MONDAY MORNING greetings and best wishes from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, still located in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma. Our Sunday morning services begin at 10 o'clock. Come and worship with us if you can. If you can't, say a little prayer for us! A number of Presbyterians, with second homes on Grand Lake, have found us and we are glad to welcome these friends to Pilgrim Church, "a friendly church of faith".
Hear this urgent message for all of us: we need to learn that speed, and more speed, are NOT solutions to everything!
There are things that cannot be hurried: the acquaintance that deepens into friendship, the mind that seeks knowledge and wisdom, the healing that follows bereavement, the time for memories stored up from a lifetime of experience.
Perhaps this prayer by O.L. Crain will help slow us down:
Remind me each day that the race is not always to the swift and that there is more to life than increasing its speed. Slow me down, God, and inspire me to send my roots deep into the soil of life's enduring values, that I may grow toward the stars of my greater destiny.
In friendship,
Richard
Monday Morning greetings and best wishes from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, still located in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma.
Have you ever heard of another Presbyterian Church named "Pilgrim Church"? If you have, let me know. It is a common name among Congregationalists. I love the name. After all, we are pilgrims on a journey.
Early in the 19th century, Presbyterians and Congregationalists agreed to avoid missionary and outreach competition. Arrangements were made for Congregationalists to establish churches in New England and Presbyterians to move westward in upstate New York.
Those arrangements are still visible. Today one sees few Presbyterians in the New England states and few Congregational churches in the Mohawk Valley of New York.
The first Congregational Church in Vinita was founded in 1879. Three years later a Presbyterian Church was organized.
In 1947 the two Vinita churches united and the congregation was named "Pilgrim Presbyterian Church". One of the last members of the Congregational Church, Jim Humble, died recently. His daughter, Jewell Morgan is an elder in Pilgrim Church, which she serves faithfully.
The Congregational Church in America is now known as The United Church of Christ.
Thought you might be interest in a snippet of history.
All the best,
Richard
Easter Monday greetings from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, located in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma.
I hope you had an enjoyable Easter! I underline that word "enjoyable" because God intends us to enjoy this life and live it to the hilt.
Much is being written about life after death, and I do believe that life does not end at the grave. But survival is an empty victory unless it is based on what is enjoyable, virtuous and responsible here and now.
Get your priorities in order. Your life is of inestimable value. Rage against anything that shrivels your soul or withers your spirit.
How's this for a Pearl of Value from Ruther Rendell, a mystery writer: "Happiness makes so much difference to people. It doesn't just make them happy, it makes them more intelligent, more aware, more alert, while unhappiness deadens, dulls and stupefies."
Read Matthew 5:3-11 again, and substitute "happy" for the world "blessed". Does that little change make more sense to you?
Cheers,
Richard
Greetings and best wishes from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, located in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma!
This is Monday of Holy Week, the most significant week of our Christian calendar. It is a week of joy (Palm Sunday), sorrow (Maundy Thursday and Good Friday) and triumph (Easter Sunday, the Resurrection of our Lord).
Life is like that: joy, sorrow, mixed feelings and triumph...bittersweet!
Our granddaughter was born in Holy Week. Our family was overjoyed; she was the first grandchild. In the midst of our joy, another family was gathered nearby in the waiting room experiencing the grief of life slipping away for their year old child.
Jesus knows the ups and downs of human feelings and emotions. Life, bittersweet as it is, beckons us to move forward into an unknown future certain that our Resurrected Lord is God with us. That is central to our year 'round Easter faith.
A blessed, Happy Easter to you and your loved ones near and far.
Richard
