To Everything There is a Season

January 17, 2011

Dear St. Paul’s Family,

Read this next sentence slowly, and see if it makes sense to you: Every straight line is actually part of a circle.

I know. It goes against everything you and I learned in grade school geometry, right? But it’s true. In theoretical mathematics, every straight line is in fact an arc. As a circle increases its radius towards infinity, and grows to near limitless size, any segment of that circle eventually “flattens out,” and seems to approach perfect straightness. In that event, what is linear is actually circular, as what is circular appears to be linear.

Mind-blowing stuff, huh?

But that’s what happens when our minds drift towards matters of the eternal. Our narrow view of reality changes as our perspective zooms out in infinite wide angle. The Teacher of Ecclesiastes grasped this idea and then took it one step further, applying this notion to the concept of time. To our limited sensibilities, time seems to be linear and sequential, progressing with a past, a present, and a future. We perceive it to have a beginning and an end, as we march forward in a straight line.

But Ecclesiastes challenges us with a glimpse of the eternal, elevating our view of time into the realm of the infinite. “God has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.”

This is a passage that is as true mathematically as it is theologically: the less we define our lives linearly, with a past, a present, and a future, the more we discover that we are part of God’s vast, boundless activity across time, with seasons of highs and lows, ebbs and flows. And no Scripture better describes this concept more powerfully – or poetically - than Ecclesiastes 3, our text for this Sunday. The word time appears twenty-eight times in just eight verses, and describes time not as a straight line, but as a circuitous, repetitive pattern of events.

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to throw away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.

So here’s the good news: while your time on earth is limited, your life in God is not. You are an important part of God’s grand, sweeping movement throughout the ages. Like the author of Ecclesiastes, you may be searching for a temporal respite from your pain and suffering. So you move forward, in a present situation that seems to be nothing more than an inescapable history fused with an unknowable future. But in God’s view, your linear life is actually circular, and you are part of something bigger than yourself.

Pete Seeger, one of the greatest folk composers in American history, turned the words of Ecclesiastes 3 into a number one hit by the Byrds in 1965. When asked by biographer Alec Wilkinson about the song “Turn, Turn, Turn,” Seeger described Ecclesiastes 3 in this way: “What a poem that is. It’s something worth considering. That the world is full of opposites, intertangled. The good and bad tangling up over time. Nobody knows. God only knows.” [1]

Indeed, God only knows.

The same year that the Byrds scored a number one hit with Seeger’s song, Dr. Martin Luther King was making history of his own. On March 7, 1965, five hundred people marched along U.S. Highway 80 from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. As part of that march, Dr. King uttered one of his favorite phrases, one that he included in several sermons throughout his career: “The arc of the moral universe is long,” he said. “But it bends towards justice.” King challenged the Selma marchers to see their finite efforts as contributing to God’s grander, more infinite vision, which is peace and justice for all people.

Though King made this phrase famous, it was not original to him. It was first spoken by Rev. Theodore Parker, a Unitarian preacher and an abolitionist. In 1853, he preached a sermon called “Justice and the Conscience,” declaring, "I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice."

The words of Ecclesiastes, Dr. King, and Rev. Parker are all timely for us today. Though we live in a world addicted to violence, ravaged by hatred, and bent toward sin, we can continue our work in the present day, believing in a God whose ultimate purpose arcs toward justice for the world. We may not see it. Our eyes may “reach but little ways.” But we can “divine it by conscience.” Today may be a time for war, but there will be a time for peace. Our world may be filled with hatred, but there will be a season of love.

And the same is true for your life. You may be in the midst of a difficulty that seems unbearable, and from your private perspective, it seems interminable. But for everything there is a season. Your mourning can turn to dancing, your weeping into laughter, your loss into new opportunities. You may feel like your life is crumbling. But Ecclesiastes offers you a promise. Though your stones are scattered, you will have a chance to gather those stones again. This may feel like a time of tearing down, but there will be a time to build up again. Some things may have to die, before they can be born again.

There is great hope in these words, which is why they have offered great power to people in times of need. Join us this Sunday as we explore the richness of these words and allow their impact to shape a dream that is greater than our present condition. And you’ll also want to hear our very own Charlie Leissler, who will perform The Byrd’s hit “Turn, Turn, Turn” and lead us as part of worship.

Let us move forward with confidence, courage, and conviction, in the presence of the infinite.

Grace and Peace,

Magrey

The Rev. Magrey R. deVega
St. Paul's United Methodist Church
531 W. Main St.
Cherokee, IA 51012
Ph: 712-225-3955
Email: mdevega@sp-umc.org

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2OYfmiysWo

My Favorite Old Testament Book

January 10, 2012

Dear St. Paul’s Family,

Last September, I learned of the death of Mary Carter, a former parishioner in Tampa and a member of Hyde Park United Methodist Church. She was a grand and gracious 80-year old Southern gem from South Carolina and a member of the church’s altar guild, a group of women with whom I had the privilege of serving. Mary’s special role was to be caretaker of the church’s collection of oil-based votive candles, which she purchased in memory of her mother. Every Good Friday and All Saints’ Sunday, Mary’s candles were on proud display, glorifying God and inspiring people in worship. I loved working with her.

But Mary and I shared another connection: a love for the book of Ecclesiastes. After I casually mentioned my affinity for the book during one of my chapel sermons, she came to visit me in my office a few days later. We talked about how the book is often misperceived as hopelessly nihilistic, rather than a realistic, relevant, and authentic portrayal of the complexities of the human condition. We agreed that, in each other, we had found a rare comrade in our mutual admiration for a book in the Bible that is so widely disregarded.

A few months later, Mary returned to my office, this time with a present in hand. She wanted to talk about Ecclesiastes again, and wanted to know if I had ever heard of a collection of poems called the Rubaiyat of Omar Kayyam. I pled my ignorance, then she gave me the gift. “This,” she said, “is one of my favorite books. And it’s just like Ecclesiastes.” I opened the beautifully bound, antiquarian copy she had spent months locating for me, and I read it immediately.

Kayyam was an eleventh-century Persian astrologer, who made a modest living paid by the government to philosophize about the nature of the universe and the meaning of life. He was a scientist by trade, but a poet at heart. The 101 quatrains – or brief poems – that constitute the Rubaiyat are his most famous work, and read at times like they were written by the Teacher of Ecclesiastes himself. Kayyam reflects on his own pursuit of happiness and meaning, turning to wisdom, love, and wine in order to make sense of the world. Read the comparisons for yourself:

Ecclesiastes 1:10-11:
“Is there a thing of which it is said, ‘See, this is new’? It has already been, in the ages before us. The people of long ago are not remembered, nor will there be any remembrance of people yet to come by those who come after them.”
Rubaiyat XXVI:
Why, all the Saints and Sages who discuss’d
Of the Two Worlds so wisely – they are thrust
Like foolish Prophets forth; their Words to scorn
Are scatter’d, and their Mouths are stopt with Dust.

Ecclesiastes 2:1-3: “I said to myself, ‘Come now, I will make a test of pleasure; enjoy yourself.’ But again, this also was vanity. I said of laughter, ‘It is mad,’ and of pleasure, ‘What use is it?’ I searched with my mind how to cheer my body with wine – my ind still guiding me with wisdom – and how to lay hold on folly, until I might see what was goof for mortals to do under heaven during the few days of their life.”
Rubaiyat XXXIX:
How long, how long, in infinite Pursuit
Of This and That endeavour and dispute?
Better be merry with the fruitful Grape
Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit.

Ecclesiastes 3:11-13: “God has made everything suitable for its time; moreover he has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I know that there is nothing better for them than to be happy and enjoy themselves as long as they live; moreover, it is God’s gift that all should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil.”
Rubaiyat XXXVII:
Ah, fill the Cup: - what boots it to repeat
How Time is slipping underneath our Feet:
Unborn TO-MORROW and dead YESTERDAY,
Why fret about them if TO-DAY be sweet!

Ecclesiastes 3:19-20: “For the fate of humans and the fate of animals is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and humans have no advantage over the animals; for all is vanity. All go to one place; all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again.”
Rubaiyat XXIV:
Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,
Before we too into the Dust descend;
Dust into Dust, and under Dust to lie,
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and – sans End!

Of course, neither Ecclesiastes or the Rubaiyat resolve their quests with anything remotely close to Christian hope. To wedge that inference into either text would be a disservice to their respective Hebrew and Muslim perspectives. But what both books do model is a kind of open, frank assessment of our human condition. Ecclesiastes invites us to acknowledge the shadow side to our faith: any part of us that is uncertain about things that everyone else seems to be so sure about.

The Teacher of Ecclesiastes challenges us to engage spiritual matters beyond mere memorization, beyond pious platitudes, beyond rote religious formulas. He serves as our immersion journalist, digging deeply into issues of life and death, hope and despair, promise and pain. What results is a narrative that creates space and freedom for you to face your own skepticism, and perhaps even your cynicism. And it might even suggest to you that the only way to find ultimate meaning and purpose in God is to stretch yourself to the limits of your own humanity.

For all of these reasons, Ecclesiastes is my favorite book in the Old Testament.

I’m grateful for having known people like Mary Carter. Her desire to explore the complexities life with courage and authenticity gave her a strength that equaled her love and grace. Her surprising gift to me was more than a lovely copy of an obscure, thousand-year old book. It was the encouragement to live life in the face of death, for to do otherwise is to ignore the former and be held captive by the latter. Last September, when I learned that her time had come to leave the trappings of this earth, I knew she was ready.

This sermon series on Ecclesiastes is one that I have always wanted to preach. I hope that you’ll join us as we dig deep into the riches of this book, unafraid to ask our toughest questions, and be open to the complex beauty beholden in its answers.

Ecclesiastes: The Bible’s Dose of Reality

Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? The Pursuit of Wisdom
Ecclesiastes 1
January 8

Hoarders: The Folly of Self-Indulgence
Ecclesiastes 2
January 15

The Real World: Ups and Downs of Living
Ecclesiastes 3
January 22

Big Brother: The Value of Community
Ecclesiastes 4-5
January 29

Survivor: When the Chips are Stacked Against You
Ecclesiastes 7-8
February 5

Amazing Race: Expecting the Unexpected
Ecclesiastes 9-10
February 12

Extreme Makeover: Living a Transformed Life
Ecclesiastes 12
February 19

Grace and Peace,

Magrey

The Rev. Magrey R. deVega
St. Paul's United Methodist Church
531 W. Main St.
Cherokee, IA 51012
Ph: 712-225-3955
Email: mdevega@sp-umc.org



CHRISTMAS EVE SERMON ONLINE
For those interested, an audio recording of “A St. Paul’s Home Companion” is available on mdevega.blogspot.com. It is the sermon from Christmas Eve, in the style of Garrison Keillor’s “Guy Noir” sketch from his popular radio program “A Prairie Home Companion.” Enjoy!

THANK YOU, ST. PAUL’S!
What a remarkable finish to an amazing year of generosity and faithfulness. Your efforts toward our first-ever Salvation Army bell ringing brought in over $3,500 dollars, 90 percent of which will stay right here in Cherokee County to help people in need. You also gave over $1,500 to Heifer International, Church World Service, and Stan Sitzmann’s Needy Children Program. You have given over 2,000 pairs of shoes to Soles4Souls, and donated coats and other outerwear to our new clothing ministry (to the point where donations are no longer needed at this time!). To top it all off, we have gained an amazing fifty new members in 2011, many of which are by profession of faith, paid all our apportionments in full, and paid all of our expenses for 2011! What a tremendous year! Thank you, St. Paul’s, and let’s look forward to another great year ahead!

A St. Paul's Home Companion

For those interested, here is the audio recording of "A St. Paul's Home Companion," the Christmas Eve sermon preached at St. Paul's UMC on December 24, 2011. It is in the style of Garrison Keillor's "Guy Noir" sketch from his popular "Prairie Home Companion" radio broadcast. It features Magrey, along with Bruce Dagel and Mary Cowan as voice characters, Jordan Taylor on sound effects, and Betty Point on piano.

Ring Out, WIld Bells!

December 21, 2011

Dear St. Paul’s Family,

“Ring Out, Wild Bells”

A Christmas Poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light;
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more,
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease,
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

On behalf of the staff and lay leadership of St. Paul’s United Methodist Church, I wish you and your loved ones a joyous Christmas and a blessed new year!

Merry Christmas!

Magrey

The Rev. Magrey R. deVega
St. Paul's United Methodist Church
531 W. Main St.
Cherokee, IA 51012
Ph: 712-225-3955
Email: mdevega@sp-umc.org



CHRISTMAS EVE SERVICE
We will gather to celebrate the arrival of Christ this Saturday at 5:30 pm for our Christmas Eve Service. It will feature carols, candlelighting, and a very unique "radio drama" sermon. Join us, and bring a friend! We will also have a regular service at 10:10 am on Christmas morning.

CHURCH OFFICE CLOSED
In observance of Christmas, the church office will be closed next Monday and Tuesday. Magrey and his family will be traveling after Christmas, so the Mid-Week Message will resume on Wednesday, January 11. Happy New Year!

YEAR-END GIVING
Help us end the year strong with your generous contributions to the church’s general budget. Just a reminder, to have your gifts counted toward your 2010 giving statement, they must be postmarked to the church by December 31.

Bearing the Word

December 14, 2011

Dear St. Paul’s Family,

This week’s message marks a bit of a minor milestone for me, as it is my 200th Mid-Week Message since becoming your pastor in 2007. I would otherwise let the occasion slide by unnoticed, except that I have to acknowledge some surprise at reaching this benchmark. I was quite unsure when I started writing these four years ago whether I’d have both the regular content and the ongoing stamina necessary to keep writing them. Nor was it clear whether I could fit it into the rigors of writing both the weekly sermon and the Sunday morning radio program. So it is not without some level of astonishment that I share this observance with you.

I can only hope that you’ve received as much benefit from reading these messages as I have had in writing them. The discipline of producing them has sharpened my command of language, in a form and scope quite different from the auditory experience of a live sermon. More importantly, as the messages have gotten longer, more substantive, and more varied, I have strengthened by ability to theologize on a broader array of contemporary issues at the intersection of life and faith. Words, after all, constitute my stock in trade, so writing these Mid-Weeks has made me a better preacher, a more effective pastor, and a more capable spiritual leader.


PASTORS WRITING BADLY

Whenever I’ve felt tempted to cut corners on the Mid-Week, I think about a shot in the arm I received exactly one year ago today. On December 14, 2010, Duke Divinity School’s Faith and Leadership website published an article by the Rev. Lillian Daniel called “Pastors Writing Badly.” [1] It is a call for ministers to give renewed attention to one of the most basic, yet most overlooked, forms of pastoral communication: the epistle. Daniel laments the lost art of simply writing to one’s congregation, whether it take the form of a monthly newsletter article or a weekly e-mail message. Too many pastors, Daniel argues, ignore the importance of writing these pieces well:


Pastors tired of writing newsletters would do well to remember that most Sunday worship attracts a fraction of our members. That means that more people may be touched by that newsletter than by our worship. The newsletter may be the only connection a home bound and elderly member has to the church. Just when I am convinced no one reads the newsletter, I hear a story about an article that truly turned someone’s attention back to God at a crucial moment.

And for good or bad, they have a wicked long shelf life. They lie on people’s kitchen counters for a neighbor to pick up, they get sent off or emailed to relatives if a child’s name is mentioned within, and they are even perused by petty clergy colleagues with an axe to grind.

I do have an axe to grind, and it is this. As much as I appreciate the minister’s workload, I want to suggest that even in the busiest week, we prioritize. As long as the newsletter is an afterthought, we miss an opportunity for ministry.

Lastly, sloppy newsletter articles are, in their frequency and practice, a rejection of one of Christianity’s historical treasures -- the well-written epistle. We are a religion in which we gather to worship, to hear the gospel, the prophecies, the songs, and then, as odd as it may seem, a letter. A letter from a pastoral leader to a church.

I don’t aspire to write like Paul in every issue of the Pilgrim newsletter, but I am humbled to note that 2,000 years later, we know him by his letters, and not his preaching. We also know those churches. And in their struggles, in their arguments, and in their growth, they had a leader who wrote to them carefully, critically, lovingly and with all he had. It’s time to reclaim the pastoral epistle at the local level, move the newsletter article higher up the list and take it seriously again.


Daniel captures perfectly why it is so important for clergy to maintain the discipline of good writing, and why writing these weekly messages is such an important part of my ministry to each of you. I’m grateful for any benefit it brings you.


BEARING THE WORD

In case you think clergy are the only ones who have the responsibility of influencing the world with their words, guess again. You do too. You don’t need to have a seminary degree, or formal religious training, in order to have the ability to be word-bearers.

Just ask Mary.

It is not a coincidence that this 200th message coincides with the Sunday that we turn our attention to Mary, for no one knew better the significance of bearing the Word than her. Orthodox traditions name her as the Theotokos, or “bearer of God.” Christian doctrine is careful to specify that Mary’s bearing of Jesus does not make her older than God, the creator of God, the source of Christ’s divinity, or even divine herself. What it simply means is that she was the vessel through which God gave the world God’s best, most complete self-revelation of love for humanity. Without Mary bearing the Word, the world would not know love in the Word made Flesh.

While most Protestants do not give Mary the kind of doctrinal prominence that our Catholic and Orthodox siblings do, hers is a critical example to incorporate into our discipleship. You don’t need to be a minister, drafting sermons and weekly messages to be a conduit of God’s grace. The Word that you bear may take a number of forms:

A timely word of encouragement to a troubled friend in need.
A prophetic word of truth for someone living amid the shadows of sin.
A liberating word of hope for a person gripped by grief, anxiety, or loss.
A reconciling word of forgiveness, to mend a broken relationship.

As noted preacher and author Barbara Brown Taylor once said, “You are a word, about the Word, before you even say a word.” And whatever form that word takes, yours may be the vital link connecting someone else to an experience of God’s love. Just like Mary, you may be exclusively chosen by God to carry that word for a specific person. So may you birth that word in the way you live, speak, and relate to others, that you may say, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

Peace and Joy,

Magrey

The Rev. Magrey R. deVega
St. Paul's United Methodist Church
531 W. Main St.
Cherokee, IA 51012
Ph: 712-225-3955
Email: mdevega@sp-umc.org

[1] http://www.faithandleadership.com/blog/12-14-2010/lillian-daniel-pastors-writing-badly


WINTER OUTERWEAR REQUEST
Thank you for the tremendous response to our new winter outerwear ministry. Every day, new loads of coats, hats, and mittens arrive for distribution on Saturdays. There is now a need for snow boots, for all ages and sizes. If you have new or gently used boots to donate to families in need, please place them on the table outside the church office.

INCREDIBLE GENEROSITY
You all continue to prove to be a congregation of generous hearts. Thank you for your donation of over $750 to Stan Sitzmann’s Needy Children project, and for your efforts to ring bells for the Salvation Army, which has raised over $1,800 so far this December. You are truly putting God’s love into action!

END-OF-YEAR GIVING
Thank you for your faithful giving to support the ministries of the church throughout the year. You can help us end the year strongly and start 2012 without any operational deficits. For your gifts to be counted toward your 2011 statements, please postmark your contributions by December 31.

CHRISTMAS EVE SERVICE
Join us for another beautiful Christmas Eve Candlelight service on December 24 at 5:30 pm. We are also having a regular service on Christmas morning, Sunday the 25th, at 10:10 am.

Rhyming John the Baptist Sermon

For those interested, here is the audio from last Sunday, December 4, 2011. It's my rhyming sermon on John the Baptist, based on Matthew 3:1-17.

Matthew 3:1-17

In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’ This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said,

‘The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:

“Prepare the way of the Lord,

make his paths straight.” ’

Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, ‘You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our ancestor”; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

‘I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing-fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing-floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.’

An Advent Prayer for Our Relationships

December 6, 2011

Dear St. Paul’s Family,

Most popular depictions of the holiday season would have us believe that this is supposed to be a time of good cheer for everyone. Yet, despite musical pleas to make this “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year” and the “happiest season of all,” we find our relationships with others strained under stressors too numerous to count. You don’t need me to remind you that despite our best efforts, Christmas festivities tend to amplify our most deeply hidden family dysfunctions, and intensify the subtle fractures that exist in our relationships all year long.

We remember that even Jesus himself was born into a dysfunctional family. His mother bore the scandal of a pregnancy out of wedlock, and his father was the subject of public scrutiny. Even Jesus’ ancestry is a roll call of the scandalous and malfeasant, including a foreigner, a liar, a prostitute, and an adulterer. We might even come to the conclusion that when it comes to the Christmas story, there is no such thing as a “normal” family at all!

It is therefore in the spirit of that reality that I offer you this pastoral prayer, for any strained relationships you have with family members, friends, or loved ones.

An Advent Prayer for Healthy Relationships

O God our Creator, whose breath formed us into being, and in whose triune image we are called into relationships of mutual love and support, we thank you for the gift of yourself in Jesus Christ, whose Advent we anticipate once again.

Though you desire this season to be filled with joy and peace, we confess that we have fostered relationships soaked with brokenness and dysfunction. We admit our longing for health and peace in the way we treat one another, yet we are an imperfect reflection of your self-giving example, and we are prone instead to dispute and disruption.

For every household filled with chronic anger and wearying quarrels, bring to light neglected faults, in a spirit of new understanding and peace.

For every gathering of family and friends that verge on the edge of squabble and scorn, unstable because of fault lines of unnamed hurts and past sins, pour out your spirit of confession and forgiveness.

For every family dealing with the haunting influences of addiction, substance abuse, and mental disease, grant your spirit of courage and compassion, to be bold in truth and generous in love.

For every marriage troubled by unfulfilled expectations and chronic miscommunication, grant your spirit of understanding and empathy. Rekindle within them an awakening of boundless, unconditional love.

For every set of siblings long plagued by competition and resentment rather than encouragement and affirmation, grant a new spirit of peace and cooperation.

For every old wound bandaged by tenuous scars, whose injurious past can be recalled with the most inadvertent reminders, grant your spirit of healing.

For every person whose ongoing grief for loved ones lost skews this season of hope and promise into a time of sadness and loss, grant your comfort and constant presence. Remind these persons that in your being, the bonds of love never end.

For every young family adjusting to new life with a child, and negotiating new ways to relate as a family in the midst of transition, grant a spirit of child-like wonder, and a desire to mature.

For every couple struggling with infertility, in the midst of a season based on the birth of a Child, grant a spirit of hope, and the reminder that they are not without ability to provide other enduring legacies of love.

For older couples separated by distance from children and grandchildren, or widows and widowers who have long lived alone, grant a spirit companionship, and surround them with new friends and cohorts on their journey.

For those who live in the shadow of their own mortality, in fear of their own death and disease, offer a reminder that you are the source of all life, encouraging them to embrace their lives and the lives of others with courage, unafraid of joy and pain, sickness and health. May your love be made real in our care for others.

O God of hope and promise, you revealed your power in the self-giving love of Jesus, whose birth in lowly means exemplifies your call to servanthood and humility. May we, in the strength of your spirit, receive the gift of your son, living out his image in all that we say and do. May this season truly be one of preparation, that our hearts, minds, and souls may be awakened to a hope that brings holiness, for ourselves and the people we love. Enliven us by your spirit, that we may live in the fullness of your reign.

In the name of Immanuel, your presence among us, we pray.

Amen.


The Rev. Magrey R. deVega
St. Paul's United Methodist Church
531 W. Main St.
Cherokee, IA 51012
Ph: 712-225-3955
Email: mdevega@sp-umc.org



CANDLELIGHT SERVICE OF REMEMBRANCE
Tonight we offer a worship service at Bethlehem Lutheran Church at 7:00pm for those grieving the loss of loved ones. In partnership with Bethlehem Lutheran, St. Paul’s UMC, Memorial Presbyterian, and Greenwood Funeral Home, the Candlelight Service of Remembrance features the reading of names and the lighting of candles in memory of people that we love. Join us for this meaningful worship experience.

CHRISTMAS CANTATA THIS SUNDAY AFTERNOON
Our music ensembles have been diligently preparing a wonderful program of songs and readings to prepare us for the coming of Christ. Join us at 4:00 this Sunday afternoon for our annual Christmas Cantata.

CHILDREN’S CHRISTMAS PROGRAM THIS SUNDAY
Our children’s ministry will be leading us in worship this Sunday for their annual Christmas program. Come experience the birth of Christ offered through spoken word and song. Following the service, you are invited to join us in the Fellowship Hall for a soup and hot dog luncheon.

CHRISTMAS COOKIE SALE
The Adult Class is once again sponsoring a cookie sale this Sunday. Reserve a batch or two of your holiday cookies and bring them to church this Saturday or before 9:00am this Sunday. They will be prepared by class members and offered for sale during the luncheon. Proceeds will fund projects sponsored by the Adult Class throughout the year.

COMMITMENT CARDS
Thank you to all of you who have already turned in a pledge for our annual stewardship campaign. Those who have not yet done so can pick up a stewardship packet in the narthex or in the church office. Thank you for turning it in as soon as you can, so that our Finance Committee can determine final approval of our 2012 General Budget.



To view past editions of the Mid-Week Message, visit http://mdevega.blogspot.com
To unsubscribe from this e-mail distribution list, please reply to this e-mail and write "UNSUBSCRIBE" in the subject line.