First Congregational Church of Sutton

    Christmas time is such a magical time of year. People decorate their homes with bright lights, which symbolize the bright light of Christ returning to our world. The malls are full as people purchase gifts for their loved ones, just as the wise men brought gifts to baby Jesus. The Fed-Ex, UPS, and mail-people are all working frantically to deliver our packages on time. We find ourselves making lists, planning ahead, and wrapping presents, and preparing for the big day.  We buy wrapping paper, bows, and tags to put on our presents that will sit proudly under our Christmas trees, for our loved ones. We buy presents for our children, spouses, neighbors, colleague, aunts, uncles, parents, the garbage man and paper-boy.  But where is Jesus' present? Do we purchase a gift for him? Isn't Christmas about His birthday and shouldn't we be offering the babe of Bethlehem a gift or two?

    As I sit here at my desk, I find myself looking over the financial reports for our church. Every Sunday there seems to be more and more people in church, and yet we are still struggling with our finances. Our Sunday School is full of happy, engaged children who are learning the joy of being children of God. But our finances continue to be in the red. Our Junior Youth Group welcomes new members and we have just started a new Senior Youth Group. We have over ten youth in our confirmation class. We have a large number of youth ready and willing to serve the homeless in Boston and to give a week of their summer vacation to help the people in Pennsylvania, again this year. Yet, the number of pledging units is smaller than last year. We have an active adult choir who blesses us with wonderful music each week during worship and who is preparing to fill us with the wonder of Christmas during their concert on December 18th. As a church, we voted for a deficit budget last year, and if I am not mistaken we are even behind on this budget.  The music committee has just started a new chime choir, which will teach people how to read music and allow more members to be involved in the ministry of music, here in our church. But each month it is increasingly more difficult to meet our bills. We simply need more financial resources to complete the ministry God has placed before us. We are blessed to have such and active church. We are blessed to have so many people who are willing to share their time with the church. We are blessed to have a safe place to worship each week and to offer our children a welcoming, loving, and nurturing environment to develop their faith. We are blessed to have each other. But, our blessings also need financial nurturing to grow and multiply.

    As you make your Christmas list this year, I am asking each family to consider making a gift to baby Jesus, by making a financial gift to the church.  Scripture tells us that God loved us so much that God sent us Jesus, to teach us, guide us, and to die on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins. Scripture also tells us that when Jesus returned to the Father, he left his faithful followers the gift of the church to nurture and grow in His name. The wise men brought gifts to the newborn King, now it is our turn to offer the Christ Child our gifts to help His church grow and to help His light shine in our world. Let's all sit down with our families this year to discuss the true meaning of the season and to discuss the gifts we can offer to the Christ Child. The gifts you bring to the Babe of Bethlehem will be true blessings for the King.

Peace,    

 Victoria