Tuesday, June 20, 2023

Today in the PC-USA Mission Yearbook


The Mission Yearbook for Prayer and Study is a daily devotional with 365 inspiring mission stories that come from next door and all across the globe. It inspires thousands of Presbyterians daily as they uphold the mission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in intercessory prayer.

Contributed Photo
Today in the Mission Yearbook: June 20, 2023

WORLD REFUGEE DAY - You cannot turn on the news these days without hearing about violence and displacement. We live in turbulent times. According to the United Nations, we are witnessing record high numbers of forced displacement and migration — over 100 million globally. The causes are many — civil wars, the rise in autocratic governments who violate human rights with impunity, drug wars and even domestic violence. Natural disasters, too, such as hurricanes, droughts and flooding. And when asked, most migrants will tell you that they have left home for a combination of these factors. Their destinations are often determined by where they have family or friends and the financial resources to get there ...

CLICK HERE to read more.

Monday, June 19, 2023

Burgers & Blessings Continues ... THIS WEEK at Grace Presbyterian-Midland

Image by Laura Up In the Clouds
• Continuing our summer gatherings of faith, fellowship and food

Please join us Wednesdays, during the month of June, at Grace Presbyterian Church, 2801 N. Garfield Street in Midland, Texas. The dinners begin at 6:00 p.m. and are very casual.

Burgers, hot dogs and "the fixings" will be provided by the church; you just come, bring a side dish or dessert, and the gift of your company.

We hope to see YOU there!

C.S. Lewis Daily - Today's Reading

Presented by Bible Gateway
Today's Reading

The problem of reconciling human suffering with the existence of a God who loves, is only insoluble so long as we attach a trivial meaning to the word ‘love’, and look on things as if man were the centre of them. Man is not the centre. God does not exist for the sake of man. Man does not exist for his own sake. ‘Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created’ [Revelation 4:11]. We were made not primarily that we may love God (though we were made for that too) but that God may love us, that we may become objects in which the Divine love may rest ‘well pleased’. To ask that God’s love should be content with us as we are is to ask that God should cease to be God: because He is what He is, His love must, in the nature of things, be impeded and repelled, by certain stains in our present character, and because He already loves us He must labour to make us lovable. We cannot even wish, in our better moments, that He could reconcile Himself to our present impurities—no more than the beggar maid could wish that King Cophetua should be content with her rags and dirt, or a dog, once having learned to love man, could wish that man were such as to tolerate in his house the snapping, verminous, polluting creature of the wild pack. What we would here and now call our ‘happiness’ is not the end God chiefly has in view: but when we are such as He can love without impediment, we shall in fact be happy.

From The Problem of Pain
Compiled in A Year with C.S. Lewis

Today in the PC-USA Mission Yearbook


The Mission Yearbook for Prayer and Study is a daily devotional with 365 inspiring mission stories that come from next door and all across the globe. It inspires thousands of Presbyterians daily as they uphold the mission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in intercessory prayer.

Today in the Mission Yearbook: June 19, 2023

JUNETEENTH - Juneteenth, the official freeing of enslaved people on June 19, 1865, in Texas, is one of the most important events in American history — but most students haven’t even been taught it. Maybe that will change now that Juneteenth is a national holiday.

It makes sense to acknowledge the day when Union troops arrived in Galveston a full 2½ years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation — it is the start to remedying one of this country’s darkest sins ...

CLICK HERE to read more.

Sunday, June 18, 2023

C.S. Lewis Daily - Today's Reading

Presented by Bible Gateway
Today's Reading

Prayer is either a sheer illusion or a personal contact between embryonic, incomplete persons (ourselves) and the utterly concrete Person. Prayer, in the sense of petition, asking for things, is a small part of it; confession and penitence are its threshold, adoration its sanctuary, the presence and vision and enjoyment of God its bread and wine. In it God shows Himself to us.

From The World's Last Night
Compiled in A Year with C.S. Lewis

Today in the PC-USA Mission Yearbook


The Mission Yearbook for Prayer and Study is a daily devotional with 365 inspiring mission stories that come from next door and all across the globe. It inspires thousands of Presbyterians daily as they uphold the mission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in intercessory prayer.

Contributed Photo
Today in the Mission Yearbook: June 18, 2023

OFFICE OF GENDER, RACIAL & INTERCULTURAL JUSTICE - Radical welcome, defined as “the spiritual practice of embracing and being changed by the gifts, presence, voices and power of The Other: the people systemically cast out or marginalized within a church, denomination and/or society,” was the focus of a recent webinar put on by the Presbyterian Mission Agency’s Office of Gender, Racial & Intercultural Justice ...

CLICK HERE to read more.

Saturday, June 17, 2023

C.S. Lewis Daily - Today's Reading

Presented by Bible Gateway
Today's Reading

On God

God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.

From The Problem of Pain
Compiled in Words to Live By

Today in the PC-USA Mission Yearbook


The Mission Yearbook for Prayer and Study is a daily devotional with 365 inspiring mission stories that come from next door and all across the globe. It inspires thousands of Presbyterians daily as they uphold the mission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in intercessory prayer.

Photo by Seven Weeks via Unsplash
Today in the Mission Yearbook: June 17, 2023

INTERFAITH POWER & LIGHT - Interfaith Power & Light, a partner of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), recently held a webinar exploring both the political and the faith-based aspects of the Farm Bill, which expires Sept. 30 and is reauthorized every five years.

Karyn Bigelow, co-executive director of Creation Justice Ministries, put the question directly: Why should faith-based communities care about the Farm Bill, most of which goes to provide food assistance to people who need it, including students? ...

CLICK HERE to read more.

Friday, June 16, 2023

From ServLife International ... "Long Term Hope"


ServLife International is a movement defined by values of God’s kingdom, not programs built around human efforts and activities. The reign and rule of God should be made apparent to every person on the planet, despite their religion, race or socioeconomic status. We believe that issues of justice are inseparable from the good news that Jesus Christ came to proclaim. ServLife exists to take the gospel of Christ and the hope of a better, more just, world to the lives of people we touch. This happens through individual contributions of time, creativity, resources and dreams.



ServLife Photo
Long Term Hope

“We are thankful for the loan, and all the opportunities it has provided.”

Sita, her husband, and their two sons live in a small village in east Nepal. Despite working hard in their past jobs, they have not been able to make enough to provide for their family. Fortunately, Pastor Samuel came to their village and told them about a loan program. Sita shares, “Before receiving a small business loan from ServLife International, each person in my family only had one set of clothing, and we couldn’t afford a place to live. My husband and I were working day and night to build a church in our village, and my husband also worked for an orphanage as a security guard.” Her husband lost his job and became a full-time volunteer at the church where they also live. They have both worked to help the church grow ...

Click here to watch and read all of Sita’s story ... 

Click here to give a gift to help families and our partners in India and Nepal.


Join Our Mission

ServLife International propels reconciliation and justice by building global community to plant churches, care for children and fight poverty. Compelled by the message, life and love of Jesus Christ, we seek to care for the spiritual, physical, social, and economic areas of life in northern India and Nepal.  Learn more about our latest news, featured stories, and how to get involved at servlife.org

Support a Pastor

Our church planters spread
the love of Christ in some of the most difficult
environments in the world.
Support Them ... 

Sponsor a Child

For only $30 per month you can help give a child food, education, care and, most importantly, hope.
Sponsor Now ... 

Fight Poverty

The HOPE Fund, our micro-finance program, provides start-up funds for a small business, paving a way out of poverty for families in need.
Learn More ...




 
 Adam J. Nevins
 Executive Director
 ServLife International, Inc.
 P.O. Box 20596
 Indianapolis, IN 46220
 USA

From @FWMission ... Friday Story: “Hope After Darkness”

Founded in 2001, Free Wheelchair Mission is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to providing wheelchairs for the impoverished disabled in developing nations. Headquartered in Irvine, California, FWM works around the world in partnership with a vast network of humanitarian, faith-based and government organizations, sending wheelchairs to hundreds of thousands of disabled people, providing not only the gift of mobility, but of dignity, independence, and hope.



FWM Photos
Friday Story: “Hope After Darkness

Godfrey lives in a remote town in the mountains of Uganda, seven hours away from the capital city, Kampala. He was born with a disability.

Our distribution partner, Father’s Heart Mobility Ministry, met him when he made his way to a wheelchair distribution at a local church. Without a mobility aid, Godfrey would scoot himself along sideways, with one leg wrapped in plastic bags to protect his many wounds ...

Read the rest of this story ...

C.S. Lewis Daily - Today's Reading

Presented by Bible Gateway
Today's Reading

Lewis, grieving the death of his wife, Joy:

Why has no one told me these things? How easily I might have misjudged another man in the same situation? I might have said, ‘He’s got over it. He’s forgotten his wife,’ when the truth was, ‘He remembers her better because he has partly got over it.’

Such was the fact. And I believe I can make sense out of it. You can’t see anything properly while your eyes are blurred with tears. You can’t, in most things, get what you want if you want it too desperately: anyway, you can’t get the best out of it. ‘Now! Let’s have a real good talk’ reduces everyone to silence. ‘I must get a good sleep tonight’ ushers in hours of wakefulness. Delicious drinks are wasted on a really ravenous thirst. Is it similarly the very intensity of the longing that draws the iron curtain, that makes us feel we are staring into a vacuum when we think about our dead? ‘Them as asks’ (at any rate ‘as asks too importunately’) don’t get. Perhaps can’t.

And so, perhaps, with God. I have gradually been coming to feel that the door is no longer shut and bolted. Was it my own frantic need that slammed it in my face? The time when there is nothing at all in your soul except a cry for help may be just the time when God can’t give it: you are like the drowning man who can’t be helped because he clutches and grabs. Perhaps your own reiterated cries deafen you to the voice you hoped to hear.

From A Grief Observed
Compiled in A Year with C.S. Lewis

Today in the PC-USA Mission Yearbook


The Mission Yearbook for Prayer and Study is a daily devotional with 365 inspiring mission stories that come from next door and all across the globe. It inspires thousands of Presbyterians daily as they uphold the mission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in intercessory prayer.

Contributed Photo
Today in the Mission Yearbook: June 16, 2023

"EARTH CARE" CONGREGATION IN PUERTO RICO - The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) now has its first Earth Care Congregation in Puerto Rico.

Primera Iglesia Presbiteriana en Bayamón is in its first year as an official ECC, which are churches that demonstrate they are active stewards of the Earth by following, tracking and promoting environmentally friendly practices ...

CLICK HERE to read more.

Thursday, June 15, 2023

In the News ... "Let's try something new - how about news of kids on mission trips?"

ARN Photo by Tommy Metthe
• I’m asking the parents of these kids to speak to your event leader and encourage them to contact me

By Carl Kieke, Contributor
Abilene Reporter-News

ABILENE, TEXAS - Many youth groups slow their activities during the summer, making it more difficult to find things to write about. But there is one activity that picks up noticeably during the summer: Church mission trips.

I haven’t really covered that area, since we have a “church page” each week. But these trips don’t usually make it into that page, as it is only once a week and has to cover just about all church-related items.

Putting those two items together, it seems this is a good place to tell our readers about some more things that our “all right” kids are doing with their summer free time ...

read the rest of this ARN report ...

From @austinseminary ... "The Reed" for June 2023

For the glory of God and to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary is a seminary in the Presbyterian-Reformed tradition whose mission is to educate and equip people for ordained Christian ministry and other forms of Christian service and leadership; to employ its resources for the nurture of the church; to practice and promote critical theological thought and research; to engage a range of voices and perspectives within and beyond the life of the seminary; and to be a winsome and exemplary community of God's people.



The State of the Seminary address

ate! The Inauguration for The Reverend Dr. Irizarry, Austin Seminary's tenth president, is scheduled for March 30-31 in Austin, Texas.


President Irizarry shares the highlights from the 2022-23 academic year and points to new directions for the Austin Seminary community.


Education Beyond the Walls
August 18 | "Healing Trauma: Resources for working with immigrants" is a a two-hour workshop to learn about our new video series on Healing Trauma to better prepare you and your congregation to help asylum seekers, immigrants, and refugees in your community.

Location: Austin Seminary campus.

• More Information and registration ....


First Latina scholars bring experience and expertise to faculty openings

The Reverend Patricia Bonilla and The Reverend Crystal Silva-McCormick have been called by the Austin Seminary Board of Trustees to fill faculty positions. Bonilla, a PhD candidate from Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, will teach in the area of Christian education. Austin Seminary alumna Silva-McCormick (MDiv’10), a PhD candidate from the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, will teach in the area of evangelism and missions, beginning with the 2023-24 academic year.

Dean Margaret Aymer said, "We welcome Reverends Bonilla and Silva-McCormick who bring scholarship and ecclesial commitments that strengthen us as we become a seminary that increasingly resembles the global church! In their appointments, these two scholars make history as the first Latina faculty members of Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

Welcome New Austin Seminary Alumni!

The Commencement for the Class of 2023 was held on May 14 with The Reverend Carol Howard Merritt (MDiv’98), pastor of Bedford Presbyterian Church in New York, delivering the Commencement Address to forty-two graduates and their friends and families. It was a joyous occasion and the first under the leadership of President José Irizarry and Dean Margaret Aymer.

• Enjoy scenes from the day by accessing our photo gallery ....

Support Our Students

Your gift to our Annual Fund supports the formation of Christian leaders.

• Click here to support our students... 




Get the latest news from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary in their digital monthly eNewsletter. Features on events, students, faculty, and alumni can be sent directly to your inbox.





In the News ... "How to donate to Anson church fire rebuilding efforts"

ARN Photo by Greg Jakliewicz
• Historic building is a total loss after fire in May

Staff Report
Abilene Reporter-News

ANSON, TEXAS - Two means to donate to the rebuilding of First Methodist Church of Anson have been announced by Bruce Morgan, pastor of the Jones County church that burned [last month].

By mail: Donations can be mailed to First Methodist Church Anson, P.O. Box 744, Anson TX 79501
By bank account: Account No. 20151718 at First National Bank of Anson.
Morgan said an online giving method is being selected and will be announced soon.

A lightning strike during a early Friday evening storm is believed to have started a first that erupted just after 3 a.m. Saturday, engulfing the sanctuary built in 1908.

The historic building is a total loss, with the congregation meeting for now in the fellowship hall of Anson Church of Christ, 1400 Commercial Ave.

First Methodist's education wing was not damaged by fire but sustained smoke and fire damage. When that is addressed, services could return to the church campus.

Morgan said the plan is to rebuild the church, as it was and hopefully with funding aid from the Texas Historic Commission.

C.S. Lewis Daily - Today's Reading

Presented by Bible Gateway
Today's Reading

On Immortality

I think that Resurrection (what ever it exactly means) is so much profounder an idea than mere immortality. I am sure we don’t just “go on.” We really die and are really built up again.

From The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis
Compiled in Words to Live By

Today in the PC-USA Mission Yearbook


The Mission Yearbook for Prayer and Study is a daily devotional with 365 inspiring mission stories that come from next door and all across the globe. It inspires thousands of Presbyterians daily as they uphold the mission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in intercessory prayer.

Contributed Photo
Today in the Mission Yearbook: June 15, 2023

PENTECOST OFFERING - Yuriko Beltran doesn’t ask for much — just an opportunity to change the world.

Which is exactly why the 23-year-old entered the PC(USA)’s Young Adult Volunteer program ...

CLICK HERE to read more.

Wednesday, June 14, 2023

From Outreach Foundation ... "It is illegal to be a Christian in Iran. A Letter From Mark Mueller"



It is illegal to be a Christian in Iran. A Letter From Mark Mueller

God is doing incredible work in the world. This should not surprise us, but sometimes it does

The Outreach Foundation is working more closely with Pars Theological Center in London. Pars trains future pastors and church leaders in the spread of the Gospel in Iran and where Iranians gather. What is unique about Pars? Many of their students return to Iran to continue the flourishing work of Christ amid potentially harsh treatment by the government.

It is illegal to be a Christian in Iran. Imprisonment is possible. Disappearance and death are as well. Yet, God is calling people out of the country to be equipped as Christian leaders to return and form underground house churches.

The result is the church in Iran is one of the fastest growing churches in the world.

You can be a part of this incredible work by supporting Pars throug The Outreach Ministry.

Please consider a Kingdom gift.


Rev. Dr. Mark Mueller

Executive Director
The Outreach Foundation\



Engaging followers of Christ for His work in the world, the Outreach Foundation is committed to helping the church live out its missional calling, building the capacity of the global church, especially where the church is vulnerable or growing rapidly, and transforming lives through mission involvement.

The Outreach Foundation
381 Riverside Drive, Suite 110
Franklin, TN 37064,
United States
(615) 778-8881
info@theoutreachfoundation.org

From Synod of the Sun, PC(USA) ... June 2023 Newsletter"

The Synod of the Sun is is a network of Presbyterians from 11 Presbyteries, approximately 700+ Congregations, in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas. Over 150,000 members of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). The Synod of the Sun of the serves Christ by connecting, equipping, and empowering Presbyterians for Christ's mission within and beyond the Synod's bounds.



Photo by Kyla Hebert
Celebrating Pride Month

In the photo above, a Community of the Servant-Savior Presbyterian Church in Houston celebrates Pride this month through their liturgy and worship. ...

Read more about "Disaster Recovery and the LGBTQIA+ Community" in Kathy Lee-Cornell's blog post ...


Contributed Photo
Welcoming the Sojourners

Siblings in Christ:

Immigration is a global reality/crisis. Though the United States is impacted less than some of our international neighbors, the Synod of the Sun is located strategically for the ministry of Christ to welcome the sojourners, the widows, and the orphans ...

Read more about "Welcoming Sojourners" in this blog post ...

Contributed Photo

Living in Liminal Space: A Conversation Seeking Wisdom on the Way

A Conversation Seeking Wisdom on the Way
On the 2nd and 4th Thursdays of every month at 10:00 am (CT) via Zoom


Susan Beaumont, consultant for churches and author of “How to Lead when You don’t Know Where You are Going” says, “Liminal space is the space between things. Between periods of industry, productivity and growth lay fallow spaces; spaces where untapped potential is lying in wait. In liminal seasons there is a body of work to be done”

Richard Rohr, Franciscan priest and founder of the Center for Contemplation and Actions says, “Liminality is an inner state and sometimes an outer situation where people can begin to think and act in genuinely new ways. It is when we are betwixt and between, have left one room but not yet entered the next room, any hiatus between stages of life, stages of faith, jobs, loves, or relationships. It is that graced time when we are not certain or in control, when something genuinely new can happen. We are empty, receptive, an erased tablet waiting for new words. Nothing fresh or creative will normally happen when we are inside our self-constructed comfort zones, only more of the same. Nothing original emerges from business as usual.”

Liminal spaces are times of transformation – which usually are not short periods of time. They are like cocoons in which a caterpillar emerges as a butterfly. The transition does not happen overnight. These times are evolving days, maybe years between what was and what will be. They are thresholds where we leave one place or way of being and cross over into a new place or way of being....

The Zoom link for each event can be found on the appropriate day on the Synod Calendar at: https://www.synodsun.org/calendar ...

In the News ... "From flames, history rises at Anson church destroyed in fire"

ARN Photo by By Ronald W. Erdrich
'Something there for the future'

By Ronald W. Erdrich, Reporter
Abilene Reporter-News

ANSON, TEXAS - For people of faith, a church is a cornerstone. It serves as a foundation, the first rock from which the character of their lives is defined.

No matter how dark the day, the impenetrable cornerstone remains. If faith remains.

And so it was for the congregants at First Methodist Church after the May 13 fire that destroyed a their 115-year-old church ...

Read the rest of this ARN report ...