December…A Great Time For Fishing

If your family is like our family, fishing for fun or profit would not be high on your list of things to do during December. Yet fishing is vitally important to who we are. No, I’m not talking about throwing a hook into the lake on a balmy December day, or even following some family’s traditions of picking out a live fish and keeping it in the bathtub until Christmas morning. I’m thinking of the kind of fishing that Jesus desires us to do…fishing for men (and women and kids), and fishing for them in December. Why December?

Because, for some reason, people who would otherwise reject “Jesus talk” any other time of year remain wide open to spiritual things through the month of December. Statistics may even tell us that it’s easier to get people into a church building during December than any other time of year. I hope you sense with me the great opportunity that we have to fish. May I suggest a couple of events for you to use in your fishing?

#1 – From Heaven’s Throne

It is a fully-staged, dramatic musical production depicting the events surrounding the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. Our Children’s Choirs will begin the evening with some fun, fast-paced music, and then the Festival Choir and Orchestra will begin the David T. Clydesdale musical, From Heaven’s Throne. As songs are sung and different elements of the story are told, they will be re-enacted before your eyes. To top off the evening of beautiful music and seasonal pageantry, Pastor Ray will explain the plan of salvation, inviting your friend or loved one or coworker who has not yet unwrapped God’s gift of love to do so before they leave the concert.

Tickets are available today(!), free of charge, in the Resource Center, and so are invitation cards and posters. Please use the invitation cards to invite friends, neighbors, or coworkers. Feel free, too, to take a poster and put it up in a public place. We really, really want to get the word out about this concert event.

From Heaven’s Throne will be presented twice-Saturday, December 11, at 7:00 p.m. and Sunday, December 12, at 5:00 p.m.

#2 – Christmas Eve at Calvary

We will be offering two identical Christmas Eve worship services this year, at 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. on December 24. The Christmas Eve services will be beautiful, warm, traditional Christmas Eve services, complete with carols, choral music, special songs from Calvary soloists and instrumental groups, and candlelighting. You won’t want to miss this unique, meaningful worship time. Please come early to enjoy a special prelude, featuring Calvary musicians.

A Word About Advent…

Advent, the four Sundays leading up to Christmas Day, is a season of expectation. It’s a season of hope in knowing that God’s promises will be fulfilled, even as they were fulfilled thousands of years ago in the birth of Jesus. It’s a season that gives us the opportunity to teach the old, old story to those who are young-either in physical or in spiritual years. It’s a time for us to renew our admiration for and adoration of the Lord for what He did in laying aside His glory to become man.

This year, the four Sundays in Advent will represent:

Prophecy (Expecting God’s Fulfillment)
Shepherds (Joyfully Receiving God’s Message)
Magi (Faithfully Following God’s Sign)
Mary and Joseph (Willingly Hearing God’s Voice)

Special thanks to Lisa Maxwell for arranging the wreath, and John Sredl for building the wreath table.