WEST LIBERTY CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP

“I want to know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death.”  Philippians 3:10

Nov 269, 2023

THE GOD WE WORSHIP

The Teaching of Jesus in Matthew

 

Message and Scriptures

Matthew 1:17-23

Messiah, Yeshua Immanuel

 

 

WLCF VISION STATEMENT – To be a God centered, God loving, Holy Spirit filled, led and empowered Church, having Christ as the Head and we, as His Body, being used to make disciples of Jesus to build His Kingdom.

CHURCH COVENANT:

We covenant together with God and with one another in an ever-increasing relationship with God as follows: Lord God-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit we covenant with you and with each other That we will seek to equip one another to the works of service, and to the building up of one another.

BARUCH ATA YHWH SEBAOTH – Bless You. Praise You. Thank You Beloved LORD GOD.  We are thankful for the missionaries we support, who are sharing God’s word with people around the world.

Weekly Dawn Prayer – Wednesday mornings at 7:00am both in person and via Zoom

Daily Time Alone with God – for a daily devotion please follow “Time Alone With God”, found on the website. Please pray TAG every day.

 

Prayer Chain – Call or email Lynne Zeman  319-627-4858 or westlibertychristianfellowship@gmail.com

 

 

TODAY AT WLCF (On Site and Zoom)

Communion Worship Service

9:00 a.m. Adult Sunday school         10:00 a.m. /Prayer        10:30 a.m. Worship Service

 

 

THIS WEEK AT WLCF –

 

Bible Studies/Sunday School/Worship      

Tuesday                               7:00 p.m.                                               No Spanish Bible Study – Lucas Holy Spirit

Wednesday                       7:00 a.m.                                               Dawn Prayer – Prayer for the World/Nation/Community/WLCF

  6:00 p.m.                                               Youth Bible Study – Luke & Psalms  

  7:00 p.m.                                               Adult Bible Study - Old Testament Pillars.                      

Thursday                              5:30 p.m.                                               Baptism Class

Saturday                              7:30 a.m.                                               Men’s Bible Study - Revelation

Sunday                                10:00 a.m.                      Prayer (Sanctuary) Social (Foyer)

                                                 10:30 a.m.                      Worship Service – Matthew

                                               

 

Birthday(s)

     Saturday, Dec 2 – Darlene Harmon   

 

Anniversary(ies)  

      Tuesday, Nov 28 – Brenda & Dan Miller

     Thursday, Nov 30 – Geri & Bob Owen

 

Meeting(s)

 

 

 

MASKS: Everyone is now welcome to make their own decision regarding wearing masks. There will still be a supply by the entry door, but it is your choice whether you wear a mask.

 

Zoom –You will need to download the app on your phone or computer. The code for ALL videos is 228 893 6865.  The password is 416991. Join us!

 

 

 

UPCOMING EVENTS, SERVICES, AND ACTIVITIES

 

Food Pantry – United Way Community Hygiene Supply Drive:  November 13- 26. Supplies will be available for distribution to local families on Giving Tuesday, November 28, 2023. Needed items include: laundry detergent, dish soap, toilet paper, paper towels, shampoo, conditioner, body wash/soap, Kleenex, toothpaste, toothbrushes, dental floss, deodorant, feminine products, combs/hair brushes, and lotion. Donations can be left in the Food Pantry box outside First Church United’s front door.

 

Community Blood Drive – Monday Nov 27  2:00 pm – 7:00 pm @ First Church United.  Appointments preferred but walk-ins accepted.  To schedule call 1-800-747-5401

 

Blue Christmas Community Service – Sunday, Dec 3 @ 4:00 pm, United Methodist Church

 

WLCF Christmas Program – Sunday Dec. 17 during the morning service.  We will follow it with our traditional Christmas Pot luck meal. 

 

 

ONGOING EVENTS, SERVICES, AND ACTIVITIES

 

 

Baptism – If you are interested in following Jesus in the Waters of Believer’s Baptism please see Pastor Mario.

 

West Liberty Food Pantry – Is open at FCU Saturdays 9:00 – 10:00 a.m. and Thursdays 6:00 – 7:00 p.m.

Thanks to the men who deliver these items to FCU.  Julie McKillip is our coordinator.

 

Church library – You are invited to check out the books from the library downstairs.

 

Copy of the Message or Bulletin – Visit our website: www.wlcf.org  (an audio version is included) or contact Brad Jenkins.

 

Stephen’s Ministry – is available for anyone needing someone to walk beside them or pray with them.  Please contact Kelsey Jenkins 319-936-4891 or Cindy Mays 319-330-4620 for more information.

 

Child Care: Child care is available in the Nursery during worship service.

 

Children’s Sunday school – during the sermon at the 10:30 a.m. worship service.

 

OUR GIVING TO THE LORD’S WORK: Offering Box – back table

Giving in November:  $3325, $3057, $1540. We are ahead of budget $2309.25.  We need a monthly offering of $8615.75 and a weekly offering of $1988.25. BARUCH ATA YHWH SEBAOTH for the giving of YOUR people through the years. God loves a cheerful giver. Checks can be mailed to the church or0 dropped off at the church, in the mailbox at the end of the lane. You are also invited to sign up for Electronic Funds Transfer (ETF). Please see Lynne for details.

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WLCF YOUTH MINISTRY

WLCF Youth Group for young people in 6th – 12th grades

Ministries

Worship Service:                     Sundays at 10:30 a.m.  

Youth Night:                            Wednesdays at 6:00 pm – Luke & Psalms (Please bring your Bibles).   

 

 

Activities and Events             

 

 

 

 

COMMUNITY YOUTH GROUP (CYG)

 

If you are interested in serving this ministry in any way, let Pastor Mario know. They need one board member and several cube leaders. The group meets at First Church United (FCU) on Sunday evenings.

               

                Nov 26                     No CYG

                Dec  3                      Regular CYG                                                                                            6 p.m. FCU

Dec 10                     Live Nativity                                                                                            6 p.m. FCU

                        Dec 17 – 26                    No CYG – Winter Break

 

 

Pine Lake Camps

 

No events currently scheduled

 

Registration for all events is open at PineLakeCamps.org

 

 

 

TIME ALONE WITH GOD (TAG)

Sunday, Nov 26, 2023

 

 

     Celebrating Advent means learning how to wait…Not all can wait – certainly not those who are satisfied, contented, and feel that they live in the best of all possible worlds!  Those who learn to wait are uneasy about their way of life, but yet have seen a vision of greatness in the world of the future and are patiently expecting its fulfillment. The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come. For these, it is enough to wait in humble fear until the Holy One himself comes down to us, God in the child in the manger.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer. “For Those Who Are Troubled.” Plough Daily Dig. Dec 2, 2002.

 

 

 

     The gospel begins with a birth. Christians claim that the God of the universe has made a remarkable intrusion into the human predicament. The God of the Precambrian soup, the God of the Carboniferous forests, the God of the Cretaceous and the Pleistocene, the God of the triceratops and the wooly mammoth; that same God, Christians say, was born in a barn. The Bible is clear: God loved the world in such a way that he gave to us his only Son (John 3:16). God loves the world with a passion that exceeds our own. God loves this planet and all its many inhabitants. When we fail to appreciate that God is human with us, that he made himself nothing and is the dust of the earth with us, the gospel comes to be more about psychology, more about feelings and fantasies, more about escaping, and less about God and God’s deep and abiding love for his material creation.

 

Daniel J. Stulac. “A Remarkable Intrusion.” Plough Daily Dig, Dev 1, 2002.

 

 

 

          Through it all, we desperately seek glimpses of God’s grace. And they are there. Like tiny, glistening quartz crystals on a broad, sandy beach. God’s grace appears in surprising and undeniable ways.

     God’s grace is His unmerited favor in our lives. Its presence takes our breath away and draws us closer to the One who lavishes it upon us. Christmas is God’s shout of grace, a bold, in-your-face declaration of His love for us. As John put it, in Jesus we have received grace upon grace (John 1:16), a never-before-seen grace, a cannot-be-denied grace, an unmistakable, jaw-dropping, eye-popping demonstration of God’s kindness towards us.

     This Christmas draw the family I a little closer. Hold them a little tighter. Linger a little while longer in conversation around the table. Talk about the story of God’s grace in your life. Then look one another in the eye and say, “I love you.” That’s what God did when He sent His only and only Son to us.

 

Mark Young. “Introduction.” Expressions of Grace. Denver Seminary. 2016. 

 

 

    What went through Joseph’s and Mary’s minds when they heard these instruction from the messengers of the Lord? Call him Yeshua? Why? He will save people? He will be great? The Son of the Most High? What does all this mean? What will be required of Him? What does the future hold for Him? No doubt, they must have been puzzled as this mystery unfolded before their eyes.

     Hebrew names are extremely meaningful, especially when they include a theophoric element such as yah, yahu (short forms of Yahweh) or el (a short form of Elohim). Many prominent biblical characters were given theophoric names. For example, the following names reveal important features of God’s character and wonderful deeds” Hesekiah (“Yahweh is strong”), Jeremiah (Yahweh exalts”), Zechariah (“Yahweh remembers”), Yehonatan (“Yahweh gave”), Yehoshua (“Yahweh is salvation”), Ezekiel (“God is strong”), Daniel (“God is my judge”), Michael (“who is like God”).

     The name Yeshua (“salvation”) was common during the second Temple period (e.g. Yeshua ben Ananias, Yeshua ben Sirach, Yeshua Barabbas). Why then does Paul tell the Philippians that Yeshua was given “the name above all names” (Phil. 2:9)? The exalted name was not simply Yeshua, but Yeshua haMashiach, “the Anointed One, the Christ,” Yeshua “the Son of the Most High.” No other Yeshua could be given these unique designations.

    This Yeshua was like no other. He came from the Father in heaven. (John 8:29; I John 4:14), lived a sinless life in complete humility and obedience to the Father (Matt. 26:39; Luke 22:42), humbled Himself even till death on a cross as a sacrifice for the sins of humanity (Phil. 2:8), and was led in silence to shed His blood as the sacrificed Lamb of God (Isaiah 53). This inimitable Yeshua – the Mashiach, the Anointed one, the Christ, The Son of the Most High – was highly exalted and given “the name that is above every name” so that one day, at the name of Yeshua, every knee would bow and every tongue confess that He and only He is the Messiah, the Christ, the Lord, the Anointed One.

     

Helene Dallaine. “Yeshua, Salvation.” Expressions of Grace. Dec 18. Denver Seminary 2016.

 

 

     The sign of the Immanuel child, given to King Ahaz of Judah in the 8th century B.C. from the prophet Isaiah, was a curious one indeed. For King Ahaz was in a serious military, political, and social predicament. What should he do about the advancing Assyrian armies to the north? How should he respond to the problems with Egypt to the south? What action should he take concerning the alliance that his immediate neighbor, the kingdom of Israel, had made with the kingdom of Syria? With a threat on every border, things appeared bleak for the tiny kingdom of Judah. King Ahaz was fearful, like a “tree shaken by the wind.”

     Enter the prophet Isaiah who brought a word from God to prompt faith – A child whose name will be Immanuel, God with us. With a pretense of piety, Ahaz refuses the word. He decided to take his chances by forming an alliance with Assyria. Instead of standing firm and believing that God was able to deliver. Ahaz chose to invite the Assyrians, along with their oppression and their pantheon of gods, into the lives of the people of Judah. The decision proved disastrous, as any decision would that gives preference to fear over faith.

     Quoting this passage of a coming Immanuel, Matthew applies it to Jesus in his account of Jesus’ birth (Matt. 1:23). Once again, we are given a sign that God is with us through the coming of a child. Speaking to a world still full of military conquest, political oppression, and social upheaval, such a sign remains paradoxical. God speaks to us of His presence in the simplicity, the innocence, and the vulnerability of a child

The Kingdom which the child ushers in is one where the weak are the strong, the humble are the exalted, the foolish are the wise, where loss is gain, death is life, and where the child leads. What a strange Kingdom! It is a Kingdom of an entirely different order than that which Ahaz imagined or into which Jesus was born. This advent season, and every day of our lives, let us ponder the reality of this Kingdom. For God is with us – Immanuel.

 

Keith P. Wells.. “The Sign of the Immanuel Child.” Tidings  of Joy. Dec 21. Denver Seminary. 2010.

 

 

 

 

VOLUNTEER ASIGNMENTS

Church Cleaning Schedule                 

Dec 3 & 10                            Mike & Lynne Zeman

Dec 17 & 24                          Hugo Ramos

Dec 31 & Jan 7                     Sandy Green & Geri Owen