Covenant Update

Dear Covenant Family:

Like last Sunday, today was another grateful day at Covenant with 28 folks in attendance at our Sunday service!  The only health update we had on church members was that Betty Arnette is still in North Florida Regional Hospital, and they have still not diagnosed her medical issue.  Marilyn Bishop also asked for prayers for both her brother and sister who are in rehab programs in Gainesville.  Let’s continue to pray for all our members and friends and their families as they go through their difficult times.

Our local ministry for December is the Helping Hands Clinic, run out of First United Methodist church downtown.  Carl Romey got us involved with this ministry which he has been very close to for a long time.  Its mission is to improve the physical and mental well-being of the homeless and poor by delivering comprehensive health care, sensitizing providers to the special needs of the poor and engaging the community in meaningful contribution.  Helping Hands is a group of volunteer health professionals who have provided free healthcare to the poor and/or homeless for over 30 years. The clinic is staffed by social workers, registered nurses, advanced registered nurse practitioners, physicians, and community service volunteers. 140 people in all! Over the years, there have been over 50,000 visits with over 12,000 individuals seeking care.  Half of those served are homeless, ranging from months to decades on the streets.  Please contribute to this important local mission if you can to support the poor and homeless in our community.

The title of Pastor Don’s sermon today was “How Grateful are you?”  He began by telling the story of a woman who grew up in Gainesville and whose family was one of the early families to join Tower Road Baptist Church, a church that Don started many years ago.  The girls parents were killed in a plane crash when she was only 8 years old, and her growing up period was very difficult and challenging for her.  She recently returned to Gainesville and visited with Don and Diane.  While here, she had a number of things darken her life again while here.  Yet Don said all she talked about was thanking God, and how would God continue to bless her moving forward!

How many people do we know whose lives are consumed by themselves, that as soon as they face any adversity, they fall apart?  Instead, as Pastor Don told us, gratitude is an attitude of the heart!  We need to trust God to resolve our issues because He will, although maybe not as quickly as we would like sometimes. 

Don’s scripture was John 9:18-23, about the family that could not acknowledge to the Jewish religious teachers that their son’s sight was restored by Jesus.  They were more caught up in the “legalism” of the church which criticized Jesus for “disobeying” the law than they were for being grateful that their son’s vision was restored.

Pastor Don ended with a question for us – Are you living a life of joy, being grateful for everything you have been given?  How you answer this question could impact your eternal life!

Note the two quotes included in the attached church bulletin both dealing with having a grateful heart!  Finally, near the end of the service, Bill Mercado gave Tina a message which she read before we ended.  It was titled Count Your Many Blessings and read:

Count your blessings instead of your crosses; count your gains instead of your losses.

Count your joys instead of your woes; count your friends instead of your foes.

Count your smiles instead of your tears; count your courage instead of your fears.

Count your full years instead of your lean; count your kind deeds instead of your mean.

Count on God instead of yourself.

Anonymous

Then tonight we all gathered again at Covenant Church for our renewed Thanksgiving dinner.  We had about 65 church members and their families attend, and Covenant provided 4 fried turkeys and 2 hams, dressing and drinks.  Our members each brought their favorite dish and we were swamped with vegetables, salads, and desserts.  Everyone got all they wanted to eat and many folks took home carryout dinners for themselves or their neighbors.  It was indeed a great day and night for Covenant Church, and it seemed that everyone was grateful for the fellowship time together both this morning and tonight.

Have a blessed, safe, peaceful and grateful week of giving thanks!!!!!

Ron