There was a choir of mostly seniors dressed in red and yellow, also with a hand-bell choir of your girls, that i found very enjoyable. We spoke about the last of the Christmas candles. That candle is Love.
This a a very solom church service, there were prayer for families that might be feeling the pain of spending Christmas with out a loved one that has passed away in the last year. There was talk of the Christmas story. And how it is important to see the connection between the birth of David and the birth of Christ, indicating he is the savior. There was also mention of the fact that there is a instance of child abuse in the Christmas story that is often ignored. I actually had no idea what that was so afterwards i addressed my question to the pastor. Apperenly after King Herold hears that "the King of all Kings" has been born, he is afraid, afraid for his power and empire. So he orders all children under the age of 2 to be killed off. This is where it comes from.
Matthew 2:16-17
16Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, was exceeding wroth, and sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men.
We had our children's story of the day. It was Called The Table Where Rich People Sit. And it outlines the life of a young girl and her dislike of living very poorly in a cabin in the mountains. Despite her parents enjoyment of the lifestyle. Good book, i suggest checking it out. But it all comes down to the idea that sometimes we have people in our lives that see value differently as we do.
There was also continued talk on love, but also what indicates when love is missing. There was a verity of things listed, such as wars and killing but the one that stuck out to me was Insane asylums. I know that a lot of them are shutdown these days, but I had some slight knowledge of the workings of them because i have a old friend that used to have a job as a grounds keeper at one. Hi Ryan.
I knew from another family member that there was a very heavy stigma against people with mental illness especially back in the 60's. This fully came to light when Ryan was giving me a tour thru the grounds of his old work. It all seemed quite normal until suddenly we get to a small graveyard. I asked him what this was for. He said that back in the day, sometimes the mentally ill people would die and there families would not even want to acknowledge there existence, never mind their death. So the staff would have a small funeral and bury them in the graveyard on the asylum grounds. I also noticed a mini excavator and a grave dug up. Ryan explained to me that sometimes the family will start to feel guilty for what they have done and occasionally they will disimtomb the body and rebury it with the rest of the family. I remember approx 50 tombstones.
Quote of the day
" the Church has never been judged for being poor, but it has been judged for acting poorly".
I wanted to talk to the pastor, but before i could do that the church was having a meeting about there budget. Lets just say it looks bad, There is nothing set in stone, but this church is in deep financial trouble, and likely doesn't have long to live.
Despite all of this doom and gloom i was able to find a few happy things. I must admit this really got my attention.
I'm not sure what your first thought is when you see this thing. It could be a 7 post candle holder or it could be a Menorah. I asked about it latter. And the pastor laughed. He said he never thought about it much but the do have this item sitting at the back of their church. I had to ask how this Jewish object ends up in a Christian church? He told me that it was given to the church in memory of a person that passed away and has just been there ever since.
And then there is this thing.
for the longest time growing up i swore that we were the only family that had this. As a child i understood that the only objects that were acceptable to place on the top of the tree were ether a star or an angle. But we had weird wreath thing with a candle in it. And the crazy part is now, I kind of miss that funny looking tree topper. I guess that is growing up for ya.
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