THIS SUNDAY: The Community of Pilgrims Presbyterian Fellowship, Oct. 3, 2021, Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost, World Communion Sunday, Gathering and Devotion and Communion on Zoom this Sunday. If you have any questions, or are interested in a conversation, contact Pastor Brett Webb-Mitchell (919) 444-9111; brettwebbmitchell@gmail.com and visit www.communityofpilgrims.com.
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Dear Community of Pilgrims!
The first Sunday in October, October 3, 2021, is designated as World Communion Sunday, which celebrates our oneness in Christ with all our brothers, sisters, and siblings around the world. The Apostle Paul tells us that we are to “discern the body” when we partake of Holy Communion, mindful that we note our relationship to all our brothers and sisters and siblings in Christ in the celebration.
For this Sunday, the focus Scripture is going to be Galatians 3:23-29. In this letter and passage, Paul is addressing a largely Gentile audience who are getting confused and caught up in replaying the rules and rituals of Judaism as necessary to inclusion in and among God’s covenant people. Paul reminds them, the Galatians, that they received the Spirit by believing the proclamation about Christ crucified and not by doing works of law (3:1-5). Paul quickly reminds them that Christ has come, and the rite of entry into God’s people is baptism, available to all people: “As many of you were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ”(3:27). Being baptized, we are all clothed with Christ, wrapped up in Christ, filled with Christ's Spirit, incorporated into Christ and Christ’s body so that Christ becomes and is our primary identity marker. And what does that mean for us, especially on this World Communion Sunday? The differences between us, which we know by the social labels we inherit or take upon ourselves, become secondary to our primary identity as Christ’s beloved community. Paul declares, in a quite radical move, that the power of the three categories that mattered most in the ancient world—ethnicity, socio-economic status, and gender—are no longer the primary way we identify with one another in our world, which are also boundary markers. They don’t necessarily disappear, of course, but Paul declares that in Christ, “there is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male and female,” meaning these categories are irrelevant in the greater, risen, mysterious, yet real body of Christ. For one to be baptized into Christ means being clothed with Christ, and finding one’s primary identity in Christ. Paul doesn’t stop there, nor do we: “And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham (and Sarah’s) offspring, heirs, according to the promise. All of us Christians, around the world, belong to Christ, sharing fully and equally in the inheritance of God’s promise and the call to live as God’s people and heirs. Join us this Sunday as we celebrate our world communion with other Christians around the world.
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Events!
Oct. 3, 4 pm, Gather and Devotion on Zoom! Celebrating World Communion! Holy Communion to be shared.
Oct. 10, 4 pm, Gather and Devotion on Zoom!
Oct. 17, 4 pm, Gather and Devotion on Zoom!
Oct. 24, 4 pm, Gather and Devotion on Zoom!
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Prayers of Celebration and Concern
· Improved health for Randy dealing with kidney and prostate issues.
· Christian's sister Yarrow who is dying from cancer and for their mother Iva who at 97 years old lives with cancer but is in stable health.
· Thanksgiving for Patty's mother's improved health.
· Thanksgiving that Zeta has been able to move into her daughter's house.
· An end of gun violence in Portland and in our country.
· The Stanfield and Faulkner families after Carol's sister Paula's recent cancer diagnosis.
· Friend Dana whose son passed away after a drug overdose and the family had to let him go.
· Thanksgiving that COVID vaccines are going up.
· States such as Alaska where the Delta variant is out of control.
· Thanksgiving that Hannah has been transferred to a psychiatric hospital and prayers she can get help there.
· All the dead and missing persons in the intense 10 year old civil war in Syria.
· Our democracy and can we save it.
· Guidance in Germany where Merkel is ending her tenure and appreciation for her leadership.
· Refugees seeking relief from terrible situations.
· Brett's new church, Portsmouth Trinity Lutheran.
“God, in your love, attend our prayers…”
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Poem
Table Blessing, by Jan Richardson
To your table
You bid us come.
You have set the places
You have poured the wine,
And there is always room,
You say,
For one more.
And so we come.
From the streets
And from the alleys
We come.
From the deserts
And from the hills
We come.
From the ravages of poverty
And from the palaces of privilege
We come.
Running,
Limping,
Carried,
We come.
We are bloodied with our wars,
We are wearied with our wounds,
We carry our dead within us,
And we reckon with their ghosts.
We hold the seeds of healing,
We dream of a new creation,
We know the things
That make for peace,
And we struggle to give them wings.
And yet, to your table
We come.
Hungering for your bread,
We come.
Thirsting for your wine,
We come,
Singing your song
In every language,
Speaking your name
In every tongue,
In conflict and in communion,
In discord and in desire,
We come,
O God of Wisdom,
We come.
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Buen Camino! Pastors Brett & Karen Cornwell Fortlander.