Prayer for Today, Tuesday, November 1

O God our God,

We raise our heads and arms, crying out to You. Come to us in our distress, we pray. We lift up our voices in song and prayer. Come to us, we pray, in our joy. We turn away from You, confident in our own ability to triumph. We pray you will come to us in our arrogance. Our lives are such a mixture of emotions and experiences. Come to us now, we pray. May we feel the embrace of your love, the comfort of Your presence, and the hope of Your grace. In Jesus name. AMEN.

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I received the following email from Tim McAnally:

John,  Please keep my Dad, Ira and my entire family in the prayers. Dad has been in the hospital over a week now. He did not tolerate the chemo treatment for his prostate cancer well and they have successfully treated him for an infection. They are trying to find another facility to prepare him to go home, but he continues to have memory problems and other issues that are not resolving yet. I pray other families that have and will go through this kind of experience have great family and church family support. Thanks to All of You. Tim McAnally

We certainly will keep Ira McAnally and all of his family in our prayers.

Please pray also for Birdene Schoonover and Alta Mae Birkenbile. Birdene is continuing to decline. The Birkenbile family needs our prayers as they decide what course of action to take regarding Alta Mae’s care.

The funeral for Liz Beaty’s mother, Arlene Parson, was last Saturday. Liz is an only child and she is still in Moore with her father. Please keep Liz and her family in your prayers.  

Here are two questions for you to ponder. Why are you a Christian? Why are you a part of Central Christian Church? We need to be able to articulate our answers to both those questions, relating our experience of God in our lives and in our community of faith. Take some time to reflect on these questions and then write out your answers. This isn’t a required assignment, but I would like to read what you write.

REMEMBER: No Sunday School this Sunday, November 4^th. We will all meet in the Fellowship Hall for an All-Church Breakfast and the Extravagant Generosity – Pony Express Kick Off.

The scripture for today is Colossians 1:15-20:

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; ¹⁶for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers—all things have been created through him and for him. ¹⁷He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. ¹⁸He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. ¹⁹For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, ²⁰and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

Grace and peace,

John McLemore