Christmas Sunday Photos

The Chancel on Christmas Sunday.

April Wheeler, flutist; Teresa Wheeler, harpist

The Morgans lighting the Advent Candle, Jared, Jewell, Jacob, Josh, and David Morgan

"Thank You" to Jewell Morgan for continuing to send Church Photos for the blog!

2010.12.20 Monday Morning!

Greetings and Best Wishes for a Merry Christmas from all of us at Pilgrim Presbyterian Church in Vinita, Oklahoma.

 

Do your best to be consistent.  Let your outward life, visible to all, reflect your inner life.  That may be the best Christmas gift you can give yourself.

 

Will Durant, who wrote an eleven volume story of history said, on his 94th birthday, "Loving kindness is the most successful method of behavior."  Loving kindness...warm fuzzies...will equip you to live as God intends life to be lived.

 

The good news of Christmas is reconciliation, beginning with oneself.  Go for it and enjoy a Merry Christmas.

 

Richard

Christmas Eve Service at 1st Presbyterian Church Chelsea

1st Presbyterian Church Chelsea will hold our Christmas Eve service at 7:00 pm. We would like to invite all of our Vinita friends and family to attend!!

Merry Christmas!!

Alaine Dye

For more information please contact Alaine Dye at:

AAA Insurance
445 S Brady
Claremore, OK 74017
918.341.2100
918.341.2154 fax

2010.12.13 Monday Morning!

Best wishes for a MERRY CHRISTMAS from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church in Vinita, Oklahoma.

 

Christmas is a time for lights.  Beautiful lights are shining in every city and village.  Lights are an important part of Christmas, symbols of the Christmas story:

    The true light that enlightens every person has come

     into the world in the birth of Jesus.  In him was life,

     and the life was light for all people.  His light shines

     in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

                                            (Will you read John 1:1-18, please?)

 

The mood of despair, however, is familiar in our dark patches.  Immense problems face our nation and the world;  war, an economic recession, unemployment, hunger, home foreclosures, terrorism.

 

And, there are personal difficulties:  problems within families and among friends, jobs that no longer give satisfaction, loss of health, unexpected death of a loved one.

 

I understand how people may feel abandoned by God.  Sometimes I ask myself "Is there really a God who cares?"

 

Then the light of Christmas comes with the assurance that in smooth and rough places "God is with us".  None of us is alone.  Confident of that helps disperse times of darkness.  I haven't  answers to the many questions that bother me, but of this I am sure; God is with me and helps me carry on with courage and strength.

 

My thoughts and prayers are with friends for whom 2010 has been a shattering year.

 

Richard.

2010.12.06 Monday Morning!

Top of the morning from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, located in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma.

 

Do me a favor this week?  Will you read a story found in Matthew 25:1-13?  You may think it is an odd request for this Advent season, but, like all Bible stories it is a guide from which we can receive ancient wisdom into our life.

 

Five of the maidens discovered they could not borrow oil for their flickering lamps.  There are things in life we cannot borrow, and faith is one of them.  We can't live off the spiritual capital of someone else.

 

The birth of Jesus is an opportunity to rekindle connection to "God with us", and to the responsibilities those three little words place upon us.

 

God needs our services.  By our little and big acts at this season - by writing cards and notes to friends from the past, by visiting a shut-in, by phoning a lonely person, we affirm our contact to "God with us."  We become God's instruments of love and friendship.

 

Share the depth of your spiritual capital.

 

Cheers,

Richard

 

2010.11.29 Monday Morning!

Top of the morning from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma.

I hope you had an enjoyable Thanksgiving Day, and that now you will journey through Advent to Christmas and the glorious celebration of the birth of Jesus.

Nothing is more important than “to keep in touch” with God, with family and with friends.  To “keep in touch” one must be able to share the small and big events of life.  The holidays provide that opportunity, especially when we live far away, in distance and time, from those whom we love and with those who were close to us at different periods in our life.

This story, which I heard tell, is about a minister who loved golf more than almost anything.  He feigned sickness one bright Sunday morning and after his family left for Church, he snuck out the back door and went to his favorite golf course.

There, on the 7^th, he shot his first hole in one.  But who could he tell?  He couldn’t share a big moment in his life and he felt embarrassed and empty.

Let Advent and Christmas lead you in the direction of happiness in our complex world.  “Go, tell… that Jesus Christ is born.”  “The Word has become flesh and dwells among us, full of grace and truth.”  (John 1:14)

That’s good news worth sharing!

Richard

2010.11.22 Monday Morning!

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church in Vinita, Oklahoma.  I suggest that at your Thanksgiving gathering someone read aloud Psalm 100.   To give thanks for specific reasons is reasonable.  In good conscience all of us can be thankful for the good things of life which we have received.   If, however, one of those specific reasons for thanksgiving is lost, can we still be thankful?  Yes we can if we cultivate an attitude of thanks toward all life.  An attitude of thankfulness sustains us and enhances purpose and meaning in all the situations we meet.   Shakespeare captured that truth in Henry VI:        "O Lord that lends us life,          Lend me a heart full of thankfulness."   A heart full of thankfulness is an attitude toward life itself. That is the absolute character of genuine thanksgiving.   Consider thankfulness not for a day, but as a life long attitude.   Cheers and best wishes, Richard