Being Grateful Together
By Janet Nordlund --
This Sunday, November 24 is Community Sunday, and our theme is GRATITUDE in the Upside-Down Kingdom!!!
Four times a year we intentionally choose to be together as a whole church family with people of all ages and stages together in one room. Because of Jesus, we get to be a whole, diverse, kaleidoscopic and complete faith family. This is AMAZING, plain impossible, and weird in the world today, and reason enough to be grateful!!!
But also, in our study in Luke of Jesus’ Upside-Down Kingdom, GRATITUDE is openly, unabashedly and repeatedly expressed to JESUS! Expressions of thanks come out of all sorts of people as Jesus saves them, heals them and sends them out as his witnesses.
Some we have already met:
A temporarily silenced and humbled middle-aged priest…Luke 1
An unexpectedly pregnant teenage girl…Luke 1
A bunch of unwashed, unkempt ‘blue-collar ‘workers…Luke 2
An old, devoted Jesus-seeking dude…Luke 2
A very old, prayer warrior widow…Luke 2
Others we have still to meet:
A tortured, possessed young man…Luke 4
A paralyzed brother…Luke 5
A generous, faith-filled prostitute…Luke 7
A leper from the wrong side of the tracks…Luke 17
And so very many more fill the written and unwritten pages of history up to us today!!! In preparation for our shared gathering, would everyone please take some time with Jesus and think about your personal gratitude responses to these three areas.
Jesus, Thank you for saving me ….
Jesus, Thank you for healing me….
Jesus, Thank you for sending me…
Please also remember to bring your picture/s of your honored loved ones who are no longer with us on this side of heaven. We will put those up on display boards so we can express Gratitude together for all the generations past, present and future that are a part of Jesus’ forever Upside-Down Kingdom.
Grateful for all of you,
Janet and Your Community Sunday Team