Service Highlights or Announcements for this Sunday
Be sure not to miss uplifting new music this week on piano, organ, flute, and guitar as we lift our hearts in praise.
We are currently awaiting approval of our regathering plan from the West District and California Pacific Conference. We are hopeful to be able to provide an outdoor service to a limited number of attendees. Please continue to ready the weekly Buzz email newsletter for details.
Come check out our virtual Gather(ing) via Zoom on Wednesdays at 7 pm. We would LOVE to see you there. Come ready to discuss our scripture passage and raise our voices in song! If you would like the Zoom link, please sign up here.
Reflection of the Week
This week, our “Key to Survival” is God Is with Us.
How often have we asked God, “Why?” When we undergo pain, uncertainty, or when we must simply wait to see what the future holds, our minds race to find any meaning at all in that experience.
Yet, gradually we learn that another question is more essential: “Who?” Who will we rely on? Who will go with us? Who can we talk with? Strangely, we find that a clear understanding is less vital than the support and love that allow us to survive.
This Sunday we arrive at the 8th and final message in our Keys to Survival sermon series! In this final passage from Exodus, Ex. 33:12-23, Moses is blessed to become the only human who is allowed to see God survive. More importantly, God promises that his presence will not leave Moses. Like Jesus’ other name, “Emmanuel,” God is with us, and truly, this is all we need to know.
See you Sunday!
Peace and Health,
Pastor James
Scripture Passages of the Week
Exodus 33:12-23
Moses’ Intercession
12 Moses said to the Lord, ‘See, you have said to me, “Bring up this people”; but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, “I know you by name, and you have also found favour in my sight.” 13Now if I have found favour in your sight, show me your ways, so that I may know you and find favour in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.’ 14He said, ‘My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.’ 15And he said to him, ‘If your presence will not go, do not carry us up from here. 16For how shall it be known that I have found favour in your sight, I and your people, unless you go with us? In this way, we shall be distinct, I and your people, from every people on the face of the earth.’
17 The Lord said to Moses, ‘I will do the very thing that you have asked; for you have found favour in my sight, and I know you by name.’ 18Moses said, ‘Show me your glory, I pray.’ 19And he said, ‘I will make all my goodness pass before you, and will proclaim before you the name, “The Lord”; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. 20But’, he said, ‘you cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live.’ 21And the Lord continued, ‘See, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock; 22and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by; 23then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back; but my face shall not be seen.’
