On the Lord’s Day:
9:15 am — Sunday school classes for all ages: Classes for graded age groups meet to learn from the Scriptures. To see Sunday school classes, ages and meeting locations, click on the red “Ministries” button under the category “Pages” (to the right).
10:30 am — We conclude our series in looking at the many ways the Lord loves. Read ahead in Hosea 3 to be prepared for this week’s message from God’s Word.
During the Week:
- Tuesday, 10:30 am: Our Ten-thirty Tuesdays Bible study resumes at 10:30 am, meeting in the Fireside Room.
- Wednesday, 6:30 pm: Awana Clubs meet. This week: The Awana Store!!!
- Thursday, 6:30 pm: Thursday Night Toolkit Bible study continues in our survey of the Old Testament. This week, we’ll survey Jonah and Micah.
- Saturday, 4:00 pm: Elim League Bowling at 4:00 pm at Don Carter Lanes
Upcoming and Ongoing:
- Elim recently had the opportunity to bless a very enthusiastic sister in Christ as she left for the mission field in England. Her exuberant thanks blessed us in return. Now, we have the opportunity to show her continued love as she is spending her first Christmas away from home. Our missionary to bless is 24 years old, a native of Wisconsin, living in England, where she is training young people to serve the Lord in evangelism and discipleship. Some of her special interests are: horses, medieval things (knights, castles, etc.), baseball, chocolate, dogs and cats. As a special Christmas love gift, we want Elim to shower her with small, wrapped Christmas gifts. (Please, no homemade food items due to customs restrictions!) Please bring them to the church office or the specially designated area by December 13th. We’ll make sure that they get to her in time to help her celebrate our Savior’s birth!.
- Encouragers (those 60 and over) have a special mission in the body of our church— to encourage us all that walking in faith and serving in love are NOT age-related! This special group will meet for a lovely Soup and Sandwich Christmas Dinner on Sunday, December 13th, immediately after the morning worship service. If you plan to attend, please sign up on the special sheet on the back table in the sanctuary.
- We’re looking for volunteers to serve the Lord and the family at Elim! We are currently organizing the rotation schedules for those who volunteer to secure the building after our worship services and for those who help with snow removal. If you are interested in serving in these ways, please contact the church office or sign-up on the sign-up sheets on the back table in the sanctuary.
- If you are interested in being part of the rotation of men and women who help direct our congregation to their seats and assist those with special needs, please see the church office. We are organizing those loving volunteers for next year and want to make sure that YOU are included!
- There is a special place at Elim for those Serving Sisters who want to bless someone with a special gift or card. Please place these items on the piano in the Gathering Place. Please don’t leave gifts or cards on the back table in the sanctuary
From the Pastor’s Recent Reading:
Does God love like that? Yes, God loves like that! God steps into the marketplace of sin and buys us out of sin’s bondage by the death of Christ. We read in our Bibles, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son … ” (John 3:16). We ask, “What does so mean?” The answer is in Hosea’s story. When we see Hosea standing in the market place under orders from God to purchase his wife, who had become an adulteress and a slave, we recognize that this is the measure of God’s love.
We are Gomer. We are the slave sold on the auction block of sin. The world bids for us. The world bids fame, wealth, prestige, influence, power-all those things that are the world’s currency. But when all seemed lost God sent the Lord Jesus Christ, His Son, into the market place to buy us at the cost of His life. If you can understand it as an illustration, God was the auctioneer. He said, “What am I bid for these poor, hopeless, enslaved sinners?”
Jesus said, “I bid the price of My blood.”
The Father said, “Sold to the Lord Jesus Christ for the price of His blood.” There was no greater bid than that.
— from “The MInor Prophets,” by James Montgomery Boice
Posted on November 26th, 2009 by Janet
Filed under: This Week @ Elim