Tag: Thanksgiving

Pastor’s Notes 11/21/2025

Posted on by Wende Gonzales

“God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you ay share abundantly in every good work. 
– 2 Corinthians 9:8

As we approach Thanksgiving, we come to the final Sunday in our fall worship series, Living Our Verbs. Over these past weeks, we have explored what it means to be  people who love, serve, pray, and worship.

It feels fitting that “Sharing” is our final verb, because it is the thread that weaves all the others together. When we share our lives, our gratitude, our time, our compassion, and our resources, we embody the heart of Christ. We become living witnesses to God’s love at work among us.

This Sunday, our scripture from 2 Corinthians 9:6–12 invites us into a grace-filled vision of generosity. Paul writes to the church in Corinth as they prepare an offering to support their struggling siblings in Jerusalem. His message is not about guilt, pressure, or meeting a quota. Instead, he reminds the reader that sharing is an act of worship, a response to God’s abundant blessings.

Paul uses simple, earthy imagery: seeds, harvests, sowing, and reaping. When we share with others, the harvest is not merely financial; it is a harvest of gratitude, justice, compassion, and thanksgiving to God.

In a world where scarcity and fear so often dominate the headlines, Paul’s words offer us a different perspective. We live thankfully because everything we have is a gift from God.
We share generously because God first shared generously with us.

This Sunday, we will reflect together on the joy of sharing. We will focus upon how God continues to “multiply our seeds for sowing.” We will also give thanks for the countless ways our lives, stories, faith, and generosity continue to shape our ministry in Sun City.

I look forward to sharing with you on YouTube or in person on Thanksgiving Sunday.

Brett

Pastor’s Notes – 11/17/2023

Posted on by Wende Gonzales

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?  – Matthew 6:25

Every time I see the words “don’t worry” together in a sentence, my mind automatically goes to the Bobby McFerrin song from my youth, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” I would bop around the house singing the tune incessantly, it was such an earworm of a song. The concept of happiness being the opposite of worry takes me back to a simpler and most likely child-like time.

Life experience has taught me that the opposite of worry is more likely gratitude than happiness, so the lyrics should really be “don’t fret over the things that could go wrong but be grateful in the things that are working out.” This faithful solution runs counter to everything I learned growing up (Iowans by nature tend to be fatalistic I’m afraid).

Our gospel writers try to remind us that anxiety doesn’t add a single hour to one’s life, but apparently people throughout time have been unconvinced. It is easy for us to overlook Matthew’s advice in 6:33, “strive first for the kingdom of God.”

As Fred Craddock and Eugene Boring teach it, Matthew wants to relate his key word dikaiosyne (or righteousness/justice) to the eternal reign of God as well as having trust in God’s providential care as we walk this earthly life.

This Sunday we will celebrate Thanksgiving Sunday. We will focus our attention and prayer on the things we are grateful for having in this life rather than being consumed by that which we don’t. If nothing else, it is a good place to start in our praise for God our creator. I look forward to worshiping with you on Sunday.

Brett