Pastor Jones Weekly Update
Grace and Peace Be Unto You!
The Book of Job
Our Church theme for 2024 is “Why?”
Prayer: “O God, author of the world’s joy, bearer of the world’s pain, make us glad that we are men/persons, and that we have inherited the world’s burden; deliver us from the luxury of cheap melancholy; and at the heart of our trouble sorrow; let unconquerable gladness dwell;
through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Amen
Henry S. Nash
A Riddle
If God is will
And will is well,
Then what is ill?
God still?
Dew tell?
“J.B.: A Play in Verse”
by Archibald MacLeish (p. 78-79)
Thank you for your faithfulness and generosity. Please continue to stay connected with us each week. May God Bless You, Pastor Jones
Monthly Emphasis: Annual Mission Awareness, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday, Annual Leadership Workshop, & State of The Church Address
Monthly Scripture Readings:
Week of January 7th (Holy Communion)
Weekly Readings - Job 1 v 1-12 Job’s Prosperity
Scriptures:
* Genesis 22.1-19, God provided
* Judges 6.36-40, Put God to the test…
* St. Luke 4.1-13, the temptation of Jesus
Questions:
1. Where have you been?
2. What do you think…?
3. Are you sure?
Thought: The power of my circumstances spiritually, physically, emotionally, and financially
can cause trauma in my daily life.
Week of January 14th (Annual Mission Sunday)
Weekly Readings - Job 2 v1-13 Job’s Affliction
Scriptures:
* St. Matthew 20.1-16, the laborers in the vineyard
* Romans 12.1-8, the new life in Christ
* Ephesians 6.10-20, armed for battle
Questions:
1. Why do you still trust God?
2. Is there a response when the unwarranted, unexpected, and undeserved arrive?
Thought: There are no exemptions in the spiritual battle within me – ongoing and vexing!
Week of January 21st - (State of the Church Address)
Weekly Readings - Job 3 v11-23 Job’s Complaint
Scriptures:
* II Thessalonians 1.3-8, the expectation of enduring afflictions
* Revelations 14.12-13, the importance and Divine command to be faithful to faith- Jesus –!
Questions:
1. When death seems to be a better alternative, is/are there options?
2. What do you see while blinded by (glaring) surroundings of hopelessness?
Thought: Why me now, in this?
Week of January 28th
Weekly Readings - Job 4 v1-7, v17-21 Eliphaz 1st speech of rebuke
Scriptures:
* Psalm 7.12-16, the only agenda of evil is destruction, you’re in line!
* Gal. 6.1-10, Be cautious and careful in your assessment of those who are down.
Questions:
1. Think, who that was who was innocent, who never perished or suffered?
2. Where, when were the righteous ever cut off?
3. Can humans be that good “righteous” before God to be exempt from …?
Thought: Oh, the things the faithful think as they experience the things, they think they shouldn’t go through.
*Books for the Month: The Hugging Tree: A Story about Resilience by Jill Neimark, Love you Forever by Robert Much, Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson, and The Sellout
by Paul Beatty