This Sunday, March 1st is the First Sunday of Lent. Lent is that season of spiritual preparation that leads to Easter. Our theme for Lent 2009 is “40 Days of Love.” Each week we will emphasize one way we can move closer and deeper in relationship with God through our relationships with one another. We will search the scriptures together about repentance, forgiveness, reconciliation, prayer and worship. This search will involve tangible acts of love shown toward someone else. Each worship service starting this Sunday, will be themed around “40 Days of Love.” We’ll celebrate Holy Communion and hear music and prayers around these Biblical calls to holiness. Our staff and volunteers are preparing special reminders and worship decoration that will open us to the work of the Holy Spirit in worship and for the week.
I ask you to do two things this Lent. First, make worship a priority. I promise you that walking this whole journey with Jesus can be a life-changing time if you will place yourself in a position to experience it, and that starts with worship. Second, invite someone to experience it with you. That someone might be in your household, husband, wife, child, or grandchild. It may be a neighbor, a friend, a co-worker, a stranger. Don’t assume they already go to church somewhere, 50% of our community is un-churched. When you invite them, help make it happen for them – tell them you’ll pick them up on your way to church, invite them to eat lunch with you after church, and when they come, make sure they get information about our church and meet others while they are here. All of this will make it more likely they come and more likely their experience is positive. God’s grace is available all the time but the season of Lent can be an awesome and special time to experience it.
On another note, last Sunday, we introduced our new Director of Music Ministries. Jim Lazenby has many years of directing experience in church and school choirs of all ages, with hand-bells and instruments. Jim has a deep love for God and one powerful way he expresses that is through the musical gifts God gave him. Jim is a lifelong Methodist, growing up in Houston and living in Texas and Oklahoma. He has a Bachelors degree in Sacred Music from Southwestern University and a Masters in Music Education from Stephen F. Austin State University. Jim is excited to take on this challenge and we welcome him enthusiastically. Jim and his wife Glenda are already members of our church as is Jim’s Dad, Jesse. Take a moment to welcome Jim personally when you see him.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Lent is coming
It is hard to believe but the season of Lent is coming soon. We are excited about the spiritual journey that we will begin together that will move us toward Easter. Ash Wednesday is the day which begins that holy season. This year it falls on February 25th. We will have a worship service in the chapel at 6pm that will mark that beginning and we’ll follow it with a sample of a Passover Seder Meal at 7pm. We hope you will begin this season in worship.
Ash Wednesday is the beginning point for the season of Lent that focuses us on life and relationship examination. It is a time for taking stock of where we stand with God and each other. During that worship service, we will sing and pray together in ways that we pray places us in that spirit. There won’t be a sermon; rather the primary “message” of that service will be conveyed through the imposition of ashes.
According to the tradition of the early Christian church, the palms from the previous year’s Palm Sunday celebration are burned and the ashes are used the next year on Ash Wednesday. We have done that once again this year. I will have someone assist me who will place the sign of the cross on my forehead and then I will do that humbly with you. While doing, these words will be said to each of us, “repent and believe the Gospel.” With that, we begin the Lenten journey in the right spirit. The powerful prayer of Psalm 51 comes to mind. “Create in me a clean heart O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.” That is a good prayer for this season.
The Passover Seder meal is a new opportunity for faith learning this year. Even though the Jewish Passover Seder takes place during what we know as Holy Week just before Easter, we thought that after the Ash Wednesday service would be a good time for us to learn. There will be samples of food from that meal. We have been guided on the food and the traditions by Patrick Lam, chef and owner of Texas Star Restaurant in Colmesneil, who is Jewish. We hope you’ll take advantage of this opportunity to learn about our faith heritage through this meal. Take a look inside this newsletter for a schedule of Lent 2009 at Woodville UMC. Our theme this year is “40 Days of Love.”
This Sunday I’ll be preaching from Mark 9: 2-9 on the transfiguration experience of Jesus and three of his disciples. The sermon title is “Embracing the Mystery.”
Ash Wednesday is the beginning point for the season of Lent that focuses us on life and relationship examination. It is a time for taking stock of where we stand with God and each other. During that worship service, we will sing and pray together in ways that we pray places us in that spirit. There won’t be a sermon; rather the primary “message” of that service will be conveyed through the imposition of ashes.
According to the tradition of the early Christian church, the palms from the previous year’s Palm Sunday celebration are burned and the ashes are used the next year on Ash Wednesday. We have done that once again this year. I will have someone assist me who will place the sign of the cross on my forehead and then I will do that humbly with you. While doing, these words will be said to each of us, “repent and believe the Gospel.” With that, we begin the Lenten journey in the right spirit. The powerful prayer of Psalm 51 comes to mind. “Create in me a clean heart O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.” That is a good prayer for this season.
The Passover Seder meal is a new opportunity for faith learning this year. Even though the Jewish Passover Seder takes place during what we know as Holy Week just before Easter, we thought that after the Ash Wednesday service would be a good time for us to learn. There will be samples of food from that meal. We have been guided on the food and the traditions by Patrick Lam, chef and owner of Texas Star Restaurant in Colmesneil, who is Jewish. We hope you’ll take advantage of this opportunity to learn about our faith heritage through this meal. Take a look inside this newsletter for a schedule of Lent 2009 at Woodville UMC. Our theme this year is “40 Days of Love.”
This Sunday I’ll be preaching from Mark 9: 2-9 on the transfiguration experience of Jesus and three of his disciples. The sermon title is “Embracing the Mystery.”
40 Days of Love - Lent 2009
“40 Days of Love” - Lent 2009 @ Woodville UMC
February 25th - Ash Wednesday – April 25 @6pm
Passover Seder Meal @7pm
March 1 – First Sunday in Lent
“40 Days of Love” – Sermon Series and Congregation-wide emphasis
Week 1 – The Week of Letter Writing
Week 2 – The Week of Phone Calls
Week 3 – The Week of Love Gifts
Week 4 – The Week of Prayer
Week 5 – The Week of Visits
Week 6 – The Week of Worship
Saturday Mission project – March 14th
Palm Sunday/Confirmation Sunday – April 5th
Maundy Thursday and Good Friday Worship in the Chapel @6pm
Easter Egg Hunt for Children – Saturday, April 11th
Easter Sunday Worship with Full Choir Musical @10:50am
February 25th - Ash Wednesday – April 25 @6pm
Passover Seder Meal @7pm
March 1 – First Sunday in Lent
“40 Days of Love” – Sermon Series and Congregation-wide emphasis
Week 1 – The Week of Letter Writing
Week 2 – The Week of Phone Calls
Week 3 – The Week of Love Gifts
Week 4 – The Week of Prayer
Week 5 – The Week of Visits
Week 6 – The Week of Worship
Saturday Mission project – March 14th
Palm Sunday/Confirmation Sunday – April 5th
Maundy Thursday and Good Friday Worship in the Chapel @6pm
Easter Egg Hunt for Children – Saturday, April 11th
Easter Sunday Worship with Full Choir Musical @10:50am
Monday, February 9, 2009
Week of February 9 column
I want to share some news with you regarding our church staff. Our Director of Music Ministries, Matt Moody, has decided to resign in order to spend more time balancing his primary work and his family commitments. Matt and Mindy and their young family continue to be members of our church and we look forward to their continued participation in the life of our church. Matt, as we all know, is extraordinarily talented. His gifts for singing and musical excellence have shined in his leadership of our Hand Bell and Chancel Choirs for the past year. We thank God for Matt’s leadership. I am personally grateful for the friendship that Matt and I share and for the “can do” spirit that he has always demonstrated in his work on the staff. Thank you Matt for your service to Christ through Woodville United Methodist Church.
As with any staff transition, our Staff Parish Relations Committee (SPRC) is the group charged with personnel decisions and they will work with me to find a new director of music ministries. Representatives from our choirs will be involved in the process as well. All of you are welcome and invited to give input. We maintain our commitment to excellence in all areas of staff ministry leadership including in our music ministry. Meanwhile both of our choirs will continue to meet and rehearse on Wednesday evenings.
On that musical note, our Children’s Choir had their debut in worship last Sunday and did a great job! Yolanda Griffin is directing the choir with assistance from Judy Brown and Jackie Fultz. What a wonderful blessing our children and their leaders are to the church.
This Sunday I am concluding the sermon series on “Biblical Wisdom for the New Year.” I have really enjoyed this series with you and have learned a great deal about the wisdom books of the Old Testament. I hope you have too. This Sunday I’ll finish in the Book of Job. I will be preaching from excerpts of the dialogue between Job and God. One of the famous lines from Job is that verse that introduces God. After a period of silence, God comes to Job, “out of the whirlwind.” Have you ever had an experience of God that comes out of nowhere like that? Maybe we’ll experience God that way together this Sunday.
As with any staff transition, our Staff Parish Relations Committee (SPRC) is the group charged with personnel decisions and they will work with me to find a new director of music ministries. Representatives from our choirs will be involved in the process as well. All of you are welcome and invited to give input. We maintain our commitment to excellence in all areas of staff ministry leadership including in our music ministry. Meanwhile both of our choirs will continue to meet and rehearse on Wednesday evenings.
On that musical note, our Children’s Choir had their debut in worship last Sunday and did a great job! Yolanda Griffin is directing the choir with assistance from Judy Brown and Jackie Fultz. What a wonderful blessing our children and their leaders are to the church.
This Sunday I am concluding the sermon series on “Biblical Wisdom for the New Year.” I have really enjoyed this series with you and have learned a great deal about the wisdom books of the Old Testament. I hope you have too. This Sunday I’ll finish in the Book of Job. I will be preaching from excerpts of the dialogue between Job and God. One of the famous lines from Job is that verse that introduces God. After a period of silence, God comes to Job, “out of the whirlwind.” Have you ever had an experience of God that comes out of nowhere like that? Maybe we’ll experience God that way together this Sunday.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Looking for a College for someone you care about?
I have recently begun a term of service on the Lon Morris College Board of Trustees. Lon Morris is a United Methodist 2 year college in Jacksonville, Texas. I am honored to serve because I attended there and had a great experience that prepared me for further study and gave me continued encouragement and experience for my life in the Methodist ministry.
If you have a child, grandchild or know a young person who is considering college and trying to figure out where to go, I want you to let me know so that I can talk to them about Lon Morris. Lon Morris is a small college that offers great individual attention from high quality teachers; the average class size is 12. When I transferred from Lon Morris to Stephen F. Austin to finish my Bachelor’s Degree, there was no drop off in the quality of teaching from Lon Morris to SFA. I was very well prepared for that university and later for graduate school. Lon Morris offers all of the “real college” experiences - sports, art, dance, theatre, music, student activities, student government, and dorm life. Most importantly they offer continued growth as a Christian disciple. They have a new gifted young chaplain. He leads Christian students and with those students reaches others for Christ through worship, missions and classes in church careers for those who are trying to discern a call to some type of ministry.
I was hooked for Lon Morris when I was in the 6th grade. The youth group from my local church visited Lon Morris on one of their youth campus visit days. We ate in the cafeteria, went to a basketball game, toured around the dorms and got a first impression of “college life” that I never forgot. Since that visit, my family moved to Houston and heard about all other kinds of schools. When it came time for me to decide on where to go to college, I always pictured Lon Morris in my mind. So my parents and I went to Jacksonville, met with folks from the school and worked out a way for me to go there. My parents and my church were a great support.
On Saturday February 28th, Lon Morris is holding a campus visit day. If you have a young person from 6-12th grade in your family or know of someone who might want to go, I will personally take them that day. Feel free to call me at the church office, or email me at revtommywilliams@sbcglobal.net
If a young person is a member of Woodville UMC or another Methodist Church, I as a pastor can write one letter of recommendation a year for a youth in my church and they will be awarded a $2500 scholarship to Lon Morris.
Lon Morris College will not be the school for every young person but it will be for some, maybe someone like me.
If you have a child, grandchild or know a young person who is considering college and trying to figure out where to go, I want you to let me know so that I can talk to them about Lon Morris. Lon Morris is a small college that offers great individual attention from high quality teachers; the average class size is 12. When I transferred from Lon Morris to Stephen F. Austin to finish my Bachelor’s Degree, there was no drop off in the quality of teaching from Lon Morris to SFA. I was very well prepared for that university and later for graduate school. Lon Morris offers all of the “real college” experiences - sports, art, dance, theatre, music, student activities, student government, and dorm life. Most importantly they offer continued growth as a Christian disciple. They have a new gifted young chaplain. He leads Christian students and with those students reaches others for Christ through worship, missions and classes in church careers for those who are trying to discern a call to some type of ministry.
I was hooked for Lon Morris when I was in the 6th grade. The youth group from my local church visited Lon Morris on one of their youth campus visit days. We ate in the cafeteria, went to a basketball game, toured around the dorms and got a first impression of “college life” that I never forgot. Since that visit, my family moved to Houston and heard about all other kinds of schools. When it came time for me to decide on where to go to college, I always pictured Lon Morris in my mind. So my parents and I went to Jacksonville, met with folks from the school and worked out a way for me to go there. My parents and my church were a great support.
On Saturday February 28th, Lon Morris is holding a campus visit day. If you have a young person from 6-12th grade in your family or know of someone who might want to go, I will personally take them that day. Feel free to call me at the church office, or email me at revtommywilliams@sbcglobal.net
If a young person is a member of Woodville UMC or another Methodist Church, I as a pastor can write one letter of recommendation a year for a youth in my church and they will be awarded a $2500 scholarship to Lon Morris.
Lon Morris College will not be the school for every young person but it will be for some, maybe someone like me.
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