Church Christmas Party

We had a church Christmas party yesterday after the Children's play and I think it went well.  The children did a great job in the play and the adults did a great job of getting them ready for it.

The youth were also really great with the children.

The Christmas party itself was fun too.  We had pizza and delicious desserts.  It was a good night. 

Trip Lee Vid

The youth of the church went to a concert last month and Trip Lee was there.  They told me about him.  Since I am a fan of Christian Rap, I decided to check him out on YouTube.

It's impressive the way he breaks down Phillipians in rhyme:

19

The number for the title is the number of days it has been since I blogged.  I'm not sure why it's been so long but it has. 

I've had a rough last two days.  Thursday night I was in a fender bender.  Then I had major stomach issues on Friday as a I tried to get the van repaired.  We think it was food poisoning.  I'll let you use your imagination on how bad I felt.  I still haven't eaten a full meal since Thursday at lunch and it's Saturday afternoon.

It was a terrible time for all of that to happen.  I have two sermons to prepare for tomorrow.  The normal Sunday morning messages and a special Thanksgiving message Sunday evening at the Baptist church.

Anyway, my family has been awesome through all of this.  It's been hard to concentrate on getting sermons prepared, but I know I'm in good hands and that God will help me with the preparation and delivery of both messages.

The Fall Festival

Last night Catawba UMC held a fall festival for the community.  We had free hot dogs, games, hay rides, trunk-or-treating, door prizes, a silent auction, Bingo, a costume contest and whole lot of chaotic fun!

Here are a few pictures for your enjoyment!  I'm so glad the "Holey Ghost" decided to show up at our fall festival!

In the Dust of the Rabbi

We have been doing the Ray Vanderlaan Faith Lessons Bible study called In the Dust of the Rabbi on Wednesday nights at Catawba UMC and I have really enjoyed the series. 

The idea up to this piont is that discipleship is all about being like the rabbi.  It's not enough to know about the rabbi or to learn the rabbi's teachings or to be with the rabbi.  The whole purpose of discipleship is to be like the rabbi.

Jesus is a different kind of rabbi in that he chose fisherman and tax collectors and doubters and betrayers to be his disciples.  He chose people that didn't have what it took to be the disciple of any other rabbi.  Jesus chose his disciples and said in essence "I believe and trust in you enough to be the kind of disciples that make other disciples who are like me."

It's nice to know that Jesus believes in me even when I don't.

Images of God

We think all kinds of things about God.  Each one of us may use similar words to describe God but we each may mean something a little bit different by those same words.  If you had good parents, your image of God may be different that if you had abusive or distant or altogether absent parents.  Your image of God will be affected by whether or not you were raised in the church and just as much by what church you were raised in.

Our image of God is absolutely essential to knowing God.

C.S. Lewis said "I don't want my image of God, I want God."

This message series will be based on the book by Jarrett Stevens The Deity Formerly Known as God.  Which Stevens intends as an update to the book by J.B. Phillips titled Your God is too Small.




The idea of the series will be to take a look at the kind of pictures the Bible paints of God.  To get biblically accurate and faithful images of God so that our God is not one we create in our own minds, but one He presents to us in His word.  The irony of a series like Images of God is to discover not just images of God, but God himself.

Finishing a Series

I always have mixed feelings when we conclude a sermon series.  This Sunday is the last message in the series Pastor's Favorites: Movies.  This Sunday we will be looking at a children's animated movie.  The text will be from Luke 15:1-10.  Can you guess the movie?

Anyway, the mixed feelings are due to the sadness of being done with the series and the excitement over the next series. 

I think our next series will be an excellent pre-cursor to our Christmas celebrations.  Our next series will be called Images of God and center around unhealthy and unbiblical images of God and healthy and biblical images of God.

I look forward to it and I hope you do to...but first, we have to talk about the final movie in Pastor's Favorites: Movies.