Christmas Eve Service | December 24
CMC Christmas Eve 2021 from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.
The video above includes the full service, except for the time for sharing.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained through One License with license A-727859.
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Worship | Advent 4 | December 19
The video above includes the full service, except for the time for sharing.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained through One License with license A-727859.
Sermon: An essential story
Text: Luke 1:26-38
Speaker: Joel Miller
Song: STS 11 No wind at the window, v. 1
“No wind at the window, no knock at the door; no light from the lampstand, no foot on the floor; no dream born of tiredness, no ghost raised by fear: just an angel and a woman and a voice in her ear.”
In this Advent season focused on the essentials, we have now reached the essential story. Not that the others aren’t important – Jesus calling to be watchful for the coming of the Human One, John the Baptist’s claim that one more powerful than he is coming, the hopeful words of the prophets Isaiah and Micah, even the birth of Jesus – these are all part of the holy drama of the season. But for any of those prophetic words to be fulfilled, for Jesus to be born in the first place, it took a young woman willing to birth Christ into the world. It took Mary, young Mary, and her encounter with the angel who told her to not be afraid. The messenger who invited her to partner with God, at great risk to herself. And it took Mary’s acceptance of this strange burden to bring forth the one whose kin-dom shall have no end.
On this forth week of Advent, the final Sunday before Christmas, we light the candle of love, and we ponder this essential story.
I suppose the other three gospels might beg to differ on its essentialness. Matthew does mention that Mary was “found to be with child by the Holy Spirit,” but proceeds to focus on the…
Worship | Advent 3 | Music Sunday | December 12
December 12 Worship from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.
The video above includes the full service, except for the time for sharing.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained through One License with license A-727859.
Essentials: Hope, Peace, Joy, Love, Immanuel, Epiphany
Prelude
Welcome
Land Acknowledgement
Call to Worship
VT 281 | Joyful Is the Dark
Advent Candle Lighting
Children’s Time
Offering/Dedication and Pastoral Prayer
VT 240 | Joy to the World
Scripture | Isaiah 12:2-6
Special Music
O Come, O Come, Immanuel | Jacqui and Ryan Hoke
It Came Upon a Midnight Clear | Joel Call, Tom Blosser, Steve Rolfe, Karl Helmuth
Mary had a Baby | Phil Hart and friends
Children’s Christmas Program | Acts of Angels
VT 412 | My Soul Cries Out
Scripture | Philippians 4:4-7
Special Music
Still, Still, Still | Abbie Miller, Katie Graber, Ivan and Nina Graber-Nofziger, Karl Helmuth
Silent Night | Katrina and Matthew Brown
O Holy Night | Debra and Galen Martin, Sarah Martin
VT 229 | Unexpected and Mysterious
Passing the Peace
Extinguishing the Peace Candle
Announcements
VT 276 | Solemn Stillness, Weary Streets
Benediction
Credits
Acts of Angels. Script by Margaret Goger. Songs by Phil Hart. Piano arrangements added by Alexander Martin, 2017.
Thanks to everyone who helped lead today’s service
Music Sunday | Tom Blosser, Coordinator
Children’s Program | CMC Children & Parents, Phil Hart, Debra Martin, Elisa Leahy, Tracey Lehman, Sarah Martin
Worship Leader | Mark Rupp
Song Leader | Phil Yoder
Candle Lighting, Children’s Time | Davey Family
Scripture Reading | Cindy Fath, Brendan Erb
Zoom Host | JoAnn Knapke
Camera Operator | Tim McCarthy
Sound Operator | Jim Myers
Worship Table | Virginia Nussbaum, Chris McCarthy
Greeter | Blake Miller
Usher/Sanctuarian | Bill Plessinger
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Worship | Advent 2 | December 5
The video above includes the full service, except for the time for sharing.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained through One License with license A-727859.
Sermon | Peace and release
Texts: Malachi 3:1-4; Luke 3:1-14
Speaker: Joel Miller
It’s the second Sunday of Advent and the candle of peace has been added to the candle of hope. For those of us who identify as Mennonite, or at least Menno-curious, this is a familiar theme. Mennonites have long believed that peace and peacemaking, rather than being an optional extra for Christian living, is essential to the gospel itself. Jesus models for us the kind of peaceful humanity we both aspire toward and can never quite reach. A peace-centered faith has all kinds of implications in how we relate with our militarized national government, the international community, and immigrants and refugees who enter our country; where we invest money; advocacy for ending the death penalty; our relationship with creation and our neighbors and ourselves. Kind of everything. We believe in peace so much we have two peace candles going right now.
On a personal level, another dimension of peace for me is that whenever I have taken the Enneagram personality type indicator I have most often been identified as a Nine, which is called…wait for it…The Peacemaker. This could be because I like to get right answers on tests and being “The Peacemaker” is clearly the right answer for a Mennonite pastor to be. Or, more likely, as I am learning, this type does seem to capture my own potential pitfalls and strengths. When The Peacemaker type is not overly healthy we can simply blend with other’s opinions and preferences, essentially losing our sense of self, all the while building up unexpressed anger toward others for taking…
Worship | Advent 1 | November 28
CMC Worship 112821 from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.
The video above includes the full service, except for the time for sharing.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained through One License with license A-727859.
ADVENT 1 | Essentials: Hope, Peace, Joy, Love, Immanuel, Epiphany
Speaker: Mark Rupp
Texts: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Luke 21:25-36
Sermon text:
Sing a Song of Hope Once More
Some birds sing when the sun shines bright
Our praise is not for them
But the ones who sing in the dead of night,
We raise our cups to them…
Some flowers bloom where the green grass grows,
Our praise is not for them.
But the ones who bloom in the bitter snow,
We raise our cups to them.
These are lyrics from the final number of the musical Hadestown, which my husband and I had the opportunity to see a few weeks ago. The show is a modernized retelling of the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Instead of togas and harps and Gods of the underworld, Hadestown presents the story through the lens of overworked and downtrodden railway workers, a struggling musician, climate change, and the struggle against a domineering industry magnate, who might as well be considered a God by the other characters.
The myth has been around for thousands of years, so I hope it’s not too much of a spoiler for me to say that the plot revolves around Orpheus’ attempt to rescue his beloved Eurydice from the underworld (or in the case of Hadestown, from the grips of a kind of proto-fascist form of capitalistic life where work and toil slowly strip away at who you are). Orpheus is the son of a muse and his music has the power to bring the world around him back to…
