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Maundy Thursday
The Church through the ages has marked the Thursday before Easter as a time to commemorate the Institution of the Lord's Supper and the giving of the new Commandment to "Love One Another" (John 13). Join us in the Latimer Room on the second floor at 6:00 P.M. for a light dinner of lentil and vegetable soups, a Lord's Supper Mediation, and the celebration of the Lord's Supper around our dinner tables. We need at least eight crock-pots of soup. Please contact Sue O'Donnell at susanmarit@gmail.com or Aggie Sterlacci at patsterlacci45@comcast.net. Children are welcomed to participate along with their families in this meal.
Easter Hams Needed
at the Springfield Rescue Mission
On Saturday, April 23rd, the Springfield Rescue Mission will be serving Easter meals to the homeless at their 19 Bliss Street, Springfield location. Easter is an opportunity for the homeless to seek renewal and the Springfield Rescue Mission provides a chance for everyone to participate. We will serve breakfast on Saturday morning, as well as a special Easter dinner on Saturday evening at 4:00PM. We expect to feed hundreds of hungry and homeless men, women and children and would like to make this day special by providing a traditional ham dinner. The volunteer list is full but we are still in need of food - especially HAMS! Donations are greatly appreciated and can be delivered to the Springfield Rescue Mission, 19 Bliss Street, Springfield, Monday - Friday, 7AM-5PM. Items most needed: Hams, Potatoes, Sweet Potatoes, Fresh Vegetables - carrots, salad, broccoli, asparagus, Desserts, Rolls, Eggs, Milk, Juice, Bread, Breakfast Meats - sausage, bacon. For more information contact the Community Development Office at 413-732-0808 ext. 114, 115 or 102. Easter Sunday -No Sunday School. -Worship at regular time 10:30 a.m. Children's Class Provided. -Street parking will be limited due to St. John's Congregational Church service at Symphony Hall. Courtyard parking will be available as usual as well as Street Parking on State Street and Free Parking in the lot opposite Hampden County Courthouse on State Street. May 5, 2011 Massachusetts Citizens for Life Banquet. Click here for more information.
May 5, 2011, 7:00 p.m National Day of Prayer Service Sponsored by area church held on the steps of Old First Church.
May 7, 2011 Titus 2 Women's Retreat. Click here for more information.
May 9, 2011 Elders Meeting- Past and Present for continuing conversation and reconciliation. Please pray for your leaders and this congregation. From Pastor Burt The 31st Psalm is listed for today, April 20, in Robert Murray M'Cheyne's daily Bible reading schedule. In this Psalm we hear David condescending to the will, wisdom, and protection of God in his time of trouble and danger. I was struck by this Psalm today because verse 5 contains the last recorded words spoken by our Savior on the cross. They are not words only for David, nor were they first prayed by David merely to be used later by Jesus as his life ebbed away. There are three contrasts I'd like to explore briefly as we learn from David and Jesus. First, we hear David cry for help in a time of trouble. Unlike other psalms this one has no historical note. While this may frustrate us as we try to pin this psalm to what we k now of David's life, it does allow us to universalize his experience and use it in our own lives. David asks God to keep him from shame (the shame of believing in God and being disappointed when God does not answer), to deliver him, to hear him, to rescue him (speedily!) and to "Be a rock of refuge for me, a strong fortress to save me." Five requests. Then a contrast. "For you are my Rock." In other words David is saying, "Be a rock, because you are my rock." What does this mean? How can he ask for what he is already experiencing? Has David wavered in his faith? On the contrary, David is praying the prayer of a man who needs to know experientially what he knows by faith. In times of trouble and turmoil, danger and distress, fear and frustration, we often have the desire to have more than our faith. David here, as we in our lives, is like the man in Mark 9:24 who says, "Lord I believe, help my unbelief!" Our problem is never that God has forgotten, become busy with someone else's problem, or ceased to care for his children. Our problem is that we find ourselves in a situation where our faith is stretched thin by the feelings we have about the circumstance. The best antidote against the poison of situational responses is our prior commitment to the God whose faithfulness and works are never circumstantial. Here is the confidence that David has when he says, "You are my rock." He says this because he has known God to be the One who always works His works for His own glory. Is this not what David is saying, "For your name's sake you lead me and guide me"? ("Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death." David says, "you are my rock because you work for the reputation of your name and the faithfulness of your word" (v. 5 O Lord, faithful God). What is the content of your prayer in times of stress and trouble? Is it, "O Lord be a rock"? Or is it, "O Lord, the faithful God, You are my Rock, Now get Glory for your name in my life"? The second contrast is between hand of God (v. 5) and the hand of the enemy (v. 8). How sweet it is to know that the hand that handles our lives is the good, gentle, and wise hand of God. Like a competent physician who probes, pushes, squeezes, and sometimes cuts, our heavenly Father's hand sometimes causes pain, but never ultimately hurts us. His Fatherly hand holds us when we stumble, guides us when we cannot see, and comforts us when we cry out in our distress. Yes, it can be a chastening hand, but it is never a punishing hand. How unlike the hand of the enemy that grasps, clasps, traps, abuses, and exploits. There is no generosity in the enemy's hand, it is a hand that takes and never gives. Even the child who has never known the gentle hand of an earthly Father can allow herself to confidently be held in the hands that bear the scars of the nails-nails that were pushed through the Savior's tender flesh to show and prove his love. Here is assurance, the hand of God that holds, guides, and protects you is not to be compared to the hand of the enemy of your soul, even when that hand of the enemy seems to hold good things for you. They are but the fleeting pleasures of this world, and they will melt away quicker than cotton candy. I am reminded of David's response in II Samuel 24:14 when God gave him three options to choose between as his discipline for taking a census of the people. David said "Let us fall into the hand of the Lord, for his mercy is great; but let me not fall into the hand of man." David preferred the chastening hand of God to the hand of even a good man. This is the hand that protects every child of God. This is the hand of protection that is safe against every enemy. It is the hand Jesus that describes when he says, I will give them eternal life and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand...and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand. I and the Father are one. The third contrast is between body and Spirit. In times of trouble our primary concern is the physical. When we are faced with enemies we look for physical protection. David's prayer is for a rock, a refuge, a fortress. He is facing real physical enemies who are threatening to hurt him, they have built traps and besieged him in a walled city. He speaks of his eyes, his bones, and his body. His appearance has been fearsomely changed. But notice that he does not ask for physical healing. He could have, it would not have been wrong to do so. What he does say is that he has committed his spirit into the hands of the Lord, the faithful God. Why is this important for us? Because our spirit is the place where the deepest pain is felt. We can experience excruciating pain in our bodies and not be able to reproduce it at a later time. The best we can do is recall the fact that we have had pain. This is not the case with what might be called emotional pain. It stays, it returns, it threatens to cripple. So what does David do in his situation? He gives his battered and broken spirit to God. The deepest hurt needs to be given to the deepest well of mercy and healing, the heart of God. For some of us, it may not be that we have a bruised spirit, it may be that we have a restless and roiling spirit. There may be a circumstance or a person in our life which tries to hold us ransom and enslave us. Our spirits are consumed with the problem, with the pain, with the person. What can we do when faced with an out-of-control spirit? The same thing David did (Psalm 31: 5 "into your hands I commit my spirit"), the same thing our Savior did (Luke 23:46). Peter tells us at his most vulnerable point Jesus put himself into the hands of God (I Peter 2:22-25), that at his weakest point mere minutes before his life ended Jesus put his spirit into the hands of the Father for calming safety. May you know the quieted spirit of one who has found the good hands of God to be your rock, refuge and fortress.
I am reminded of the old hymn, Day by Day, Day by day, and with each passing moment, Strength I find, to meet my trials here; Trusting in my Father's wise bestowment, I've no cause for worry or for fear. He Whose heart is kind beyond all measure Gives unto each day what He deems best- Lovingly, it's part of pain and pleasure, Mingling toil with peace and rest. Every day, the Lord Himself is near me With a special mercy for each hour; All my cares He fain would bear, and cheer me, He Whose Name is Counselor and Pow'r. The protection of His child and treasure Is a charge that on Himself He laid; "As thy days, thy strength shall be in measure," This the pledge to me He made. Help me then in every tribulation So to trust Thy promises, O Lord, That I lose not faith's sweet consolation Offered me within Thy holy Word. Help me, Lord, when toil and trouble meeting, E'er to take, as from a father's hand, One by one, the days, the moments fleeting, Till I reach the promised land. |
