The Church of the Messiah

This Wednesday, February 18th, begins the season of Lent with the yearly celebration of Ash Wednesday.  Lent is the period of 40 days which both commemorates Our Lord’s 40 days in the wilderness fasting and praying before He began His public ministry and helps us to prepare to celebrate the coming feast of Easter by fasting and praying in similar ways.   Ash Wednesday is the special celebration where we take time to remember that the Christian walk is called to be one of prayer, fasting, and penitence.  We will gather together at 7 o’clock and participate in the imposition of ashes, the litany of penitence, and then partake of the Holy Eucharist as a way to begin a Holy Lent.  We invite everyone to join us this Wednesday, beginning at 7 o’clock for our Ash Wednesday Service.

Don’t forget that tomorrow morning, February 7th, beginning at 10 o’clock, Church of the Messiah’s Women’s Ministry will hold their “Wild About You” Brunch.  The brunch will be at the home of Cathie Shimp (click HERE for a map).  Ladies, be sure to wear a wild, animal print, and bring your favorite love Scripture.  The brunch will include wonderful food, fellowship, music, vision, and ministry!  For more information, call Cathie Shimp at 904-610-2599.  Of course, if you have nothing animal print, they will have tables of extra so that you can come anyway and find your animal apparel when you arrive!

Fr. Looker’s Bible study Converting the Conversation continues this Wednesday night, February 4th, with a study of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings series of movies.  Converting the Conversation has taken several of the highest grossing movies of all time and discussed how to reshape conversations about those movies into conversations about Jesus Christ.  We have already discussed Frozen as well as the Star Wars and Marvel Cinematic Universe franchises, all of which happen to be owned by Disney.  On February 4th, we will be discussing The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (#8 and #18 respectively).  If you know Fr. Looker, you know Tolkien is one of his passions, so this session of this Bible study should be one of the highlights of the entire series!   Converting the Conversation equips those who attend to better witness to their families, friends, and co-workers using conversations about wildly popular movies as springboards to begin conversations about the Gospel.

The services begin at seven o’clock each night and childcare is provided.  We promise to finish by 8:30 every night so that everyone can be home in time to prepare for work and get their little ones ready for school the next morning.  These services are open to everyone so be sure to invite your friends.  We look forward to seeing everyone together this Wednesday night!

This Saturday, February 7th, at 10 o’clock, Church of the Messiah’s Women’s Ministry will hold their “Wild About You Brunch.”  The brunch will be at the home of Cathie (and Earl) Shimp (click HERE for a map).  Ladies, be sure to wear a wild, animal print, and bring your favorite love Scripture.  The brunch will include wonderful food, fellowship, music, vision, and ministry!  For more information, call the parish office at 904-721-4199 or Cathie Shimp at 904-610-2599.

Fr. Looker’s Bible study Converting the Conversation will continue this Wednesday night, January 28th.  This series takes seven of the highest grossing movies of all time and discusses how to reshape conversations about those movies into conversations about Jesus Christ.  We have already discussed Disney’s Frozen and the Star Wars franchise.  Tonight we discuss The Avengers and Iron Man 3, both of which made over a billion dollars, as well as other movies in the “Marvel Cinematic Universe.”  This series equips those who attend to better witness to their families, friends, and co-workers using conversations about wildly popular movies as springboards to begin conversations about the Gospel.

The services begin at seven o’clock each night and childcare is provided.  We promised to finish by 8:30 every night so that everyone can be home in time to prepare for work and get their little ones ready for school the next morning.  These services are open to everyone so be sure to invite your friends and childcare is provided.  We look forward to seeing everyone together this Wednesday nights!

This Wednesday night, January 14th, Church of the Messiah is pleased to re-start our Wednesday Night Mid-Week Services.  We will begin with a special teaching series led by Fr. Scott Looker entitled Converting the Conversation.  This series will take several of the highest grossing movies of all time, all of which have made over a billion dollars, and discuss how to reshape conversations about those movies into conversations about Jesus Christ.  This series will equip those who attend to better witness to their families, friends, and co-workers using conversations about wildly popular movies as springboards to begin conversations about the Gospel.  The five-part series begins with a discussion of the most successful Disney movie of all time Frozen.  The services begin at seven o’clock each night and childcare is provided.  We promised to finish by 8:30 every night so that everyone can be home in time to prepare for work and get their little ones ready for school the next morning.  These services are open to everyone so be sure to invite your friends.  We look forward to seeing everyone together on Wednesday nights again!

Following the Christmas Holy Days, Church of the Messiah will be resuming its Wednesday night services beginning with the Feast of the Epiphany on January 7th.  The Epiphany, or more fully, The Epiphany of Our Lord Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, celebrates the revelation of Jesus to all nations as the Magi came from afar, bearing gifts, and worshiped Jesus and King, Priest, and Sacrifice.  Not only is it an incredibly important moment in the life of Christ, but it is also the official end of the Twelve Days of Christmas as well.  This service will be an Eucharistic service.  Childcare will be provided and we will be doing our very best to have everyone out by 8:30 so that everyone can prepare for work and school the next morning.  We look forward to seeing everyone Wednesday night as we celebrate the Wise Men coming and adoring Our Lord and Savior.

Church of the Messiah extends a warm and heartfelt invitation for everyone to join us in celebrating the birth of Christ this Christmas.  We will have two services to commemorate this most glorious event this year.  On Christmas Eve, beginning at 7 pm we will have our Family Service with a special presentation from the children of our parish, a children’s sermon, and special musical offering.  The family service concludes with singing Christmas Carols by candlelight.

On Christmas morning, beginning at 10 o’clock, we will have the first mass of Christmas day.  This is a special service which allows worshipers to celebrate the birth of Our Lord while getting back to the other obligations of the day quickly.  The service is a said mass with a brief homily so the service itself lasts around 45 minutes ending with Holy Communion.

At Church of the Messiah, we wish everyone a blessed Christmas.  We hope to see everyone tonight and tomorrow morning and pray God’s abundant blessings be upon you all.

As we prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving, let’s not forget to give thanks to God because “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.”  If you are giving thanks this year, it is because the Lord has blessed you.  What better way to begin the Thanksgiving holiday than with The Great Thanksgiving, the Holy Eucharist.  Church of the Messiah’s annual Thanksgiving Eve Eucharist is this Wednesday night, November 26th, beginning at 7 o’clock.  Everyone is welcome and we encourage everyone to join us as we thank God for all of our many blessings and cap off this wonderful year.

All of the men of Church of the Messiah are invited to come together this Saturday morning, November 22, for a special breakfast.  We will be having a bacon and eggs and all the wonderful breakfast “fixings” that make for a great manly meal as well as a great time of fellowship with the other men of the parish.   After the meal we will spend time discussing ideas for future events for Men’s Ministry and what we would like to do together both for fellowship and ministry outreach.  Bring your appetites and good ideas.  Please RSVP to the event either by contacting John Cunningham or by going to the event page at Church of the Messiah’s Facebook page clicking that you will be going.  There is no cost for the meal, however we will accept donations to offset the cost of the meal.  If there is any money left over after expense have been covered, leftover money will go into the men’s ministry fund for future events.