Showing posts with label Wholeness of Life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wholeness of Life. Show all posts

Monday, May 14, 2012

2012.05.14 Monday Morning Message

Greetings and best wishes from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church in Vinita, Oklahoma.

Bible wisdom asserts that people have powerful hungers that will not be satisfied by bread alone.  (Deuteronomy 8:3).  We, human beings have other hungers.  Be be aware of them, and to act upon them, makes life rich and splendid.

What are those hungers, you might ask?

Well, don't you have a hunger for love and affection?  Without them you"ll shrivel and die in spirit.

And, there are other hungers which make us fully human.  We hunger to be needed, to be useful and vital in some life other than our own  That hunger tells us that we need to perform some tasks that enrich our church, our community, our circle of friends.

I wish more people experienced a hunger for contributing a little kindness and goodness.  That would renew faith and go a long way toward increasing tolerance and civility.

While it is important to be aware of the millions of people who don't get enough to eat, it is important to nourish our souls with that which has imperishable meaning, and which gives us dignity and self-respect.

With blessings and in friendship,

Richard

Announcements:

Bingo at Burroughs Manor Sat. May 19 - 2:00 - 3:00
Helpers are needed.

Next Sunday is Birthday Sunday.  We celebrate Lawrence Noggle, Jan Clark, Mark Curnutte and Jim Ratcliff.

Session and Deacons meet after worship and birthday cake.
Fran Callaway, our Moderator will conduct the Morning Worship and Session meeting.


I will be out of the office Tues-Thurs and will return on Fri.
Jewell


Monday, April 2, 2012

2012.04.02 Monday Morning Message


Greetings and all good wishes from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, located in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma.

Holy Week, which began yesterday, is the most significant week of the Christian calendar.  It is a drama that portrays life in three acts:
  • Act 1 - Palm Sunday, a carnival mood of exuberance and joy.
  • Act 2 - Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, a mood of grief, sorrow, tears.
  • Act 3 - Easter, a mood of victory

Life is a whole.  It swings from laughter to tears, from carnival to Calvary.  There are things that can't be greeted with joy or dismissed with a chuckle.  There are things when life stands still, when the landscape is dark and barren.

But Act 3 is different!  If you choose to accept Christ as Lord and Savior, your life will be encompassed by Easter love.  You will know that your life is lived in God's presence, and that you are literally never alone.

The Easter faith is the faith in which Christians live here and now, and in the eternal life after we did.

"I'm sure that neither death, nor life...will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."  (Romans 8:38-39)

Thanks be to God.

Richard

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Next Sunday, Easter Sunday, Ray Hickman will fill the pulpit.  Suzie will sing and the Children's Bell Choir will perform.  Please come join us to worship God.
 

Monday, March 12, 2012

2012.03.12 Monday Morning Message

Greetings and all good wishes from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, Vinita, Oklahoma.

Christianity is profoundly inward, but at the same time outreaching and social.  It brings enlarged vision and it stirs deepest emotions, but it also moves the will to action.  It calls all aspects of a person into full function.

Jesus put a strong emphasis upon "wholeness of life".  "Do you desire to be made whole?"  is a basic question addressed not to one solitary person, but to everybody.  His gospel aims at nothing less than an integral wholeness of life, a harmony of the outer and inner self.

The kingdom of God, of which he persistently  speaks, begins as an attitude of the soul, as an inner experience of God.  "The kingdom of God" is within you.

We do not discover the full richness of the inner life until we take in terms of the love which he expects of us.  "You are to love", Jesus said, "even as I have loved you."  These words are demanding and at the same time they are words which reveal an immense faith in the inner possibilities of everybody.

Never neglect your fellowship with the unseen Lord of your life.  Always nurture and appreciate the richness and abundance of your inner life.

Hear the words of the prayer of St. Patrick, and make it your own prayer:

Christ within me, Christ beside me,
Christ before me, Christ to guide me,
Christ in my rising, Christ in my sleeping,
Christ in working, Christ in speaking.

Christ in the heart of all who love me,
Christ in the mouth of neighbors near me,
Christ in the eye of all who see me,
Christ in the ear of all who hear me.


With blessings that Christ bring to an expansion of joy!

Richard


Bingo at Burroughs Manor, Saturday, March 17 - 2:00 - 3:00


There will be a free screening of the Tar Creek documentary created and directed by Vinita native Matt Myers,
Monday, March 12 at Vinita High School cafeteria  sponsored by Vinnie Ream Cultural Center.
If you have not seen this movie, or would like to see it again this film shows what happened
in the Tar Creek area over the last century.
Tar Creek is located near Picher, Oklahoma.