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2330 South Jefferson Street
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2330 South Jefferson Street
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FIRST
SUNDAY IN ADVENT
NOVEMBER 27, 2005 As
Christ cares, we care… we care about all people. ORDER
OF SERVICE 9:00 AND 11:00 A.M. 9:00 A.M. PRAISE SERVICE 8:50
a.m.-Gathering Songs ORDER OF SERVICE-11:00 A.M. +
Indicates the people standing ENTRANCE Words
of Welcome, Registration of Attendance and Announcements
Bill Davidson
PROCLAMATION
AND RESPONSE SENDING
FORTH +Hymn
203
Hail
to the Lord’s Anointed
Ellacombe THOSE
SERVING TODAY: FREE
ADVENT BOOKLETS are
available in the narthex as you leave this morning. Please pick up one for
your use during this Advent season. CHILDREN (ages 3 through 1st grade), may
meet the acolyte to recess to Children’s Church. Please ask your child
to line up behind the acolyte who will lead all children out together.
After the worship service, parents must pick up their child in the
Children’s Department; children will not be allowed to leave the room
until their parents arrive. WELCOME! We're
glad to have all who have joined us for this time of worship. Especially
to our guests and visitors, we welcome you to South Roanoke and to our
fellowship. We invite those who have no church home to make South Roanoke
your church and add your witness to ours. NEXT
WEEK’S SERMON, God is Still Coming, will be based on Isaiah 40:1-11. Please read and study the text this week. TO
DATE WE HAVE RECEIVED $465,163.00 IN PLEDGES toward our 2006 budget. The proposed budget for 2006 is $543,032.00. If you
have not yet had the opportunity to make your pledge you may do so this
morning. You will find pledge cards in the pew racks, and you may place
them in the offering plate as it is passed. SENIOR
HIGH CONFERENCE RETREAT is
December 2-4, 2005. This will include 8th-12th graders. Cost is $96.00 and
includes meals and lodging. Sign up by November 28th, 2005. THERE
WILL BE a meeting of
the Charge Conference on Monday, November 28, at 8:00 p.m. in the Wimmer
Classroom. THE
CHURCH OFFICE WILL BE LOCKED ON SUNDAYS BEGINNING DECEMBER 4! Desk drawers have been broken into, and purses stolen
from the church office recently, therefore the church office will be
locked on Sunday mornings. If you need to make copies please come during
the week as the copy machine will be unavailable on Sundays. THE
PASTOR’S DISCRETIONARY FUND is
used for special needs that are called to the attention of the pastor.
This fund has been depleted over the past several years and needs some
additional funding. If you would like to contribute please make your check
payable to SRUMC and earmark it “pastor’s discretionary fund”. PENNY
HAYNES APPRECIATION SUNDAY! On
December 4 we will celebrate her thirtieth anniversary as our
Administrative Assistant. We will recognize her at our 11:00 a.m. worship
and join together for a reception with her and her family following the
service. THE
WIMMER CLASS CHRISTMAS DINNER AND PROGRAM will be held December 13 at 6:00 p.m. at Brandon Oakes. Everyone is invited
to attend. Cost of dinner is $13.00 per person. Reservations may be made
by calling Natalie Carter, 776-2118. If paying by check make your check
payable to Natalie Carter. Deadline for reservations is December 9, 2005. THE
FRIENDSHIP CIRCLE will
have their December meeting at the home of June Tegenkamp, 2524 Stanley
Avenue. The meeting will be an Open House Coffee on Tuesday, December 13,
from 10:00-11:30 a.m. All ladies in the church are invited. Please call
June at 342-7784 if you would like to attend. THE
CHURCH BASEMENT will
be cleaned out soon. If your organization has anything stored in the
basement that you do not want thrown out please mark it clearly for
keeping. C.R.e.W. “Children Ready for Worship:Grades
2-5 What we’re doing this week _________________________________________
THE ADVENT ANGELS ARE HERE! __________________________________
O that you
would tear open the heavens and come down! So the prophet prays
for his people. It is the cry
of a people desperate for an advent of God.
A long time ago they enjoyed the bounty and protection of the
Promised Land, the land given them by God as promised to their ancestor
Abraham. That was a long time
ago. Now life is so different.
Long ago their nation was defeated by the army of Their
despair is deep. The prophet prays So
the prophet prays for them.
Pam
Naylor teaches high school in Our
Mission Team heard Pam’s story as we stood in her home where we had been
working that day, removing sheet rock and insulation and spraying and
scrubbing Clorox solution to counteract the mold. As
she shared her story with us she was expressing her own experience of
desperation.
Displaced from her home, now living, as it were, in exile in the
FEMA trailer in her driveway, she was desperate for an advent of God. Few
of us have ever experienced the desperation that Pam faced that day.
Few of us have known the depth of despair shared by the people of
God who were held in captivity for so long.
But lest the Word of God today be reserved only for those in the
most desperate of situations, we do, in our own day, in our own way, long
for the coming of God.
In your journey of life haven’t you made the prayer of the
prophet your own?
Have there not been moments when you just took the gloves off, let
God know exactly what you think, and shouted from the depth of your soul: You know, the whole world must be like that because this season that is upon us is so very appealing. The whole culture, even as it embraces the greed of spending and buying and accumulating that so distorts the true meaning of this time of year, really does long for the promise of peace on earth and good will to all. From the tune of that Christmas carol turning round and round in your head bringing back memories of Christmases past to the anticipation of holiday gatherings with family and friends, there is so much more to our longing that this season sparks in us than even this. After all the food becomes leftovers, after all the packages are unwrapped, after all the holiday guests have gone back home it is the promise that lingers, it is the hope that sustains. It is the advent of God we seek, it is God’s coming that we long for. That is what we are preparing to welcome today. That’s what the whole world is so desperate for. That’s the real power of this season of the year. It
is interesting, isn’t it, that we seek that advent always, even after it
has already happened?
It is interesting, isn’t it, that we are so desperate for an
advent of God even though God has come already?
Over 2000 years ago God answered the prayer of the prophet.
Over two centuries ago God came down.
That advent of God But
this is Advent—the season of preparation for the celebration of the
anniversary of the birth of the Christ child.
In this era of ours when our world seems to be so inundated by
natural disaster and the scourge of war we need this season of the year to
remind us what an act of God really looks like.
Now, more than ever, the church must declare with confidence and
boldness the advent of God—in the birth of a baby in As
we stood in the bare-framed living room of her home listening to her
story, we asked Pam Naylor if she would like us to pray with her.
We joined hands together and offered God thanks for her safety,
prayed God’s blessing upon her home and family, and again committed our
work to the service of Christ. As
we dried our tears and embraced one another in Christian love, would you
understand me when I tell you that we experienced in that moment an act of
God? God came to her and to us
right in the midst of that place of destruction and despair or, rather, we
came to see God who had already come to her in Jesus Christ and had been
with her and with us all along. In
this season we come so desperate for an advent of God.
But there is such good news today.
That good news is this:
there is only one other who is more desperate than we in this
season. You
see, God has already come.
God is just as desperate for you and for me to know that, to
recognize that, to experience that in our lives.
As we prepare to celebrate the anniversary of the birth of the one
who has come and is now here, may the good news make clear once and for
all the act of God that changes lives and brings promise and hope both now
and forever.
William G. Davidson
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