St. Paul United Methodist Church

During this week, many will celebrate Thanksgiving Day.  Though often thought of as a single day, however, it should be a way of life.  The goal is to look past the single day and see something greater.  C S Lewis described this ability to see beyond something immediate as a tenet of Christian Faith:

 “I think all Christians would agree with me if I said that though Christianity seems at first to be all about morality, all about duties and rules and guilt and virtue, yet it leads you on, out of all that, into something beyond.  One has a glimpse of a country where they do not talk of those things, except perhaps as a joke.  Everyone there is filled full with what we should call goodness as a mirror is filled with light.  But they do not call it goodness.  They do not call it anything.  They are not thinking of it.  They are too busy looking at the source from which it comes.  But this is near the stage where the road passes over the rim of our world.” (Mere Christianity)

 

I hope you will see beyond a single day filled with family traditions.  It is much larger.  It is a way of existing where one is thankful for all they have received.  See beyond. See a God who gave himself in Jesus Christ for your benefit…and be thankful.

 

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This week’s reading:

• Monday –  2 Corinthians 1
• Tuesday – 2 Corinthians 2
• Wednesday – 2 Corinthians 3
• Thursday – 2 Corinthians 4
• Friday – 2 Corinthians 5

I have a close friend, one since childhood, that fights the demon that ‘busyness’ equates value. My friend dances from one event to another in hopes that when it is all said-and-done, he (or she) will see something different about him(her)self when finished. Much of our conversations revolve around this struggle. My hope is that one day my friend will discover his (or her) identity is already established and secured in Christ, and that everything that is done stems from that identity.

My friend is not alone. How often do you allow yourself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns? To surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone in every way is to succumb to the misconception of our times and the false assumption that a busy life equates value. Your life’s value is already established in Christ. The rest is only to live out and into what is already there.

This week’s reading:

• Monday – 1 Corinthians 12
• Tuesday – 1 Corinthians 13
• Wednesday – 1 Corinthians 14
• Thursday – 1 Corinthians 15
• Friday – 1 Corinthians 16

Please Pray for:

• The St. Paul Church family.
• Those who are unwillingly absent.
• Those who are grieving and depressed.
• The United Methodist Church.
• Our nation and our leaders.
• The World.