NFTH #43
Week of December 26, 2021 – Time for Change
Sunday Service
We concluded the last worship service of 2021 with Pastor Joshua Kuang leading us in reflection on the past year and a Time for Change in the new. Just as with any gift we received over the holidays, we need to know what a gift is and how to use it. We looked at Titus 2:11-14 at the gift of God 🎁, which is the ability to live godly and upright lives with eagerness. The passage teaches us the way to access this gift is through self-examination (seeing ourselves as God see us and who He is shaping us to be), contrition (to feel sorrow over aspects of our lives that God wants us to change), and penance (to make wrong things right).
There are many examples in Scriptures of the kind of change in our lives that we all desire. One is that of the disciple Peter who went from denying Christ three times to embodying the rock that God saw in him. The many depictions of the theme in art falls under the names of denial of St. Peter, repentance of St. Peter, or the confession of St. Peter. Artists must love this theme because it affords them an opportunity to show off their ability for portraiture and emoting a sorrowful face. Paintings of this theme can also often be recognized by the telltale sign of a cock 🐓 in the corner. But the illustration above from an early illuminated devotional manuscript shows neither Peter’s face or a rooster. It uses none of the dramatic lighting or close-up perspective in later paintings to manipulate emotion. Instead, it shows a man like any other in a moment of recognition, facing something in himself that he regrets and loathes. What remains is a person well in age but still with new things to learn about himself and still with the possibility of change. That is the gift of God—that we may become stones on which He can build his kingdom with and on. Here’s to a new year and a renewed you!
Worship songs 🎶 this week: In Christ Alone / There is No One Like You / Glory to Glory
📢 Announcements
This week, we are pleased to welcome newcomers 🎉: John and his brother visiting with their parents.
We are starting off the new year by having daily meditations as a congregation. You can access the meditations (M-F) at bit.ly/rhcccdevos
If you want to sign up for a weekly reminder sent to your phone, you can text “@RHCCCDEVO” to the number 81010. There are some questions they ask before you are signed up for our weekly reminders.
This Saturday we will be hosting a workshop for our upcoming college graduates about Life After College. Let us keep them in our prayers as the prepare to finish one chapter of their lives and to begin another!
Last week, our Christmas Eve service was focused on the theme: the Coming of Jesus. Our worship team had divided the night into three parts. The first part was focused on Jesus’ birth, how he came into our world. The second part fast forwards to us and our own lives in the present day. Lastly, we sang about the future, that Jesus is to come again, not as a baby in a manger, but as a King riding victorious, bringing an end to all that oppose his goodness and truth here on earth.
The Second Hour
Join us for Sunday School, the second hour, or whatever you would like to call it!
Our Middle School Group meets at 11:30am and is taught by Jacob.
Our High School Group meets at 11:30am and is taught by Vincent and Connor.
These Sunday Schools are elective and open to everyone College and above.
Paul and Gracemeets at 11:30am in the Library. It will be taught by Jason and Josh.The Book of Actsmeets at 11:30am in Room 104. Different leaders will take turns teaching this course.
Fellowships
Our Candlelight Fellowship 🕯️is for 6th-8th graders. It meets on Friday nights at 7:30pm and is led by Pastor Emmanuel.
Our Footwasher Fellowship 👣 is for high schoolers. It meets on Friday nights at 7:30pm and is led by Pastor Josh.
Our College & YA Fellowship meets on Friday nights at 7:30pm and is led by Elder Soon Teck.
Our Adult Fellowship meets on Friday nights at 7:30pm and is led by Jason and Cindy.
Our Married Couples Fellowship meets every other Saturday at 7:00pm. The previous meeting was on March 6. It is led by Tim Yang.
Our Women’s Ministry meets seasonally. For more information, please contact rhcccwomenministry@gmail.com.
The Church at Large
On this day in the year 1925, the silent film Ben Hur, based on Lew Wallace’s novel of the time of Christ, opens at the George M. Cohan Theater in New York City and receives rave reviews.
On this day in the year 1944, a Clerical “Error” Freed Corrie Ten Boom from Nazi Prison.
Not ready for Christmas 🎄 to be over? Keep Christmas going by thinking about Santa’s 🎅 origin and how bad he is at zoology 🦌, how the Magi from the East know and a poem/song for Christmas Day.
Are you in the habit of doing year end reviews and setting some goals for the new? What questions do you ask or what guides do you follow to reflect on the past and orient the future? Please comment below!