“Almighty God, whose blessed Son was led by the Spirit to be tempted by Satan: Come quickly to help us who are assaulted by many temptations; and, as You know the weakness of each of us, let each one find You mighty to save; through Jesus Christ Thy Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen” (The 1979 Book of Common Prayer, 2005).
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Mark your calendars to join us for a free time of food, fun, & fellowship! All are warmly welcome.
What can I expect?
Lunch will be served (hot dogs, hamburgers, & fixings)
Easter egg hunt with areas divided by general age groups
Weather permitting, both inside & outside games for all ages
What should I bring?
The most important thing to bring is yourself & all the family & friends your vehicle will hold! Nothing else is required.
If you’d like, you’re welcome to contribute to the Easter eggs for the egg hunt, or bring a container to participate. We’ll have a few extra baskets on hand too.
More questions? Contact us.
Daylight savings time ends March 9 at 2 AM. Remember to “spring forward” any clocks that require manual adjustment.
Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it will be hard for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”
When the disciples heard this, they were utterly astonished and asked, “Then who can be saved?”
Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
Then Peter responded to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you. So what will there be for us?”
Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, in the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields because of my name will receive a hundred times more and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first.
Matthew 19:23-30 (CSB)
Then little children were brought to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray, but the disciples rebuked them. Jesus said, “Leave the little children alone, and don’t try to keep them from coming to me, because the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” After placing his hands on them, he went on from there.
Just then someone came up and asked him, “Teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?”
“Why do you ask me about what is good?” he said to him. “There is only one who is good. If you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.”
“Which ones?” he asked him.
Jesus answered: Do not murder; do not commit adultery; do not steal; do not bear false witness; honor your father and your mother; and love your neighbor as yourself.
“I have kept all these,” the young man told him. “What do I still lack?”
“If you want to be perfect,” Jesus said to him, “go, sell your belongings and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
When the young man heard that, he went away grieving, because he had many possessions.
Matthew 19:13-22 (CSB)
When Jesus had finished saying these things, he departed from Galilee and went to the region of Judea across the Jordan. Large crowds followed him, and he healed them there. Some Pharisees approached him to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife on any grounds?”
“Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that he who created them in the beginning made them male and female, and he also said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate.”
“Why then,” they asked him, “did Moses command us to give divorce papers and to send her away?”
He told them, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because of the hardness of your hearts, but it was not like that from the beginning. I tell you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another commits adultery.”
His disciples said to him, “If the relationship of a man with his wife is like this, it’s better not to marry.”
He responded, “Not everyone can accept this saying, but only those to whom it has been given. For there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother’s womb, there are eunuchs who were made by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves that way because of the kingdom of heaven. The one who is able to accept it should accept it.”
Matthew 19:1-12 (CSB)
The posture of repentance begun on Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the season of Lent, forty days of preparation for Easter or Resurrection Sunday. Some church traditions, like our own, eschew the official liturgical calendar and its inherent risk of repetitive ritual divorced from its significance and power. Yet, the meaning of feast days and seasons, the deep truths to which they beckon our return, resonates across time, place, or even Christian denomination. Lent is a season of reflection, repentance, and renewal for all who are in Christ.
Esau McCauley writes, “We hope that as Christians we mature and grow and become more and more like Christ. But the church in its wisdom assumes we will fail, even after our baptism. The church presumes that life is long and zeal fades, not just for some of us but for all. So it has included within its life a season in which all of us can recapture our love for God and His kingdom and cast off those things that so easily entangle us” (2022). McCauley’s description reminds us that our own “low church” denomination certainly has its own liturgical calendar. We don’t formally celebrate Advent, Epiphany, Lent, Pentecost, and common time like our “high church” brothers and sisters, but there are spring and fall revivals, communion services, district and denominational camp meetings, and homecoming Sundays, all about the same times each year. And for the same reasons: because we are, as the hymn writer so aptly penned, “Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.”
Commemorating Lent for its intended purpose does not require bondage to tradition or coldness of faith. Rather, it is merely an honest recognition that until our sanctification here and now yields to our glorification in heaven, we contend with our flesh—that is the remaining human nature in us that apart from the keeping power of the Holy Spirit would surely rebel against God. James, a brother of Jesus, gives practical instruction in the matter:
“Therefore, submit to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be miserable and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you” (James 4:7-10).
Drawing near to God, according to James, requires cleansing, purification, mourning, and humility. Why such a gloomy posture for a season of victory? Because there is no resurrection that is not preceded by death. There is no exaltation that is not preceded by humility. In that vein, there is no Easter that is not preceded by Lent.
Lenten observances vary widely, but have traditionally included:
Fasting: purposefully abstaining from something of importance, most often food, for the discipline of directing our longing for what has been set aside to the things of God. Every hunger pang becomes a call to prayer. Every altered meal becomes a reminder of the source of every good and perfect gift.
Focused study or Scripture reading. There is no merit in observances apart from their significance and their significance is only found in the Word of God. You absolutely can read the Bible. (No, really, hit that link, pick a resource, and just get started.)
Remembrance or renewal. In liturgical traditions, there are additional church services or activities compared to the rest of the calendar year. In traditions like our own, this might simply be a time to recommit to church attendance as a priority. Perhaps you’re faithful on Sunday mornings but have yet to support night or midweek gatherings of your local congregation. Try using this season to intentionally rework your calendar to gather with the family of God for encouragement, worship, and instruction.
Acts of charity or justice. The Word of God through the prophet Isaiah: “Isn’t this the fast I choose: To break the chains of wickedness, to untie the ropes of the yoke, to set the oppressed free, and to tear off every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, to bring the poor and homeless into your house, to clothe the naked when you see him, and not to ignore your own flesh and blood?” (Isaiah 58:6-11). Lent may be the time to consider where works of our hands should further accompany our thoughts and prayers for others.
Confession. For many, confession evokes troubled images of booths and priests, part of the baggage and misunderstanding that discourages participation in celebrations of Lent. And yet we are instructed to “…confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, so that you may be healed” (James 5:16). Do we notice the reason for confession? It’s not so we can feel wicked, but so we might be healed. The season when we remember the sin nature that required Jesus to become our propitiation at Calvary is ripe for learning the practice of confession.
There is no exhaustive list of disciplines to help believers grow in faith. Jude, another brother of Jesus, writing “to those who are the called, loved by God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ” (Jude 1) summed it all up nicely:
“But you, dear friends, as you build yourselves up in your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting expectantly for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ for eternal life” (Jude 20-21).
Jude reminds that because Christians are the called, beloved, and kept, we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to keep ourselves in the love of God through varied means of grace. As we prepare to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus in victory over death, hell, and the grave, let’s intentionally use the remainder of these 40 days in whatever manner the Spirit leads to truly remember our great need for a Savior, repent, and receive deep renewal in Christ Jesus.
Lent: The Season of Repentance and Renewal (Fullness of Time) by Esau McCauley (2022, IVP Formatio)
The 1979 Book of Common Prayer (2005, Oxford University Press)
Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing by Robert Robinson (1758).
This phrase will be spoken over many today who will kneel before an officiant in certain types of churches (quite different from ours) to be smeared with ashes in the shape of a cross on their foreheads. Young and old, healthy and suffering, rich and poor, all alike will be reminded of our mortality, the inevitability of death in the time preceding Christ’s return. Why mark the start of the Easter season—a time of celebration and triumph—with such a somber memento mori? Because there is no resurrection that is not preceded by death.
Death was not God’s original design for creation. We read in Genesis 2:17 that death was a consequence of human choice, not part of the “good” and “very good” (Gen. 1:31) fabric of creation. Lured by the serpent’s lie that “You will certainly not die,” (Gen. 3:4) Eve and Adam, “who was with her,” (Gen. 3:6) openly defied the explicit command of God, an act of spiritual treason. The consequences of sin were immediate and devastating, including the promise of eventual physical death as an outward display of the spiritual death that had already occurred.
…The ground is cursed because of you.
You will eat from it by means of painful labor
all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
You will eat bread by the sweat of your brow
until you return to the ground,
since you were taken from it.
For you are dust,
and you will return to dust.Genesis 3:17-19
The story of Scripture from the garden to this day is that we are still prone to spiritual treason. Faced with the reality of our inherited sin nature, we can pray no different from King David when confronted with his own deeply grievous sin: “Indeed, I was guilty when I was born; I was sinful when my mother conceived me” (Psalm 51:5). Our story is not that of generally good people who are damaged by the difficulties of life. We are sinners from birth because we are children of Adam and Eve (Rom. 5:12), and “the wages (recompense) of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23). Such is our helpless state unless we are spiritually born again—raised from death to life in Christ (Eph. 2:1-9).
Ash Wednesday is an annual reminder that apart from the regenerating work of Jesus, we would remain dead in our sins and trespasses, alienated from God. Apart from the keeping power of the Holy Spirit, we would return to our sins and trespasses. Despite the new life we have received in Christ, we contend with our flesh (Col. 3:5) and continually return to “The LORD—the LORD … a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in faithful love and truth, maintaining faithful love to a thousand generations, forgiving iniquity, rebellion, and sin…” (Exodus 34:6-7).
On this Ash Wednesday, we return afresh to a spirit of repentance. We recognize the frailty of our flesh, our inability to keep to the things of God unless we are first kept by His Holy Spirit. Easter reminds us what it cost to put away our sins. We dare not neglect so great a salvation (Heb. 2:3), but instead pray with saints the world over this prayer of repentance:
Almighty and everlasting God, you hate nothing you have made and forgive the sins of all who are penitent: Create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we, worthily lamenting our sins and acknowledging our wretchedness, may obtain of you, the God of all mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Collect for Ash Wednesday (Contemporary), Book of Common Prayer, 1979
Lent: The Season of Repentance and Renewal (Fullness of Time) by Esau McCauley (2022, IVP Formatio)
The 1979 Book of Common Prayer (2005, Oxford University Press)
Then Peter approached him and asked, “Lord, how many times must I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? As many as seven times?”
“I tell you, not as many as seven,” Jesus replied, “but seventy times seven.
“For this reason, the kingdom of heaven can be compared to a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. When he began to settle accounts, one who owed ten thousand talents was brought before him. Since he did not have the money to pay it back, his master commanded that he, his wife, his children, and everything he had be sold to pay the debt.
“At this, the servant fell facedown before him and said, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay you everything.’ Then the master of that servant had compassion, released him, and forgave him the loan.
“That servant went out and found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii. He grabbed him, started choking him, and said, ‘Pay what you owe!’
“At this, his fellow servant fell down and began begging him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.’ But he wasn’t willing. Instead, he went and threw him into prison until he could pay what was owed. When the other servants saw what had taken place, they were deeply distressed and went and reported to their master everything that had happened. Then, after he had summoned him, his master said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Shouldn’t you also have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you? ’ And because he was angry, his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured until he could pay everything that was owed. So also my heavenly Father will do to you unless every one of you forgives his brother or sister from your heart.”
Matthew 18:21-35 (CSB)
Join us for Spring Revival Services, April 6 at 6 PM, & April 7 - 9 at 7 PM.
We welcome Rev. Randy Carter, PFWB General Superintendent, as our special guest speaker, along with special singers each night.
All are warmly welcome.
