A Love Story: Rebecca & Isaac

Dear People of Messiah Church:

Today's Lectionary Bible story from Genesis 24 portrays the courtship of Isaac & Rebecca. The illustration, a painting by Giovanni Pellegrini from BiblePortal portrays Rebecca at the well with Abraham's Agent who has gone back to the ancestral homeland to find a wife for Isaac. While sending an emissary back home to find a wife is not part of today's cultural practice, the story is packed with beauty, grace, love, individual respect and the presence of God's Divine Spirit.

Serendipity plays a huge role, whereby Rebecca, a member of Abraham's Brother's clan, is at the well at the exact time the emissary arrives.

God's Ever-present guidance is on full display, as Rebecca shows exactly her character of hospitality and fearlessness as she waters the visitors camels and answers his questions as a woman of power.

The Subsequent marriage of Rebecca and Isaac is among the most stable in the Ancestral stories. Its love at first sight for the young couple. They stay married only to each other 'til death do us part'. They have two boys, Jacob and Esau.

Rebecca is the primary actor, a woman of power in the story. It is she who is the exemplar of God-Follower. It is she who now obeys God's call to leave her native land. It is she who chooses to follow this path.

The story in today's reading is heavily edited from the 24th Chapter of Genesis in order to comfortably fit the liturgy as a Sunday reading. You might enjoy reading the entire story here as you prepare for worship.

I will be preaching this Sunday, July 9 at 10am. Please Join us!

Vicar John

You can reach me directly at: Lakesinai@comcast.net

Its One Week Until the

Parish Visioning Retreat July 14 & 15

Join Us 10-4 Friday, 10-5 Saturday

Your Vestry, as well as the Site Selection Team, have been hard at work lately to implement a process for moving ahead with finding a new location on which to build a more permanent Church of the Messiah. The Diocese of South Carolina is ready to partner with us in this process. To prepare for our next steps together, we have collaborated with Bishop Ruth to work with a Consultant from the Episcopal Church Building Fund, Ann Fleming. Ann will be with us at Church of the Messiah on Friday & Saturday, July 14 & 15. She will also be with us at Sunday worship July 16. Over those two retreat days, we will begin visioning and planning work to prepare us for our next steps. What is our common story that has brought us here? Who are we, what is our core identity as a church? Where in Myrtle Beach has God called us to put down roots to become the Congregation God has called us to be? What kind of property, at what location do we need to fulfill our call? How do we travel from there to here?

Please set aside the dates of July 14 and 15, and plan to attend one or both days as you are able. Both Friday and Saturday will start at 10am. Friday will end at 4pm. Saturday will end at 5pm, and will be followed by a fellowship reception. The vestry will meet after church Sunday, July 15 with Ann to organize next steps for the Property Search Process. We are aware that not everyone can attend the entire retreat, so plan do participate as you can. Remind your friends at Messiah and encourage them to attend as well. I will be sending out additional Newsletters to announce the details and times of the retreat sessions! If you have any questions, you can email me at Lakesinai@comcast.net, or Kristi Burch at k3burch@gmail.com.

The Vision Retreat Planning team is Kristi Burch, Charlie Jordan, Rick Stall & Fr. John