Parish News & Updates
Worship with Us this Sunday

Services at 8:00 & 10:00 am

Families are encouraged to worship together. We had hoped to have new programming and staffing, but things seem to be different than we anticipated.

Multiple Children's activities will be available with age appropriate materials.

There will be a Children's Sermon.

Masks and hand sanitizing are mandatory.
Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin.
Hebrews 4:14-15

The Grace to be Good

It’s good to be good. It’s good to try to do good. But in the end, we rely on Grace! Ancient catechisms tell us that “Grace is God’s favor, the free and undeserved help, that God gives us to respond to the divine call to become children of God”. Grace is a gift which allows us to respond to God’s love. John Macquarrie writes: “the saints speak of the love of God as not just their response to God’s love for them, but somehow the very movement of God’s Spirit within them, God being on both sides”.

Protestant theologians focus on the “unearned and unmerited” aspects of grace. Martin Luther and John Calvin both emphasized “justification by faith through grace” as an alternative to “works righteousness” in which believers strived to amass heavenly credits and prayers. Frederick Buechner describes grace this way: “There’s no way to earn it or deserve it any more than you can deserve the taste or raspberries and cream or earn good looks or bring about your own birth”.

It is essential for us to notice when and where grace comes from. We might think that good things happen to us because of luck or astrology or hard work. As believers, we know that grace is the product of what God does for us. The Letter to the Hebrews reminds us today that Jesus is able to sympathize with our weakness; he was tested, and he knows our struggles.

The Collect for Sunday (printed below) is one of my favorites. Originally it asked that God’s grace would “prevent and follow us”. This came from the Latin where the word prevent meant “go before” rather than “get in the way!” Today we pray that God’s grace may precede and follow us. Theologians call God’s preceding: “prevenient grace”, God making the way. As a friend of mine has written, “We do not do good works so that God will love us. Quite the opposite. We do good works because God loves us”.

We swim in the ocean of God’s grace. Returning the Buechner: “Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don’t be afraid (God) is with you. Nothing can ever separate us. It’s for you (God) created the universe”. You are loved; you are surrounded by grace.

Peace,
Mark +

Lord, we pray that your grace may always precede and follow us, that we may continually be given to good works; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
This Sunday's Worship Service

Please pray for: Robin Pender, Camilla Parrott, Anna Sisson, Verna Downey, Daniel Bedard, The Fraser Family-Todd, Susan and Ashton, Karen & Jim, Afghan Refugees, Steve Daniels, Neil Brayton, Jess & Andrew, Sheila Savage, Theresa Steinhice, Juan Mendoza, Chance Terrell, Jackson (Jack) Daniel Wright (RIP)-Juanita Dombkowski & Family, Mark Mangin, Kathy Blodgett, Annie Benson (RIP)-Benson Family, Sharon Billings, Rick Culp, Kevin Soibel, Evelyn Folliot, Chris Tracy, Michael Mahfood (RIP), Dolina Millar (RIP)-Laurie Hanley & Family, Carol Wilson, Susan Fralic, James Boffen, Jane Belew, Joy Torbit (RIP)-Torbit Family, Carole Tulip, Nancy Poole
 
Prayer Requests can be sent to prayer@ccpki.org
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African Team Ministries Sales
Returning to Christ Church
October 10th & 17th 

Serving the Church in East Africa
Through Sales of Crafts and Jewelry

African Team Ministries is a Christian ministry working as an intermediary between African and American churches. We provide funding for orphan and refugee relief missions and evangelism in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania . The support we receive is sent directly to our partnering Bishops to provide school fees, tuition, books, and uniforms. 

Providing:
 
CLEAN WATER
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MEDICAL CARE
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TRAINING FOR THE LAITY
Christ Church Parish Kent Island| 410-643-5921 | office@ccpki.org | ccpki.org