Covenant Update

Dear Covenant Family:

Today was a good day at Covenant, with 31 folks attending our service.  There were a few important announcements made at church, so I want to make sure you get them all:

• Next Sunday, Covenant will hold its Annual Thanksgiving Dinner, beginning at 5 PM.  Covenant will provide turkey and ham, dressing, and drinks.  Each member is asked to bring their favorite vegetable, salad, or dessert.  Please feel free to bring family and friends with you, we will have food for all. 
• The annual decorating Covenant for Christmas will take place on Monday, November 21, at 10 AM.  [Note, this date has been changed from next Tuesday to Monday to accommodate a conflict we learned about only after church today.]  Anyone who would like to help decorate can attend.
• Because Christmas Day falls on Sunday this year, Covenant has decided that we will have a Christmas Eve service, time to be determined, but then will not have a service on Christmas Sunday, so members can spend that time with their families.
• This will be the third consecutive year Covenant Church will hold its Annual Business Meeting immediately following the church service on Sunday, December 11,.  This meeting is held each year to approve the new year’s budget and to affirm Trustee membership as needed.  This year we will also have a vote on approving a capital budget expenditure for next year.  We hope all members will stay for the meeting.

Our prayer request list continued for Tina Floyd who is still recovering from a broken hip in rehab.  The good news is she is expected to go home sometime this coming week.  Becky Alexander had a prayer request for her aunt (Bill Mercado’s sister) and uncle who were in a serious car accident in Puerto Rico where they live.  The area they live in does not have the needed medical expertise needed for their serious injuries so they are being transferred to a larger hospital on a different island.  Please keep Tina and Becky’s aunt and uncle in your prayers.  We also had a prayer blessing in that Carl and Shirley Romey were in church today after their safe and successful 18-day trip to Brazil to revisit good friends there. 

Pastor Don titled his sermon today The Great Confusion.  The scripture for this sermon began with a brief reference to Romans 2, but the main focus was on Romans 12.  Don reminded us that in Romans 2 Paul is telling the Romans that God makes his intentions for how we are expected to live our lives very clear and yet many people choose a different direction than God desires for us.  We can choose to have it “our way” but we will pay the price at God’s final righteous judgment.  Pastor Don then shifts to Romans 12 for the main part of his sermon, in which Paul reminds us of God’s way, that God cares for all of us, and that He wants everyone to seek His redemption.  Chapter 12 describes for us how to be “Living Sacrifices to God”.  I strongly suggest you read chapters 2 and 12 in the book of Romans for the ways to live your life and just as important, for the ways to avoid living, if you want to have a godly life.

Don then summarized the five specific ways He wants us to live our lives in His service:

Point #1 – We are to be a help to each other! 

Point #2 – We need to care about one another! 

Point #3 – Be Prayerful!  

Point #4 – Give yourself, your time, and your heart to others! 

Point #5 – Forgive others! 

I wish you all a blessed week!

Ron