Communion Statement Christmas Day 2016

On this Christmas Day, we celebrate the birth of a baby in the lowliest circumstances.  Born away from home in a stable, our Savior makes clear that material wealth is not his starting point.  Love is, a mother's love, a step-father's love.  Grown, Jesus' message is simple.  Love God and love people.On this Christmas Day, we need only obey Jesus command to love.

I was a Deist for many years, but today I believe in Jesus, God Incarnate, God in the flesh.  I started out on a Christian path to belief.  I was baptized as a baby in the Presbyterian Church thanks to the beliefs of my Presbyterian-Christian Scientist grandmother.  Later, I was dunked in a Baptist Church thanks to my Southern Baptist mother.  Unfortunately, that church destroyed my blossoming faith.  I walked away from Christianity as a teenager firmly believing that no intelligent person could be a Christian.

I was an adult holding a doctorate in chemistry before I found God in Jesus and intellectual challenge in Christianity.  I joined a liberal Baptist church that promptly split. With a dozen or so others, we started a new church.  The first Sunday, there were 60 people present.  Now it is a congregation of six thousand.  Over time, I found I was no longer in tune with the beliefs of that very vibrant, but theologically conservative, church.

I left and spent a year never going to church, but studying and contemplating my faith.  Eventually, I realized I needed a church home. God's grace led me to Central Christian.  Here I am accepted, just as any of you searching for a church home would be accepted.

My church is a Christian Church (Disciples of  Christ). We are part of a denomination that started in the United States in the early 1800's.  Our founders were Scottish immigrants who wished to break down denominational barriers.  Our church welcomes all who accept Jesus the Christ as their Savior, a Savior who as a child was refugee fleeing with his parents into Egypt. 

We are here on this Christmas Day to take Communion.  Disciples celebrate Communion every time we worship.  Everyone is invited to the Table because it is not our Table, it is the Lord's Table.  Jesus opens his arms to everyone to come and be one with him. 

God and people meet at the Table and something happens.  At the Table, we touch eternity. At the table, God gives love, forgiveness, acceptance and we receive.  In prayer we go to God.  In Communion, God comes to us.  We are not learning something, or remembering something, but doing something–we are meeting God.

(The last paragraph is adapted from A Communion Meditation by Myron J. Taylor.)

Invitation to Communion January 11, 2015

Join us in Communion
Also know as  the Lord's Supper.

"We welcome all to the Lord's Table

As God has welcomed us."

The Scripture from Mark describing Jesus baptism

Introduces us
To all three members of the Trinity,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Some have said that when Christians

Have a hard time understanding
An aspect of their faith.

They slap a label on it

And put it on a shelf.

The Trinity is such a concept

That is hard to get one's mind around.

To make the Trinity more understandable

Think of the Creator as

"I am,"
As he named himself to Moses.

Jesus is God in action,
The Word.

The Holy Spirit is the Love

That binds the Creator to the Word. 

So the Trinity

becomes

I Am Love in action.
Now join the Three-in-One

And take the cup and bread. 

Christmas Invitation to Communion

I come to invite you to join us

In Communion.

Our statement of identity says that:

"We are Disciples of Christ

A movement for wholeness

In a fragmented world.

As part of the one body of Christ,

We welcome all to the Lord's Table

As God has welcomed us."

When I think of Christmas,

The baby in the manger,

I am not surprised that we all love this holiday

Despite its commercialization and too often, frantic pace.

We remember that

God came as a baby.

We  can hold a baby.  We could hold God.

I think deep within in each of us
Is the desire to be in control.

God as a baby gives us control

And sets Christmas in a special place.

But Christmas leads us to Easter,

And a Savior who did not conquer by might

But became the Lamb of God,

A living sacrifice,

Out of our control.

When we take the bread and wine,

We follow Jesus' command:
"Do this in remembrance of me."

In Communion,
God is in control.

I feel at peace with myself

When I take the bread and cup

And know that I do God's will.

That now the Christ holds me.

Join us at the Lord's Table.

Let Jesus cradle you.