Watch this week’s service on YouTube by clicking:
Sunday morning worship at CUC is at 10:00 AM and please stay for the He/SheBrews Café following in the Van Roon Community Hall
Dates to Keep in Mind in the Next Month
- Saturday, November 22
- Christmas Craft Sale and luncheon (this week)
- Wednesday, November 26
- Senior’s Fellowship Christmas Lunch
- Saturday, November 29
- Super Saturday Sundae – Children’s craft making event
- Monday, December 1
- Women’s Advent Service 7:00 PM with reception to follow
- Sunday, December 7
- White Gift Sunday, kick-off to hamper week with many volunteer opportunities
Dear Friends
Welcome to worship for Sunday, November 23, 2025.
I must admit, that this is the last Sunday of the church year is not front of mind for us at Charleswood. We have a lot of focus on the Advent season that initiates a new church year and understandably so. Craft days and special services and Christmas Hampers all need to be planned and promoted. We can’t wait for a ‘new (church) year’ to start sharing good news nor recruiting volunteers. But I hope we can pause for this three-minute read at the end of the year that was.
By ‘church year’ I am referring to the Christian calendar as it is observed by historically liturgical denominations including ours. Credit where credit is due, the rest of us are patterning ourselves on the calendar of the Roman Catholic Church but that is a subject for another letter. The Christian calendar begins with four weeks of Advent which is followed as you know by ’12 Days of Christmas’. The festive season ends with Epiphany which in turns launches what scholars call ‘Ordinary Time’. The length of OT depends on the movable placement of Easter because it lasts until Ash Wednesday or the start of Lent. Lent is forty days (after the biblical story of Jesus in the wilderness). Lent ends as Holy Week begins leading us through Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday. But Easter, like Christmas, is both a day and a season, in this case one of fifty days. It culminates on Pentecost. The season after Pentecost (also sometimes called Ordinary Time) lasts for nearly five months until we come to this Sunday, the last of the year, known as Reign of Christ. And then it starts all over.
In ways you may not think about very much, the church year has an outsized presence and influence in the life of our congregation. For one thing, we routinely observe the special days (the origin of Holy Days or ‘holidays’ in English) throughout the year. For another, the first 213 hymns in Voices United are ordered according to the Christian calendar. Visually, the collection of quilted banners that hang at the front of the church were created to follow the calendar. Same thing with the colours worm by the minister, the choir, and the ‘antependia’ on the pulpit, lectern, and communion table. All are symbolic of the season of the church year we are in.
Many congregations do likewise in varying degrees. But Charleswood has an extra special reminder of the church year that other churches do not. The stained-glass windows were patterned on the church year and follow it in order from north to south. Have a closer look at their colours and symbols and you will see how they respectively represent Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Holy Week, Easter, and Pentecost (for a fuller description you can visit our website: The CUC Windows
The Christian calendar helps us mark time and not get fixated on our preferred stories of scripture. The readings on most Sundays follow the lectionary, assigned texts for the church year. It also helps us spread things out so that we don’t, you know, celebrate the birth of Jesus three times a year because we love singing carols so much. In one sense you might say that we are heavily invested in the church year as a teaching tool. The calendar annually leads us through the Bible from beginning to end. This in turn is a look at the history of salvation from the dawn of time to the end of time. (that’s another comment that deserves a letter all its own)
All of which brings me back to how the year ends. The last Sunday of the church year is referred to Reign of Christ Sunday. Where the seasons and special days in the windows invite us to remember something in our spiritual past, Reign of Christ welcomes us to look forward towards God’s promised future. On Reign of Christ, we recall the promise of Jesus that while the Kingdom of God (or Realm of God, Kingdom of God, Commonwealth of God) has begun it remains to be fulfilled at the close of time. It is the promise of our hope and mission to see the end of war, famine, sorrow, hatred, brokenness, and death itself and the start of a new and glorious day.
“Thy Kingdom come”, we pray. For now, we strive to see it on earth as it is in heaven. But the day will come when it is. Reign of Christ Sunday recalls this promise upon which our faith is based.
Grace and peace,
Michael
- For news and events please have a look at Life & Work on our website: Life and Work
- Share the service with friends by forwarding this email or using this link: https://youtu.be/VfkCVATEGw8
- Read this week’s scripture lesson here: Luke 23:33-43
- 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.
