A Word From Pastor Mike - Beginnings

The following was Mike's Christmas Eve Sermon this year but it is an important year round.  I think as you read, especially the last part of the sermon, you'll see that this is a great sermon for a New Year as well.

"In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered."  Luke 2:1

This is the beginning of the Christmas Story.  It is one of the world's great stories, Luke 2:1-20.  It's a great piece of writing.  It's got a little bit of everything:

a) Historical Figures - Augustus, Quirinius

b) Travel - Nazareth to Bethlehem, small town to small town

c) Humble Couple - Mary and Joseph - teenagers?

d) A Birth in Trying Circumstances - birth in a cow barn

e) The Natural and the Supernatural - shephers/sheep, angels

f) Announcement/A Sign - good news

g) Music - Glory to God in the Highest

h) Going in Haste - running shepherds (funny?)

i) Mary Pondering - Why am I a part of this great thing God is      doing?

j) Shepherds Praising God!

The Christmas story is short and compact.  It gets a lot of information out in just a few sentences.  This is the beginning of the Jesus story, of the Christian Faith.  "In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered."

Author Stephen King wrost, "A first line of a story should say: Listen. Come in here.  You want to know about this."  God works through stories to call us to faith.  God wants to draw us in with the first line.  Listen.  You'll want to know more about this.

Consider how the Bible starts, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."  Wow!  You talk about jumping in with both feet!  Does that get your attention?

Here is some more of the world's great writing, Psalm 23.  "The Lord is my shepherd.  I shall not want."  This is telling us that God is guiding our lives, providing our needs.  God is closely involved in your existence, like a shepherd with his sheep.  Does that get your attention?

1 Corinthians 13 is an ode to love.  It begins, "If I speak in the tongues of mean and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging symbol."  Every beginning needs a good ending.  This is how 1 Corinthians ends, "So now faith, hope and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love."  Does that get your attention?

The gospel, the good news about Jesus, has a surprising beginning, a humble couple, travel, birth, angels, shepherds.  What is not said here is said in John's gospel, "The Word (Jesus/God) became flesh and dwelt among us" or the paraphrase, "God took on human flesh and pitched his tent with us."

God is one of us.  In the life of Jesus, God experienced life as we know it, life with its joys and disappointments, with friends and enemies, eating, sleeping, working, birth and death.  God as one of us, that's a strange beginning.  It gets your attention.

The Christmas Story is a beginning.  It's a start.  There is something special about a new beginning, a new year, a new job, a new opportunity, a new season.  All these things give a sense of excitement.

Here is a story of new beginnings...  

In 1973 Ed Ryder was sentenced to life in prison for a murder he didn't commit.  (Does that first sentence get your attention?)  Ed Ryder was a 22 year old petty thief and sometimes heroin user.  He was in jail, in a holding cell, when three other men in the cell decided to get revenge on another man who had insulted them.  Ed Ryder was lumped in with the other men who had committed the murder.  Two of the other men later admitted that Ed Ryder had nothing to do with it.  How long did it take then for Ed Ryder to be set free?  5 years?  10 years?  Try 20 years!

When Ed was in prison he dreamed of playing trumpet in his own jazz band.  He never let go of hope.  He always believed he would get a new beginning.  In September of 1993 Ed Ryder was set free from his prison.  He started his own jazz band!  He was able to begin again.

The Jesus story has a beginning but it is also about beginnings for others.  When Jesus grew up, he started his ministry by reading from the book of Isaiah.  "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me... to bring good news to the poor, proclaim release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind and letting the oppressed go free to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."

The good news of the gospel is that you and I get a new beginning with God.  Jesus lets people start over.

Jesus didn't give up on people.  He said to the woman caught in adultery, "Neither do I condemn you.  Go and sin no more in this way."  You get a new beginning.

He said to the leper kicked out of society, "Be made clean."  You have a new beginning.

There was a paralyzed man let down through a roof.  Jesus said, "Your sins are forgiven.  Take up your mat and walk."  You have a new beginning.

Jesus didn't give up on Peter, poor impetuous Peter.  Peter wanted to straighten Jesus out of his ministry.  He wanted to walk on water.  He wanted to take on the Romans.  He denied Jesus.  After the resurrection Jesus came to Peter and told him he could start again.  He gave him a new beginning.

The Christian faith is all about new beginnings.  We are sinful.  We fall short of God's glory.  We miss the mark.  We make bad choices.  We need new beginnings.  We need to know that God doesn't give up on us.  He doesn't!

Every day is a new day.  It's a chance to begin again with God.  No one is too far away from God.  He gets our attention with a story, a story about a beginning.

Every beginning needs an ending.  Here's the end of the Christmas Story... "And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen as it had been told them."

What is this story about for us?

There was a beginning to the life of Jesus on earth.

A savior and Lord was born for us.  That means Jesus saves us from our sins and teaches us through his Spirit and Word how to live a life that pleases God.

Jesus had a beginning.  He is the King of New Beginnings.  God has not given up on you.  You are not too far away from God.  God knows all about your life.  He loves you and he wants you to begin again with him.

This story, this day, this faith is God's gift to you.  Be a shepherd.  Glorify and praise God.  Let that be the beginning and the end of your faith story with God.

Caroling 2015

Do you go Christmas Caroling? We have gone caroling a variety of places.  It is an old fashioned tradition but I am glad it still happens today.

We have caroled in the back of a truck while sitting on hay bales in Montana. Often this occurred in VERY cold weather.

We have caroled in New Mexico in weather that seemed almost balmy compared to Montana.

Wyoming caroling can be really cold, especially if the wind is doing its Wyoming thing.  

No matter when or where we have gone caroling, it is a nice tradition. It is one of those Christmas things that spreads cheer without involving shopping. We generally focus on singing to people who are sick or shut in. It is a feel good activity.

Last night was our annual caroling with our church group.  Mike and I took our granddaughters along, making it even more of an adventure. Buckling and unbuckling them from their carseats, plopping on hats and slipping on four mittens at each stop got a bit hectic. It is possible I got a little careless with it. I would like to tell you that Elise put her own hat on here, but sadly, it was me.

Cordelia is absolutely darling when we carol. I have explained to her that a lot of older people in nursing homes don't get to see kids much and that it makes them happy to see them. She also knew they sometimes want to hold their hands or touch their faces. Cordelia takes her "job" quite seriously! 

At one such stop a lady came up and wanted to hug Cordelia, holding her arms open as invitation. Cordelia went right to her!. The hug went on rather long and the lady just kept holding on to her. I took Cordelia's hand and extracted her from the situation and walked her over to greet a few other people but when the first lady wanted more hugging, Cordy willingly went right back to her embrace. I was so proud of her! 

At a few of the nursing homes Cordelia didn't even wait for an invitation. After our songs she just walked among the people and told them, "Merry Christmas." 

Elise was a lot more reserved but she joined in on the songs she knew, rang her little bells and made people smile. She got pretty tired and sometimes laid down on the floor or buried her face in my hair as I held her, but it didn't matter. She was adorable. She was NOT reserved in the vehicle between stops. She shared her opinions freely and sang "Go Tell it on the Mountain", her favorite song, many times over.

It was a good night.

These photos were at our last stop. Don't they look like they've had fun? 

Yep, a good night.

Christmas 2014

We have developed a weird Christmas Eve Tradition. We go out for Chinese Food.  It started about 10 years ago. As you know, my husband is a pastor.  Our church used to hold two Christmas Eve Services as so many people came, they didn't all fit in the building at the same time. Since our home is nearly 1/2 hour from the church, it was not feasible to go home for dinner between the two services. We resolved that problem by going just a few blocks down the street to a Chinese Buffet.

Things have changed. We are now in a big building and can all attend one Christmas Eve Service together. Still, the Chinese Dinner Tradition continues.

We go to a nicer place where there are plenty of vegan options for our vegan family members.

We feel all fancy and nearly have the place to ourselves as we go pretty early.

We aren't always all there but those of us in town gather for that bit of family time to kick off Christmas.

From there we go on to church. I love Christmas Eve! I and our son-in-law, Eric, are on the Worship Team and we begin singing about half an hour before the service. I love it! I love the whole service. Often there are people back in town that we've not seen for awhile.  Many of the little kids are dressed up in their finest and they look like sweet angels. It always just makes me feel so warm and happy. I am always a bit disappointed when it concludes.

When I get home Christmas Eve, I put together cinnamon rolls for the next day (I will do a separate post and give away all my cinnamon roll secrets). After that, there are always some last minute things to do before falling into bed.

When I was a kid, we often were at my grandparents house for Christmas.  My Mom had 4 sisters and a little brother and usually at least 4 families were staying there at my grandparents. I usually got to be one of the kids that got to sleep in the living room. I really loved sleeping in Grandma's living room. That way, I was sure to be a part of any of the action!

Early Christmas morning my brother and I would each go into one of the bathrooms and start flushing. For some reason, we were allowed to be obnoxious on Christmas morning. Grandma and Grandpa's plumbing was really noisy so the flushing produced some pretty good results in that everyone started waking up. That, of course, was our goal. Sometimes we had everyone up by 5:00 or so!

My last year staying there for Christmas Eve I think I was 19. My brother wasn't there but by then there were a lot of younger, much younger, cousins.  I don't know what came over me but I got them all in on my evil plot. I had a nice little talk with them before bedtime. I was much too cool for the toilet-flushing by then. I had bells! Yep, I walked around shaking little bells and that was their cue to wake up their parents (the kids were sleeping on the floor in their parent's rooms). Why the relatives let me get away with that, I'll never know. I do know that there were a lot of photos of sleepy adults at my grandparents house on Christmas mornings.

Anyway, we no longer open presents quite that early. In fact, we let Sam sleep in and wait until our daughter and her family come by.  My apologies to my aunts and uncles.

 Cordelia got a new doll. Little girls and dolls... too precious.

Eric and Elise

You really should bop on over to our daughter's blog for a second to read about the gifts the little girls gave to us.  It is pretty adorable.  I hope you went and read her post as it will make this picture make more sense.

This is our Advent Wreath. Each candle is lit for meals during the four week prior to Christmas. I added that center candle as our "Christ Candle". It was a gift from some sweet friends at church and I just thought it looked right to have it in the center of our wreath this year.

The girls have been wanting dance classes and we also got them the clothes to wear. Elise's class is actually a tumbling class, set to music. Instead of new ballet shoes she got Hello Kitty Sneakers but she was just as delights. I'm sure the tumbling teacher will allow her to wear her ballet clothes...I hope! Anyway, I couldn't stop taking photos of those sweet girls, dancing around amidst the Christmas mess.  It was great!

I hope your Christmas was as sweet as our's.

Do you have any weird Christmas confessions such as our toilet-flushing trick?

Nativity and the Farm

I am kind of proud of this photo. I started out taking photos of the Nativity Set that Mike grew up with when he lived on the farm. It has a cardboard stable but we can't quite make it stand up anymore so we have the characters set up like this. 

As I was photographing it, I realized that hanging above it is the painting our daughter did of the farm. Mike grew up there and we lived there for about four years early in our marriage. It was also Maria's first home and I love that she painted it.

Anyway, I hope you all had a lovely Christmas Day. I will post photos of our's in a day or so.

A Super Christmas Program

Did any of you get to see a children's Christmas Play this year? Our Sunday School Children gave us a fun one Sunday morning. Cordelia' part was to be Super Girl!

Yep. That is right. We got to see her be a little tiny Mary one year but this year she was Super Girl. The play had all the usual characters... Joseph, Mary and shepherds and such. 

I remember one of the shepherds complaining about his friends being at Starbucks while he was there cleaning sheep poop.  It maybe wasn't your typical Christmas Play.

The play was about the Super Heroes worrying because they had heard of a new super hero to be born. Like all of us, they were worried about how the newcomer would affect them.  Besides Super Girl, we had the Incredible Hulk, Spider-Man,  and others. 

As we know, Jesus is the Light of the World. I enjoyed Cat Woman talking about those lights you can never catch.  Get it? Think flashlight shining in the floor and wall... A kitty chasing it? 

The best part of the play for me was seeing Cordelia...

And Elise exclaiming, "Delia is a Super Hero! She saves the day!" She said it all with such adoration, it was adorable. I wish you could have been there.

Happy Christmas Eve!

Cardboard Mountain

How are doing with your Christmas shopping? Almost done?

Last Saturday I was pretty close to hitting that PANIC Button as I really had not done much Christmas shopping. Mike calmed me down, though, and we went shopping. I generally hate shopping but we actually had a good time. We are both rather overcommitted this time of year, going in opposite directions, so I liked just spending time with him. 

Anyway, Mike had some good ideas for gifts and we managed to get a lot done. We celebrated by getting a drink at Sonic and driving around for a bit. We planned out gifts to be shipped to some of our out of town loved ones as well. To finish it off, I did a significant amount of online shopping as well. Sam works for UPS, you know. We do our part to ensure his job security!

Well, it has been a very busy week. As the packages started arriving, I just tucked them into my craft room. It got all those boxes out of sight, as well as the plastic bags.  As you see, it piles up into a pretty big mountain!

I can't even remember what all we have in that pile! 

The time has come for me to conquer that mountain so I am going to see what I can find on Netflix and have me a sweet little evening. As I open those boxes and wrap those gifts I am going to say thankful prayers for each of the recipients.  I am also going to remember that these gifts and  all good gifts come from God.

Has Christmas Become Generic?

Yesterday I was at a store looking for a little gift card holder type of Christmas card. They had lots and lots of them! I was pleased to see such a big selection, 3 or more separate racks. I set out to make my choice.

I looked and looked.... and looked for one that had something to do with Christmas. Yes, I see that Santa one right there, but I found NONE, ZERO, ZIPPO that had anything to do with Christmas. 

I'd better stop right now and warn you that you may not agree with my point of view on this issue. I say that because most people do not. That was very, very apparent as I shopped for cards. Also, I feel a bit of a rant coming on so feel free to click off my post right now if you'd like.  This could get ugly. It's been building up for a long time.

Are you saying to yourself, "What's her deal?"  Well, my deal is, I am wondering when Christmas went generic. 

Hear me out. Christmas is a Christian Holiday. It is about God sending his son to live a human existence, to teach us, and eventually to die in our place. The story is about a young woman who was pregnant with the Son of God. She likely suffered torment and taunting from those who did not believe she was telling the truth about her pregnancy. Good grief! She had to ride on a donkey only to end up going into labor when she didn't even have a place to lay down. It is about Joseph, who really had to step out in faith to support her and to accept the role of helping raise the Son of God. It is a gritty story. The shepherds were likely a bit rough around the edges but they were chosen to receive that first announcement. They knew to respond with adoration and an attitude of worship.

What happened to that sort of attitude?

Now, back to Christmas today. Recently I heard someone tell what Christmas was all about. They mentioned sharing and giving and caring and things like that. They were absolutely right! Yet, they didn't mention Jesus. 

You probably don't want me to get started on Santa.  

Sure, he is about fun and presents and all that, but he isn't real. SANTA IS NOT REAL. Who's idea was it to make him the center of Christmas? It was a very effective plan, wasn't it? That is, if the plan was to push Jesus aside.  

Tangling them all up together, Santa kneeling down at the manger scene for instance, kind of bothers me as well.  I realize that was someone's idea of showing that Jesus is more important than Santa. I appreciate that and maybe it was a good plan. I don't know. What bothers me is this... what happens when kids learn that Santa is not real? If he and Jesus are buddies, doesn't that mess with their faith in Jesus?

I don't hate Santa. I just wish he had his own, make-believe holiday.

I'm almost done with this rant.

I don't know of Ramadan or Hanukkah being taken over by secularism.  I think people are still allowed to say Happy Hannukah, not Season's Greeting or Happy Holiday. We Christians could learn a thing or two about protecting our holidays.

One last thought...

When medications go generic, they are cheaper. 

I don't want to cheapen Christmas.

There.

I feel better.

I'm done...

                                                                       ...until Easter.

Pajama Party

Our church has undergone some big changes over the last couple of years. Some of those changes came with a lot of sadness and left us feeling a bit discouraged. Recently, though, we've seen healing and growth that is heartwarming.

One if the changes was a loss of a full-time youth director. She had previously done so much work and organized many great events for the kids. With her resignation came a lot of reorganization, which is not always an easy thing. What I've noticed now, a year later, is a lot of people stepping up to the plate, so the speak. 

New events keep popping, organized by parents and other volunteers. This past Friday night they organized a Polar Express Party. As with many of these events, entire families were there having fun together. We all wore our Jammie's and went as groups from one station to another. 

We followed train track to lead the way to stations where we decorated and ate cookies...

... Played in piles of shaving cream "snow"...

... Made decorations and had coloring contests. 

 I am showing close-up photos of only our granddaughters and not the faces of other kids since I didn't ask for parental permission to show the others. There were over 60 kids there!

There was a white elephant gift exchange. I was worried Elise , at age 2, wouldn't quite understand the funky gifts but a small miracle occurred as she received a My Little Pony. She was so very excited! I was so relieved!

Cordy received stationery cards and wasn't thrilled at first but later was planning how she could leave secret letters to make people happy. I love that girl.

At each "station" the kids received a mark on their ticket. At the last station they realized their marks came together to spell JESUS.  

They all sat down while Mike told a story that brought home the message that Christmas is really all about Jesus.

Then, things got wild with an indoor snowball fight. Ok, the snowballs were made out of newspaper. The kids loved it!

The adult leaders then had a contest to see which team could clean up the fastest... A stroke of genius!

I love when a congregation serves as our larger family.  In January we will be having Saturday Talent Sharing Day. Different folks will be teaching others such things as Intro to Drumming, How to Play Cribbage, Crocheting, How to Improve Your Golf Swing, and more! Doesn't that sound wonderful?  The week after that we are going cross country skiing together. 

It is so wonderful to see so many people maybe stepping a bit out of their comfort zone to do more together. Do any of you have ideas you'd like to share of events your congregations sponsor?

Happy Day of Forgiveness!

Merry Christmas.

Happy Day of Forgiveness.

Make My Heart a Manger

Thanks to my sister-in-law, Sue, for recommending this song to me.

A Walk down Christmas Memory Lane

I was looking at some of our Christmas decorations last night and I realized many of them are sweet reminders of their givers. Let me show you.

This star was a gift from some church friends.

 I guess I don't know where this one originated but I think  it came to us

from Mike's Mom. It was one that Mike knew from his childhood and that makes it special.

I am really appreciative that it has held up over time

(and that I haven't squished it).

Ben made this one for us.

Wasn't he a cute little guy?

This one is all the more special as Ben is far away

from us this Christmas.

This is one of many hand-painted ones that originated in Harlowton, MT and were

give to us by our friend, Evelyn. She gave us a new one each Christmas we lived there

and she even continued sending them to us for several years after we moved away.

Evelyn is gone from this Earth now but she is not forgotten!

When we moved from Harlowton to Alamogordo, NM we made another friend who

purchased fancy ornaments from Hallmark for us each year. This was one of my favorites.

Her name was Laura and she also has moved on from this life.

Our memories of her make us smile.

Sam also gave us an ornament featuring his own sweet little face.

For the record, that was the year he tried trimming his own hair.

Even so, he was pretty cute!

I really like this rag angel. Our friend, Kim, gave it to us about 15 years ago.

Kim was a young mom who volunteered to babysit Sam when I first went back

to college. She was very sweet and so generous with her time. We went on quite a few excursions

together with our little kids. She was always ready to have some fun!

The last time I talked to Kim she handed the phone to her husband so he

could tell me about the rare disease she had developed, the one that was robbing 

her of her personality and eventually her life.

Well that was mean of me to start out with a happy-go-lucky type of post 

and then to throw the sadness of loss in your face. 

I feel kind of bad that I did that but I wasn't really expecting to take that turn myself! 

Sometimes my posts take on a life of their own.

Even with the sadness of loss, I am so grateful for these and so many others

who have been a part of our lives over the span of many Christmases.

We've been blessed.

Amy Grant - Breath Of Heaven (Mary's Song)

So beautiful...I hope you can make time to listen to the entire song.

Toys for Tots! 750 Toys!

Not long ago our Sunday School Superintendent, Tanya, had a grand idea of raising money for

Toys for Tots. 

Actually, she shared with our congregation the fact that she had been one of those kids who benefited from that program when she was a child. I think that meant a lot to everyone.

So, the plan was put into place.

First, we had a fundraiser. She asked the kids (and their families) to start by getting cookie jars and then filling them up with homemade cookies. After church that week-end, we held an auction. Each kid stood up when their cookies were to be auctioned off, sometimes talking a bit about their cookies. It was not the kind of auction where you try to get a good deal. It was a fundraiser, after all.

Mike doesn't really "do" auctions so it was up to me to do the bidding. It was pretty fun. Toward the end, though, I was bidding on some cookies. Sometimes I bid just to get it going. I'd set our limit before the auction so I knew my limit was $80 for that batch. I thought I was in good shape until some guy across the room started bidding. It was Mike! People thought it was pretty funny so we kept it up a bit, bidding against each other. I did go a bit over budget but it was worth it.

ANYWAY, our smallish Sunday School raised over $5,000 with those cookies!

Part two of the plan happened yesterday morning. Tanya had arranged for the kids and their parents to come on a grand shopping spree at KMart. Since Toys for Tots is a Marine program, there were a couple of Marines there in uniform to assist. I thought that made it even more exciting for the kids.

Cordy gave a salute to one of them. It was adorable! It looked more like she was checking her temperature, but it was very cute.

I couldn't imagine how this was all going to work. Luckily, I wasn't in charge. Tanya had it all worked out. Each child got a shopping basket and 30 minutes to spend $230 on toys! Yep, $230 EACH! I carried Elise while Maria and Eric helped Cordelia. She took her job quite seriously and thoughtfully, as did all the kids. There was a lot of JOY at our KMart today!

Cordelia was allowed to check out first. She put her share of the toys up on the counter herself.

Then posed for me, along with her family.

This sweet girl is one of the students in our high school class. She was so patient and won the honor of being last in line. I bet she waited 45 minutes to an hour!

When all was said and done, those kids had purchased more than 750 toys!

Yes, 750 toys!

Can you imagine?

The kids all had such fun and I am certain

they were proud to be a part of something

so special.

Great job, Tanya!

Decorating for Christmas 2013

The first year Maria left home we had to adjust to some new traditions. She wasn't going to be home for Christmas Break until Christmas Eve. I imagined having the house all decorated, cheery and festive, when she came home. You know, like they do on all the Christmas movies?

Well, the Ben and Sam would have none of it. They refused to decorate without Maria.

I thought it was so sweet that they wanted to wait for her. However, I'm a bit suspicious, even still, that they just didn't want to do much of the decorating themselves. It's always been the boys putting up a few decorations then watching Maria really get into it. Whatever their motive, it was a good thing we waited. Maria didn't want to miss out on the decorating.

Now, even though Maria and Eric have their own home to decorate, we still wait until they are at our house before we do it. If you are suspicious that I really just like to let Maria do most of the decorating, you are correct. Her daughters really get into it as well, and it all works out great. So, Mike put on John Denver and the Muppets (a bit too loud) and we got started.

Sam was soooo excited to get started.

You can see that Eric was also anxious to hop to it.

Elise was good to go!

After she hung up each ornament she kept saying,

"More?"

When shopping one day Cordy picked out two new ornaments for Mike and Me.

He received the red cardinal, for obvious reasons.

I received a blue whale because she couldn't find anything orange

and "blue goes so well with orange."

Maria works with the red finger weaving that she made in about third grade.

She is perched a bit precariously while wrapping it around the rail...

...while wearing high-heeled boots!

She managed to decorate without injury, though.

When we were satisfied with our work Mike turned out the 

overhead lights while

we all relaxed and enjoyed the tree.

The girls then did lots of dancing and 

twirling and

making us laugh.

Life is good.

Have you decorated yet?

Do you have any special holiday traditions?