{"id":6158,"date":"2020-12-20T07:59:36","date_gmt":"2020-12-20T12:59:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/?p=6158"},"modified":"2020-12-20T07:59:36","modified_gmt":"2020-12-20T12:59:36","slug":"pastors-greeting-for-4th-sunday-in-advent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/2020\/12\/pastors-greeting-for-4th-sunday-in-advent\/","title":{"rendered":"Pastor’s greeting for 4th Sunday in Advent"},"content":{"rendered":"
Welcome to\u00a0Chilmark Community\u00a0Church.<\/div>\n
We are\u00a0happy God has led you to be with us.<\/div>\n
Today is the fourth and last Sunday\u00a0in<\/div>\n
Advent. It is\u00a0the Sunday before Christmas Day<\/div>\n
–\u00a0the Day of our\u00a0Lor\u00a0d\u2019s Nativity. Our reading for the Psalm\u00a0 \u00a0 and the\u00a0Gospel both rejoice in the steadfast love of God for<\/div>\n
his people. In t\u00a0he Gospel reading, Mary rejoiced<\/div>\n
and\u00a0gave thanks for what God was doing through her.<\/div>\n
She was troubled and perplexed when she learned<\/div>\n
what was going to happen to her. She pondered, in<\/div>\n
her heart, what sort of greeting the angel\u00a0brought\u00a0. Gabriel then said to her:\u00a0\u201cDo not be\u00a0afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. You will conceive in your womb and\u00a0bear a son, and you will name him\u00a0Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of\u00a0the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor, David. He\u00a0will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom, there will be no end\u201d.<\/div>\n
(1:30\u00a0–\u00a033)<\/div>\n
During the months of October and November we spoke about BLESSINGS.\u00a0I asked you to\u00a0name\u00a0the\u00a0BLESSING\u00a0God has given you. God gives gift\u00a0s of BLESSING\u00a0so we may use then<\/div>\n
for God and for others. As we use our\u00a0BLESSINGS for<\/div>\n
God and others they grow and we\u00a0are\u00a0given\u00a0even more<\/div>\n
blessed in the process.\u00a0The gifts of\u00a0God\u00a0\u2019s BLISSINGS<\/div>\n
change our\u00a0society and\u00a0civilization.\u00a0God is the first gift giver and the greatest gift giver.\u00a0John 3:16\u00a0\u00a0tells us that \u201cGod so loved the world that\u00a0he gave his only Son.\u201d\u00a0St. Paul points out\u00a0that it was \u201cGod who first gave, even while we were yet sinners.\u201d It is God who gave us\u00a0life. It is God who gave us the galaxies and the universe. It is\u00a0God\u00a0who\u00a0gave us our\u00a0mothers and our fathers, our children and grandchildren. God gave us all that we have<\/div>\n
and are.\u00a0Like Mary\u00a0,\u00a0are we\u00a0willing, for God\u2019s sake\u00a0,\u00a0to go beyond ourselves and to\u00a0be used for\u00a0the\u00a0sake of the\u00a0love of God\u00a0?<\/div>\n
Christmas is a time of\u00a0love and\u00a0gift giving!\u00a0Our p\u00a0hysical\u00a0gifts are symbols of\u00a0our spiritual BLESSING and GIFT OF LOVE\u00a0.<\/div>\n
Christm\u00a0as reminds us\u00a0that it\u00a0was God who first gave of God\u2019s self. God gave Jesus, God\u2019s only Son, and Jesus,\u00a0in turn, gave himself and his life for us on a cross because he so loved us.<\/div>\n
A\u00a0BLESSED Christmas\u00a0of LOVE\u00a0to you and yours,<\/div>\n
Ernest Belisle, Pastor<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Welcome to\u00a0Chilmark Community\u00a0Church. We are\u00a0happy God has led you to be with us. Today is the fourth and last Sunday\u00a0in Advent. It is\u00a0the Sunday before Christmas Day –\u00a0the Day of our\u00a0Lor\u00a0d\u2019s Nativity. Our reading for the Psalm\u00a0 \u00a0 and the\u00a0Gospel both rejoice in the steadfast love of God for his people. In t\u00a0he Gospel reading, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-worship-and-teaching"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6158"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6158\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6159,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6158\/revisions\/6159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}