No More Distractions

15th Sunday after Pentecost
Just these lines, my friends …

… to say thank you to Pastor Paul, Pastor Jenny, and all our staff community as well as our many volunteers in their excellent leadership in worship on Labor Day Weekend Sunday. If you missed being in worship or Pastor Paul’s message, you can click here to view one of our worship services.

The Town of Matthews and our parking lots were full all weekend with Matthews Alive. A very special thank you to our volunteers making themselves available to offer a hospitable lemonade welcome to the community through our building and parking lots…22 volunteers served 670 cups of lemonade! Labor Day Weekend is always a special time in the Town of Matthews.

Have you been able to sign up for my Wednesday evening Fall study, The Good and Beautiful Life? We’ll be reading through James Bryan Smith’s book by the same title. Smith says, “We have bought into false notions of happiness and success. These self-centered decisions lead us further into the vices that cause ruin: anger, lust, lying, worry and judging.” He continues, “Eventually we find ourselves living in a beautifully packaged life of self-destruction.” All through the fall, following the Sermon on the Mount, we’ll look behind these character notions and replace our false beliefs with Jesus’ narratives about life in the kingdom of God. I do hope you can join me on Wednesday evenings (September 13 through November 15) from 6:30 pm to 8:00 pm in The Commons. There is also an online option on Tuesday evenings led by Connor Johnson. You can sign up for either by clicking here.

Wednesday Devotional

In Matthew 22, Jesus is asked what is most important. I hope you’ll take a few minutes to watch my devotional for the week where Jesus encourages us to let nothing get in the way. I’m using the title, No More Distractions.

Campus Upgrades

As you make your way to church the next few weeks, you’ll notice some work being done on the Welcome Center near the Sanctuary. We’ve wanted to refurbish that space for a long while. In addition, on Christmas Day of last year, you’ll remember we had a frozen pipes episode that left us with six inches of water in the Sanctuary and throughout our hallways. We have finally settled the details with insurance and are preparing for new carpet and flooring for our main hallways. It will be a fresh new look. The majority of that work will occur from October 9 – October 20. That means Sunday, October 15, ALL of our regular worship services will be in the Gym. In the meantime, we apologize for the inconvenience.

Upcoming Opportunities

• Potato Drop Prep: This Sunday in the Courtyard – Stop by to tie a bag for next month’s Community Serve Event where 40,000 lbs of potatos will be bagged in our parking lot & delivered to help fight hunger in our community. Details
• Teen-A-Palooza: This Sunday, September 10, 5:00-7:30 pm. All the info here!
• Explore Church Membership at Meet the Pastors: This Sunday, September 10, 3:00-4:30 pm. Membership classes (A Disciple’s Path) Sundays, Sept 17 – Oct 5, 8-9:15 pm. Register here.
• Seasoned to Perfection (STP) resumes Tuesday, September 12! Schedule & other info here.
• MUMC Golf Outing: Thursday, September 21. Click here for more info & to register.
• Endowment Celebration Dinner: Thursday, September 28. Purchase tickets here.
• New Studies: Singles in Scripture, Faithful & Inclusive, The Good and Beautiful Life (In Person & Intergenerational Online Study), Luke: Gut-Level Compassion, and The Anxiety Opportunity. View all opportunities.

This Sunday in Worship

We invite you to join us this Sunday at 8:15 am (Traditional; in person only), 9:30 am (Contemporary; in person or online here), 9:30 am (Family Worship in the Gym), 11:00 am (Traditional; in person or online here) or 12:30 (Spanish; in person or on demand here).

In our Spanish-speaking CCH community, Pastor Roldan will continue the worship series, Maintaining Family Unity and Sanity. He will be preaching from I Samuel 2:18-20 and his sermon is titled, Let’s Have the Right Priorities.

Join us in Family Worship (9:30 in The Gym) for an action-packed service for the whole family focused on our monthly virtue of Harmony. Music, games, skits and activities will help remind us that we can “Use our words and actions to show others we care”, based on the scripture from Proverbs 17:17, “A friend loves at all times. They are there to help when trouble comes.” Join us afterwards in The Commons for a cup of coffee/juice and snacks, and enjoy a special activity that can be shared with a friend.

In our morning Sanctuary services, we will begin our new fall worship series, Pathways to Discipleship. To live into our faith and values, we need to bring intentionality and purpose to every day. This is our way of creating tangible habits that support our heart’s intentions. In these weeks we’ll wrestle with biblically rooted, time tested core practices for people seeking to do life in the Way of Jesus. John Wesley, the founder of our Methodist movement calls these purposeful actions, the means of grace.

My sermon for Sunday, The Pathway of Prayer, examines the pathway of persistent, purposeful, powerful prayer. Might you consider inviting someone to church looking for purpose and intentionality in their own life? They won’t find pious, glib, easy answers, but they will find honesty and authenticity.

And now, as always, during these strange, uncertain, and hopeful days, remember … God does God’s best work in moments like this.

We are better … together,
Dr. Charles (Chuck) W. Wilson II