Greetings friends!
I look forward to being with you in worship again this Sunday. It will be a time of celebration. I’m sure you are already making plans for your July 4th activities. (And here is another reminder to plan to attend the potluck following the service!) The 4th of July is one of those holidays that just makes us feel good. It highlights the middle of summer. Traditionally communities have come together for parades and celebrations. My father-in-law was born on the 4th. (He always claimed that the fireworks were to honor HIM!) For years, the Snyder home was known for a neighborhood celebration that day. Lots of food…more different salads and desserts than you could count. And there was a wide and diverse group of people who stopped by to share the day. There were family members and neighbors. But there also folks Don worked with. There were guys he had coffee with each day. Lots of folks were drawn together who had no other connection than the fact that Don Snyder was an important part of their lives.
So it’s appropriate that the focal point of our gathering on Sunday should be a meal. And I’m not talking about the potluck. We will be celebrating communion together. And everyone is invited to the table. The communion meal is a reminder that God chose to bring all people together for no other reason than to celebrate the love, grace and forgiveness offered in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We celebrate that we have been set free from anything that has separated us from God and from one another.
That is not a freedom we run up a flagpole. It’s not found in the “ooo’s and ahhh’s” of a fireworks display. It is not a freedom celebrated by beating our chests and pointing out how great we are. It is the celebration of a freedom that has allowed us the possibility of bringing everyone to the table. For 250 years, this country has grown and prospered because folks of all colors and creeds have responded to the invitation to come to the table of freedom.
As you prepare for worship on Sunday and as you prepare for the 4th, remember who you are… whose you are… and who God has called you to be. And then celebrate freedom with a humble sense of the God-given, grace-filled responsibility that goes along with that gift.
See you in church!
Terry