SUNDAY SERVICES:

The Sharing Center opened in 1986 with the goal of helping churches be better stewards of the monies, times and talents that God gave them.  All needs are directed to the Sharing Center, which works to eliminate duplication of services while ensuring all needs are addressed.  This year they received the Non-Profit Business of the Year from both the Greater Sanford Regional and the Seminole County Regional Chambers of Commerce.  The center not only provides support for the church and community, it also provides an excellent opportunity to serve.  For more information visit our website or read their Church Handbook 2015.   If you feel led by the Spirit, join in.

Dear New Covenant,

We are writing to invite you to 9 o’clock. Beginning in February, we are taking a fresh look at adult formation by presenting four new series at 9:00 am in the Parish Hall. Our format deserves a word of explanation.

Glenn, Sheryl, Clint and I will take a Sunday each month and develop a theme or topic. Listed below are two ways to see what is coming. The schedule shows you who is teaching each week. The descriptions tell you what the focus of each module will be.

Please cover our retreat in prayer and prepare for this Sunday's service.

The worship team, vestry and staff will be meeting in Daytona Beach Shores for a time of listening, prayer and worship.  Andy Piercy will lead us in the retreat and then again in Sunday worship.  He is a world renowned singer/songwriter with a heart for worship.

We all have a set of traditions at Christmas, and changing those traditions is never easy even when it’s for good reason. You see until this year, I have always attended Christmas Eve service; I’ve never attended a Christmas Day service, not as a child, not as a young adult, not even as a chaplain. Rarely had our Christmas morning as a family been interrupted by anything other than family desiring a visit.

When I was a chaplain, we would rotate the holidays so that no one person had to work each and every one. To be honest, I had offered to handle the Christmas Day service as a chance to give Father Carl and Father Christopher time with their families. As I was viewing it, it was an obligation that I could take off of their plate. As usual, they had much to teach me!

“It’s my life isn’t it?”
Danny and I sat on the front step watching the black line grow on the horizon – a tornado warning had been issued and he wanted to be ready. I had a Bible of some translation in my hand, he a pistol of some caliber in his. Danny had been buried in a basement of a strip center when the last tornado blew through town and that wasn’t going to happen again. He was 16 now but his father’s death of just a couple years before, he jumped off the Ohio River Bridge, was still burning in his heart. Suicide, why not? “It’s my life isn’t it? “Well, actually, no it’s not, Danny,” or something like that, I responded. “You have been bought with a price, it’s not you who live but Christ in you – it’s not your life, like it or not.” I’m pretty sure that is not an exact quote, but it was what was in my mind that spring afternoon. Danny is alive and well today, still living a life, I trust, not his own.

Nearly every week, we repeat this Sunday’s Gospel at the 8:00 o’clock service.  Rite One states,