Welcome to St. John's Episcopal Church, Fort Worth, Texas

Joshua - "The Lord is Salvation."

2011-09-05T19:41:00.001-05:00

On Wednesday, Sept 7, 2011 at 7:00 pm we will start Bible Study. We will begin with the Book of Joshua. The name "Joshua" in Hebrew means "the Lord is salvation."

Under Joshua's leadership the people of God gained control of the Promised Land. The Book of Joshua provides a theological outline of the conquest of the Promised Land.

Join us!

Creating “the form” and filling “the void.”

2011-08-04T07:35:00.003-05:00

Genesis 1:1-2 makes a peculiar statement. It says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 And the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep;”. Have you ever considered how God created the "form” and filled the "void?”

Let’s look at each of these words, 'form" and "void."

Taking a close look at the first chapter of Genesis we can see that the Holy Spirit provides an ingenious literary structure. The six days of creation are divided into two sets of three days.

In the first three days, God created forms;

In the second three days God filled the forms.

There also must be noted a deliberate correspondence between days one and four; two and five; three and six. Now, let's look at all of this more carefully.

Creating the Form
In the first three days God created “form.” What is "form"?

Time: On the first day, God separated light from darkness, creating day and night, and thus time.

Space: On the second day, God created sea and sky, thus He was marking divisions of space.

Life: On the third day, God created the dry land and filled it with all vegetation, which was the beginning of biological life.

Filling the Void
In the second three days God “filled” the void in the following way:

“Rulers” of time: “Time” is given Order. There is a rule and cycle to time. On the fourth day, God created the stars, the sun, and the moon to “rule” or give order and method to the day and night and to mark the seasons and days and years. This “filled” time in this way to help us know that “time” has purpose and meaning.

“Rulers” of space: On the first day, God created sea creatures and birds to fill the sea and sky. Life occupies space.

“Rulers” of life: On the sixth day, God created the animals and humans to fill the dry land.

In the six days God laid a sure and lasting foundation. He established in this His Natural Law which remains firm and absolute to this very day. This is God's "Divine Design" that is the fabric of His unshakeable faithfulness to His covenantal promises to us and all creation.

As believers we stand upon this sure and lasting foundation. We build our life and help build society upon God’s sure and lasting foundation. This is the very DNA of creation.

God rested on the Seventh Day, and made this Day holy. The Seventh Day, or Sabbath, becomes the doorway to the Eighth Day. With the Eighth Day a New Day has dawned, which is the Day of Christ's Resurrection.

The seventh day completes the first creation. The eighth day begins the new creation. God amazing work of creation and all of its mystery, including all that we yet to know about reaches culmination in the greater work of Christ’s Redemption. The first creation finds its meaning and its summit in the new creation in Christ. Redemption even surpasses the beauty of the first creation!

Does the Bible Need to be Interpreted?

2011-07-27T22:32:00.001-05:00

A reason we must approach the interpretation of the Bible with great care and respect is because the interpreter is seeking to realize the meaning(s) intended by God, who is the chief author of the Holy Bible. The sacred texts were written centuries ago and in languages that are often difficult to understand. The ideas in the Bible are frequently challenging. For example, consider what St. Peter said about the writing of St. Paul:

"And regard the patience of our Lord as salvation. Just as our most dear brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given him, has written to you, as indeed he did in all his Epistles, speaking in them of these things. In these Epistles there are certain things difficult to understand, which the unlearned and the unstable distort, just as they do the rest of the Scriptures also, to their own distruction. You therefore, brethern, since you know this before hand, be on your guard lest, carried away from your own steadfastness. But grow in grace and knowledge of our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen." 2 Pet 3:15-18.

This is one example of how Scripture itself admitts that there are "certain things difficult to understand, which the unlearned and the unstable distort, just as they do the rest of the Scriptures also, to their own distruction." 2 Pet 3:16

Therefore, the Bible is a gift of Revelation given to us by God Himself. We should always treat the Bible with great reverence. The Bible was given to the Church to be guarded and explained. The Bible must be interpreted by the Church from the "heart of the Church."

Here I go again, but I thought you would like to know.

2011-07-21T11:31:00.001-05:00

The so called "health care legislation" passed in 2010 has directed the Obama administration to create a list of preventive services for women that all new health care plans must cover without deductibles or co-payments. You guessed it. If this goes through health insurance plans could soon be required to offer female patients free coverage for prescription birth control along with a “the full range” of federally approved contraceptives, devices, and sterilization procedures. All free for the asking.

Why is this bad? Well for one thing this legislation makes pregnancy and children (and family life) a disease and a woman's fertility is a pathological condition to be suppressed by any means technically possible. Second, it shows no respect for human life and human dignity. Life is not sacred. Third, the use of contraceptives and any such devices is immoral. By contraception I mean the intentional use of a drug, chemical, device or procedure that will prevent pregnancy by acting directly and deliberately against the fertility cycle. Contraception denies God's gift of life and the goodness of fertility and family life. It's a deep lie against personal dignity and marriage. It turns the body into a "temple of a lie" and denies that God wants our body to be a Temple of the Holy Spirit. Contraception violates our human nature in the deepest way possible. Contracepting is like enjoying a delicious meal and then vomiting it up so that you don't gain weight, and yet you can fully satisfy the appetite and cravings (binge-purge gluttony). Contraception is sexual gluttony.

Fouth, this legislation will encourage contraception which will encourage the sinful behavior of cohabitation, the sins of adultery, fornication, pronographical behavior, and more. This legislation encourages profound sins and creates the illusion of absolving people of the need to behave in a moral and Godly way. It takes away "the chance of embarrassing consequences."

I know that what I have said here will "cut across the grain" for some folks. But any Christian who knows his or her faith and knows Christian history should never be offended.

The present day dismantling of marriage and family life is clearly the outgrowth of a culture increasingly defined by serial monogamy, cohabitation, children born and raised out of wedlock, divorce-ready prenuptial agreements, pornography, abortion and contraception. A truthful analysis always shows that the root of the problem, more than anything else, is contraception. A contraceptive culture is a divorce culture, a cohabitation culture, an adulterous culture, a pornography culture, a same-sex “marriage” culture, a narcissistic and pleasure-seeking culture, because all these "cultures" or "life-styles" refute and deny a coherent biblical and historic understanding of marriage, family life, children, human dignity, or even what sex is, or who God is.

It may suprise some to learn that up to 1930 both Protestants and Catholics alike clearly taught that contraception, abortion and all forms of sexual promiscuity were morally evil. Since apostolic times the Church has articulated the moral evil of all of this, as did Judaism. Are we any better off now that people's minds have changed? Study after study provides a clear demonstrable link between the contraceptive mentality promoted since the 1930’s and the abortion and death industry mentality of the present day.

But simply denying God and acting as one wishes is never a solution. In fact it's a very dangerous place to be in. This position brings death to our soul. Let us pray for our legislators that they will not permit this horrendous provision into the health care of this country. It will never be caring for people's health... in fact it will never be caring at all.

The Word of God in Written Form: the Bible.

2011-07-09T12:31:00.000-05:00

Just reading the Bible in its original form is not very easy. First you have language and many “language idiosyncrasies” to overcome. Then you have the writing style. The Bible was written originally in “uncial” style. This type of writing consists of writing in all capital letters with no connection between letters, no spaces between words and sentences, no periods or comas and not chapters or verses or chapter headings, etc. It would look like this:

INTHEBEGINNINGWASTHEWORDANDTHEWORDWASWITHGODANDTHEWORDWASGODHEWASINTHEBEGINNINGWITHGODALLTHINGSWEREMADETHROUGHHIMANDWITHOUTHIMWASNOTANYTHINGMADETHATWASMADEINHIMWASLIFEANDTHELIFEWASTHELIGHTOFMENTHELIGHTSHINESINTHEDARKNESSANDTHEDARKNESSHASNOTOVERCOMEITTHEREWASAMANSENTFROMGODWHOSENAMEWASJOHNHECAMEASAWITNESSTOBEARWITNESSABOUTTHELIGHTTHATALLMIGHTBELIEVETHROUGHHIMHEWASNOTTHELIGHTBUTCAMETOBEARWITNESSABOUTTHELIGHTTHETRUELIGHTWHICHENLIGHTENSEVERYONEWASCOMINGINTOTHEWORLD

In our modern translations we have no problem reading John 1:1-9. All aspects of grammar need to be applied in addition to figuring out what the word means and how it is being used. But this style of “uncial” writing was popular until around 800 AD.

From this simple example we can well understand why Bishops carefully oversaw the translation of the Bible. Bibles for the most part were handwritten by monks from roughly 405 to 1452 or until the invention of printing in 1450.

I just thought you’d like to know.
Fr. Klein

St. Cyril of Alexandria, pray for us!

2011-06-27T08:07:00.001-05:00

ONE THOUSAND FIFTEEN HUNDRERD AND SIXTY SEVEN years ago St. Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376 - 444) died. He was the Patriarch of Alexandria from 412 to 444. He came to the Episcopate when Alexandria was at its height of influence and power within the Roman Empire. Cyril wrote extensively and was a leading supporter in orthodox Christology of the later 4th and 5th centuries. He was a central figure in the First Council of Ephesus in 431, which led to the deposition of Nestorius as Patriarch of Constantinople. He is a Doctor of the Church.

In his work titled “On Union with the Holy Trinity” he writes: “Our communion in the divinity of Christ means our union with the Trinity, which in its turn allows the divine nature to pervade and permeate us, just as fire heats a piece of iron and makes it glow. All we have to do after believing in Christ and discovering our communion with him is to give the divine, ineffable beauty of the nature of the Trinity the chance to dawn within us, to glow and to shine.
Ascetical struggle is nothing but an attempt to be in conformity with the Holy Spirit, which is actually within us, and to be in harmony with the thought of Christ, which actually fills us. The Holy Spirit, which God gives us as soon as he dwells in us, qualifies us for acquiring the likeness of Christ, and consequently, we become a real image of the Father. When we acquire the likeness of Christ by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in us, we become “sons of partnership,” and when we partake of the divine nature as sons with Christ we become in union with God through the Holy Spirit."

St. Cyril of Alexandria, pray for us!

2011-06-13T08:49:00.000-05:00

The first Book of Common Prayer was printed in 1549. To celebrate the Feast of the Holy Trinity and our Prayer Book Tradition we will celebrate the Holy Eucharist using this historic liturgy Sunday, June 19th at the 11:15 AM service. A service booklet with the liturgy included has been prepared.

A Brief History
Henry VIII had the liturgies of the Church said in Latin throughout his reign, even after his separation from Rome. However, once Henry died and the young Edward VI attained the throne in 1547, the stage was set for some very significant changes in the religious life of the country. One such change was producing in English the first Book of Common Prayer. It is generally assumed that this Prayer Book is largely the work of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, but as no records of the development of the prayer book exist, this cannot be definitively determined.

The 1549 Book of Common Prayer was not created in a vacuum, but derives from several sources such as the ancient Sarum Rite which was the Latin liturgy developed in Salisbury in the thirteenth century and widely used in England, and a reformed Roman Breviary of the Spanish Cardinal Quiñones and a book on doctrine and liturgy by Hermann von Wied, Archbishop of Cologne.

There were a number of books required for all the Latin liturgies. The priest's part of the Mass was contained in the Missal, which is the book on the Altar. The Mass also required a book for the choir, and another which gave the unique parts for each day; not only did the lections change from day to day (as they do now), but there were also many other differences (prayers, etc.) from one day to another.

The Latin Missal was divided into two parts: the Ordinary, and the Canon, the latter corresponding approximately to the Eucharistic Prayer we know today. The Canon was fairly similar among the three or four Uses employed in England; the Ordinary less so. Although this Sarum Missal was one of the main influences on the 1549 Book of Common Prayer, there are more differences than similarities.

While the general outline of the service, and many of the prayers of the Canon are quite similar, many other parts, particularly the rubrics involved with the priest's actions, were drastically changed and simplified.

The 1549 BCP was in use only for three years, until the extensive revision of 1552. Many of the 1552 BCP were made as compromises to keep peace with the growing presence and influence of "English Puritan's". "Puritans" were a grouping of English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries. They actually were an activist movement within the Church of England dating back to around 1564. They by in large felt that the English Reformation had not gone far enough, and that the Church of England had retained too much Catholic theology and liturgical practice. "Puritans" formed into and identified with various religious groups advocating greater "purity" of worship and doctrine, as well as personal and group piety.

Puritans adopted an anti-Catholic and Reformed theology that was developed by Martin Luther, John Calvin and Huldrych Zwingli and others. In church polity, over all Puritans advocated for separation from all other Christians, in favor of autonomous gathered churches. These separatist and independent strands of Puritanism became prominent in the 1640s, when the supporters of a Presbyterian polity in the Westminster Assembly were unable to forge a new English national church. We still see this "separatist" attitude in modern day Protestantism. The bottom line here is that since 1552 forward the Church of England and Anglicanism struggle to retain a consistent and right understand and practice of its Apostolic and Catholic faith and legacy.

However, much of the 1549 BCP tradition and language remain in all this historic Prayer Books of today. Please join us as we explore our Anglican liturgical legacy.

Parish Family BBQ

2011-06-10T09:43:00.001-05:00

Parish Family BBQ. Saturday, June 18 starting at 4:00 pm. Spread the word! Plan to be with us and bring your friends and family! Sign-up sheet in Mitchell Hall or call or email the Parish Office. Bring food to share and enjoy great BBQ. For more information see Kendall Collins Smith

Annual Visitation of Bishop Jack L. Iker

2011-06-03T13:50:00.004-05:00

On Sunday, June 5, 2011 the Right Reverend Jack Leo Iker, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth will make his Annual Pastoral Visit to St. John's.

The Bishop will celebrate the Holy Eucharist and preach at both the 9:00 am and 11:15 am services. He will baptize and confirm at the 9:00 am service.

Please join us in welcoming our Bishop to St. John's.

Sunday, March 27th. "Jesus thirsts for you!"

2011-03-25T09:43:00.000-05:00

What is the difference from quenching your thirst and satisfying your thirst? Is there much difference? I believe there is.

The Gospel lesson this Sunday, March 27th being the 3rd Sunday of Lent, is Jesus and the Samaritan Women. You know the story. The woman came to draw water. Jesus was already at the well. He eventually explains to her that the water she is searching for will only quench one's thirst. But the water that He wants to give will fully satisfy her and anyone. In fact, Jesus says, "the water that I shall give will become in man a spring of water welling up to eternal life." (Jn 4:14b)

As you can see my sermon for Sunday is coming together! Be sure to be with us!

Season of Lent at St. John's

2011-03-14T08:57:00.005-05:00

The season of Lent is our journey to Easater Morning. Please join us!

Ash Wednesday, March 9th at 7:00 am and 7:00 pm with Choir. Both services offer ashes.
First Sunday in Lent, the singing of the Great Litany at 9:00 and 11:15 am services.
Stations of the Cross each Friday at 6:00 pm. On Friday, March 25 they will be at 6:30 pm.
Mass - Feast of the Annunciation, Fri, Mar 25 at 6:00 pm. Stations of the Cross follow immediately at 6:30 pm.
Lent and Easter Program, Wednesday March 16 to June 15. Potluck at 6:30 pm, Program from 7:00 to 8:30 pm. Child Care provided. Registration required. We will not meet the Wednesday in in Holy Week.

First Friday Mass and Rosary, Friday, April 1st at 7:00 pm.

Holy Week Schedule

Palm Sunday, April 17th, the reading of the Passion Gospel and the beginning of Holy Week.
Holy Monday, April18th Mass at 6:00 pm
Holy Tuesday, April 19th Mass at 6:00 pm
Holy Wednesday, April 20th at 7:00 am and 6:00 pm.

The Easter Triduum

Maunday Thursday, April 21st at 7:00 pm. The Altar of Repose and the Great Watch follow in the Lady Chapel. Chapel open all night for prayer.
Good Friday, April 22nd at 12:00 noon and 7:00 pm with Choir
The Great Vigil of Easter, Saturday, April 23rd at 8:00 pm. The First Mass of Easter.
EASTER MORNING Masses, 8:00 am (1928 BCP), 9:00 am (Rite
Two) and 11:15 am (Rite One).

Statement from the Diocese regarding Lawsuit

2011-03-12T08:01:00.002-06:00

Dear Parishioners,

The following statement from the Diocese is being distributed to the media and published on the diocesan Web site. Please feel free to share it with anyone who may be interested in these developments. I have highlighted and underlined an important paragraph for your convience. Fr. Klein

When the Diocese realigned in November 2008, a small minority of our members elected to leave their churches to worship elsewhere. The following April, the Diocese was sued on behalf of those people, and two years later we are still in the midst of what will be a precedent-setting case to defend our property under Texas law.

In the weeks since our last court hearing, on Feb. 8, our lawyers have been conferring and negotiating with the plaintiffs' attorneys over the terms surrounding Judge John Chupp's Jan. 21 ruling, which favored the plaintiffs. Since the Jan. 21 ruling did not dispose of the case, the parties are engaged in a process of "discovery" which permits them to obtain and examine one another's records. Some of the documents requested by the plaintiffs previously have been delivered to them for inspection, and other documents currently are being prepared.

In addition, lawyers for the parishes and missions of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth and lawyers representing the minority breakaway faction (affiliated with the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America) are making arrangements for the inspection, requested by attorneys and representatives of the minority faction, of all our property, including the Diocesan Center, Camp Crucis, and all our churches. This inspection is being arranged pursuant to a Request for Entry Upon Property filed by the minority faction pursuant to Rule 196.7(a)(1) of the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure.

This rule provides that any party to a lawsuit may request and obtain entry upon the property of another party to the lawsuit "to inspect, measure, survey, photograph, test, or sample the property or any designated object or operation thereon." The Rule is customarily and routinely invoked whenever there is litigation between competing parties with respect to which party has a right to title or possession of property. This is nothing to be alarmed about, though the other side is attempting to use it for propaganda purposes, to promote the impression that they have prevailed in the litigation, when, in fact, it is far from over.

Previous rulings by the Trial Court in the litigation pending in Tarrant County - including the interlocutory Declaratory Judgment - have no effect on the right of the minority faction to inspect the properties. According to Rule 197(a), the right of a party to inspect property in the possession of the other party exists until "the earlier of 30 days before the end of the discovery period or 30 days before trial."

The motivation that underlies the minority faction's decision to incur the thousands of dollars in expense for the inspection of the property in the Diocese is unknown to the attorneys and officers of the Diocese. Unfortunately, however, the Diocese will incur substantial expense, because the inspections by the minority faction must be supervised by the attorneys representing the Diocese and its parishes and missions.

Attorneys representing both sides of the dispute are attempting to schedule the inspections so as to minimize disruption of regularly scheduled activities and events sponsored by the Diocese and its parishes and missions.

Shrove Tuesday "Mardi Gras" Pancake Supper

2011-03-07T08:23:00.002-06:00

Tuesday, March 8th from 6:00 pm to 7:30 pm. Come and enjoy! Wind up the season of Epiphany with a plateful of pancakes and your favorite toppings!!

Shrove Tuesday. The word "shrove" comes from the verb "to shrive" which is when a Christian receives absolution for their sin by way of confession and doing penance. They have "shriven" from their sins.

Shrove Tuesday in Europe often brings to a close weeks and even months of celebrations trying to slow people down and get them focused on the season of Lent. In England the week before Lent is often called "Shrovetide" and Christians are expected to go to confession in preparation for the penitential season of turning to God.

Ash Wednesday

2011-03-07T08:15:00.003-06:00

"Remember that you are of dust, and to dust you shall return."

Wednesday, March 9th Ash Wednesday services

7:00 am Mass - 1928 BCP and ashes
7:00 pm Mass w/Choir - Rite One and ashes

Almighty God, You have created us out of the dust of the earth: Grant that these ashes may be to us a sign of our mortality and penitence, that we may ever remember that it is only by Your gracious gift that we are given everlasting life; through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.

The Reverend Canon Billie R. Boyd

2011-03-04T09:54:00.002-06:00

We are saddened to announce that the Rev. Canon Billie R. Boyd died Thursday afternoon at Baylor All Saints hospital in Fort Worth, just three weeks short of his 88th birthday His Requiem Mass will be celebrated by Bishop Iker on Saturday, March 5, at 2 p.m. at the Church of the Holy Apostles, 3900 Longvue Avenue, Fort Worth. Interment will follow in his native Sulphur Springs. Canon Boyd became the first priest canonically resident in the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth in 1983 when he was named Canon to the Ordinary by the founding bishop, the Rt. Rev. A. Donald Davies. He continued to serve as Canon to the Ordinary under Bishop Davies' successor, the Rt. Rev. Clarence C. Pope, until 1989. He served Bishop Iker as Business Administrator from 1997 to 2001 and was appointed interim rector at both All Saints' in Weatherford and St. John's in Fort Worth. In recent years he was chaplain to the retired clergy and clergy widows. He is remembered fondly by all the diocesan staff. Canon Boyd was a graduate of The Episcopal Theological Seminary in Lexington, Kentucky. Born on Annunciation Day in 1923, he was ordained deacon on June 15, 1970, and priest on Dec. 20, 1970, in the Diocese of Dallas. Before his life as a priest, he served in the United States Army for 21 years, retiring with the rank of Major. During his parochial ministry, Fr. Boyd served for 11 years as rector of St. Luke's Church in Mineral Wells. His affection for that parish never waned.

Canon Boyd is preceeded in death by his wife, Doris, and his son, Bill. He is survived by a daughter, Mary Ann Woolsey, who lives in Virginia, and several grandchildren.

May he rest in peace and rise in glory.

Prayer - Man's Search for God

2011-03-01T06:58:00.006-06:00

One fundamental truth about every human soul is that he's always searching for God. Why is this true, especially if you happen to be someone who doesn't want to be found by God? It's true because man is simply made that way. Each soul is geniunely "defaulted" (or designed) to search for God.

In the act of creating every human soul, God calls each soul from nothingness into existence and crowns him or her with glory and honor. This "crown" enables man to know, love and desire God. (Psalm 8)
Even after the Fall when man is profoundly morally wounded by sin, he still has deep within him this genuniue desire for God, a true and lasting thirst for God. Jesus explains this in the Beatitudes, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness [ie, for God], for they shall be satisfied." (Matt 5:6).

Prayer

It is true that man can try to turn his back to God by trying to hide from "His Face." He does this when he runs after worldly idols and idolertrous dreams and desires and when he accuses God of abandoning him or not being at "some situation." Yet the Bible explains that our living God is tirelessly calling each soul to Him. "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." (Matt 11:28). Jesus also said... "If you wish to be complete... come, follow Me." (Matt 19:21). The adjective "complete" in Greek here is teleos. Teleos means coming to full maturity. This word is sometime translated as "perfect."

This "calling" to follow Jesus Christ is a call to pray. We mature as Christians through prayer and worship.

We mature because God is actually praying in and through us. It's His love within us that moves our desires and heart to pray and to seek Him and to seek peace. Even though the words or ideas we use originate from our thoughts or situation prayer is always God's eternal love initiating the moment. He is joining forces with us and brings light and understanding to our soul.

We see this happen through out salvation history. God explains at the Exodus: "Then I will take you for My people, and I will be your God; and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians." (Ex 6:7). We also have that lovely call from Him to "Be still and know that I am God." (Ps 46:10).

So God reveals both Himself and He reveals each person to himself through prayer. Prayer is the "family talking and listening to each other." It's our heavenly Father speaking and listening to His sons and daughters. His "attention" and "affection" is not divided. He listens to each soul as though we are the only person on earth.

Prayer is also when His children can listen and speak to Him. Through love and the actions of our heart we grow open to God, maturing to complete perfection through the journey of our life.

The Schedule for the season of Lent

2011-02-26T08:49:00.001-06:00

Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper, March 8th beginning at 6:00 pm.

Ash Wednesday, March 9th we will have two services: Holy Eucharist and ashes at 7:00 am in Lady Chapel using the 1928 BCP and Holy Eucharist with Choir and ashes at 7:00 pm.

First Sunday of Lent and singing of the Great Litany, Sunday, March 13 at the 9:00 am and 11:15 am services.

Stations of the Cross, Fridays of Lent at 6:00 pm.

Lent and Easter Program: Obtaining Financial Peace! See short video below. Beginning Wednesday, March 16 at 7:00 pm and running through June 15. We will have a potluck dinner from 6:30 to 7:00 pm. Bring something to share and enjoy great fellowship. If you desire you can eat (or fast) and come for the program at 7:00 pm. Child care is offered. We will not meet the Wednesday in Holy Week.

Kitchen Renovations have begun!!

2011-01-14T15:55:00.000-06:00

Why do we encourage prayer for those who have died?

2010-12-04T09:48:00.017-06:00

Recently a parishioner emailed me with the question "why do we pray for the repose of the dead?" This is a great question to ask. The question about praying for the dead must be approached by reflecting on three doctrines of our faith:

The Resurrection of the body;
What do we mean by "death;"
What is the mystery of the Church.

The Resurrection of the Body

First, lets consider our faith in the Resurrection of our human flesh. God does not abandon our soul at the time of death. He will assist us to see Him and enjoy His Presence after death. In the Old Testament Job believes:

"even after my skin is destroyed, yet from my flesh I shall see God..." (Job 19:26 and BCP 469).

We use this phrase in the Prayer Book Burial Office "though this body be destroyed, yet shall I see God."

Man is composed of both "body and spirit." By "spirit" is meant our immortal soul. The human soul is created directly by God. It is not a product of procreation, as our body is. These two aspects of "body and spirit" that make up man's "nature." On the bodily side, we are of the same nature as the ground on which we walk and the air we breath, but on the spirit side, we share in the nature of the angels. This is what it means being created in the "image and after the likeness" of God. (Gen 1:26)

This is all beautifully stated in the Burial liturgy:

Thou only art immortal, the Creator and maker of mankind; and we are mortal, formed of the earth, and unto earth shall we return. For so Thou didst ordain when Thou createdst me, saying, “Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” All we go down to the dust; yet even at the grave we make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia. (BCP 482)

Our body will lie in "dust" but our immortal soul will sing out of the victory of Christ: "Alleluia."

What is death?
Our second part is we must understand what the Bible means by "death?" Death occurs when our body and soul are separated. The soul gives life to our body. When separation of body and soul occurs this is death. Our body rests from worldly labor and turmoil awaiting the General Resurrection. Our soul rests "sleeping in Christ." (1 Cor 15:18, Col 3:3), but our soul lives on, which means man lives on after death.

As we pray in the Proper Preface of the Burial liturgy: "life is changed, not ended; and when our mortal body lies in death, there is prepared a place for us a dwelling place in the Heavens."

So death is not annihilation as many people (even some Christians) may assume. In fact no one can choose annihilation, if in fact that is what they want as their "eternal future." No matter what kind of life you now live, you shall live forever. Man continues to live forever, even after death. The question is where shall one spend eternity? In Heaven or in Hell?

So why do we pray for the repose of the soul? We pray for them because, as we now understand, they are not annihilated or extinguished of life. They are alive! Just as you prayed for someone when they were still part of this world, so you still have reason to pray for them. Life has changed for them, but it has not ended, and it never will. So for those who have died they benefit from your prayers now and you benefit from their prayers!
So what is the Church?
Third, let us look at an important aspect of the Church's spiritual life in Christ. The Church is the communion of saints. We believe that the Church is a sacramental reality which may also be called the communion of saints.

The Church as a mystical reality transcends time and space. This means we are united to all who live in Christ whether they are alive in this world (you and me) or they are asleep in Christ or have been fully received into Heaven as a Saint glorified. The Church of Jesus Christ, the communion of saints is united in one head who is Jesus Christ and in sharing one Holy Spirit who is the soul of the Mystical Body. The Church is a communion of saints that love and pray for one another and for the needs and the redemption of the world. Why let death stand in the way???

We are Catholic Christians by Bishop Jack Leo Iker

2010-12-02T13:16:00.001-06:00

The following article is written by Bishop Iker. Please enjoy reading it. Fr. Klein

In the previous article I refuted the allegation of our adversaries that this diocese has “left the Church and joined another denomination.”

On the contrary, we remain members of the worldwide Anglican Communion, which is a global fellowship of Christians in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury, sharing the same spiritual, sacramental, theological and liturgical heritage. This “fellowship” is described in the constitutions of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the USA, the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone, and the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, as Anglican. The term is synonymous with Episcopalian and the Diocese of Fort Worth has not ceased being that. We are, by virtue of our place in the Province of the Southern Cone, constituent members of the Anglican Communion.

So much for the claim that we have “joined another denomination.” But on further reflection we see that there is a basic fallacy in assuming that Anglicans are part of a denomination in the first place. We are not. We are members of the Catholic Church, not a denomination.

I invite us all to look beyond the surface level of our Anglican identity, with its temptation to denominationalism, and go back to our heritage as catholic Christians. In those same constitutional provisions that I quoted in the previous article, the Protestant Episcopal Church in the USA, the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone, and the Diocese of Fort Worth, all declare that we are a fellowship within, or a branch, of the one holy catholic and apostolic Church, maintaining and propagating the faith and order of the historic Church throughout the ages.

This means that we are not members of a sectarian, Protestant denomination, but of the Catholic Church. Remember, the Church of England, which came to be known as Anglican, existed before the Reformation and traces its roots back to the Patristic age of the early Christian Church. This same Church, which predated the arrival of Augustine and his missionaries from Rome in the sixth century, is continuous with the Church of England that emerged from the sixteenth century Reformation. Reformed, yes, but not a new denomination; the Church of England still maintained the sacraments, creeds and holy orders of the undivided church of the early centuries, before the Great Schism of West and East in 1054.

Knowing this, Archbishop of Canterbury Geoffrey Fisher famously said, “We have no doctrine of our own. We only possess the Catholic doctrine of the Catholic Church enshrined in the Catholic Creeds, and these creeds we hold without addition or diminution. We stand firm on that rock.” And to that we might add that Anglicanism has no Scriptures of its own, no sacraments of its own, no holy orders of its own – just those of the Catholic Church that we have received. Fisher was right, as Anglicans we have no faith of our own.

Like the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church, orthodox Anglicans uphold the historic faith and order of the undivided Church. We are nothing more nor less than Catholic Christians, seeking to be faithful to the teaching of the early Church Fathers and the great Ecumenical Councils of the first centuries of Christian witness. With St. Vincent of Lerins, we affirm that the Catholic faith is that which has been believed “everywhere, always, and by all.” Wherever you find departures from this given faith and received order, you will find sectarianism, heresy and error.

With this in mind, we understand that the divided and fractured nature of Anglicanism today has been caused by heretical innovations and departures from the Church’s historic faith and practice. Two Provinces are specially to blame – the Anglican Church of Canada and the Protestant Episcopal Church in the USA. It is our Christian duty to speak out and stand against the errors advocated by these Provinces because they lead others into falsehood and away from salvation. All this to say nothing of the fact that deviations from the historic teaching of the Church have led to a serious state of brokenness and impaired Communion throughout Anglicanism.

In the Diocese of Fort Worth we stand against that. Our commitment as an orthodox Anglican diocese is to the faith and order of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. We seek to do nothing other than maintain and propagate the faith once delivered to the saints, which is rooted in Holy Scriptures and one with the Apostolic Teaching of the ancient church.

Far from having joined a “different denomination,” we have remained faithful to the witness of the Catholic Church of the ages. With our Lord Jesus Christ, we too pray for an end to our divisions and for a restoration of visible unity of Catholic Christians, both East and West.

The Rt. Rev. Jack Leo Iker
Bishop of Fort Worth

Sermon: The First Sunday of Advent

2010-11-29T13:20:00.000-06:00

The Theme of “journey”

Most of us know what it’s like to be on a lengthy journey. We might remember when as kids when riding in the car we would ask all too often from the back seat… “are we almost there?” The answer from the front seat was always the same… “soon.” And we would press on mile after mile.

Even today, when taking a trip I become so caught up in trying to keep track of “where I am” during the journey that it’s hard to always judge how much distance still is ahead before I reach my the destination.

The People of the Old Covenant

The journey through Advent is a journey that started with the people of the Old Covenant, as they journeyed towards the redemption promised by God. God was (and is) with them every step of the way. He provided “signs” and “wonders” and voices of conscience through patriarchs, prophets, kings and priests. These “signs and wonders and sacred words” were like “mile markers” we see posted alongside the highway. Mile markers are there to help us gage how far we have traveled and how far we still must go before our destination is reached.

Yet, in spite of all the help God offered the people still did not know “the exact time” when their deliverance would come. It seems to some that this is not really fair, yet God intended it to be that way. He wants His people to learn to look “within” the signs and wonders and the sacred words for details that will keep both their theology and their faith developing.

God provided the people of the Old Covenant with wonderful clues. For example, they knew that, at some divinely appointed time, the root of Jesse who blossom forth anew. At some point a key would be found within a sign that would finally unlock the meaning of history and allow the past and the future to merge into the fulfillment of the perfect Day.

We know who this special "key" is. The "key' was revealed by the Prophet Isaiah: “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign. Behold, a Virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and He shall be called Immanuel.” (Is 7:14)

The Emergence of the Apostolic Church

From this sign of hope emerged the Apostolic Church.

A person is baptized into this hope. Hope becomes the Christian’s DNA, the essential ingredient of their Christian life; and this hope keeps them always looking forward and never just dwelling on the past. Our faith is about God and His activity within history… within man.

For nearly 2000 years now, Christians have returned to this first Sunday of Advent, to reclaim the need to again look forward to the spiritual journey.

So we begin afresh, and again we follow the shepherds lead. We are to imagine ourselves traveling with them, even in the dead of night, even when we see dimly or when the “mile markers and the signs” that God provides will pass by us all too quickly, even when it’s difficult to keep looking forward to what is uncertain, we must journey with the shepherds toward the light that God offers to help us know that we are on the right path.

The Lord’s Second Coming

When we plan a trip we believe at the outset that we shall reach our point of destination and return home safely.

We don’t plan a trip wondering if we will find our way to where we want to go. We may be off a bit in planning or in timing, or in estimating the cost of the travel, but we certainly believe that we will arrive and return.

A principle theme of the season of Advent is the Church’s certitude of our Lord’s Second Coming. But if our faith is a bit clouded in this area, and we spend not a great amount of time thinking about the return of Jesus Christ; the liturgy and the liturgical year is fiercely persistent in reminding us.

This is why on this morning by way of our Collect we offer an important Advent petition to God. It is a petition seeking necessary grace to assist our fallen nature in casting off any and all spiritual darkness so that our soul and our intellect may breathe in only the grace-filled light that is Jesus Christ.

We need to ask God for all the help we can get; real help to rid ourselves of whatever impairs our spiritual vision and clouds our heart.

And the first step of help is helping us to learn that our spiritual vision and intuition is impaired by our fallen nature.

The Crib at Bethlehem

The eternal radiance emanating from the crib at Bethlehem is the Light of the world; it is the “true Light that enlightens every man.” (Jn 1:9a) This Light is Jesus Christ; and all who receive this Light, who believe in Him, they have found the source of power to become a child of God.

God intends for this Light to glow from the crib until all things have been made new. It will glow through time so each generation can be drawn by the Holy Spirit to the crib; every person will be given an opportunity to look into the face of the infant Jesus and to bend their knee in homage to Him and declare that this Child is “my” Lord, “my” Savior, “my” God.

St John in his Gospel tells us that this Child has the power to make us a child of God. (Jn 1:12)

As young children with a life and faith yet untainted by the spoils of the word, this homage to Christ is easy(ier). Yet as we live on “in time” it is so easy to develop “spiritual cataracts.”

Spiritual cataracts and the healing of our spiritual eyes

Cataracts are usually not present in the beginning of a person’s life. They usually form slowly over time and the result is cloudy vision.

It’s interesting, that in spite of our desire for good health, how often we put up with things, we easily compensate for weaknesses that we may have? Instead of going to the doctor to be healed we just compensate.

It’s also sad when we find ourselves compensating for spiritual weaknesses too. Instead of dealing with sin, we compensate and live with sin, we live with moral anomalies, we live with too much that is unnecessary, and yet we know were perfect healing lies.

Why do we do this?

What must happen??? What do we still “need” or be certain of before we are willing to stop compensating for spiritual weaknesses and dull spiritual vision and take the first step for healing and peace of mind???

Obviously the first step is the hardest one because it requires that we admit we are compensating and that we are only “making do” but what we really need is God’s help. Once we acknowledge this our soul is open to the influence of grace.

We need grace because we need God.

The Collect

So let us look at the Collect for a moment. It is composed in part from our Epistle reading from St. Paul’s encouraging words to the Church in Rome.

St. Paul said:

Let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light;
Let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy.
[Rather, in place of such immoral behavior] let us put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.” (Rom 13:12b-14)

What I want us to look at is verse 13 which reads “Let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day.”

Variations of this verse 13 are: "Let us live decently, as in the light of day;" (NJB) and "Let us conduct ourselves properly as in the day;" (NAB) What’s being worked with here is the adverb εὐσχη-μόνως and it is often translated as “becomingly, or decently, or properly.”

By wanting us to behave “becomingly” or “properly” St. Paul wants us to understand that it’s through our daily life that we are literally teaching the Good News of Jesus Christ.

St. Francis of Assisi would remind his followers that “the way you live your life may be the only Gospel someone will read.”

This is a powerful thought. Think about it.

Do we behave in a way that befits our redeemed life?

Is our lifestyle(s) a scandal to the Cross or does it witness to the power of the Cross to heal and change me from one degree of glory to the next?

The hour for us to stop compensating for sin has arrived! St. Paul explains that “salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.”

Today is always the best time for an honest examination of conscience. This alone will allow our soul to be ready to welcome Jesus when He comes.

This examination is using both sacramental confession and our developing the habit of making a daily spiritual inventory of our conscience.

This is very refreshing. By taking an honest look at the “present moment” it’s like opening our eye to see clearly into the innermost recesses of our heart and ideas. An honest look will discover potential deviations and conflicts that may rest within us.

St. Augustine

St. Augustine offers this wonderful testimony to the influence of grace. He explains in his book Confession that this passage from Romans 13 “Let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day,” helped him to finally take the last step towards casting off the attachments of his former sinful life. He writes:

I felt myself still enslaved by my iniquities, and I would groan to myself, “How long, Oh, Lord.. how long? How long must I continue saying, Tomorrow, Oh, Lord… tomorrow. Why not now? Why not, at one instant, make an end of all uncleanness?

[…] And behold I heard a voice, like that of a child in the house next door, repeating in a sing-song tone, “Take up and read, Take up and read” […]. I rose up […] and returned to where I had left the book of the Apostle Paul; I took it quickly into my hand, opened it and read in silence the first passage on which my eye happened to fall. I read no further, nor was there any need to; for with this sentence, “let us conduct ourselves becomingly, as in the day,” as by a clear and constant light infused into my heart, the darkness of all former doubts was immediately driven away.

When we ask God for help, His assistance will be found. Augustine offers a wonderful example of how grace works with a prayerful heart and God’s word to move us away from struggles and defeat and allow us to see more clearly.

The Holy Spirit told St. Augustine that he need not wait until tomorrow to begin living a moral life, he only needed to want (to desire to live ‘becomingly’) to begin today!

But there’s more here. St. Paul continues, “Let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day,”

What “day” is he referring to? He is referring to the Day of our Lord’s Second coming; the “Day” when Jesus shall stand on this earth in bodily form; the “Day” when all tears shall be wiped away, and all things shall be made whole and all is at rest in God. It will be when Heaven and earth are again joined.

St. Paul wants us to live today as though “The Great and Final Day” has already arrived!

Now that is a powerful thought!

Surely Jesus is with us now sacramentally. He is with us when we pray. But just consider how different you would behave if you could see our Lord… sit down with Him physical present… reach out and touch Him in the same way we reach out and touch one another.

Jesus remains for the present moment still behind the veil that separates time from eternity. This is done to help us grow in faith and in love.

St. Paul explains to the Christians in Ephesus to “Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil.” (Ep 5:16)

Christians do not waste time… they redeem time. Time is given to us as a gift so that we may know God more fully and love Him more deeply. But there shall come a time when the veil is removed and time as we know it will end.

At that point we are either ready for what lies ahead or we are not. At that point we shall face God and we shall give an account of the life that He gave us to live.

God will say, I made you in My Image and after My Likeness. I breathed into you My breath of life. I have provided for you in every way necessary and gave you so much more. Now tell Me, what have you done with your life?

We can see how important daily examination of conscience and frequent use of the sacrament of confession is our help [and God’s grace] can help us stay focused and keep our life under the influence of grace.

Grace: A Sure Foundation

Now this brings me to my final point, and actually returns to the theme of grace. As Christians, something we discover over time is that God’s grace can “work for us” in many different ways.

Our Collect reads: “Almighty God, give us grace that we may cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the armor of light…”

But we could also say: Almighty God, give us a sure and certain foundation so that we have courage to cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the life of Jesus Christ …”

Jesus often uses the illustration of a foundation to point out that people often build their life upon different kinds of foundations; some on rock, some on sand, and even on what could be called “thin air.”

Jesus always concludes His illustration by saying that the only sure and certain foundation is God.

We know how true this is. We know how the “storms” we encounter in life will test how solid we have constructed our spiritual home. Will our spiritual foundation withstand the gushing floodwaters and what seems like hurricane winds that hurl against us, against our family life, against our dreams and hopes and prayers? We know how persistent and unrelenting Satan can be!

So our life must be built on Jesus Christ. He alone is our hope, which means we build our life and dreams around Him and His will. To say that Jesus is my hope and foundation is to strive to identify our will to His will.

When death comes we need to be able to say with a true and pure heart: “I have earnestly tried to seek to follow God’s will in everything!” If we have this conviction and peace residing daily in our soul we have nothing to fear. What matters is that we have loved and desired God’s will in preference to our own will.

Loving God is what gives us strength to carry on through the course of every day looking with hope and joy for the arrival of the final and great Day!

Amen

Have we joined a different denomination, by Bishop Jack Leo Iker

2010-11-19T14:42:00.000-06:00

One of the allegations in the numerous lawsuits brought against us by the other side is the constant claim that “Iker left the Church and joined another denomination.” There are several problems with this, of course, beginning with the point that “the Church” is a much, much greater reality than the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America (sometimes called TEC for short). Add to this the fact that it was the Diocese of Fort Worth that left TEC (by a vast 80% majority vote at two successive diocesan conventions), not just me as the Bishop. I don’t even have a vote at diocesan conventions! And the third, we did not vote to join another denomination, but to realign with another jurisdiction of the worldwide Anglican Communion – the Province of the Southern Cone. However you cut it, we are still Anglicans or Episcopalians – two different words used for the same denomination all over the world.

As you are aware, TEC is an autonomous Province of the Anglican Communion, as is the Province of the Southern Cone. All 38 Provinces of the Communion share a common Anglican heritage and officially recognize the holy orders and sacraments of all the other Provinces (that is, we are in communion with one another). Just as TEC has dioceses in Central and South America (Honduras, Central Ecuador, Litoral Ecuador, Columbia, Venezuela, and others), so does the Southern Cone have recognized dioceses in North America (San Joaquin, Quincy, Pittsburgh and Fort Worth). We did not join another denomination; we realigned with another Province of the Communion.

In Scotland, we are called Episcopalians. In England, we are called Anglicans. Likewise, in Canada, the term is Anglican, while in the States, the term is Episcopalian. All are members of the same church family, holding a common faith and order. In border areas of these countries, church signs often have the wording that says “Anglican/Episcopalian.” It means the same thing. Not long ago I saw the sign out front of St. James Church, Piccadilly, in London that used this exact phrase to describe their affiliation as a parish of the Church of England.

In addition, as you go around the world, you find that TEC is not the only Province calling itself The Episcopal Church. The name is used in the Sudan, the Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East, Scotland, Cuba, and the Philippines, just to name a few. It simply will not do for TEC to try to claim ownership and exclusive rights to the name “Episcopal”!

Denominational lines in Christendom are much wider than our adversaries seem to recognize. On a global basis, denominations are broad families of Christians who come from various historic traditions, based on common beliefs and practices. There are Baptists, Methodists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, and so on, but within each of these groups there are a number of different jurisdictions. So let us say it once again: We have not joined another denomination, but remain part of the Anglican/Episcopalian denomination.

Let’s further illustrate this point by looking at some key legal, church documents pertaining to all of this. The Preamble of TEC’s Constitution says:

The Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, otherwise known as The Episcopal Church (which name is hereby recognized as also designating the Church), is a constituent member of the Anglican Communion, a Fellowship within the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, of those duly constituted Dioceses, Provinces, and regional Churches in communion with the See of Canterbury, upholding and propagating the historic Faith and Order as set forth in the Book of Common Prayer.

Article I of our own Constitution of the Diocese of Fort Worth on “Anglican Identity” states:

The Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth is a constituent member of the Anglican Communion, a Fellowship within the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, consisting of those duly constituted Dioceses, Provinces and regional Churches in communion with the See of Canterbury, upholding and propagating the historic Faith and Order as set forth in the Old and New Testaments and expressed in the Book of Common Prayer.

The Province of the Southern Cone has a similar statement in its Constitution:

The Anglican Church of the Southern Cone is established as a Province of the Anglican Communion, a branch of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church which professes the historic Faith and Order as contained in the Holy Scriptures, to conserve the Doctrine, Sacraments, Ministry and Discipline of the Anglican Church and as observed in the Book of Common Prayer and the administration of the Sacraments and other Rites and Ceremonies, in the form and manner of Consecration, Ordination or Institution of Bishops, Presbyters and Deacons and the Articles of Religion maintains the ecclesiastical unity of the Dioceses and Provinces legitimately established and that are in communion with the See of Canterbury.

Before the “recent unpleasantness,” clergy and laity transferred freely from one Province to the other – bishops included – as circumstances required. Since our realignment in 2008, we continue to use the same Prayer Book, and Hymnal, buildings and polity, just as we did before. Who we are has not changed! Many of our people still call themselves Episcopalians – just not the kind that follow the innovations of the General Convention Church.

The churches of this diocese assert that we have “left” no one. They remain member churches in union with the Bishop and Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, founded in 1982. All that our Diocese has done, acting by and through its duly constituted Annual Convention, is to amend our own Constitution and Canons in accordance with the procedures set forth in the governing documents of the Diocese.

And likewise, our diocesan church property has not gone and is not going anywhere! It remains in the name of the Diocesan Corporation, just as it has since the beginning, for the use of our congregations. The question being litigated right now is going to be whether TEC determines the identity of the persons elected to govern the Corporation and the Diocese, or whether this Diocese, pursuant to our Constitution and Canons, makes that determination.

It is clear from the above that both charity and truth require our adversaries to stop this silly little game of accusation that we “have left the Church.” Our time would be better spent praying for the unity of the Church of Jesus Christ than casting stones across our divisions.

The Rt. Rev. Jack Leo Iker
Bishop of Fort Worth

He led them on safely

2010-11-11T11:58:00.000-06:00

I lead in the way of righteousness, in the midst of the paths of judgment.2

Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared.3 In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them: in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; and he bare them, and carried them all the days of old.4

They got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them: but thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favor unto them.5 So didst thou lead thy people, to make thyself a glorious name.6

Lead me, O Lord, in thy righteousness because of mine enemies; make thy way straight before my face.7 O send out thy light and thy truth: let them lead me; let them bring me unto thy holy hill, and to thy tabernacles. Then will I go unto the altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy: yea, upon the harp will I praise thee, O God my God.8
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1 Psa 78:53; 2 Pro 8:20; 3 Exo 23:20; 4 Isa 63:9; 5 Psa 44:3; 6 Isa 63:14; 7 Psa 5:8; 8 Psa 43:3,4;

Faithful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God.1

2010-11-10T09:46:00.000-06:00

I beseech you, ... brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.2 As ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness.3 In Christ Jesus neither circum-cision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be on them, and mercy.4

Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.5 I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.6

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1 Col 1:10; 2 Rom 12:1,2; 3 Rom 6:19; 4 Gal 6:15,16; 5 Joh 15:8,16;

Os Guinness: The Christian Church and the Western World

2010-10-29T17:29:00.000-05:00

Lausanne Congress - Cape Town 2010 - Os Guinness - Plenary Session

2010-10-29T17:26:00.000-05:00

St Johns 1949 Video Modified

2010-09-16T11:29:00.000-05:00

Your Prayers are Needed!!!!

2010-08-31T10:40:00.000-05:00

To the clergy, convention delegates, Executive Council, and vestry members,

Well, we're headed back to court in Hood County on Thursday morning of this week, where Judge Walton once again has several motions to be heard from both sides. You may recall that this all has to do with The Episcopal Church trying to get its hands on a bequest left to St. Andrew's in Fort Worth. Your prayers are asked for attorney Shelby Sharpe, who represents our interests in this case, as well as for Lisa Jamieson and R.H. Wallace who are the attorneys for the parish.

Here are a few comments by Shelby regarding this hearing:

"On Thursday morning, September 2 at 9:00, the court in Granbury will have an opportunity to dismiss those parties affiliated with The Episcopal Church who are trying to get the trust proceeds that have been left in trust for St. Andrew's Episcopal Church. Pray that the court will see clearly the issues and have a heart to rule justly. Our opponents are trying to get a postponement of the motion that will knock them out for lack of standing to be in the suit. Pray that the court will not grant that motion.

"Additionally, our opponents are trying to get me and the attorneys for St. Andrew's disqualified claiming we have not been hired by persons in authority to hire us based on an incorrect reading of the opinion from the Fort Worth Court of Appeals that granted our motion to order the trial judge in Tarrant County to dismiss the pleadings of two opposing counsel who failed to prove they were hired by people who had authority to hire them.

"Lastly, the court will have an opportunity to end the litigation that day by ruling that St. Andrew's named in the trust is still entitled to continue to receive what was left to it in the trust."

St John's in 1948!

2010-08-29T22:30:00.004-05:00

This is about 5 minutes of old movie film of St. John's Episcopal Church, Fort Worth, Texas. The film was found in the Parish Archives. It was filmed in 1948-1949. You will see the original Church built in 1925, the original Mitchell Hall and the first Rectory. You will also see Fr. John Leatherbury, Bishop Mason of Dallas, and Fr. Sherwin Clayton, former rector of St. John's; and the Leatherbury children, Hester, Tom and John. The film is in poor shape, and at one point there is a bit of slippage common to reel films.

Comments have been made on my Facebook (which I have also posted this video on) that the film seems to cover several seasons. Some parts have bare trees and other parts have trees in full bloom. To me, most likely it was made over a period of time. All we have on the reel is "1948 Installation." Also keep in mind that the original church was torn down in 1950 when the present sanctuary was built. You might also notice how College Avenue went through into Fairmont. It went uninterrupted to downtown. The original entrance of Dagget School faces what was College Avenue. This street was closed off I believe in the 1960's-70's. And of course caps for the choir ladies.... ah, the good old days! :)

The Voice of the early Church about 130 AD.

2010-07-23T09:49:00.000-05:00

Here are quotations from an early Christian document "Mathetes - Epistle to Diogentus" which was written around 130 AD. Enjoy our early faith!

The Celebration of the Holy Eucharist in 155 A.D.

2010-07-23T09:32:00.001-05:00

Here is a letter from St. Justin Martyr in 155 A.D. describing the weekly Christian liturgy of the Early Church. Anyone familiar with the service from our Book of Common Prayer and the Catholic Mass, and therefore the Eucharist, will immediately recognize that this is the way we worship. It is the way of the early Christians and the way that Jesus Christ intends His Church to worship. Enjoy the root of our liturgical life!

LOOK AT YOURSELF AFTER WATCHING THIS.mp4

2010-07-22T14:32:00.000-05:00

The "Battlefield" called "Prayer."

2010-07-16T15:07:00.001-05:00

Prayer is both a gift of grace that comes from God and it is a determined response on our part. Prayer involves effort. Every person of faith has learned in one way or another that prayer is a battle. Who or what is the battle against? We can find the answer to this question in the Prayer Book on page 302. The battle is fought against:

Satan and all the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God...
The evil powers of this world that corrupt and destroy man...
And ourselves, our fallen nature and all our sinful desires that draw us away from God.

Prayer is first about putting our complete trust in God; in His grace and love. This surrender is something we learn to do over the course of life. We pray as we live, because we really live as we pray. Praying and living go hand-in-hand. The spiritual battles that we fight in order to grow deeper in grace and trust is fought on the battlefield we call prayer.

Heaven and the Four Last Things

2010-07-08T15:19:00.002-05:00

The four weeks of Advent are often used as a time to preach about the beauty of Heaven and the “four last things.” On Christmas Day we affirm through the birth of Jesus Christ that although we are born under the confines of “time and space” we are meant to live for all eternity. Yes, every human being is destined to live always, either before the glory of the Beatific Vision of the Godhead; or to live with the loss of God forever.

Let’s talk about Heaven first!

What is the Beatific Vision? It is the direct seeing of the Holy Trinity, with nothing standing between the soul and God. It is called “beatific” because it will produce intense and lasting happiness, such as only God has the right to enjoy but that He shares with those who enter Heaven. Access is granted to those who have lived grace-filled lives on earth. St. Paul speaks of this anticipated joy to the Church in Corinth. He writes:

But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who truly love Him... (1Co 2:9)

Our faith propels us towards the beatific vision. Faith allows us to taste the sweetness of God in advance of the light of the promised beatific vision, which is the goal of our journey here on earth. In Heaven we shall see God "face to face", "as He is". (1 Cor 13:12; 1 Jn 3:2). So the exercise of our faith is already the beginning of eternal life.

St. Thomas Aquinas explains that “when we contemplate the blessings of faith even now, as if gazing at a reflection in a mirror, it is as if we already possessed the wonderful things which our faith assures us we shall one day enjoy.”

Is there any real communication among the persons in Heaven? Simply put, yes! The angels and saints glorified communicate with one another. The ties of blood and friendship that we enjoy now on earth will continue into eternity. And of course, these relationships are now perfected and fully glorified. We shall enjoy the companionship of Christ in His humanity, along with the companionship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, angels and archangels, saints and all the company of Heaven.

So who are these persons in Heaven? For sure it will be so many that we know. And we speak of them in the Liturgy as “the angels and archangels and all the company of Heaven.” These are the dear persons who encountered death in faith and in a state of grace.

So what are the “four last things?

The four last things are what await every person, namely death, judgment, Heaven and hell. They have been called the four “last” things because they are the last things in our lives at the end of time and the beginning of eternity. Scripture reminds us that “

In everything you do, remember your end, and you will never sin.” (Eccles 7:40)

Occasional meditation on the four last things can help keep us focused on living a faithful Christian life.

The four last things help us more deeply appreciate the chance we have for the Beatific Vision of God. It reminds us that we shall enjoy not only God and the angels but also redeemed creation and creatures. It makes sense why St. John wrote, “… and I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of Heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband; and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,

Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be with them; He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away. (Rev 21:2-4)

Book TV: Stephen Meyer, "Signature in the Cell"

2010-07-02T10:07:00.000-05:00

"... he who does the Will of My Father."

2010-06-30T11:40:00.002-05:00

Jesus explains to His disciples that it is not enough to call Him Lord and yet refuse to obey Him. In Matthew's Gospel Jesus explains this.

"Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but he who does the Will of My Father who is in Heaven." Matt 7:21-27

Jesus is speaking about yeilding daily to His Will and to God's design for life and creation. Jesus knows the struggle and the fickled nature of the human heart. He asked Peter three time "do you love Me" (Jn 21:15ff) because He knew how uncertain Peter could be. It does one little good to say with their lips that they have "faith in Christ" and yet are unwilling to yeild their life to Him.

But in every area of our life we must find a real love for Jesus Christ. In terms of money, time, talent... and yes, even in terms of our bodies. St. Paul explains this in 1 Cor 6:18-20.

Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body. 1Cor 6:18-20

Yes, we actually glorify God in our bodies. What's more, our very body is the meeting ground where the culture of life and the culture of death interface. Let us always choose life! Deut 30:19,20.

Episcopal Church proponents suffer legal setback in Fort Worth

2010-06-27T21:41:00.001-05:00

Please read the Bishop's comments on the Friday, June 25, 2010 Texas Second Court of Appeals ruling granting our Diocese's Petition for Writ of Mandamus instructing instructed the 141st District Court to modify its ruling of Sept. 16, 2009, to the effect that there cannot be a second Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth and a second Corporation of the diocese.

Here is the PDF link.

Texas Court of Appeals Decision

2010-06-25T23:39:00.001-05:00

To the clergy, convention delegates, Executive Council, and vestry members,

We give thanks for the decision just issued by the Texas Court of Appeals in Fort Worth. The decision is posted on the diocesan Web site at http://www.fwepiscopal.org/downloads/CourtOfAppeals062510.pdf

A statement concerning the court's decision will be issued by Bishop Iker on Monday, June 28.

Suzanne Gill
Director of Communications
The Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth

Completion and Truth

2010-06-13T22:32:00.018-05:00

I have often said that God will waste nothing. Everything in His created and spiritual order must be completed, it must "come true." Jesus makes this point when He promised,

Do not think that I have come to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I have not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For amen I say to you, til Heaven and Earth pass away, not one jot, or one tittle shall be lost from the Law till all things have been accomplished. Matthew 5:17,18

Jesus explains here that all things shall "come true." By using the notion of "all things accomplished" Jesus is speaking about reaching fruition and final purpose. This is the meaning behind "till all things have been accomplished" that is until all things have reached their final and natural end in God. The Greek verb translated as "accomplished" means to come into being, to come into fullness. This can be illustrated in looking at man's life which is to have its perfect consummation and peace in God. This is the theme of each of the Beatitudes.

Our earthly pilgrimage is time of grace and mercy which God offers to us to work out our earthly life in keeping with His divine plan. This divine plan for man has been written deep in the human heart by the Holy Spirit; and Scripture acknowledges this by saying that man is created by God and for God; and our heavenly Father never ceases to draw every person to Himself. The presence of the Cross is ever active achieving God's will of redemption for all persons. Only in God will we find truth and lasting happiness.

In His parables Jesus compares our earthly life to fallow fields and relationships that must mend and mature and seeds that must be planted in order to grow into capable and sturdy shrubs giving shade to all. Seeds must die to blossom, lessons must be heard first to be learned, and fields will be seeded and harvested. God spoke at the beginning of Creation and He shall speak at the close of the age. God is both Alpha and Omega, the first Word and the last Word, the author of love and of judgment and mercy.

So the completion that Jesus refers to, the "coming to furition" is both internal and external. He explains that the internal completion is focused on becoming the person God made us to be. This is the person God longs to love and in our heart of hearts we long to become. Achieving this becoming is what Heaven is all about. It is that place where the true and perfect reside.

This talk about things "coming true" is realizing how our basic desire for God is written in the depth of our heart, written in such a way that we know from within that we are created by God and for God and that He never ceases to draw us to Himself. We must realize that only in God will our soul be at rest and there we find the truth and the happiness we never stop searching for. Grace is the supernatural help God gives us to help us draw close to our vocation of becoming His adopted sons and daughters.

Becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ means accepting the invitation to vocation to God's family, to live in conformity with His way of life: "For whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is My brother, and sister, and mother." (Matt 12:50)

So, our dignity rests on the fact that we are made to live in intimate communion with God. The Christian life is just this! This vocation is initiated from the very moment we come into being in our mother's womb. We "live and move and have our being" (Acts 17:28) because God wills this through His love and by means of His eternal love He continues to hold us in existence. We cannot live fully according to truth and come into fullness and completion unless we freely acknowledge God's sustaining love and prayerfully entrust ourself to Him always.

The Blessed Virgin Mary, the Holy Rosary, and other Marian teachings.

2010-06-11T17:22:00.001-05:00

Fr. Klein will make a presentation to the St. Elizabeth's Guild on Thursday, July 8 at 10:30 am. He will discuss the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary in salvation history, the Holy Rosary and he will answer any questions one may have.

This is an invitation for you to join us. Please come and learn about the greatest woman to has ever lived!

"And with thy spirit."

2010-06-11T17:11:00.012-05:00

In the traditional call to prayer the priest bids the people, “The Lord be with you.” And the people respond “And with thy spirit.” What does the congregation mean in using these words (the same meaning is in the Rite 2 version “And also with you”)? Why does the congregation address the priest’s “spirit”?

This phrase is found in Christian liturgy back to 215 AD! One early example is from St. John Chrysostom (347-407), who was Bishop of Constantinople and a major theologian of early Christianity. He addressed this liturgical phrase in a homily on Pentecost Sunday. He said,

“If the Holy Spirit were not in our Bishop [he is referring to Bishop Flavian of Antioch d. 449 AD] when he gave the peace to all shortly before ascending to the Altar to celebrate the Holy Eucharist, you would not have replied to him all together, “And with thy spirit.” This is why you reply with this expression not only when he ascends to the sanctuary, or when he preaches to you, or when he prays for you, but when he stands at the holy Altar, when he is about to offer this awesome sacrifice [the Holy Eucharist]. You don't partake of the offerings until he has prayed for you the grace from the Lord, and you have answered him, “And with thy spirit,” reminding yourselves by this reply that he [the priest or bishop] who is here does nothing of his own power, nor are the offered gifts [the bread and wine] the work of human nature, but it is the grace of the Holy Spirit present and hovering over all things which makes present to us the mystic sacrifice.” [Comments are mine].

St. John Chrysostom teaches that this simple address “The Lord be with you, And with thy spirit” is a prayerful profession of faith. The faith that is being confirmed here is that the bishop or priest by means of his ordination is uniquely configured to Christ and that he is offering the Holy Eucharist just as Christ intends, that is in Persona Christi, or "in the person of Christ" and never by his own resources or worthiness or anything else.

The charism given to the bishop and priest at ordination is given to reach out to each soul and through the words and actions of the celebrant Jesus Christ Himself consecrates and blesses the bread and wine into His very Body and Blood.

What is the basis of this sacramental faith? It is Christ's own priestly ministry on earth, and the revealed fact that he associated men with Him to learn His teachings, acquire His spirit, receive sacred powers from Him in order to continue His work of salvation until the end of time. "Behold, I will be with you to the end of the ages." (Matt 28:20). It's by means of the sacramental nature of the Church that Jesus makes this promise a reality.

So, when the people of God say, “And with thy spirit,” they are professing our theology of the sacrament of Holy Orders and how in the consecration of the man’s soul at ordination Jesus Christ places an indelible mark upon his soul and making him a priest forever!

The response, “And with thy spirit,” is a key phrase of our faith; it serves to remind us that the Holy Eucharist is not the peoples celebration but it is solely Christ’s Holy Eucharist, it is His gift of His very Body and Blood for the salvation of the world and for the spiritual nourishment and renewal of the people of God. Fr. Klein

Join the Summer Family Choir

2010-06-11T16:58:00.000-05:00

Now that our chancel choir is officially on vacation, the Summer Family Choir is officially in session. All are invited to join, adults and kids. No week night rehearsals, no vesting, and no processing. Just show up at 8:45 am on Sunday morning to go over familiar hymns. Join us.

EYC Garage Sale

2010-06-11T16:51:00.002-05:00

Save the date and start saving your stuff! St. John's EYC will hold their annual Labor Day Weekend garage sale on Friday, September 3rd. We can start receiving donations beginning July 6. Call the Parish Office or speak with Georgette Lopez-Aguado if you need something picked up.

Vacation Bible School

2010-06-11T16:47:00.000-05:00

Our Vacation Bible School this year is title "Hey God, Let's Talk." It's all about prayer and it's all about fun. The schedule runs from June 28 to July 2, 9:00 am to Noon. For more information speak with Kristy Leaseburg or email her at kristy-leaseburg@hotmail.com.

St. John's Parish BBQ

2010-06-11T16:42:00.000-05:00

St. John's will hold a parish-wide barbecue in Mitchell Hall on Saturday evening, June 19 from 4:00 to 7:00 pm. Please sign up to bring a side dish. The sign-up sheet is in Mitchell Hall or on the Bulletin Board in the kitchen. Join us!

Wednesday Night BIble Study

2010-05-25T10:25:00.000-05:00

We will complete our study of Exodus on Wednesday, May 26. The Wednesday evening potluck and study will pick up again in the Fall.

Bishop Iker joins us for the Feast of Pentecost!

2010-05-04T15:13:00.000-05:00

It will be indeed a blessing to welcome our bishop, the Right Reverend Jack Leo Iker to St. John's on Sunday, May 23, being the Feast of Pentecost. At the 9:00 am service the bishop will preach, administer the Sacrament of Confirmation, and celebrate the Holy Eucharist. The children's choir will provide some special music at the 9:00 am service. The bishop will be with us at the 11:15 am service to bless our new access ramp. Please join us!

Tuesday, April 27 - Day of Fasting and Prayer.

2010-03-12T09:45:00.002-06:00

The Diocese has been notified that the Texas Second Court of Appeals will hear oral arguments regarding our Petition for Writ of Mandamus at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 27. This is very encouraging news.

We will be represented in the hearing by the Hon. Scott Brister, who stepped down from the State Supreme Court last September in order to return to private practice. The court is located in Fort Worth on the ninth floor of the Tarrant County Justice Center.

Bishop Iker is calling all clergy and lay people of the Diocese to a day of fasting and prayer on the hearing date.

Attorneys representing plaintiffs have indicated that they will be seeking a postponement. If the court revises its schedule, we will announce the change.

All proceedings in the suit against us, which were under way in the 141st District Court, remain stayed until the appellate court issues a ruling. If the appellate court grants our Petition, the rival diocese and corporation will be removed as plaintiffs in the suit.

Please continue to pray for our legal team, for the 141st District Court, and for its judge, the Hon. John Chupp.

Daughters of the King Lenten Retreat

2010-02-24T10:12:00.004-06:00

This year the DOK retreat at Camp Crucis will focus on methods of praying. The address is 2875 Camp Crucis Court, Granbury, Texas 76048.

The retreat is February 26 to 28, 2010. Registration runs from 4:00 to 6: 00 pm on Friday, Feb 26.

A parishioner of St. John's and Christian author Julie Cosgrove will lead the retreat from her book P.R.A.Y.I.N.G. A copy of the book is included in the registration. The following link will take you to the Retreat Schedule. http://www.docstoc.com/docs/document-preview.aspx?doc_id=26418508

Growing Deeper in your Faith and Theology!

2010-02-22T08:56:00.004-06:00

The Adult Inquirer's Program is geared to those who desire:

to be confirmed Anglican this Pentecost when Bishop Iker makes his Annual Visit to our parish this year on Pentecost Sunday at the 9:00 am service;
to learn more about the faith and customs of Anglicanism;

Fr. Klein encourages confirmed members of the Church to join us in the study as an excellent way to refresh your knowledge and understanding of the faith.

We will meet on Sunday afternoon following the 11:15 service and each session will run 60 to 90 minutes. There will be a simple lunch provided. Fr. Klein will be the instructor. The dates are April 11, 18, 25; May 2, and 16. We will not meet on May 9 as that Sunday is Mother's Day.

"Inviting God into your Life"

2010-02-12T14:01:00.001-06:00

Our Wednesday evening Lenten program this year is on prayer. Fr. Klein will teach the prayer method called "the Examen Prayer." This prayer method comes from St. Ignatius of Loyola.

Wednesday Evening Schedule

6:00 PM - The Holy Eucharist and Healing
6:30 to 7:00 PM - Lenten Dinner of soups, salad, bread
7:00 to 8:00 PM - "Inviting God into your Life."
Nursery is from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm.

What is the Examen Prayer? This is a five step prayer method. The steps are:

We give thanks to God for the blessings of the day just lived;
We ask for grace to see and to overcome our failings;
We review the day using prayer to see our spiritual expereince/responses throughout the day;
We seek God's forgiveness where necessary;
We make a spiritual plan for the coming day.

This prayer method helps us to close the day and to acknowledge the presence of God during the day. It can raise our level of awareness of God's daily life with us, and to our interior spiritual journey.

Feb. 24 - Introduction to the prayer and the power of desire!
Mar 3 - Steps One and Two.
Mar 10 - Steps Three and Four.
Mar 17 - Step Five and Conclusion: talk on flexibility, prayer setting, identifying fruit of Examen prayer. Hand out prayer card.

At the conclusion of this program you will have learned a method of prayer that will help you keep the eyes of your heart open to the love and presence of God! Join us.

Choir and Programs Cancelled tonight.

2010-02-11T12:02:00.000-06:00

The following programs are canceled due to bad weather and driving conditions:

St. Elizabeth's Guild
Clergy Study Group
All choirs

See you Sunday!

The Rector's Annual Meeting Address

2010-01-31T07:00:00.086-06:00

THE RECTOR’S ANNUAL MEETING REPORT
The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany
January 31, 2010

PARISH NECROLOGY
On this date, January 31, 2010, being the fourth Sunday after the Epiphany of our Lord, I prayerfully open the 85th Annual Parish Meeting with a call to silence and to prayer.

Let us pray for those of our parish family who have gone to rest in Jesus over the past year. Let us pray:

O God of grace and glory, we remember before You this day our faithful departed: Romesh Algama, Richard Barr, Fr. William Belury, Archie Crow, Doug Dickerson, Ernest Knudsen, Alan McClellan, James Meyers, George Stuard, and Dennis Williamson. We thank You for giving them to us, their family and friends, to know and to love as companions on our earthly pilgrimage. They now have come to know the strength of Your presence and share in the fellowship of Your Saints. In Your boundless compassion, give us faith to see in death the gate of eternal life, so that in quiet confidence we may continue our course on earth, until, by Your call, we are reunited with those who have gone before; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Good morning!
The Church of Jesus Christ is indeed a wonderful and a sacred mystery. We are privileged by God to be found worthy to share in His glorious work at the level and depth that we do. Among all the descriptions of the Church that could be used for an illustration, I want to turn to St. Paul’s statement from Ephesians 1:23. Paul writes that the Church is... Christ’s Body, the completion [or the fullness] of Him who Himself completes [or fills] all things everywhere. Eph 1:23

The Church is Christ’s Body: Jesus is living in and through the Church just as He promised: “and behold, I am with you always, to the close of the age.” Matt 28:20

The Church is the fullness of Christ on earth… Jesus explains: “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do; because I go to the Father.” Jn 14:12

The Church enables creation to achieve its right and perfect end, which is to be a new creation in God and this is achieved by filling the universe with Jesus Christ. This commentary by St. Paul on the mystery of the Church is a powerful reminder of our place within this great mystery and it’s an appropriate way to open our Annual Meeting.

St. Paul is pointing to Christ’s union with His Church and His deep love for her. Through the Church’s physical presence in the world and as a result of her worship and prayers our Lord is filling up “… the whole universe with His presence” (Eph 4:10b) extending to all creation the fruits of the Cross and the gift of Heaven. The Church eagerly waits for all of this to come to fruition (Rom 8:18-25) and she waits “…with patience.” (Rom 8:25b).

Can we be a patient people?
Patience here does not mean sitting still; rather it means active perseverance. The Greek means to not swerve from our deliberate purpose in mind but to remain loyal to faith [ie, to the “mind of Christ” 1Cor 2:16] and pray even at the high cost that calls for the greatest trials and sufferings. Perseverance is what the parable of the vigilant steward is all about. Jesus said:

Be dressed in readiness, and keep your lamps burning. And be like those who are anticipating their master’s return from the wedding feast, so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks. (Lk 12:35)

The word “anticipating” in this Parable means “to expect a promise to be fulfilled” and is often translated as “waiting for their master’s return.” The Church is a community of faith that knows her Master and is joyfully waiting for His return in glory.

We know

He is always present under the elements of the Holy Communion. Christ gives us His Body and Blood so that “He may dwell in us and we in Him.” (BCP 1928p.81 and 1979 BCP p.336 and Jn 6:56 and 14:20);
Jesus does not refuse any one who seeks Him to know and to live His mind (Jn 6:37-40);
So... we remain loyal; our lamps are bright and getting brighter; we are growing grace-filled in holiness and we are calling others to join us in this life of grace; so we never stand still, but we keep moving forward in faith.

Let us not fool ourselves. We are living in challenging times.
Having said all of this, yet we know that Christians are living in challenging times and even under death threats and persecutions. But the Church has always lived in such times. Being leaven and love in any culture at any time in history or even in the present day is a high calling. Of course we do expect things to be better. After all, for the last 2000 years Christianity has been much of the DNA of Western culture, and now Western society from Europe to North America is showing signs of permanent amnesia; forgetting its roots, its history, its identity.

Do you recall these words by Charles Dickens from his book, The Tale of Two Cities:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way…

So we could say that we are living through the worst of times; at least for orthodox Christians because the whole world seems like it’s being turned upside down and falling rapidly upon us! Whichever way we turn to avoid fallout we don’t see a readymade way to go. How do you escape from this craziness? It’s easy to be convinced that it’s impossible to escape, so what many Christians do is to barter with the culture to find some peace with the world. This kind of despair is what the Tempter is looking for; the reaction he wants from us.

But it’s also the best of times. It is the best because in such hours of challenge the Church’s moral courage has never been found stronger. History shows that when we face the darkness with the Light of Christ, His Light turns fears and worries into hope, earthbound eyes are turned upward to eternity, man finds himself, and his soul is nourished in the mercy of God.

What it takes is for Christians to not swerving from the purposes God has given us, rather it means to pray earnestly even if the cost means we must face the greatest trials and sufferings. This call to bring God’s Light to a darkened world is why Christ has chosen the Church to distribute His grace to all. The Church carries deep within her memory truth and the experience of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and His holy Ascension into Heaven. (2 Cor 4:10,11)

We know how the truth of Christ has changed the world for the better and it has changed people’s lives for good! The Church is an earthenware vessel, fragile and ever so inadequate. But the fountain of God’s grace is found within her frail reality.

Our heavenly Father has entrusted the dispensing of His grace to the weakness and fragility of human freedom! By way of the Church through her worship and prayers and sacraments and sacrifices the Holy Spirit reaches out to a sinful and broken world to unite all things to the Father through Jesus Christ (Eph 1:10). So we are living in the best of times; because it is God’s time. Every effort we make, through everything we do, in our worship and prayers, even the worries we endure and the sacrifices of our time, talent, and treasure; everything God uses for one purpose and that is to connect to one more soul.

The power of Christian Eucharistic worship and prayer.
We must never forget what power lies in our worship and prayers. The word “liturgy” comes from the Greek meaning “the work of a people.” The Church’s primary duty and labor is to worship Almighty God: to love Him, to adore Him and to pray.

God can do so much through us for the salvation of many people when we free ourselves to adore Him in worship and in prayer. We gather on Sunday morning to labor with God and with His angelic workforce for the furthering of His Kingdom. The result of our liturgy and prayers is that somewhere in some place in the world someone’s eyes have been opened, stubborn hearts have been softened, searching questions find right answers, life is blessed, and souls find peace.

Just think of what this all means. It means that God liberates and heals and restores as we worship and pray. This is a very good way to open our Annual Meeting, to be reminded that we are a prayerful community that faithfully worships the Lord.

Worship
St. John’s is a worshiping community. We are blessed to have Alan and Vivian Potts with us. Each year our adult choirs, children’s choir, bell choir, seasonal music, VBS music, and more continue to do so well. We also have a growing number of parishioners who are starting to play instruments and this is very impressive to see.

Just remember, there is always room for another adult voice, or a child’s voice, or a bell ringer. Our 9:00 am service can use additional voices in the choir. Maybe you play an instrument and you would like to share your gift at worship. Please speak with Alan.

Prayer
As a parish we are learning to pray in many different ways.

DOK

The Divine Mercy Chapter of the Daughters of the King is one such way. Rarely will a day go by that a prayer need is not passed among them or that a praise report is not shared when prayer has been answered. The Chapter meets most every month. If you are interested in becoming a Daughter I encourage you to speak with Sarah Stringer or one of the Daughters (look for the Daughters Cross) and consider joining their Discernment Classes. Also, one of our Daughters, Julie Cosgrove, has published her first book on prayer, titled P.R.A.Y.I.N.G. It is available from Julie or from amazon.com. Julie is the retreat leader for the Diocesan DOK retreat to be held February 26-28th. Any woman of the Diocese is invited to attend the retreat.

Prayer Chain

Martha Anderson along with Mary Sue Coffman takes care of our prayer chain. This prayer information is public. You can call or email Martha or Mary Sue any time with a prayer request or ask to receive their email updates of prayer needs.

Lenten Program “Inviting God into your Life: A Practical Guide for Prayer.”

I encourage you to attend our Wednesday Lenten program which I have titled Inviting God into your Life: A Practical Guide for Prayer. That is actually the title of one of the books I will be using for the program. The “practical guide” is actually the Ignatian Prayer method called “the Examen Prayer.” The program will be on Wednesdays at 7:00 pm February 24, March 3, 10, and 17. By the end these four weeks you will have learned how to put five steps to work that will help you listen more attentively for God’s voice; how to listen more carefully for when your own “inner voice” may be speaking; and how to review your day in light of God’s presence, and more. You will even have a prayer card that Diane has made to keep with you to lead you reflectively through each of the steps. Join me in Lent!

First Fridays – the Holy Eucharist and Praying the Rosary

Some years ago a few parishioners asked me to teach them how to pray the rosary. At first there were only a few of us so we had the joy of meeting in homes once a month to do this. In no time, the Lord blessed this prayer group, and we grew to the size that we needed to start meeting in the Lady Chapel. On any given month we have had as many as 25 and as few as 12 or more.

We meet on the first Friday of each month at 7:00 pm. We conclude usually before 8:00 pm and for those who are able we go out for a simple dinner and fellowship. Though the rosary is practiced among Roman Catholics, it’s a mistake to think that only Roman Catholics pray the rosary. Christians of all traditions have discovered the power and the peace that this prayer and meditation offers. Join us and discover the peace and help this prayer can give you.

Closing
In closing, there are so many people to acknowledge for their tireless efforts and support of this ministry.

In particular I want to thank my wife Diane for her labor in the office and for her support in every way; and Fr. Jeff and his wife Becca, for their enthusiasm and for Jeff’s willingness to join our pastoral team; and Allan and Vivan Potts who labor to offer to God through music the best worship in Fort Worth; and Kristy Leaseburg and Georgette Lopez-Aguado and all their teachers and helpers who labor with our ministry to the children and youth; for Richard Moseley and Gail Kleinschmidt; for Becky Tredennick and Carrie McCoy; for Dorothy Gregory, Charissa Christopher and Kathy King, for their dedicated service and sacrifices throughout the year.

I appreciate all of you, and everyone;

God bless,

Fr. Klein

The season of Christmas folds into the season of the Epiphany....

2010-01-15T19:51:00.002-06:00

The seasons of Christmas and Epiphany have a catechetical and a spiritual link. In a sense we can say that the Christmas season addresses the mystery of God having become man. Where the season of the Epiphany moves the Christmas season to it's next spiritual step, and that is man is to become like Christ.

This link shows a theological progression that has long been taught by the Church. For example, St. Athanasius, (293 to 373 A.D.) wrote that

The Son of God became man so as to deify us in Himself'.

Another way of expressing this has been that God became man so the man could become like God. Pretty strong words.

But we find St.Paul speaking on the same terms. In Ephesians 2:4-10 he writes

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of the great love he had for us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, brought us to life with Christ (by grace you have been saved), raised us up with him, and seated us with him in the heavens in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from you; it is the gift of God; it is not from works, so no one may boast. For we are his handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for the good works that God has prepared in advance, that we should live in them.

When we tag this passage above to Ephesians 1:9-10

For God has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fulness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

we can see that God is actually drawing all of creation through out the course of history into the process of deification, which is to return everything to its original state, as it was before the fall.

This is expressed in the prayers in our Prayer Book such as the liturgy of the Great Vigil of Easter. We pray

How holy is this night, when wickedness is put to flight, and sin is washed away. It restores innocence to the fallen, and joy to those who mourn. It casts out pride and hatred, and brings peace and concord.

How blessed is this night, when earth and heaven are joined and man is reconciled to God.

But could this explain why God has called each of us to be Christians? Becoming Christian means entering into this great movement of God. A movement that allows us to find purpose and completeness in Jesus Christ. Amen

DOK Presentation on Prayer and the Sign of the Cross.

2010-01-14T14:12:00.000-06:00

Fr. Klein made a presentation to our Chapter of Divine Mercy of the DOK on Sunday, January 10. The topic was how tracing the image of the Cross in the name of the holy Trinity is a method of prayer. The following are a few Patristic sources that Fr. Klein quoted:

From St. John Chrysostom (347 to 407)

Never leave your house without making the sign of the Cross. It will be to you a staff, a weapon, a strong fortress. Neither man nor demon will dare to attack you, seeing you covered with such powerful armor. Let this sign teach you that you are a soldier, ready to combat against the demons, and ready to fight for the crown of justice. Are you ignorant of what the Cross has done? It has vanquished death, destroyed sin, emptied Hell, dethroned Satan, and restored the Universe. Would you then doubt its power?

From St. Cyril of Jerusalem (313 to 386)

Many have been crucified throughout the world, but by none of these are the devils scared; but when they see even the Sign of the Cross of Christ, who was crucified for us, they shudder. (emphasis is mine)

Sign Up for Spring Foyer

2009-12-15T12:20:00.000-06:00

The office is forming the schedule for the Spring Foyer Term (January through April). Foyer groups are small groups of six to eight people who meet about once a month in homes for dinner and fellowship. It's a great way to meet and get to know other people in the parish.

To join a group just fill out the Foyer insert that has been inserted in the Sunday Bulletin or call the parish office at 817-927-5341. Last day to sign up is Tuesday, Dec 29. We would love to see you!

Prayer for Strength

2009-12-04T23:07:00.002-06:00

O Strength of my soul, make Your way in and shape it to Yourself, that it may be Yours to have and to hold, free from stain or wrinkle.

St. Augustine of Hippo from his book "Confessions."

God's Healing Surgery

2009-11-27T23:39:00.000-06:00

This is a quote from a sermon by St. Augustine of Hippo (November 13, 354 to August 28, 430 AD)

The doctor sometimes makes a mistake, but God never does. So if you entrust yourself to a doctor who can sometimes make mistakes, you are entrusting yourself to human treatment. Won't you allow God to cut, and slice off some of your profits if, by such a check, you may have a lesson to learn? So then, brothers and sisters, be upright of heart; that is, do not get annoyed with God for any reason.

This prayer is taken from his book "Confessions"

O my inward Healer, let my heart keep watch for Your loving mercy and Your gentle grace, through which every weak soul that knows its own weakness grows strong.

Unprecedented Support for Life!

2009-11-27T16:37:00.001-06:00

An unprecedented coalition of prominent Christian clergy, ministry leaders, and scholars has crafted a 4,700-word declaration addressing the sanctity of life, traditional marriage, and religious liberty. The declaration issues "a clarion call" to Christians to adhere to their convictions and informs civil authorities that the signers will not "under any circumstance" abandon their Christian consciences.

The statement, called "the Manhattan Declaration," has been signed by more than 125 Catholic, Evangelical Christian, and Orthodox leaders, and will be made fully public at a noon press conference in the National Press Club in Washington DC on Friday.

The Document reads:

We are Christians who have joined together across historic lines of ecclesial differences to affirm our right - and, more importantly, to embrace our obligation - to speak and act in defense of these truths. We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence...

We recognize the duty to comply with laws whether we happen to like them or not, unless the laws are gravely unjust or require those subject to them to do something unjust or otherwise immoral.

But they also made clear that

we will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia, or any other anti-life act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriage or the equivalent, or refrain from proclaiming the truth, as we know it, about morality and immorality and marriage and the family.

Pray for God to work amazing power through this witness. We should be very proud that ACNA is represented among the religious leaders. Please click on the Manhattan Declaration Logo above to read the document and a summary.

Our Season of Advent gets it right!

2009-11-26T10:09:00.041-06:00

Now here is a good question: "Do we Episcopalians and Anglicans believe in a type of "rapture" by Christ? After all, many Christians do. Are they wrong? Well, the short answer is simply no, we do not believe in any secret return of Christ to rapture out of this world the faithful; which leads us to answer the second question, and that is yes, Christians who do believe in a "rapture theory" about a secret return of Christ have been led astray.

Now if you want to know why, read on.

Among Christians today you hear talk that Jesus Christ is coming back in a secret way to "rapture" us from the earth so to preserve us from the terrible tribulations prophesied in the Bible for the earth's last days. This would happen sometime between His birth and His final coming as Judge. We are to know when this time has arrived as we will notice how all faithful Christians are suddenly disappearing on a grand scale. Gone before our eyes. Does this sound a bit off? It is and for many reasons.

Do we believe in the rapture?
So what about us? Do we believe in a rapture theory? As I said earlier, no, and we don't for two very important reasons:

It's not biblical. In spite of the fact that the Christians who hold firm to this view refer to themselves as "Bible Christians," both the Old and New Testaments know nothing about a third coming of Christ in secret to rapture the faithful.
The second reason is that for the first 18 centuries of Christian history, no one ever promoted such an idea of there being a "rapture" of any type someday.

Where did this rapture stuff originate?
So where on earth did it come from and why is it so popular among Christians? The notion of a rapture belongs to 19th century Protestant movements in the United States and in Great Britain. In the 19th century we find a man named John Nelson Darby, an Irish Protestant who was a leader of a Christian sect called the Plymouth Brethren. Reverend Darby traveled extensively between 1859 and 1874 preaching his ideas about "the end times." He put together various verses of the Bible and joined his own theological scenario to form what he called "Biblical prophecy." His biblical hermenutics has shaped the personal beliefs of millions of Christians since the middle of the 19th century down to our present time! Darby called his theological system Dispensationalism. He divided history into seven "dispensations" or "progressive stages" showing a pattern in God's unfolding revelation to humanity.

It is Dispensationalism that promotes the notion of a secret rapture by Christ. This idea gained a huge boost in 1909 with the publication of the Scofield Reference Bible. Cyrus Ingerson Scofield was a serious convert to Darby's dispensational beliefs. He was a lawyer by education and had no formal theological training at all. But in time, millions of people were studying Scofield's marginal notes and believing that they actually were explaining what was contained in the inspired biblical text. You will find in Scofield's notes how he breaks up history into these seven ages.

Today we have popular books like Hal Lindsey's The Late Great Planet Earth (1970), and its sequels, and more recently the Left Behind Series and the many sequals and movies and variations that continue to promote Dispensationalism and continue to make great confusion among even "biblical Christians."

Our Creeds and the season of Advent

So where do we Anglicans/Episcopalians go from here? We go to the Creeds and to the season of Advent to stay rooted to Christ and His teachings. Our Prayer Book addresses:

Our Lord's first coming which is His holy Nativity and includes His Incarnational life, Suffering, Death on the Cross, Resurrection and Ascension into Heaven;
Our Lord's second coming when He returns to usher in the "new Heaven and the new earth."

Beginning with His Incarnational life through His Ascension into Heaven Jesus spoke of and promised that He shall return one day to earth. Why is it necessary for Jesus to return some day? He must return some day, because His mission is not yet complete.

Our Prayer Book knows nothing of a "rapture theory."

But until He returns in all His glory Jesus does not leave us "desolate." Rather He says: "I will come to you." (see John 14:18). So Jesus abides now with us and will remain until He appears as merciful Judge.

St. Bernard of Clairveaux explains this abiding presence or "intermediate coming" in this way:

We know that there are three "comings" of the Lord. The third lies between the other two. It is invisible while the other two are visible. In the first coming He was seen on earth, dwelling among men; … in the final coming "all flesh will see the salvation of our God and they will look upon Him whom they have pierced." The intermediate coming is a hidden one; in it only the baptized see the Lord within their own selves, and they are saved. In His first coming our Lord came in our flesh and our weakness; in this middle He comes in Spirit and in power; in the final coming he will be seen in glory and in majesty. Because this coming lies between the other two, it is like a road on which we travel from the first coming to the last.

The formula looks like this:

First Coming: The Holy Nativity through the Ascension;
The intermediate or sacramental presence: At Pentecost Jesus establishes His abiding sacramental presence. Becuase of the presence of the Father and of the Son that dwells in the Church through the power of the Holy Spirit; the Church is a source of spiritual renewal and great power! (see John 14:10-14).
Second Coming: to judge the living and the dead and to usher in the Kingdom of God.

In John 16:16-22 Jesus addresses what St. Bernard of Clairveaux called "the intermediate coming"

A little while and you will no longer see Me, and again a little while later and you will see Me. So some of His disciples said to one another, "What does this mean that He is saying to us, 'A little while and you will not see Me, and again a little while and you will see Me,' and 'Because I am going to the Father'?" So they said, "What is this 'little while' (of which He speaks)? We do not know what He means." Jesus knew that they wanted to ask Him, so He said to them, "Are you discussing with one another what I said, 'A little while and you will not see Me, and again a little while and you will see Me'? Amen, amen, I say to you, you will weep and mourn, while the world rejoices; you will grieve, but your grief will become joy. When a woman is in labor, she is in anguish because her hour has arrived; but when she has given birth to a child, she no longer remembers the pain because of her joy that a child has been born into the world. So you also are now in anguish. But I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you. (John 16:16-22)

This intermediate presence is at the heart of our Lord's prayer to His heavenly Father:

I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word, so that they may all be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And I have given them the glory You gave Me, so that they may be one, as We are one, I in them and You in Me, that they may be brought to perfection as one, that the world may know that You sent Me, and that You loved them even as You loved Me. Father, they are Your gift to Me. I wish that where I am they also may be with Me, that they may see My glory that You gave Me, because You loved Me before the foundation of the world. Righteous Father, the world also does not know You, but I know You, and they know that You sent Me. I made known to them Your Name and I will make it known, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them and I in them. (John 17:20-26)

Jesus is speaking about His presence with us until the end of the ages: "... and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age." (Matt 28:20b).

Summary (yes, I'm almost done)
So, the Bible and our faith clearly explain that Christians are not raptured out of anything. In fact it is only by going through the great tribulations that our robe (meaning our life and soul) is washed white (purified and made whole) in the Blood of the Lamb. (see Rev 7:13-17). The only way we get out of this world is through the gate of death. Our faith is founded upon Easter morning and the fact that Christ has been victorious over death. By means of His presence in the Church our Lord is able to provide (through the work of the Holy Spirit within us) grace upon grace so that we can live virtuiously and be victorious over our fallen nature and live the life God has ordained us to live in this world and in the world to come.

Let us also remember that in every day we have the love and the support of the angels in Heaven. We can take great comfort knowing that since our Baptism our Lord Jesus Christ provided each one of us with a Guardian Angel. This angel remains with us throughout our lives, watching over us, and assisting us in many ways. The hosts of Heaven love and care for us! Jesus the Good Shepherd is with us now through the power and witness and presence of the Holy Spirit. This is His promise to be with us until "the end of the ages." This presence is speaking about His sacramental presence in His Church and in her mission and ministry to the world; as well as in our devotional life as a disciple.

So, let us pray, "Come, Lord Jesus."

The Feast of Christ the King

2009-11-22T07:01:00.007-06:00

On Sunday, November 22nd we celebrate the Feast of Jesus Christ being the Sovereign King, and this concludes the Christian year. On the following Sunday, November 29th the liturgical year starts afresh with the First Sunday of Advent and once again the cycle of time begins to prepare us to meet our God in Jesus Christ.

Our faith is so beautifully expressed in the Book of Common Prayer and its liturgy provides to the world hungry for meaning the truth that it seeks which is God in Christ, who is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. Jesus is the faithful Giver as He pours out His life for the salvation of the world, and in His life and death and resurrection He is the fulfillment of all time. In Jesus the whole world is being made new every second of every day.

Do you remember the Parable of the Wedding Feast (Matt 22:2). The meaning of being invited to "the wedding feast" and to receive the Bridegroom (Jesus) when He comes is for us to find love and power in being the Bride of Christ. This relationship with the Bridegroom is like an anchor for us to be tied to as time moves us always into the future and the unknown. His love endures forever!

Through sacred Scripture, spiritual reading, and the beautiful language and services of our Prayer Book the Holy Spirit invites us to reflect on the eternal meaning of the four last things: death, judgment, heaven and hell. Ultimately and in some way these four last things find themselves attached to every decision and every attitude and every position we will ever hold.

Now, this fact of the presence of the four last things is not a negative thing at all, but rather it is a good thing, it is something to rejoice in, because they form a "reality check" and they are part of a greater responsible spiritual and theological system of "check and balances" that keep us honest with our self and with God so that we may be made worthy at the end of life to enter more fully into His Divine plan.

In God's view of things there is no real separation between what we call "the secular things" and what we refer to as "the sacred things." Rather than separation God helps us to make holy those things that seem mundane and all too ordinary. After all, they are all His as well! In the great truths of our faith rooted to the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ our heavenly Father is forever making all things new. It is that movement of "glory to glory" that St. Paul wrote about in 2 Cor 3:18.

We do not bring God into our time through our prayers and actions of "needs and wants and service." Rather its through these things in time that we discover how God is the living Author of all things; the known and the unknown, the visible and the invisible. In essence, our creedal faith.

I invite you on this Sunday of the Feast of Christ the King to receive Jesus Christ as absolute Lord of your life; and after this in humility discover how to acknowledge Him in every part of life. When Jesus truly reigns as Lord and God, "time" becomes a precious gift; even a wonderful gift that we use to return to Him the very life He has given us to live.

Amen

Thy Kingdom Come!

2009-11-17T15:21:00.003-06:00

The season of Advent begins November 29th. The word "advent," from the Latin adventus or the Greek parousia means "coming" or "arrival." The season of Advent is focused on the coming of Jesus Christ . During the four weeks of Advent our worship, scripture readings, and prayers prepare us:

Spiritually for Christmas and the gift of our Lord's first coming;
and focuses our hope on His second coming.

This is why the readings from the Bible during Advent include:

Old Testament passages that anticipate the expected Messiah;
and New Testament passages that anticipate our Lord's return to judge both the living and the dead.

"Thy Kingdom come;"
This is the third petition of the Lord's Prayer. In this petition we learn to pray daily for the Kingdom that God has promised will come, a Kingdom that is already present to us in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Sacramentally, the Kingdom of God touches our lives today, even as we await its arrival in fullness in God's time.

In the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) Jesus deals with this. He provides an extensive revelation of the many aspects of the Kingdom of God; and how the Kingdom is to be realized through the Body of Christ. God's Kingdom is a Kingdom of love, justice, and mercy where sins are forgiven, the sick and suffering are made whole, enemies are reconciled and the needs of the poor are met.

The Kingdom of God includes all of these things, and so much more, for ultimately the Kingdom is Jesus Christ and all He means for us! The Kingdom is already here because of the redemption of Jesus on the Cross. But in another sense, the Kingdom of God is "not yet" here, since the final transformation of every person, society and culture has yet to happen in its fulness. This is why Jesus taught us to pray daily: "Thy Kingdom come."

Pray in order to believe, Believe in order to pray.

2009-11-09T22:21:00.001-06:00

When we can look closely at our Christian faith we will notice how it is composed of God's divine weaving of prayer and doctrine together. Prayer and doctrine belong working together. Liturgy is a perfect example of prayer and doctrine working in harmony together to nourish and instruct.

Our Lord asks us to believe in order to pray and pray in order to believe. This is the integration of how we know and love God; it's where faith and theology are joined at the hip.

Believing doctrine will naturally draw us to prayer. In this prayer time we find reassurance and comfort because of the validity of God's revealed truths. If we put time and effort into understanding the doctrines of our faith we will find ourselves thirsting to pray more often. This requires study, reflection, and real effort. Prayer is a loving relationship with God, and our relationship with our heavenly Father, like all relationships require real time and makes real demands upon us.

But no love can exist without real sacrifice.

Meditation on the Movement of Faith

2009-11-05T22:04:00.002-06:00

In the life of faith there are always two movements: God in search of us and we in search of God. The poet Francis Thompson describes God's persistent love as the "Hound of Heaven." God has stamped in our souls a longing for Him. We are born with a longing for Him that cannot be satisfied by anyone other than God. We are created to be seekers for absolute love, which is God alone.

Let us pray

Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Your faithful people,
And kindle in them the fire of Your love.
Send forth Your Spirit and they shall be created,
And you shall renew the face of the earth.

Lord, by the light of the Holy Spirit You have taught the hearts of Your faithful.
In the same Spirit, help us to know what is truly right
and always to rejoice in Your consolation.
We ask this through Christ, our Lord.

Amen

Becoming a saint.

2009-11-05T07:46:00.001-06:00

Fr. Klein, Sermon: All Saints’ Day, November 1, 2009

Today we join with Christians all over the world to celebrate one of the seven Principle Feast days of the Christian year, the feast of All Saints. (BCP 15).

The day means a lot to us. Some of the most beautiful hymns that we have in our Hymnology have been written to honor this day and to honor God’s holy saints.

One such hymn is Hymn 293: “I sing a song of the saints of God.”

This hymn reminds us of our childhood. It reminds us of when the Church taught us that we too can become saints of God; that every person has the potential of achieving through the course of his or her life true communion with God.

But to grow in holiness we must see life through the eyes of Jesus. We must look at our daily work, even the hard labor we may face, the untimely decisions that pressure us, the things peculiar, along with the demands of all activities as God-given occasions to foster spiritual renewal and deeper union with Jesus Christ.

Now this may sound strange, especially if you think over what your average day is like. But it’s true that we are to sanctify what we do and even time itself, learning to serve God and our neighbor at any given hour.

Those daily needs of family life, what we do to maintain a healthy and committed marriage, having the moral courage to make hard decisions and raise our children in the Christian faith and life; along with all of our activities; everything is God-given to us to see as opportunities for imitating Jesus Christ: such as charity, patience, humility, diligence, integrity, cheerfulness, faith in God, and so much more. We must bring before the Holy Spirit life in prayer and discernment and ask Him to guide us, bless us and help us to be good stewards of life.

This is how saintly Christians grow in grace and holiness, each learning to work with the spirit of Jesus Christ to live life competently with the aim that through life we love God and we can reach out with Him to His broken world.

God’s hope is that we learn to approach life in this way to sanctify the world from within. Prayer becomes the venue to bring the daily structures of life into our heart, and we use this ¬life-heart connection to expose the Gospel as a living presence in all activities whether they are outstanding or humble or even hidden.

By utilizing this life-heart connection we are able to put love into life. Once we come to grips with this, and begin to do it, we are on the pathway to becoming a great saint!

There is another hymn and it’s one of my favorites: Hymn 287: “For all the saints.” Now here is a hymn. It has everything right about it: good theology, beautiful words and a wonderful composition.

This hymn was written to celebrate the rich and beautiful hagiography we discover in a vast list of thousands of souls that have been canonized or elevated to some dignity by both the Church of the East and of the West.

These dear souls are what the Book of Revelation this morning referred to as the

great multitude of people so enormous that no one could count, representing every race, tribe, nation and language, all standing before the throne of the Father and before the victorious Lamb, His Son, Jesus Christ; each dressed in a white robe holding a palm branch in his or her hand… (Rev 7:9)

And do you know that this great multitude is resting now “under the heavenly Altar of God” (Rev 6:9), resting and being healed of the wounds received during their earthly life. Man will suffer in-one-way-or-another if he lives his life for God. But of course, it’s also true that if you don’t live your life for God you will still suffer and this suffering will only get worse and will carry over into eternity.

But for those who whose robes have been washed pure in the Blood of the Lamb the divine Physician prescribes rest.

He says to those resting under the Altar of God:

rest a little longer until the number of fellow servants and brethren, who were to be killed even as they had been, should be completed… (Rev 6:11)

Ecclesiasticus this morning calls this multitude

famous men, and our fathers in their generations. God apportioned to them great glory, His majesty from the beginning. (Sir 44:1)

The “famous men” we know about; they are people like Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; Moses and Aaron, Rebecca and Deborah and many others. The second part of that sentence which reads “and our fathers in their generations” are those whose names and deeds of virtue we know nothing about.

History leaves us with

no memory; they have perished as though they never existed; as though they were never born, they and their children after them. (Sir 44:9)

The end of verse 9 reads they and their children after them? This portion of the verse speaks to those who simply lived life. They lived in humble surroundings, sacrifice was a daily occupation. Some of them were obviously baptized and yet many over the centuries were not. Yet each lived and died in earnest pursuit of the good that is God alone.

A saint is a child of God, someone who has set his or her heart upon God and has released their stubborn will into His loving influence. This allows God at every time and in every place to draw close to His children.

And He does this; He speaks softly but firmly, much like what Elijah heard at the mouth of a cave (1 Kgs 19: 9-18). God calls us, He bids us to seek Him every day, to know Him and to love Him with all of our strength of heart and will.

Why should we consider this an odd thing for God to call to us, to want us? Are we not made by Him to share in His divine and blessed Life?

St. Peter writes of this in his second letter

[God’s] divine power has bestowed on us everything that makes for life and true devotion, through the knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and power. Through these, He has bestowed on us the precious and very great promises, so that through them you may come to share in the divine nature, after escaping from the corruption that is in the world because of evil desire. (2 Pet 1:3,4 NAB)

So the way we “escape the corruption that is in the world” is to become a saint.

But here is the deal. Saints are not “double agents;” we don’t live a double life, where on the one hand, we have this wonderful spiritual life, a life of union with God and His will; and on the other hand, we live a separate and distinct professional and social or family life.

This is not Gospel living. Gospel living is all about integration. The Gospel tells us that we have just one life and that life is made of flesh and spirit… of body and soul.

This one life we have been given to live and become in soul and body, holy and filled with God.

That is our earthly calling: to be filled with the fullness of God. Our earthly life of obedience prepares us for our heavenly life of eternity.

Is there any better definition of a saint but someone who is filled with the fullness of God? By our very nature we are a religious being. We have the capability of entering into communion with God. This communion confers upon us our fundamental dignity. In the first chapter of Ecclesiasticus we find that this desire for God (our dignity) is created in the womb. (Sir 1:14)

Closing
Because God’s saints are scattered through-out the world, nothing need be foreign to Christ’s care.

Being a saint means not fearing life but approaching life as opportunity to work with God to sanctify it.

Once our heart has matured under the Word of God, and we have felt hunger and thirst, worked with tired and labored hands, experienced the cry of a child or the sorrow of a loved one, or shouldered the burden of the suffering and cared for the dying; then we are in the position to use that life-heart connection and live as a saint of God.

Each situation is unique; each offers a unique call which we must learn how to live out; but we should live our call intensely, giving expression to the spirit of Christ

Through our life Christ is present to anyone.

So I end where I started, by saying that to grow in holiness by grace we must see life through the eyes of Jesus. We must realize that we will struggle as saints in this world.

But be of good courage my friend; the struggle is OK because it’s part of the purification process that will fix our heart upon God alone; and we know the end of the story, don’t we, that in the end our Lord has won the struggle for us.

Amen.

What Heaven Means?

2009-11-04T09:52:00.001-06:00

The New Testament explains that Heaven is being In Christ. Those who have died are at rest in Christ. St. Paul explains this in Romans 6:23, that "the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." In 1 Cor 15:18 again St. Paul makes reference to those who have died as having "fallen asleep in Christ." So being in Christ means being in Heaven.

It is good that we should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.1

2009-10-30T10:47:00.005-05:00

Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has He shut up His tender mercies towards us?2 We might believe this because of our tendency to live life with great haste. Our life is fully lived sometimes before the day is over.

Sometimes our hasty life gives us the illusion that we are cut off from the Lord. Yet, God hears the voice of our prayer and supplications whenever we become still and cry out to Him.3

God shall avenge His own elect, so day and night we must pray to Him.4 "Day and night" here means that we must exercise prayerful patience. We must learn how to act under the pressures of living "today" and wait upon the Lord for His help and guidance. In patience we find salvation.5

So let us learn how to rest in the Lord, and wait for Him. We must not be anxious when we see our neighbor prosper better then we do.6 This is not a battle that we need to fight. Instead, we must set ourselves against such attitudes and stand still and behold the activity of God already at work in our every "today." This will allow us to see and know the salvation of the Lord.7

In due season we shall reap what God has planned for us, but we must not grow weak.8 Remembr how the farmer must learn to plant and wait for the precious fruit of the earth. This planting and waiting and then harvesting requires that he be patient, until the coming of the early and latter rain.9

1Lam 3:26; 2Psa 77:9; 3Psa 31:22; 4Luk 18:7,8; 5Pro 20:22; 6Psa 37:7; 72Ch 20:17; 8Gal 6:9; 9Jam 5:7;

Scripture is interpreted by Scripture.

2009-10-29T10:26:00.001-05:00

A great many of the theological problems or innovations that we encounter today in the Church today are the fruit of a method of biblical interpretation called the historical-critical method. While there are many benefits found in using this method of critical study of the biblical text, its methodology can be overused and over relied upon when seeking a complete understanding or sense of a given passage of Scripture.

Briefly put, the historical-critical method has four components:

Form criticism
Source criticism
Redaction criticism
Textual criticism

An main assumption that lies with using these four components as a method of biblical study is the approach that there is only a rational and human development to the text of scripture as we have it.

A major problem that can develop when this method is not used correctly is to see the Bible as a piecemeal of narration. By dividing the Bible into four critical camps the one voice of the whole, the inner identity that sustains the whole Bible and binds it together is usually lost. What you end up with are interpretations that remove the transcendent and the miraculous from the Bible.

What we need to remember is that Scripture interprets Scripture. Scripture is God’s spoken Word to us. It has an underlying unity, logic and cohesion that is divinely authored for our sake. We must always labor to keep one part of Scripture always in relation to the whole, because our particular study or reading is part of a whole. When we remember that Scripture interprets Scripture we can make use of a variety of biblical tools to help us dig deeper into God Word without loosing touch with His truth that pervades it all.

The Foundation of the Nation of Israel.

2009-10-21T21:29:00.004-05:00

Notes for Wednesday night Bible Study October 21, 2009

The Torah or Pentateuch as a whole is concerned with the establishment (or the foundation) of the Kingdom of God on earth. To do this the Book of Genesis details the origin of the people who become the "people of the exodus." Such people are in a sense the first citizens of the Kingdom of God on earth. The Book of Exodus picks up where genesis leaves off and moves from "beginnings to foundation" showing the details of the origin of the people of Israel as a nation.

Some of the details in Exodus are:

Group consciousness is formed. The Israelites were related by blood to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; they shared much of the same common historical and religious traditions; and their expereinces as a people progressively moved them to form a unified group.
Unifying experiences. The oppression of forced labor and the execution of male children; the revolt against Pharaoh led by Moses and Aaron; the 10 plagues; the exodus; the miracilous passage through the Red Sea would be used by God (much like He did with Jacob's wrestling with the angel) to be unifying experiences that would stamp an indelible mark upon the Israelite soul.
System of Leadership. Israel was ruled by God through His vicars, who would call His people to obedience and observance of worship and the Law.
The Promised Land. The divinely appointed people would have a divinely appointed homeland that would be unique.

An important point that starts to develop from the Book of Exodus is that God's love for Israel is never a "political love" such has Pharaoh's and Kings would have; rather God's love is free and gracious.

The Structure of the Pentateuch

2009-10-21T10:39:00.005-05:00

Notes for Wednesday night Bible Study October 21, 2009

The Book of Exodus and the meeting of God and Israel at Mount Sinai are significant events because they mark the beginning of the history of Israel as a people of faith. Before the call to journey into the wilderness was issued the focus of God’s relationship with persons centered on speaking to individual clans and persons. At Mount Sinai this all changed. Now the reference is Israel as a nation that finds its unity in faith in Yahweh who forms them by a special call and a special way of life. The foundation is a single God and a single people. This unity made by God is indissoluble and forms the basis for a covenant of love. This is all laid out by Yahweh to Moses at the burning bush (Ex. 3). Yahweh reveals His Name and His plan to save His people. The revelation of the sacred Name was new to Moses. The revelation of the sacred Name displays how God seeks to reach out to people, that is in a personal way. This revelation makes a new moment of grace in time.

Background of the plagues
The narration of the ten plagues developed over a period of some time within the oral tradition of the Hebrews. This time frame can be seen using the source theory of J,E,P,D. The J and E authors are responsible for eight plagues and the P source added two additional one (plagues 3 and 6 which are the gnats and the boils). In the J and E account Moses petitions Pharaoh over and over to let the people go and Pharaoh continues to refuse to listen and instead hardens his heart to God’s request. The plagues are a response to Pharaoh hardening his heart to God's will.

Plagues 3 and 6 are unique and added by the P source (priestly source) to stress the role of Aaron as priest and the nature of each plague as a sign of God's amazing transcending power. The first nine plagues are natural phenomena and can still occur in the area today.

The sign that is discovered is not found in the plagues themselves but in the control that God exercised over the whole series to bring about His plan. The tenth and final plague stands apart. Here we see how death will be used by God to bring about man’s liberation and a new life. This is a foreshadowing of our Lord's life, death and resurrection.

The first nine plagues are arranged in three cycles.

The First Cycle
1. First Plague: Blood. Ex. 7:14-24. The first two plagues were shrugged off by Pharaoh as nothing more than his own court magicians could do. The Nile River turned to blood. But it wasn't just the river; it was all the water in Egypt. Egyptians would take a drink from what they thought was clean water, and it would be blood. However, when an Israelite took water from the same source, it would remain water. The plague of blood was particularly distressing to the Egyptians because they worshiped the Nile.
2. Second Plague: Frogs. Ex. 8:1-15. The land of Egypt was overrun by frogs. There were frogs in the beds, frogs in the cupboards, frogs in the pots, even frogs in the oven. And whenever the Egyptians would hit a frog in order to kill it, the Midrash explains that the frog would split into two, producing even more frogs.
3. Third Plague: Gnats or Lice. Ex. 8:16-19. This plague started to get the attention of the court magicians. They said that “this is caused by the finger of God.” To initiate the third plague Yahweh commanded Aaron through Moses to hit the ground with his staff. The dust on the ground turned to lice and spread throughout Egypt.

The Second Cycle
4. Fourth Plague: Flies. Ex. 8:20-32. The flies cover all of Egypt, including the ground, except Goshen, where the Hebrews lived.
5. Fifth Plague: Cattle. Ex. 9:1-7. This would have been a real desecration in the eyes of the Egyptians because cattle were the very animals Egyptians worshiped as gods. The plague on the cattle also affects the livelihood of the people.

The first five plagues taught the Egyptians that their material wealth and possessions along with their Dynasty is all but lost and subject to Yahweh.

6. Sixth Plague: Boils. Ex. 9:8-12. Things continue to become worse. Both the people and the livestock are affected with painful boils. Even the magicians are affected and cannot get rid of them. The plagues now turn directly to the people and begins to show the foolishness and bitterness and stubbornness of Pharaoh.

The Third Cycle
7. Seventh Plague: Hailstorm. Ex. 9:13-35. This hailstorm knows no limits, but affects the entire land of Egypt: the plants, animals and people.
8. Eighth Plague: Locusts. Ex. 10:1-20. This is a plague of real lasting devastation. Not much was left of Egypt by the time the plague of locust arrived. The cattle were dead, the buildings destroyed, and then the locusts arrived to complete devastation and destruction and break the morale of the Egyptian people. An enormous swarm darkened the sky and devoured anything that remained.
9. Ninth Plague: Darkness. Ex. 10:21-28. For three days, total darkness descended on Egypt. It was a darknness "to be felt." This darkness was so intense that the Egyptians were unable to move, they could not "see one another." Jewish mystics sat that not even a fire was possible. The Jews, however, could see where they were going and were unaffected by the darkness. The Book of Wisdom (11:15,16 and 17:1-18:4) interprets sin and darkness as a terrible abandonment of man by God. Dialogue with Pharaoh is broken down.

The Tenth Plague
10. The Tenth Plague: the death of Pharaoh’s first born son. Ex. 11:1-10. By the time Pharaoh was threatened with the final plague, his people were begging him to release the Israelites. But Pharaoh was obstinate, and would not let them go. The night that the first born Egyptians died is the first night of Passover. This was the only plague for which the Jews needed to prepare themselves so that they would not be harmed. In order to be "passed-over," Moses instructed the Israelites to mark their doorposts with lamb's blood. And in the darkness of the midnight hour all of the first born in the land of Egypt died.

Natural Law.

2009-10-19T07:35:00.004-05:00

As Christians we have always insisted that there is a Natural Law. The best and easiest definition of Natural Law is found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. It says that,

“present in the heart of each man and established by reason.” This law “is universal in its precepts and its authority extends to all men. It expresses the dignity of the person and determines the basis for his fundamental rights and duties.”

Natural Law provides the ground and foundation to build moral truths that will inform our life together if we hope to be a truly just and free society. In Natural Law we find fundamental and foundational human rights which we insist must be recognized by all civil or positive law as rightfully belonging to all men and women.

The Message to Pharaoh: A Study of Exodus Ch. 5 and 6.

2009-10-15T07:32:00.005-05:00

Wednesday Night Oct. 14th Bible Study Outline. Our study covered Exodus Ch 5 & 6. Two main points were made:

Israel is God's first born son, the covenant head of the family of nations.
Through the genealogy of Moses and Aaron (Ch. 6:14-27) with its main purpose to establish the link between the Levitical priesthood and Moses and Aaron, the people of God is called to be a "priestly nation" for all the nations of the world.

From these two points the following discussion took place:

God sent Moses and Aaron to Pharaoh with both a message and a demand. The message was this: "Israel is My first born son."

Israel is the "elder brother" of all the nations.
Israel will be the "covenant head" for all the nations.
All nations are children of God, so the Egyptians (and Pharaoh) are younger siblings.
Israel shall be a model of righteousness and wisdom.
All nations are to look to Israel to learn how to walk in the ways of God. This modeling is Israel's "priestly role."

The demand from God was simple and reasonable: Let Israel go on a three day journey into the wilderness to offer sacrifice to the Lord God.

At this point Moses was not demanding the freedom of Israel. Rather the freedom was to be discovered in the act of worship.
Moses did not ask Pharaoh to lessen the burdens on Israel. Israel was to find in the worship of God strength to hold up under the burdens of life.
The worship of God is to be a religious event.

Of course Pharaoh made Israel's life harder. The Israelites blamed Moses and Aaron. A spiritual truth is learned.

When we seek to separate ourselves from the world and especially "cleanse our soul" from worldly "tug-and-pull" on us the world will confront us with a variety of burdens and difficulties to discourage us so we will give in and pull back from cleansing and worshipping God.
We often blame the "religious system" for the struggle we have in seeking participation God's life instead of seeing much oif the struggle is in our own reluctance or laziness to bear up under the burden the world (the Devil) puts on us as we try to pursue a life in Christ.

God knew the status of Pharaoh's heart and mind. Pharaoh represented all the qualities of fallen man who remains stubborn to God's call and plan. God's judgment on this stubbornness was clear. Man understands the power and finality of death. God will use death as the means to liberate. The first born of Egypt must die so that the first born of God may be led out of slavery toward the Promised Land and live.

Sermon for Oct 11, 2009, Fr. Klein. The Parable of the Rich Man and a stubborn heart.

2009-10-11T23:01:00.009-05:00

Have you ever noticed how often Jesus ended His teachings with the somewhat mysterious statement, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear" (Luke 14:35).

We hear something similar this morning in His statement, “Children, how hard it is to enter the Kingdom of God. (Mk 10:24c)… He is speaking to the difficulty we often have in actively listening to one another and to God. To take this a bit further Jesus is saying that the root of this struggle to actively listen lies in fallen man’s most common illness, and that would be a stubborn heart.

In the Gospel reading this morning Jesus encounters the rich man… and in doing so He encounters a stubborn heart. Jesus saw much potential in this young man. It even says that He looked upon him and “He loved him.” (Can you imagine God doing that towards us? Yet, He does so all the time.)

Yet, this compassionate love of Christ can only teach or show the way. The young man himself, that is his free will must say “yes” to what Jesus was asking. So our Gospel lesson draws us into the question of actively listening to Jesus and exercising our free will properly in response to what we hear. A proper response is tied into the difficulty some will experience in entering the Kingdom of God. “Hearing” means being open to receiving spiritual truth and validating the existence of God verses those whose spiritual ears and heart are closed to God’s will and truth.

Take two different people. We can share some aspect of the faith with each person.

One will listen actively asking honest questions, and seeking real answers.
The other person simply writes off the conversation, maybe with a smile or the nod of the head, but in some way dismisses the “religious conversation” without any serious effort to learn.

Those who write Christian truth off do so with personal explanations padded with situation upon situation upon situation (situation ethics), and for me, I can always tell when the message of faith simply isn’t getting through.

Now, what prevents a person from hearing God’s call? What prevents him or her from responding positively to God's call? I believe the inhibiting factor is stubbornness. A stubborn heart rejects truth regardless of the logic presented. A stubborn heart was the cause of man’s fall from grace (Adam and Eve), this stubborn heart followed man out of Eden and down through the centuries from the journey in the wilderness (the Exodus) up to the present moment we live in. Stubborness is an aspect of our fallen nature.

We also learn of an important spiritual truth. Our ears are connected to our heart. Now this is both a blessing and a real challenge.

Holy Scripture helps us here. In Hebrews 3:7 we find, “Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, Today, when you hear His Voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness,” (Ps 95:7). [Speak about the meaning of “today.”] Although our intellect is important in the process of making a decision, when the information finally filters down to the level of deciding if something may be true or not the heart often is the final authority in how well we hear the truth and influences the decision we make.

The spiritual truth found here is that spiritually speaking, our ears are connected to our heart. It’s the main way our conscience is brought into play in the decision-making process. [Talk about this a little bit].

Here’s how this works.

A person wants something very much. But the faith may challenge the person in how to obtain what he wants or it may even inform his conscience that he should back away or even walk away from what he “really wants.” Following Jesus Christ often means that we find our self “backing away” or “letting go” of the very thing(s) we’ve set our heart on. This reality is hard to deal with at times. So, rather than face the hard learning curve, people will avoid the truth, they will avoid any decision in order to protect themselves and keep their world view and their personal hopes intact.

We see this (compromise) all the time.

In fact, if we work at it long enough we can come up with many “good reasons” why we needn’t or shouldn’t listen to the arguments presented by our faith or theology. And of course we would be very offended if anyone were to tell us that we may be rejecting the truth God has for us to learn in favor of self-will and self-preservation. I believe we can see this in the rich man. If we look hard enough we may be able to see our self here at times too. We all compete against “deafening desires and attachments.” The bottom line: Self-deception and compromise can be defeated only as we come to love truth more than our dreams. But if we stubbornly cling to our desires, self-will will always “tone-down” and even mute the voice of God.

Fallen man has a heart condition.

So, what fallen man has is a heart condition. This condition is caused by our desires being focused somewhere other than upon God’s will and His truth.

Let me offer three factors that cause our spiritual heart condition.

The imagination of the heart.

If we let the world with all of its promises of capture the imagination of our heart we will gradually be turned away (by the world) from the Word of God. The more we attach our hopes for happiness to the things of this world, and let this world and its commodities “take care of us and heal us” the less we will be sincerely interested in God or His spiritual truth. We can’t love the world and be a child of the world and love God and be a child of God at the same time. [God and mammon] We can turn to Holy Scripture to receive guidance in this. Saint James explains: "Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God?" (Jas. 4:4).

Saint John explains: "Do not love the world or the things of the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him." (1 John 2:15). Saint Paul explains to Timothy: "Those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and hurtful desires that plunge a person into ruin and destruction." (1 Tim. 6:9–10). Please notice how Saint Paul says that it is the desire to be rich (not wealth itself), [the desire is the human element that forms the attachment of the heart to the things of the world] that causes the real problems.

James, John and Peter each explain that following Jesus Christ means facing (even daily) the ongoing struggle to combat the weeds of the world to keep them from taking root and influencing our mind, body and soul. The question is, are using our spiritual tools wisely, are we accessing the grace of God properly to uproot these nasty weeds or are we too guilty of fertilizing them?

The sin of pride and prejudice.

We often see these two sins joined at the hip. Pride and prejudice are like a set of earplugs. They are often present in our conversation, when we say four words, "I already know better." Pride and prejudice keep us pinned to preconceived notions. We don’t want to take the time to investigate new positions, even if another way was presented with the accurate of evidence or the best of logic. [History is one of our most faithful teachers and yet we often turn a deaf ear to the past, even wanting to disconnect from the past because we think we know better].

Our fallen nature makes our hearing “selective” in many ways. We wear the earplugs of pride and prejudice when certain topics or ideas are brought up or when certain people speak.

Moral Relativism.

I think relativism is probably the most devious of all reasons why Christians are experiencing loss of spiritual hearing. Relative truth allows a person to avoid both objective truth (God) and their conscience all at one time.

Here’s how it works.

First, you need to dismiss objective truth all together. In place of this is put “subjective truth" and it becomes the method to believe whatever is appropriate for you. Make up a new God according to your personal design. Feel free to vary His laws to fit your situation or preferences. Sin? What is sin? Who defines sin? No “authority” knows my situation. My situation allows me to disregard the faith. Because of my unique situation I am permitted even to bend or break the commandments of God.

Relative truth is very attractive, very popular today, and it is very deceptive and evil.

It’s evil because it tells good people to believe that they really can change divine truth (any truth) simply by changing their minds. It’s evil because when people accept anyone’s version of truth as "the truth for me," what they are doing is really denying the reality of their spiritual nature, the spiritual world and the full life that God has made us for.

We’re saying, in effect, that God doesn’t exist, or that if He does exist there is no way to really know Him. Those who live in this way exchange the reality of God for fantasy all the time. But God has spoken. The gift of the Christian faith is to tell the world that our heavenly Father speaks to us. He sent us His beloved Son: "This is My beloved Son . . . listen to Him." (Matt. 17:5). The Son in turn said of Himself, "For this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth." (John 21:37); and He also tells the Church: "If you continue in My word, you will know the truth and the truth will set you free." (John 8:31–32).

Can we hear this truth and be liberated by this truth? Yes, absolutely.

The genius behind the ministry of Jesus Christ was that He went to great lengths to first give us Truth and then to make sure that His Truth would be handed on from generation to generation intact until His return. He accomplishes this through His Church that He said would always be guided by the Spirit of truth (John 14:16–17, 16:13). He put His anointed in charge of His Church, giving them the necessary spiritual gifts to govern with love and teach faithfully all that He taught ((Matt 28:20), and reminding them that "He who hears you hears Me" (Luke 10:16).He gave them the reassurance that "I am with you always, even to the end of the age." (Matt. 28:20).

To say we can’t know Jesus Christ, or that we can’t know truth is absolutely wrong. In fact, in the end on the day of our particular judgment before God we will be judged by whether or not we have sought to learned the truth of God and that we have lived by that truth to the best of our ability. (John 12:47–50) So what are we to do about spiritual deafness? Or better yet, how could we have helped this rich young man had we been in the crowd on that day with Jesus?

We can help people like the rich man by focusing on what needs to change within us. It has been said that. Monica won the conversion of her son, Augustine, by becoming a saint herself. Suffering through necessary change and growth is not an option for Christians. It’s a guarantee. This involves the purification of our hearts. So, our first step is making sure we believe in the existence of God and absolute truth, for that’s a basic requirement for finding Him (Heb. 11:6). Our second step would be to look at what we are really attached too. Are we choosing our own will over God’s in any area? And our third and final step would be to cultivate a real hunger for God, as opposed to being unconcerned with Him in the matters of life.

If we had been present that day with Jesus, and as the rich man left with his head down, walking in his own direction, we could have offered him this prayer that comes from Psalm 25: “Make me to know Your ways, O Lord; teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your truth, and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation; for You I wait all the day long." (Ps. 25: 4–5).

Amen.

What we have learned in Bible Study so far!

2009-10-07T06:39:00.001-05:00

Exodus 1-4.

The birth and rescue of Moses.

We spent some time talking about the circumstances of Moses' birth, and that he does not have a known father nor do we know when he was born (sometime between 1700 and 1550 BC). Like many who serve God, the personal or family details are not known as they are not of real importance. The story of Moses is a foreshadowing of our Lord's own life in many ways. The threat to the lives of the unborn is not a recent problem in the world.

Moses Rebels.

This section of Chapter 2 explains how Moses as a person of privilege is called to account by the suffering of those less fortunate than himself. Suffering opens his eyes.
The threat the Hebrew makes against Moses is surprising on one hand but maybe it demonstrates the serious bitterness that had developed among the Hebrews against the Egyptians due to the Hebrew's fall from a privileged life to one of being a slave.

The Burning Bush: God Reveals Himself to Moses.

The sacred Truth God reveals to Moses by means of His Name is that He has no past and no future. God is both revelation (totally in the present) and being itself (all things rely on Him).
God is giving Moses the ability to callupon Him, to seek Him and His power to accomplish his many tasks as a liberator.

The Human Person: the Image of God

2009-10-06T14:14:00.007-05:00

The human person is created in God's image and likeness (Genesis 1:26-27).

In the human person Heaven and Earth touch one another.
In the human person God enters His creation; the human person is directly related to God.
Every person is called by Him. God's words in the Bible are valid and true for every human being.
Each person is known by God and loved by Him. Each person is willed by God, and each is God's holy image.

In these four statements are found the deeper and greater unity of all mankind. Our faith explains that each of us, each individual person realizes God and has his or her origin. The Bible says that whoever violates a human being violates God (Gen 9:5).

Human life stands under God's special protection, because each human being, however wretched or exalted he or she may be, however sick or suffering, however good-for-nothing or important, whether born of unborn, whether incurably ill or radiant with with health, each person bears God's breath in himself or herself, each one is God's image.

When a person is no longer seen being under God's protection and bearing His breath then the person begins to be viewed in utilitarian fashion. It is then that human dignity is trampled upon. By vice versa: When human dignity is realized and protected under God, then a high degree of spirituality and morality is plainly evident.

Court Admits Third Parties, Sets New Hearing Date

2009-10-02T14:03:00.003-05:00

The following Press release is from the Bishop's Office. Again we have good news for our Diocese. Click on this web site to give you legal clarification about what happened today.

FORT WORTH, Texas - In a hearing this morning in the141st District Court, Judge John Chupp granted the Diocese's motions for leave to file a third-party petition and for continuance (postponement) of further proceedings until January 2010. The diocese's motion for reconsideration of the Sept. 16 order on a Rule 12 motion, was not granted.

Having determined that attorneys representing both parities were present by 8:30 a.m., the judge began the hearing early.

In the absence of any objection by the plaintiffs' attorneys, the continuance was granted, moving the date for the hearing on Plaintiffs' Motion for Partial Summary Judgment in the case from Oct. 15, 2009, to Jan. 22, 2010. Counsel for both sides agreed this period was necessary for discovery, the process of collecting evidence and depositions.

The favorable ruling on the third-party motion, which has been before the court since its first hearing on Sept. 9, brings eight persons into the suit as third-party defendants: the Rt. Rev. Edwin F. Gulick, Margaret Mieuli, Walter Cabe, Anne T. Bass, the Rev. J. Frederick Barber, the Rev. Christopher Jambor, the Rev. David Madison, and Kathleen Wells. They are, respectively, the Provisional Bishop, Standing Committee, and Chancellor for the group of Episcopalians wishing to remain in The Episcopal Church following the diocese's realignment at its November 2008 convention.

Shelby Sharpe, representing the diocese, argued for reconsideration of Judge Chupp's previous Rule 12 order, which found that there are two dioceses and two corporations in the suit. In a memorandum submitted to the court on Oct. 1, he showed that the plaintiffs already had conceded in their original petition that there is only one Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, and he cited Texas case law requiring such admission to be binding.

Judge Chupp denied reconsideration of the previous Rule 12 order saying, "I would prefer we spend our time and resources on what happened at the November election." He adjourned the hearing shortly after, saying, "I hope to see you all soon on another motion."

Additional information, transcripts of the previous hearings, and documents filed with the court are available online at fwepiscopal.org.

Bishop Iker expressed his thanks to those who prayed and fasted this morning and encouraged their continued prayers for God's guidance and sovereign care over all these matters.

Respect Life Sunday is October 4th.

2009-10-02T07:43:00.003-05:00

Anglicans for Life join with the Roman Catholic Bishops in the United States in setting aside Sunday, October 4th as Respect Life Sunday.

Respect Life Sunday, this year celebrated on October 4 is set aside to reflect with gratitude on God’s priceless gift of human life. It is also an occasion to examine how well we, as a nation and individually, are living up to our obligation to protect the rights of those who, due to age, dependency, poverty or other circumstances, are at risk of their very lives.

Pray for God's guidance in this matter and then be open to His leading.

And let us always remember that respect for life and being "pro-life" means much more then standing against abortion. It means supporting the dignity and sacred nature of human life from conception to natural death.

Anglicans for Life is the only Anglican/Episcopal, pro life organization dedicated to ending abortion and euthanasia, protecting embryos from research abuse, and promoting abstinence and adoption. We believe that, as Christians, we must follow God's biblical call to uphold the sanctity of every human life from conception to natural death. Check out their web site.

Faith gives joy!

2009-09-29T14:31:00.003-05:00

Faith gives joy. When God is not there, the world becomes desolate, and everything becomes boring, and everything is completely unsatisfactory. It's easy to see today how a world empty of God is also increasingly consuming itself, how it has become a wholly joyless world. The great joy comes from the fact that there is this great love, and that is the essential message of faith. You are unswervingly loved. This also explains why Christianity spread first predominantly among the weak and the suffering. To that extent it can be said that the basic element of Christianity is joy... it is joy in the proper sense. A joy that exists together with a difficult life and also makes this life liveable...

Faith also makes man light. To believe means that we become like angles. We can fly, because we no longer weigh so heavely in our own estimation. To become a believer means to become light, to escape our own gravity, which drags us down, and thus to enter the weightlessness of faith...

Christians are not promised an "exterior" happiness but rather a deep interior security through communion with the Lord. That Jeus is an ultimate light of happiness in one's life is in fact a part of all of this... We are so alienated from God's voice that we simply do not recognize it immediately as His. But I would still say that everyone who is in some sense attentive can experience and sense for himself that now He is speaking to me. And it is a chance for me to get to know him. Percisely in catastrophic situations He can suddenly break in, if I am awake and if someone helps me decipher the message.

Prayer and Fasting on Friday, October 2nd.

2009-09-29T14:08:00.002-05:00

I am inviting everyone in the Diocese to join me in a morning of fasting and prayer this Friday, Oct. 2nd, as Judge John Chupp considers three motions we have put before him in the 141st District Court. The hearing begins at 9 a.m. on the fourth floor of the Family Law Center, located at 200 E. Weatherford Street (one block east of the old court house, on the south side of the street).

In the first motion the Diocese is asking leave to file a third-party petition against the persons elected as provisional bishop and as members of the Standing Committee at a meeting held on Feb. 7, 2009. This is to bring before the court those persons who have authorized the suit against the Diocese and the Corporation Trustees in order to determine the legitimacy of their election.

In the second motion the Diocese and the Corporation Trustees request that the Plaintiffs' Motion for Partial Summary Judgment (scheduled for Oct. 15) be postponed (in legal parlance, continued) until such time that all parties are in the suit and that a reasonable time for investigation of the facts has been established.

The last motion requests that the Court correct its Rule 12 ruling of Sept. 16 so that it will permit the local Plaintiff attorneys, Jonathan D. F. Nelson and Kathleen Wells, to represent only the people who have hired them, not the Diocese and the Diocesan Corporation.

Pray especially for wisdom and guidance for our attorney, Shelby Sharpe, and for clarity and truth in the decisions of the Court.

The Rt. Rev. Jack Leo Iker
Bishop of Fort Worth
Sept. 29, 2009
Feast of St. Michael and All Angels

Bishop Iker Leads Benediction Service during Walsingham Pilgrimage

2009-09-24T16:49:00.000-05:00

Bishop Iker was invited as a special guest to this year's National Pilgrimage to the Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham in England, held Monday, May 25. Inaugurated on Whit Monday (the day after Pentecost) in 1938, the modern pilgrimage celebration now occurs in late May each year.

Pilgrims first made their way to Walsingham in the 11th century, after word spread that a noblewoman had seen a vision in which the Virgin Mary asked her to erect a house in the village replicating the place where the Annunciation occurred. The resulting Shrine was visited by every king from Richard I to Henry VIII, and Walsingham has been called “England’s Nazareth.” It was Mary’s promise in the vision that “whoever seeks my help there will never go away empty-handed.”

The contemporary Pilgrimage day begins with a procession from the Shrine Church to the meadow where the glassless east window of the old Abbey (destroyed in the Reformation) stands. Mass is celebrated at noon and followed by a picnic on the lawn. Following lunch this year, a sermon was preached by Bishop Lindsay Urwin, who has recently become the episcopal Administrator of the Shrine.

At 2:30 p.m., the procession returned through the streets, which are still lined with medieval buildings. Then, according to an online account, “Pilgrims crammed into the gardens as Bishop Jack Iker, Bishop of Fort Worth, brought the Sacrament from the Shrine Church to the altar of Lights.” Bishop Iker also stopped to say thanks to the youth of the Sea Cadets, who are part of the official procession party. The Pilgrimage ended with a rededication of the main arch into the Shrine grounds.

For a story on this year's National Pilgrimage and the text of Bishop Urwin’s sermon, see http://www.walsinghamanglican.org.uk/welcome/the_national_pilgrimage.htm.

For more on Walsingham and the Pilgrimage, see http://www.walsinghamanglican.org.uk

Archival photos of Walsingham sites can be found at http://www.francisfrith.com/walsingham/photos/

The Success of the Cross

2009-09-17T14:44:00.003-05:00

On the Cross, Christ saw love through to the end. For all the differences there may be between the accounts in the various Gospels, there is one point in common: Jesus died praying, and in the abyss of death He upheld the First Commandment and held on to the presence of God. Out of such a death springs this sacrament, the Holy Eucharist… Did Jesus fail? Success is definitely not one of the names of God and it is not Christian to have an eye to outward success or numbers. God’s paths are other than that. His success comes about through the Cross and is always found under that sign. The true witnesses to His authenticity, down through the centuries, are those who have accepted this sign, as their emblem…

What strengthens our faith, what remains constant, what give us hope, is the Church of the suffering. She stands, to the present day, as a sign that God exists and that man is not just a cesspit, but that he can be saved… The Church of the suffering gives credibility to Christ: she is God’s success in the world; the sign that gives us hope and courage; the sign from which still flows the power of life, which reaches beyond mere thoughts of success and which thereby purifies men and opens up for God a door into this world.

So let us be ready to hear the call of Jesus Christ, who achieved the great success of God on the Cross; He who, as the grain of wheat that died, has become fruitful down through all the centuries; the Tree of Life, in who even today men put their hope.

Intercessors, keep up the good work!

2009-09-16T22:40:00.001-05:00

Our next target date is Thursday, October 15, 2009. At that time the 141st District Court, with Judge John Chupp presiding will hear further arguments of the law suite filed against the Diocese of Fort Worth.

So now in the time to begin offering this up in prayer and fasting!

Pray for God to continue to guide Judge John Chupp with right judgment and sound wisdom.
Pray for the Diocese's lead attorney, Mr. Shelby Sharpe, that God will grant him peace of mind, and clear right judgment and sound wisdom.
Pray for our Bishop and the leadership of our Diocese that they maintain perfect charity in all things.

Grant us, O Lord, not to mind earthly things, but to love things heavenly; and even now, while we are placed among things that are passing away, to cleave to those that shall abide; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen

Update on Litigation against the Diocese of Fort Worth, Sept 16, 2009.

2009-09-16T22:28:00.002-05:00

The following is a copy of the Press Release provided by the Bishop's Office.

In a hearing today in the141st District Court, Judge John Chupp granted the Diocese partial relief under Rule 12 of the Texas code Rules of Civil Procedure. He ruled that attorneys Jonathan Nelson and Kathleen Wells do not represent the diocese or the corporation which have realigned under the Province of the Southern Cone. He denied a second aspect of Rule 12 relief which would have removed the plaintiffs’ diocese and corporation from the lawsuit filed April 14, 2009.

The judge also ruled that neither the Constitution and Canons of The Episcopal Church nor the Constitution and Canons of this diocese prohibit withdrawal from TEC and realignment under another province. Further, he found that the Diocese had done so at its November 2008 annual convention, saying that “they [the members] took the diocese with them.” The action of the November convention was not, he said, ultra vires and void, as the suit’s plaintiffs have argued. He declared, too, that the Diocese had taken its property with it in realignment. He said he did not consider any court ruling concerning a realigning parish to be applicable in the present case, and he said that he considered it “self-serving on [the part of TEC] to say that [Bishop Iker] abandoned his job.”

The hearing on the Rule 12 motion began Wednesday, Sept. 9. At that time, the judge denied a motion for continuance filed by Nelson and Wells. Each party filed a supplemental written statement in the period between the first and second portions of the hearing. The statement submitted by attorney Shelby Sharpe is available on the diocesan Web site.

Commenting on today’s ruling, Bishop Iker said, “We are pleased that Judge Chupp has recognized the legitimacy of the vote of our Diocesan Convention in November 2008 to withdraw from the General Convention of The Episcopal Church and has ruled that we had the legal right to amend our Constitution in order to do so. This a positive step in support of the position we have taken. We will continue to keep our concerns before the Lord in prayer.”

The date for a further hearing to take up the remaining Motion for Leave to File a Third-Party Petition will be set shortly. A date of October 15 has been set to hear the plaintiffs’ motion for partial summary judgement.

Keep your prayers and fasting going!

2009-09-13T22:01:00.003-05:00

A hearing was started last week and will continue Wednesday, September 16 before Judge John Chupp in the 141st District Court in Tarrant County. Please keep our Bishop and our diocesan family close in prayer. Also pray for Shelby Sharpe, our attorney.

Let us pray:
Almighty God, who sittest on the throne judging right: We humbly beseech thee to bless the courts of justice and the magistrates of this land, especially the 141st District Court in Fort Worth, the Honorable John Chupp, presiding; and give unto them the spirit of wisdom and understanding, that they may discern the truth, and impartially administer the law in the fear of thee alone: And we most humbly beseech thee, O heavenly Father, to send down upon our attorney Shelby Sharpe the spirit of wisdom, charity, and justice; that with steadfast purpose he may faithfully serve thee in the representation of the people of this diocese; through him who shall come to judge the quick and the dead and the world by fire, even Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

New Emblem on St. John's Outdoor Street Banners.

2009-09-10T10:18:00.011-05:00

The next time you come to worship you may notice that we now have on our street banners the international emblem of the Anglican Communion: the Compass Rose. This will help explain to visitors that though we have retained the name St. John's Episcopal Church, we are not a member of the Episcopal Church, USA.

Let me give you some background information on the Compass Rose. This symbol of the world-widew Anglican Communion was dedicated by the Archbishop of Canterbury at the closing Eucharist of the Lambeth Conference in 1988. He later dedicated a similar symbol in the Washington National Cathedral in 1990. Since then the Compass Rose has been spreading all over the Anglican world.

Looking at the symbol, in the center is the cross of St. George. St. George (along with the Blessed Virgin Mary) are co-patron saints of England. The cross of St. George recalls our Anglican roots in the historic English Church. Surrounding the cross of St.George is the Greek inscription "The Truth Shall Set You Free" (John 8:32); and the Compass design radiating out from the center shows the spread of Anglican Christianity throughout the world. The bishop's Mitre on the top of the symbol empahsizes the necessary role of the Catholic episcopacy and apostolic succession of the historic Christian faith. This apostolic and Catholic faith is at the core of the churches of the Anglican Communion. The Compass Rose is used widely by the family of the Anglican/Episcopal churches. It is also the logo for the Inter-Anglican Secretariat, and is used as the Communion's identifying symbol.

Update on Litigation: Wednesday, September 9, 2009

2009-09-09T13:47:00.001-05:00

The following release has been sent by the Bishop's Office.

To the clergy, convention delegates, Executive Council, and vestry members:

In a hearing this morning before Judge John Chupp in the 141st District Court in Tarrant County, our attorney filed a motion that requires the lawyers who have brought litigation against us to prove that they had the legal authority to bring the suit. They moved for a continuance, which the Judge denied.

At 10 a.m. Judge Chupp adjourned the hearing due to the fact that a jury trial in another case was scheduled to resume in his court. The hearing on our Rule 12 motion will reconvene at 2 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 16.

Please continue to keep this situation in your daily prayers, and pray for Judge Chupp and attorney Shelby Sharpe by name. As you did last Sunday, please pray during worship this week. For those who are able, fasting as well as prayer will be appropriate and appreciated on the 16th.

Bishop Iker

40 Days for Life Prayer Vigil

2009-09-03T13:54:00.008-05:00

This fall, from September 23 to November 1, Diane and I will join hundreds of Christians in Fort Worth and hundreds of thousands of Christians nation-wide and participate in 40 Days for Life. See http://www.40daysforlifeftworth.com/ for more information.

Using the spiritual tools of prayer and fasting, 40 Days for Life is seeking God's help for an end to abortion. What we do is participate in silent peaceful prayer (for one hour) outside the abortion facility here in Fort Worth at 301 South Henderson Street. This silent prayer witness will continue nearly round the clock for 40 days. You pick the day and time, go and pray for an hour or whatever amount of time you have to offer God.

In addition participants are encouraged to choose one day for fasting. One day each week for the 6 weeks from September 23 to November 1st. Maybe it is the same day you go to pray. Fasting is an awesome prayer tool that unleashes great spiritual power in whatever you are involved in.

Join us and help us spread the Good News that life is sacred and needs to be protected from conception to natural death! Fr. Klein

Bishop Calls the Diocese to Prayer and Fasting.

2009-08-28T14:02:00.005-05:00

The Bishop is asking that we pray and fast from Sunday, September 6 through Wednesday, September 9 and the focus of your prayer and fasting is a Court filling our Diocese is presenting in the 141st District Court for consideration to the Court by our Diocesan Attorney's. The purpose of the fillings involves property issues.

Fasting for this spiritual need can be done from Sunday through Wednesday or for Wednesday only. Fasting in this situation would mean a modified meal plan like we do on Fridays during the Season of Lent. What this means is that the total amount of what we eat during the course of the day (such as three meals of breakfast, lunch and dinner) should be no more in quanity of food then what we would consume at one main meal (such as dinner). For people 60 and older they are dispensed from fasting and any person with health needs must always pay attention to that before they modify their diet.

It is important that we not simply put all of this in the hands of the attorney's, but that we take up the spiritual tools of prayer and fasting. Please hold up in prayer our attorney, Shelby Sharpe and also Judge Chupp, who will be hearing the case.

Ordination to the Sacred Priesthood

2009-08-28T11:24:00.001-05:00

On Saturday, September 26 at 10:00 am by the grace of God the Right Reverend Jack Leo Iker, bishop of the Diocese of Fort Worth will confer through the Laying on of Hands the historic Sacrament of the Sacred Priesthood on the Reverend Dn. Jeffery Stubbs.

A reception in Mitchell Hall follows immediately. Be sure to be with us on this special day as our Curate is ordained to the Priesthood.

Stephen Ministry Training Course.

2009-08-28T11:06:00.000-05:00

St. John's will once again offer Stephen Ministry training course beginning in mid-September. If you would be interested in learning more about becoming a Stephen Minister, please speak with Fr. Jeff Stubbs or Sharon Tullis.

Foyer Groups Forming! Join us.

2009-08-28T10:56:00.001-05:00

Foyer Groups are small groups of 6 to 8 people who meet about once a month in host homes for dinner and fellowship. It's a great way to meet and get to know other people in the parish.

To join a Foyer Group, just fill out the flyer located in the Sunday parish Bulletin or call the Parish Office at 817-927-5341.

Groups are assigned based on the night of the week that you indicate as the most convenient for you. Last day to register for the fall Foyer term is Rally Day, September 13th.

Visionary Parenting

2009-08-28T10:16:00.000-05:00

Visionary Parenting is a successful eight week program that outlines the Biblical Principles God provides to help parents grow in faith and raise their children in the Christian faith.

The program is scheduled for Sunday evenings from 5:00 to 7:00 pm beginning Sunday, September 20th through November 15th.
The cost is $25.00. This includes Family Dinner and Child Care.

For more information please see Erik or Kristy Leaseburg.

Wednesday Night Bible Study

2009-08-28T10:13:00.002-05:00

Wednesday night Bible Study will start up again on September 16th at 7:00 pm. Fr. Klein will begin with the Book of Exodus. Come to all or any part of the Wednesday evening program:

6:00 Holy Eucharist and Unction in Lady Chapel
6:30 Potluck Dinner
7:00 Bible Study

Children's Sunday School

2009-08-28T10:08:00.002-05:00

The Sunday School program for this Fall will open with Family Chapel in the Children's Chapel at 10:35 am.

All children 3 years through the 5th grade are invited to come with their families to Chapel.
Kids in grades 6-12 can go directly to their classroom upstairs in the Bevan Building.

Our teachers this years are Kristy Leaseburg (PreK and Kindergarten); Susan Fields (1st-2nd); Erik Leaseburg (3rd-5th) and Trecia Gispanski (6th-12th grade).
Sign your kids up on Rally Day and join us!

Choir Practice

2009-08-28T10:05:00.000-05:00

The 9:00 am and 11:15 am Chancel Choirs as well as the Hand Bell Choir rehearsals are Thursday evenings:

6:00 Hand Bell
7:00 Chancel Choirs

See Alan Potts, Organist and Choir Director for more information. Please join us!

Rummage Sale

2009-08-28T10:02:00.001-05:00

A Rummage sale will be held in Mitchell Hall on Friday, September 4th from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm. The proceeds will be used to support Georgette Lopez-Aguado in a mission trip to the Diocese of Northern Malawi, Africa.

Rally Day

2009-08-28T09:55:00.001-05:00

Sunday, September 13 is Rally Day! The main event will be from 10:15 to 11:15 in Mitchell Hall. Programs, committees, organizations and ministries, especially those actively recruiting, will be represented. COme and see what is happening at St. John's this year!