Watch this week’s service on YouTube by clicking:
October 8 Worship Service Video
Join us for worship on Sundays at 10:00
- Please join us after the service in the Van Roon Community Hall for the HeBrews Café, refreshments and fellowship before continuing on with your day.
- Newcomers Welcome and Dessert Night – If you are new to CUC since 2019 we would love to welcome you for a time of fellowship, food, and information this Wednesday, October 11 from 7:00 – 8:00 PM in the Van Roon Community Hall.
- Mark your calendars for a Spaghetti Dinner and Dance Saturday, October 21 in the Van Roon Community Hall. Tickets are $17/person and are available after church and from the church office during the week. Please join us for an evening of fun, food, and fellowship.
Dear Friends
Welcome to worship for Sunday, October 8, 2023.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Harold Kushner once described the book of Psalms as the only book of the Bible in which the people speak to God. All the others are read as though God is speaking to the people but Psalms reverses the flow of the conversation. That is not surprising if you think of Psalms as Israel’s hymnbook. These are the prayers/poems/songs of the ancients. And when we look at them closely we find that even though the words change all psalms are one of two things. They are either songs of praise or they are cries of lament. Author Anne Lamott picks up on this theme when she says that prayer is typically either thankyou, thank you, thank you or help me, help me, help me.
This is the weekend we elevate the idea of thank you, thank you, thank you. To borrow from Psalms, “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord”, or “Sing a new song to the Lord for wonders God has done”, or “O God, O God how majestic is your name in all the earth”. Our own hymnbook is filled with songs of praise and thanksgiving. “Now thank we all our God with hearts and hands and voices”, or “Let all things now living, a song of thanksgiving to God our Creator triumphantly raise”, or “All good gifts around us are sent from heaven above, we thank you God, O Holy God, for all your love”.
I am thankful for the abundance of blessings that come to us in our life together at Charleswood United Church. I am thankful for the people we have known but who are no longer with us, for their legacy of wisdom, memories, laughter, joy, and inspiration. I am thankful for the community of the present that gathers, worships, celebrates, sings, prays, and serves. I am thankful for those who will come after us, take up the mantle, and be the body currently manifested in you and I.
I am thankful for the place we live. I believe it is an unspeakably beautiful part of the world. I believe that its diversity and the tapestry of language, colour, custom, and ways of living is reflective of God’s greater glory. I believe we live in a country of incalculable gifts, immense potential, and unending goodness.
I am thankful for faith as a gift of grace. It deepens the human experience. It enriches the fullness of life. It leads us into relationship with brother, sister, neighbour, and friend in ways that are meaningful and poignant.
Or, as we sing, “For all your goodness, God, we give you thanks”.
Grace and peace,
Michael
- For news and events please have a look at Life & Work on our website: Life and Work
- Did you know you can support this ministry by e-transfer, automatic withdrawal (PAR), and gifted securities, in addition to weekly or monthly cheques? For Offering Information please visit: https://charleswoodunited.org/support/ Thank you for your generous support.
- Michael Wilson’s book “A Pastoral Pandemic: Remaining Connected in a Time of Disconnection” is available in store and online through CommonWord Bookstore (Canadian Mennonite University). For more information visit: https://www.commonword.ca/go/3408.
- Share the service with friends by forwarding this email or using this link: https://youtu.be/o45leO2–G4
- The reading for this week’s service can be found at: Luke 17:11-19
