"The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies."
- Next Week – It’s the root word of “adventure”
It comes from the Latin adventus, meaning “arrival.” Advent season begins next Sunday as we anticipate the arrival of the Greatest Adventurer. He will lead us all on a journey with Him. So, get your gear in order and meet her ready to travel next week… - No prayer gathering this week
- Anyone interested in helping “organize” a small group, please let Athena know @ athena@thejake.cc or give her a call. Small groups are the lifeblood of building a caring community of Christ followers. Take a step of faith and get involved!
- Special Food Drive for Clare House!
Bring canned goods to the church so that others don’t go hungry. Share in the holiday spirit. - YOUTH GROUP TONIGHT!!!
youth group tonight!
Proclamation Establishing Thanksgiving Day
October 3, 1863
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle, or the ship; the axe had enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years, with large increase of freedom.
No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.
It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.
A. Lincoln
- Christmas Eve Service
It has been one of the most beautiful gatherings of the year at The Jake. Please make plans to be here @ 10:00 p.m. on December 24. (Jammies acceptable dress.)
Glo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-oria…in excelsis Deo!
- Operation Christmas Child – Next Week!
Imagine being a kid and receiving what may be the only toys, candy, toothpaste/brush, or soap you have ever had. Imagine that coming at Christmastime, in the Name of Jesus. Imagine learning that God’s love is a gift. Make it happen for kids in poverty this year. Info in foyer.
- Glo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-oria…in excelsis Deo!
First of all, please check to see if I have the right number of “o’s” to fit the Christmas song.Then, ask yourself this question: what is glory?
Somehow the dictionary definitions of “high renown or fame; adoring praise and thanksgiving; resplendent majesty or magnificence” seem to me to come up short, although I like that word “resplendent.”
I wonder this: if not for the Bible, if not for the story of and mystery of Christ, if not for the testimony of those who had encounters with God, would we even have the word “glory” to consider? I don’t think so. The idea of glory by its very nature seems to me to demand the Transcendent Becoming the Immanent, the Otherness Becoming the Just-like-us. Somehow, glory suggests something enormous beyond enormous, fabulous beyond fabulous, resplendent beyond resplendent.
I think that the Apostle John would love to sit down with the folks at Jacob’s Well Community Church for a discussion of the word glory. I think he loved glory. He says this about it:
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. John 1:14, KJV
“We beheld his glory.” What is that all about? Does it matter to us? I suggest that it matters beyond our ability to make something seem to matter. I believe that it is God’s great pleasure to give us encounters with portions of His glory, so that we might take pleasure in Him. But, our capacities to experience glory are small. This creates a kind of groaning within our souls, because we get a glimpse yet we know there is more. Don’t worry. Hang in there! It’s coming!
- This week’s prayer gathering will be Wednesday @ 7:00 @ the church.
- Anyone interested in helping “organize” a small group?
Please let Athena know @ athena@thejake.cc or give her a call. Small groups are the lifeblood of building a caring community of Christ followers. Take a step of faith and get involved!
- Special Food Drive for Clare House!
Bring canned goods to the church so that others don’t go hungry. Share in the holiday spirit.
- A Thanksgiving Thought…
Read More“You say, ‘If I had a little more, I should be very satisfied.’ You make a mistake. If you are not content with what you have, you would not be satisfied if it were doubled.”
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
What have you been “elected” for?
Could it be? The Jake’s 3rd Annual Thanksgiving Feast!
Saturday, November 15, 5:00 p.m.
Our 3rd Thanksgiving feast promises to be a great time of getting to know each other better over the dinner table. Invite family/friends to the feast. We honor the Lord when we feast at the table of His goodness… and share it with others.
Ask Lori McCormick how you can help.
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What have you been “elected” for?
As we close our series on covenant community, we come face-to- face with something that I hope we regard as a blessing: the call of God on our lives. Over and over again, the Bible calls God’s people “the elect.” If such is true – and it is – then for what purpose are we elected?
The benediction of our incredibly rich last chapter of Hebrews gives us our charge as God’s elect. I love the way Eugene Peterson paraphrases this passage:
May God, who puts all things together,
makes all things whole,
Who made a lasting mark through the sacrifice of Jesus,
the sacrifice of blood that sealed the eternal covenant,
Who led Jesus, our Great Shepherd,
up and alive from the dead,
Now put you together, provide you
with everything you need to please him,
Make us into what gives him most pleasure,
by means of the sacrifice of Jesus, the Messiah.
All glory to Jesus forever and always!
Oh, yes, yes, yes.
I love the line: “Make us into what gives him most pleasure.”
Do you think/feel/believe that God made you for His pleasure?
He did.
How huge is God’s pleasure?
Measureless, for He cannot be fit into any confines or box or limits into which we might try to fit Him.
Notice that His pleasure is linked to the sacrifice of Jesus.
Seems strange, doesn’t it, that God takes any pleasure in the most heinous act by man – and the most beautiful act by God – in the history of existence. But He does, because by that act we are reconciled to Him. We celebrate that reconciliation at his table.
——-
Other Notes & Updates:
- This week’s prayer gathering will be Wednesday @ 7:00. Site TBD.
- Bridal Shower for Bekah McLean (soon-to-be-Berry)
Tonight, 5:00, @ the church
All ladies of the church invited for dinner and a delightful time! - Anyone interested in helping “organize” a small group, please let Athena know @ athena@thejake.cc or giver her a call. Small groups are the lifeblood of building a caring community of Christ followers. Take a step of faith and get involved!
- Special Food Drive for Clare House!
Bring canned goods to the church so that others don’t go hungry. Share in the holiday spirit.
