Dear St. Paul's Family,
This week many of you have been reviewing the opportunity to make a pledge to the budget giving of St. Paul's. Your commitment card represents more than "good budgeting practices" by our congregation. The primary purpose in the commitment cards is to enable all of us to consecrate to the Lord our resources, including financial, with which we have been gifted.
When God gives us the gifts and talents which enables us to gainful employment, wages, vocation, we are invited to shape our hearts in such a way that we realize that our hiring, our job itself, is a gift from the Lord. It is He who has blessed with the "right stuff" to qualify for the job we have. Now, he asks us to invest those gifts of talent, employment, and finances, in such a way that we might contribute to life in general, multiplying the beauty and fruitfulness of Life. When we live by faith we do not work for income. When Christ is Lord our labor is not just about me and providing for ourselves. Christian labor is all about investing our gifts into this life, in this moment, in our city.
Thus, your commitment card serves as the way whereby you can clearly and decisively let Jesus know that you are investing the fruit of your labor as seeds in the mission of Christ through St. Paul's into this year and our city.
So, remember, you are giving to the Lord, to the multiplying of Beauty and Fruitfulness. You are giving to the mission of Jesus Christ which is embodied by the ministries of St. Paul's. Truly, God has been faithful. Now, we multiply his faithfulness to us as our faithfulness to St. Paul's and the Northeast Heights. God sent children as his solutions to so many deep challenges in the life of his people. A child is a slow journey to a solution. It takes years. It involves waiting. But, waiting is a good thing. It shapes us around the promise that the child brings.
When Christ is Lord our labor is not just about me and providing for ourselves. Christian labor is all about investing our gifts into this life, in this moment, in our city.
We are not waiting on a solution - we are waiting on a promise, we are invested in the future beauty and possibilities that this child will bring. Invest in the promise of what God is beginning here at St. Paul's. Invest in the surprises Christ is preparing to perform right here. Give to the Lord.
Great is His Faithfulness!
Feed 100: Christmas Mission to the St. Paul's Neighborhood (see article in this newsletter)
I hope you will join in this rich vision of our Dinner Church Team, as we begin to develop a new "posture" toward the immediate neighborhood of St. Paul's. 99% of the students at our Elementary School (Bellehaven), qualify for free or reduced breakfast and lunch. We know that there are dozens of families in our neighborhood that are going hungry.
Our "Feed 100" Christmas Mission is a bold vision to connect with new persons in our neighborhood. I hope you will seize the chance to make a difference!
