Stew! Stew! Stew!

As usual, two times this year we embarked upon the great Stew Sale!

In October, we set up three pots and made 958 quarts, and in November (last week), we set two pots and made 637 quarts. With a combined total of 1,595 quarts and a 100% sale ratio, we made approximately $13,000!

This is grounds for celebration, but the greater celebration is the witness of love and dedication by all who volunteered their time and labor to the event. With Katherine Earls as our fearless leader and Don Lafoon as our Stew Master, our October Stew went off without a hitch. We had a full complement of volunteers at all stations, and I can confidently say “good times were had by all.”

Our November sale, with Katherine at the helm, ushered in Vanessa Preston as our new Stew Master. As with any new experience, Vanessa was under a lot of pressure, but with some help from Chris Harlow and the goodwill and excitement of all present, the efforts were multiplied, and November’s Stew was a rousing success!

Special Thanks goes to Katherine who worked tirelessly from “get the word out” to “hand the stew out,” from start to finish. I also want to note that we were blessed by added volunteers from the Wednesday Night Men’s Bible Study, who attended both the 4-7 am and the 7-10 am shifts at both stews! That’s a time (and air temperature) that nobody wants, but from which everyone benefits when a handful of hearty souls say yes. Indeed, I know a lot more about chicken and cooking temps than I ever thought I would in my lifetime, and the stew simply couldn’t happen without the labor of those earliest, darkest hours.

What a joy it was to gather as Creator Family and Creator Friends to work together. So much thanks goes out to all who helped sell the Stew and work at all levels of the cooking events. Your caring service to God at Creator was a powerful witness, and as one person was overheard to say, “This is the kind of Church I would like to join.” 

God bless you all.
​
Fr. Bill+
​

As the opening of Oak Tree Christian Montesorri School draws near, we would like to share this letter again from Karri Messina, its founder.

Meet the family behind Oak Tree Christian Montessori School!
Hi There! I’d like to briefly introduce you to Team Messina. Mike, Kaedance (19), Koen (16) and me, Karri. Mike and I met at a masquerade ball, a singles event at our church, in 2001 and married in 2003 at Deep Run Park in Henrico County. A year later we moved to Hampton Roads, (from Catonsville MD) familiar territory for Mike since he grew up in Portsmouth, Va. It wasn’t long before we became young parents and were co-leading a Young Marrieds’ Ministry where we had the honor of studying the Bible and raising our babies with many newlywed couples who were in the Navy. The summer before Koen went into kindergarten (2014), we moved back to my hometown of Mechanicsville, where I worked for two years as a school-age director at The Goddard School, a child care center behind Mechanicsville High School. Wanting to spend more time with my own children, I decided to launch a part-time business called Handy Treasures: The Mobile Pottery Studio in 2017. I traveled to numerous summer camps, recreation programs, scouting events, and church groups hosting pottery and clay events with my children in tow! Now that my children are more independent and are starting their own adventures, I asked God to give me new direction as well. I had a 23 year off-and-on again prayer that I dared to pray - for God to grant me the opportunity to start a Montessori school - not for my own glory, only for His - it would be His school for His children!

I was brought to tears when Father Bill called and told me that Church of the Creator would be open to hosting Oak Tree Christian Montessori. I’ve been supervising and educating children almost my entire life and now more than ever I understand how critical it is to reinforce the Christian morals and practices some parents are striving to instill in their children. Since graduating JMU many moons ago, I’ve worked at five Montessori schools, two public schools, a private Christian school, Goddard, offered inhome childcare services while being a stay-at-home-mom for seven years, and even started babysitting neighborhood children when I was in the sixth grade! With this array of experience, my hope is to create a learning environment that will make my Father in Heaven proud and meet a unique educational need for young families in our local community. 

Oak Tree Christian Montessori’s Vision: To provide an exciting one room, multi-age learning environment for children 3-6 years of age with a Christian worldview using Montessori materials. Our educational philosophy asserts that children are naturally eager for knowledge and capable of initiating their learning in a supportive, loving, thoughtfully prepared environment. Our approach values the human spirit and the development of the whole child- spiritual, physical, social, emotional, and cognitive. Besides the core academic areas, we will emphasize care of the classroom environment, nature, and oneself; grace and courtesy; and an appreciation for the arts. Students at OTCM will learn in a peaceful environment that encourages each child to work independently and fosters internal curiosity as motivation to learn. OTCM will run through May, Monday – Friday, from 9 am - 1:30 pm.

Giving Tuesday and Christian Stewardship
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Originally called the  Young Men's Hebrew Association (YMHA) founded in 1874, the “92nd Street Y”, as it known today, is a juggernaut of cultural offerings and community service. In 2012 community advocates at the 92nd Street Y, in response the takeover of Thanksgiving (our only "purely national" holiday) by the rampant commercialization of Black Friday and Cyber Monday, initiated a local giving campaign urging people to give back instead of spending more. They called it “Giving Tuesday,” celebrated on first Tuesday after Thanksgiving.

Since 2012, Giving Tuesday has become a separate organization from the 92nd Y with participants all over the world. In 2022, single day donations to charitable organizations topped $3.1 billion dollars! In the wake of the spending frenzy of late November, Giving Tuesday encourages introspection and awareness of the greater need, and of our participation in our world.

Why have people given so much money on a single day? Why does it take an established organization and a (let's face it) commercial campaign to rouse such philanthropy? The answers to these question are found in the two prior “celebration” days, "Black" Friday and "Cyber" Monday. Surely there are those who wait for these days to save on much-needed resources for the greater good, but the majority of expenditures are on the self.

Black Friday and Cyber Monday stand in stark contrast to our innate sense of inclusion and connectedness. God has made us to be in relationship with God first and each other second. There is no other model. Even in this--and perhaps especially in this time of national division--people do not stand alone. We seek out like-minded people to share our concerns, passions, obsessions, and delusions precisely because we were created to be together. That innate drive to share and care drives us no matter what we believe or how we worship, we were made this way for a reason.

God’s purpose was love. Look at John 3:16, one of our much beloved Advent verses. God loved us so much, He gave His only begotten Son to the end that all who believe in him shall not perish but have ever lasting life. The action of God to give God’s self to us is relational and the living example we were meant to embody. Giving Tuesday offers the secular world a way of excising the need to give amidst the drum beat of accumulation. A single special day was created to do that which we are made to do always.

Every faculty you have, your power of thinking or of moving your limbs from moment to moment, is given you by God. If you devoted every moment of your whole life exclusively to His service, you could not give Him anything that was not in a sense His own already. – C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

The biblical doctrine of stewardship defines our (all humans) relationship to God. It identifies God as owner and us as managers. God makes us His co-worker in administering all aspects of our life. The apostle Paul explains it best by saying, “For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building” (1 Corinthians 3:9). Starting with this concept, we are then able to accurately view and correctly value not only our possessions, but, more importantly, human life itself. In essence, stewardship defines our purpose in this world as assigned to us by God Himself. It is our divinely given opportunity to join with God in His worldwide and eternal redemptive movement. Stewardship is not God taking something from us; it is His method of bestowing His richest gifts upon His people.

Christian Stewardship is a responsive act which embodies gratitude to God. It is not a single day, month, season, or year; it is an integrated part of who and what we are by the God to whom we belong. Stewardship is about exercising our God-given dominion over His creation (Genesis 1), reflecting the image of our creator God in His care, responsibility, maintenance, protection, and beautification of His creation.

When we hear the word stewardship, we mostly think our commitment to our local parish and our faithfulness in paying God’s tithes and offerings, but it is much more than that. You have heard this before, stewardship is how we manage our time, our talent, and possessions. Money is one of our possessions. Money is just a part of Stewardship, and Stewardship is our obedient witness to God’s sovereignty. Stewardship means that we fully acknowledge we are not our own but belong to Christ, the Lord, who gave Himself up for us.

Christian financial stewardship means our money is seen as being God's money. At the 8 a.m. service after the alms basin has been brought to the Altar, these words of acknowledgement are spoken: All things belong to you, O Lord, and of thine own have we given you. All we have is from God and belongs to God. We are called as His disciples, to use it for God's purposes and glory. We did not receive God's grace so that we might own more, but that we would be set free to praise God with all that we have.

The mission of the church, in part, is the proclamation and education of God’s truth to God’s people. The church is the presence of belief and faith of people in community with God and each other. The church is the palpable invitation to those who do not know to the saving grace of Jesus Christ. You are the church.

We gather together here at Creator to do all these things and to take them out into the world. We decide how we are going to this as faithful followers of Christ. Our ability to do these things is a result of our desire to give to God for the purposes of God, reflected in our purposeful giving.
This Sunday we will collect pledge cards for 2025. Our financial support of Creator’s mission and ministry is an extension of our gratitude to God and our desire for God’s grace to be spread. Please bring your pledge card this Sunday and place it in the alms basin, or you may mail it or drop it off at the Church office. Or you may use the online giving portal. Gratefully, purposefully, and prayerfully is how I ask for you to consider your support.

Therefore, be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for you, an offering and a sacrifice to God. (Ephesians 5:1-2) 
 
One steward among many,
Fr. Bill†

     For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that He died for us all, therefore, in Him, all died.  And He died for all, that those who live in Him should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died for them and was raised again.
     So from now on we regard no one according to the flesh, because we once regarded Christ in this way, so we do so no longer.    2 Cor. 5:14-16

     I was with a homeless man a little while ago, searching for ways to help him. I thought about finding him a place to live, a job, clothes, food, all the regular things we identify as a way of helping a person in need. I thought about the power these things have over our lives and how important they are to living. I made a list and formulated a plan of action and thought about the money I would need to do it. I thought about the money and the true power which comes from having it, and I grew sad because I didn’t have enough. It was then, in prayer, that I was reminded that money is power, but not true power—at least not for Christians. We know that true power lives in love, in the spirit, and in wisdom. I was reminded that all things are possible for God and that it was in giving of myself that I could truly help.

     We are so inundated by information that compels us to isolate, not just now in the midst of our “quarantine,” but before this and for a while now. I have even heard “we are better off alone,” (or some such phrase) creep into conversations as a justification for not helping, or caring about someone else, but that is lie—we are not better off. We are all God’s people. Jesus lived and died for us all, and true life—what we call power—is found in Him and through the Holy Spirit, in each of us. Wisdom is the ability to see beyond the information, around the conflict, through the isolation, and recognize the face of God. We may be separated, but we are all one in Christ Jesus our Lord!

     I love the song-hymn, As the Deer, based on Psalm 42. I encourage you to watch the first video and read along with the singing. Pray for a moment after, then play the second video.

     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rrXC5uKVb4

     Now pray now for the Holy Spirit to open, guide and fill your spirit with love and hope.

     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnIYWKfW74E

     For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.       Gal. 3:27-28
                                                                                                                                                                       AMEN.

​Greeting Brothers and Sisters.

Most of you know that I am devotee of C. S. Lewis. Lewis was blessed by God in so many ways to speak to the core issues of our faith and relationship with God. I frequently listen to his books while driving and at home. Some of his books have been recorded multiple times and by different studios, so I find I am further blessed by the variety of voices from the different speakers hired to read his writings. This is a good thing, since Lewis wrote in an earlier time in British English, and at times is a bit difficult to understand. I have found that, while I may like one reader better than another, I am edified by listening to different readers read the same thing. This practice of listening to different readers has served me well as I try to comprehend what Lewis is saying, but it is also a wonderful practice to use when trying to understand the self.

Below I have included three links to a beautiful hymn song, You Raise Me Up. I have found that while listening to these different voices praise God through song, I am humbled and raised up in profound and wonderful ways. I pray that you hear the voice of God speaking to you and hear God’s presence in unique and powerful ways.

  《You Raise Me Up》
             https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeUJ4Y-XOeY

  You Raise Me Up (with lyrics) - Selah
             https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DorNUsi5LE&list=RD5bcjzhZwOIE&index=2

  Josh Groban - You Raise Me Up **Lyrics** 
             https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyEokxi2hWY