hard path of infertility, fraught with pokes, prods, tears, and disappointment. Forgive us when we say foolish things. We don’t mean to make this harder than it is.

We thank you for those who are foster moms, mentor moms, and spiritual moms

We celebrate those who have warm and close relationships with their children

We sit in prayer with those who have disappointment, heart ache, and distance with their children

We cry with those who lost their mothers this year

We cry with those who experienced abuse at the hands of their own mother

We pray for those who are single and long to be married and mothering their own children and ask for forgiveness when we are oblivious to their experience

We pray for step-moms and we walk with you on these complex paths

We grieve and rejoice with those who will have emptier nests in the upcoming year

We celebrate and offer our care to those who are pregnant with new life, both expected and surprising

Loving God, Mother who gives us life and nourishment,

We offer our prayers through Jesus Christ, who cared for his mother from the cross,

and who taught us to pray…

Our Family had the Flu, but Christmas Still Came by Lacy Ngo

Two and half weeks before Christmas, I got the flu and this flu was a doozy.  My flu lasted almost nine days, and during those nine days, my 5-year-old’s temperature climbed to 103, and my one-year-old had a temperature of 101.  You can probably imagine how we spent much of our Christmas holidays.  Many others must be going through the same as us, because we spent three hours at the doctors office, three hours at urgent care, and still ended up back at urgent care another time.  We spent our Christmas season getting breathing treatments, filling prescriptions, just lying around feeling sorry for ourselves, and even contemplating an ambulance trip once.  We missed many of our Christmas traditions.  We missed “Journey to Bethlehem;” Christmas program practices; a week of school, which was filled with Christmas field trips and Christmas crafts.  We missed our annual trip with our grandmother to get Santa pictures, my son’s first two basketball games, a special baptism, Christmas parties and Christmas play dates, and so much more.  To top it off, my husband even has to work on Christmas day, so he had taken the week before off to spend time with us at Christmas.  He didn’t plan on spending the whole week taking care of us.  Yes, this was not our favorite two weeks, BUT, did we really miss Christmas?  At Christmas we celebrate Jesus’ birthday.  Jesus was born, lived, taught us all so much, and died for our sins.  Jesus taught us that whenever we do for others, we do for him.  While we were sick, we received so much kindness from others.  We could feel the TRUE spirit of Christ this Christmas all around us.  Hilt’s school checked on us, my friends and family showed such concern and offered to help in any way they could, even offering to bring us chicken soup and potato soup.  During a doctors visit a stranger brought over a chair for me because she realized that I was so sick that I was having trouble standing.  One of Hilt’s classmates even started praying for Hilt when she went to bed. We felt very VERY loved!  One of my favorite moments was during our second urgent care visit.  A man saw that my whole pitiful looking family was waiting to be seen again. Something made him decide to approach us.  I don’t remember exactly what he said, but his encouraging words were perfect.  He told us to hang in there and that he remembers when his children were younger.  He tells our crying 5-year-old in this perfect, cool “we are men” tone, “I know the doctors here are going to help you and I get better. They are going to fix you and me up.”  The nonchalant way the man spoke was perfect for my scared, overly dramatic 5-year-old.  Then he offered my children a sucker before he left.  You could feel the sincerity when he spoke.  After he left, my husband, Chad, put his arm around me as if he was reminded, like I was reminded, that we are a strong united family even during all this sickness.  I have felt Christmas this year.  We were sick and Christmas still came anyway.  The Christmas spirit is all around.  To Quote Dr. Sues from “The Grinch that Stole Christmas,”  “It came without ribbons. It came without tags…Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before.  What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store.  What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.”  Christmas is more than all the Christmas traditions.  Christmas is celebrating the birth of Jesus and showing Christ's love.  People showed us Christ's love this season.  We (I hope) are finally getting better four days before Christmas day, but we have already fully experienced Christmas this year.