Epiphany 2 2022

Let's be able to son and the Holy Spirit.

Let's pray together.

By the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love you and we magnify your holy name through Christ.

Amen.

Hear what our Lord Jesus Christ saith: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

This is the first and greatest commitment.

And the second is like unto it.

Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

On these two commitments hang all the law and the prophets.

Holy God, holy and mighty, holy immortal one, have compassion upon us.

The Lord be with you.

Let us pray.

Almighty God, whose Son, our Savior Jesus Christ, is the light of the world.

Grant that thy people, illumined by thy word and sacraments, may shine with the radiance of Christ's glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth.

Through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord, who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God now and forever.

Amen.

As you're being seated, our children are invited to children's church in the back of Mr.

Alex.

For Zion's sake, I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem's sake, I will not rest until her vindication shines out like the dawn and her salvation like a burning torch.

The nation shall see your vindication and all the kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name that the mouth of the Lord will give.

You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord and a royal diadem for the hand of your God.

You shall no more be termed forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed desolate.

But you shall be called, My delight is in her, and your land married.

For the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married.

For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your builder marry you, and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.

Hear what the Spirit is saying to God's people.

Your love, O Lord, reaches to the heavens.

Your righteousness is like the strong mountains, your justice like the great deep.

How priceless is your love, O God.

They feast upon the abundance of your house.

For with you is the well of life.

Continue your loving kindness to those who know you.

Now, concerning spiritual gifts, brothers and sisters, I do not want you to be uninformed.

You know that when you were pagans, you were enticed and led astray to idols that could not speak.

Therefore, I want you to understand that no one is speaking by the Spirit of God who ever says, Let Jesus be cursed.

And no one can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.

And there are varieties of services, but the same Lord.

And there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone.

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.

To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same spirit, to another faith by the same spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one spirit.

To another, the working of miracles, to another, prophecy, to another, discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another, the interpretation of tongues.

All these are activated by one and the same spirit who allots to each one individually just as the spirit chooses.

Hear what the spirit is saying to God's people!

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.

Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding.

When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, They have no wine.

And Jesus said to her, Woman, what concern is that to you and to me?

My hour has not yet come.

His mother said to the servants, Do whatever he tells you.

Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons.

Jesus said to them, Fill the jars with water.

And they filled them up to the brim, he said to them, Now draw some out and take it to the chief steward.

So they took it.

When the steward tasted the water that had become wine and did not know where it came from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew, the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the gifts had become drunk.

But you have kept the good wine until now.

Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in him.

The gospel of the Lord.

We've taken a break from Luke just for a second and gone into the Gospel of John, and it's important to hear that there's two things John does that the other Gospels don't do.

One of them is that in John, Jesus has what are called I am sayings, I am the Good Shepherd, I am the true vine.

There are seven of those.

And the other thing John does is has seven signs, and each sign is supposed to not, we're not supposed to get sort of stuck on the fact pattern.

They're supposed to inaugurate the light of God that's present in the world.

And so what John's doing here is not telling you that one of Jesus' most influential things was to change H2O into Y.

If we read it at the surface level, I'm afraid we're missing the sign.

So, in order to help us out, let me ask you to do something unepiscopalian.

Has anybody been to a Jewish wedding before?

Only a couple of us have.

Let me tell you, they're very different from the weddings I've done.

I've done about like 35 of these here in the church or outside using sort of episcopal right.

Let me tell you what happens at a Jewish wedding.

The first thing, before there's any ceremony, it is typically the groom who signs a contract with the bride's parents with all of the influential men in the room.

This is like the kind of contract you would take when you buy a home.

It's a promise.

It's extremely solemn.

And when it's done, usually people drink whiskey, not wine.

And there's this kind of big celebration because that's like the deal.

And part of the deal is I promise that I am going to, as the later vows are going to do, take care of the fiduciary responsibility.

After that's over, typically, when we're talking about groom and bride, the groom will wrap the bride up, physically walk around the bride, usually seven times with some translucent material that's like a veil.

This is not meant to be swaddling or binding.

It's supposed to represent sort of like what we hear in Isaiah or in the Psalms of being in the refuge of the wings, right?

Protection, holding.

Then you go into the synagogue, or if you're outside.

And you know this is new.

If you've been to a Jewish wedding now, there's two things that didn't happen at the time of Jesus.

One is that there's a chupa.

Even if you're inside, you build this chupa, which is supposed to represent a booth or a tabernacle or the temple.

Usually it's like four posts and it's connected around the top and there's garland around it.

Sometimes they're extravagantly beautiful.

But uh, you know if you drive by and you see a chupa, there's going to be a Jewish way.

The other thing that happens, most of us know at the very end, is you take a, usually it's the groom that does it as well, crushes the wine glass.

And that happens since the destruction of the temple, and it's a reminder, life is fragile, so take care.

Take care, or this could break down.

That glass actually gets used throughout the ceremony.

So the first thing that kind of happens when you get in the room and people are in their places is that the rabbi will take the glass full of wine and say the normal Shabbat blessing.

Blessed are you, Lord God, ruler of the universe, because you created the fruit of the vine.

And there's an exchange of wine drinking throughout the ceremony without which it doesn't work.

So we often think, oh, like wine is something you have at a party, but the ceremony itself doesn't work without the wine.

Wine is the symbol for joy in the Hebrew Bible, and the wedding is a symbol for joy.

So after the bride and the groom to be drink some of the wine, seven of their closest family members or friends get up, and instead of reading poems, they offer seven blessings over the couple, and after each blessing, they drink some of the wine, symbolizing they're trying to be full of this joy.

I'm yet to try to talk a Christian couple into doing this.

But you know what I love about it is it's very, very celebratory.

And then, of course, if you've been to a Jewish wedding, uh, or even if you've just seen Fiddler on the roof, and I gotta warn you, there's not always a bottle dance, but usually somebody goes out on a chair and they carry the chair, and the chair is involved in a raucous party.

When we read the story at Cana, we don't know at which point the wine gives out.

Could have been at the party, but friends, it could have gone out before the ceremony, without which they can't have the ceremony because there can't be any of the blessings.

Now, this story, I understand wine has alcohol content, but that's not what this is really about.

In the ancient world, you drank either really like you drank well water, or you drank wine, or you drank beer, and that was about it.

It might interest you to know that the people who came up with pasteurization were the Welches and they were Methodists, and they were very concerned about alcohol content in church.

But for you know, thousands of years you stepped on grapes, and if you stored it, it turned into wine.

It just happens, right?

Unless you pasteurize it.

So this is what people have.

And it's this image throughout the Bible that the people of God are a vineyard and they're meant to produce joy for the world.

So this image of wine is really important in the wedding, and it's not about the wine, it's the symbology.

But in order to understand the symbology a little bit further, and I've got to tell you, there's people here who probably understand wine much better than I do, it's it's worth thinking about wine for a second, right?

Because we all understand there's different tiers of wine out there, and there's different qualities.

And the things that seem to matter most about wine that are important in this story are how old the branches and the external circumstances, right?

So new wine is usually not as complex.

All those California wines that started winning awards in the late 80s, like beating the French wines, came from France.

Like they dug up, they dug up the vine roots and brought them to California, and what do you know?

People figured out how to do that, and probably many of you know that there was a a blight in Bordeaux, and California returned the favor.

So all those Bordeaux that came to California, they all died, and the Californians replaced them because they didn't get that blight.

I don't know if you know this this story.

Uh, curiously enough, things that make for good wines, really bad external circumstances.

Like whenever there's a forest fire in California, you want to buy wine made that year.

Because the stress of the environment somehow creates more joy.

I hate to even say that.

But apparently it's the case.

Talk to any veteran out there, and they will tell you when there's a forest fire, if the grapes survive, that's going to be a good year.

Because when it's tough, they do some extra investment in the fruit.

So tradition is helpful.

Oddly enough, stress is helpful.

Many of us don't always realize that white wine comes from red grapes.

It's easy to think white grapes, white wine, red grapes, red wine.

All wine comes from red grapes.

And the difference you see between red and white is whether or not you leave the skins in.

So I do think it's fair to say that having our skin in the game is pretty important when we think about the wine of faith.

Many of us know also that what you put the wine in is kind of important.

Like specifically, if you use American oak, that's better for whiskey, French oak is better for wine, and the longer it sits, the more tannin from the oak it gets, right?

Again, I'm not like a super taster or anything.

These are basic principles.

And it reminds me sometimes that we think about evangelism as just quick conversion and we forget that creating a container that will develop the notes and the complexities of our faith is just as important as inviting people in.

So I do want to say that the container that we try to create needs to hold us well and needs to develop not just cheap wine.

Notice that.

But complex joy, because to be honest, joy is usually not singular for me when it shows up.

It's usually pretty complicated.

Happiness is usually pretty simple, right?

And it's important to hear that developing and maturing in faith is just as important as entering into it.

Sometimes we beat ourselves up as Episcopalians because we're not evangelical enough, but discipleship is evangelism, and maturing in faith and creating a container that fosters wonder and curiosity and beauty is important.

And then there's this bit about where it comes from.

And this I think is the real sign Jesus does.

And uh I'm gonna have to do a lot of like nuancing here because it seems a little bit difficult.

Remember last week when I talked about baptism, if you were here, or even if you weren't, there was this practice in Judaism uh of sort of washing off residues that just may not have had like real health effects, but they just felt unhealthy in your gut or in your spirit, like I touched a dead body and I want to wash that residue off.

Or I menstruate, or I touched somebody who is menstruation, who was menstruating, I need to wash that off.

And I told you there was a Jewish practice of getting into a ritual bath called a mikvah.

And those were either uh actual pools that were fed by rainwater or they were like 50-gallon drums.

Well, I don't know if you notice in the story, uh there's these couple of really big jars that hold water for ritual purification.

And I know what you might be thinking, well, Mike, it says they only hold 20 to 30 gallons.

Well, that's because when you get in, some of it's going to come out, right?

So you don't want to fill it to the brink.

When you get in the thing, it would all come out.

So it holds 20 or 30 gallons, and then when you get in, you displace it up to the rim.

Jesus uses a bathtub.

A dirty bathtub.

It's really important to hear this.

That water for ritual immersion did not go through an RO filter.

It wasn't bleached after people got out.

It was drained and refilled.

They understood that the water wasn't antiseptic, it was representative.

And Jesus tells the steward, like something a middle, this sounds like a middle school prank when you first start to read it.

Fill the dirty bathtub and scoop some out and give it to the steward, and we'll see what happens.

If you don't read it that way, you're missing the what's happening here.

Back in the 80s, there were this like terrible things that went out, maybe even in the 90s too, like worst pickup lines.

Hey, baby, you're so drinking, so sweet I could drink your bath water.

Please do not drink somebody's bath water.

Jesus gives bath water to the steward.

And it's the best wine of the whole party.

And how it is that God is able to take my shame and turn it into joy for the world, I'll never understand, but that's the sign here.

God can take the things we're ashamed of and build joy, not only in the immediate community, but the rest of the world.

Now, I have to say, some nuancing.

That doesn't mean God causes bad things to happen to us.

The assurance of our faith, as I memorized when I was about five years old, Romans 8.28, is that in all things God works for the good of those who love God.

Better translation, in all things God is able to work to the good of those who love God.

God is able.

So I've got to tell you, I don't believe that God is like the Greek faiths and makes everything happen to you that's ever happened.

I don't believe in that.

What I trust is, no matter what happens to me, whether I made a bad choice or somebody else did, God is somehow able.

Somehow able to turn even the worse into joy for the world.

The question is, can I trust it and am I willing to join it?

A lot of the times the answer is no.

But this story is one of Jesus' seven signs because it's that significant that God can transform our shame into joy.

Doesn't mean God will do it.

It doesn't mean God causes shame to happen to us.

It means God can transform.

This I think is an interesting bit when we think about what's happening at this wedding.

It represents two people, but you see, it also represents the whole rest of the community.

Like I'm really sure, actually, that the wedding I had was as much for everybody else as it was for us.

We needed that rite of passage.

By the way, I would tell you the same thing is true about baptism.

It's as much for everybody else as it is for the person getting wet.

This is a community event, and don't you see if the joy gives out, it won't work.

It won't work for the couple, it won't work for the community.

It's just as important that the two people say all of their vows, and everybody else out says, we'll do everything in our power to support you.

If we say, hey, hey, that's your decision, guys, you're on your own, what kind of wedding is that?

Not a joyful one, because the truth is, if you've been married for more than two years, you needed somebody else.

I mean, that's my experience anyway.

What I didn't hear in church, it's important to hear, is being married is hard.

And it takes a lot of work.

And even though we put work in, we don't always get joy every time out of it.

But if we continue to work, what I'm amazed to find in my own relationship with my spouse is some of the things I've done before meeting her or since meeting her that I'm ashamed of.

She's able to love me even more.

That's the transforming power of God in a human relationship.

So imagine how much bigger it is when God's directly involved.

This story is about that.

And sometimes I think we forget when we read this passage from Paul, you know, that this is meant to be a representative list, not a comprehensive one.

So I grew up in a church that said, aha, look, there's seven spiritual gifts, and let's take a personality profile to figure out which one you have, and then you can leverage that one you've got.

I don't want to say that that's wrong.

I just want to say it's myopic, because the truth is you have no gifts.

God has all of them.

And God will use them however God pleases.

And to be honest, there's times in my life where a gift shows up that I did not have possession of, and then it leaves me when it's over.

And this list for gifts, some of the most important gifts I've ever seen in ministry, like the spiritual gift of being able to say no.

I rarely have that gift, but let me tell you, if you sit on something called the Commission on Ministry and people come before you and say, I'd like to be ordained to the clergy, you need somebody on that committee that can say no.

That might be the only thing they can do, but they can say no.

I'm conflict averse.

I like to say maybe or later or the oh, I guess you've come this far.

We need people with the gift of know.

We need people with the spiritual gift of throwing a shrimp boil, or maybe a crawfish boil.

Some people don't like to be on the altar guilt.

Here's good news: you don't have to be.

God has lots of gifts in mind.

And you know, if you've never had soul food, I mean food that nourished both your body and your spirit.

I feel sorry for you.

I don't make, that's not my gift.

I cook food.

But there are people with the spiritual gift of making food that nourishes your entire person.

The spirit gives that gift and it builds up joy in the world.

Some people have the spiritual gift of being so thorough that even granular details are exciting for them.

That is not my gift.

And the Spirit gives it to build us up.

You see, I think Paul thought he was inviting people into considering ways in which the Spirit moves, not limiting that.

This is what it takes to make joy in the world.

All kinds of gifts, all kinds, that we offer up.

And say, God, you can do more than we can ask or understand through these gifts.

Here's another gift, and this is going to sound funny when I say it.

Do you notice the spiritual gift of being passive aggressive in the story?

I mean, I, you know, this is Jesus at like 30, and his mom says, Hey son, they're out of wine, and he says, Lady, what's that to me?

And then she does this thing that only a mom in the South could get away with.

We'll just do whatever he says.

Once upon a time I was in college and I was grown up, I was like 20, and I'd packed my car, I was going the next day, I knew how I lived, and I was taking two towels with me, one that I could use, and then, you know, when I needed a wash, I'd have another one.

Um I didn't know why my mom decided she was gonna get involved, but she did, and we probably spent 15 minutes arguing about how many towels I needed.

I probably said some really mature things like it's my life and I'm living it.

I won that argument.

So I got up at five in the morning and I drove the college and I started unpacking my car.

And what do you know?

There were six towels in the car.

My mother had set an alarm for like 2:30 in the morning and surreptitiously loaded four extra towels in my car.

Now, on principle, I didn't use a single one of those.

That's what I learned from her.

But I but you know what's interesting is without Mary being passive aggressive, there was no miracle.

Jesus didn't even want to do this.

I hope you notice that.

He didn't want to do this.

And God can even use that.

I mean, it's kind of an incredible story, isn't it?

Now, I'm not encouraging you to be passive aggressive.

What I want to say is even the shame of passive aggressiveness can help create wine in the world.

You know?

That's a sign.

It's a sign of the things we dislike about ourselves or the things that we worry about.

I don't know what those are for you.

And listen, there's there's there's stuff in my little jars over here that I still would like to keep the lid on.

But part of my faith journey is that's who has that's what's made me who I am.

And God sure would like me to be full of wine instead of shame.

And this I think is quite an interesting invitation that we have here in the life of Jesus.

I don't know what Jesus' epiphany was in the story.

Again, he goes from I don't want to to doing a thing, you know?

And I know what we get to see is that, hey, even sometimes if we don't think we want to do something, God can do wonderful things with it.

And it reminds me of something that happened this week when we were hearing from the Imam.

So Imam Ibrahim Ezgahir got up and he talked about this thing.

And many of you know that the word Islam is related to the Arabic word salam, like shalom in Hebrew.

It means peace.

But Islam specifically means peace that comes from submitting to God.

Now, I'm going to tell you I don't like that word because I wrestled in high school and college, and to me, when you submit, it means you lost and somebody was actively trying to beat you.

And I have a hard time thinking that God is trying to like choke me out.

You know, I actually came from that spirituality and I like it, right?

Um, but what the Imam said that I think is really interesting is that many of us make this mistake, thinking that once we admit to something, we admit to an idea, that's all we need to do.

He said that actually, like the goal of discipleship is to submit to what we admit.

To submit to what we admit.

And I feel like that's what Martin Luther King Jr.

was trying to say when he said, we hold these truths to be self-evident, all people are created equal, and we have not submitted to that.

Right?

We admit it, but we don't submit to it.

So for me, the epiphany is I could admit God does these wonders, and will I submit what's in my jars to God?

Will I submit?

I'm afraid to take the jar off of this stuff that God isn't afraid of it.

Not only is God not afraid, God doesn't need to scour it with bleach.

What I know is that we could use a lot more joy in the world.

And I want you to hear this.

I really am drawn to the Jewish wedding.

Because it says at the center of this relationship between two people and their community is joy.

And what this story says is God can make that joy out of things that just don't seem very joyful.

I got a lot growing up to do.

And probably when we come back to the story in three years, I'll have a lot more growing up to do.

But for this epiphany, I think our invitation is to at least take the lids off our jars.

Please join me as we pray our faith in the words of the Nicene Creed.

We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, Maker of Heaven, of all the sea.

We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally God of the Father, God from God, light from light, true truth, true God, because of many peace, of one being with the Father, through the multi-surmace, for us and for our salvation, he became death from heaven.

By the power of the Holy Spirit, he became departed from the virtue of the made heaven.

For our saints he was crucified and fresh of life, he suffered death from the spirit.

On the third day he rose again, in accordance with the scriptures.

He ascended into heaven and assisted in the right hand of the Father.

He will come to me in the Lord to judge the live and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who receives from the Father and Son.

To the Father and the Son, who has worshiped and glorified.

He has spoken through the prophets.

We believe in one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.

We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.

We look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.

Amen.

With our heart and with our mind, let us pray to the Lord.

For the peace from above, for the loving kindness of God, and for the salvation of our souls, let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For the peace of the world, for the welfare of the holy church of God, and for the unity of all peoples, let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For the people and clergy of the church, for bishops and other ministers, the priests in our community, Mike, Jim, Craig, Bill, and Lillian, our bishops Andy, Hector, Jeff and Kay in the Diocese of Texas, San Francisco Diocity, Austin, Coco, Austin, St.

Albans, Montchaca, Austin, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin, and our presiding bishop, Michael.

Let us pray to the Lord.

For our parish and our ventry, the source of wisdom may guide us, the source of strength may support us, and the source of love may unify us.

Let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For St.

Thomas the Apostle School, that those who teach and those who learn may rejoice in the knowledge of your truth, that we may teach our students to love whatever is just and true and good, and that we may be bearers of your grace to all who come through our doors.

Let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For all who govern and hold authority in every nation, for the members of the armed forces throughout the world, and for all who struggle for peace and justice, that they may act with prudence and vision to plant the signs of your dominion everywhere.

Let us pray to the Lord.

Lord.

For this city, for every city and community, and for those who live in them, let us pray to the Lord.

For the good earth which God has given us, and for the wisdom and will to conserve it, let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For the aged and infirm, for the widowed and orphans, and for the sick and suffering, especially Chris, John, Ken, Nancy, Amber, Angelica.

Let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

The congregation is invited to name your own celebrations or petitions silently or aloud.

Let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For the poor and the oppressed, for the unemployed and the destitute, for prisoners and captives, and for all who remember and care for them, let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For all who have died in the hope of resurrection, especially JB, and for all the departed, let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

For deliverance from all danger, violence, oppression, and degradation.

Let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

That we may end our lives in faith and hope, without suffering and without reproach.

Let us pray to the Lord.

Lord, have compassion.

In the communion of St.

Thomas and all the saints, let us commend ourselves and one another in all our life to Christ our God.

To thee, O Lord our God.

Let us confess our sins against God and our new.

God of all mercy, we confess that we have sinned against you, opposing your will in our lives.

We have denied your goodness in each other, in ourselves, and in the world you have created.

We repent of the evil that enslaves us, the evil we have done, and the evil done in our behalf.

Forgive, restore, and strengthen us through our Savior Jesus Christ, that we may abide in your love and serve only your will.

Amen.

Almighty God have mercy on you.

Forgive you all your sins through our Lord Jesus Christ, strengthen you in all goodness, and by the power of the Holy Spirit keep you in eternal life.

Amen.

The peace of the Lord be always with you.

And with my spirit.

There's a few announcements that you'll see in your Wednesday midweek mailer, and by all means let me know if you're not getting that and would like to, but I just want to draw attention to a few of them.

First, uh on the way out, both to your left and right, you'll see these little brown bags that are decorated with like things like happy holidays and Christmas trees.

And inside is a non-perishable meal.

In case you're ever driving around downtown or Creta Lake and see somebody with a sign that says, like, hungry, anything helps.

This is something you can look forward to giving out.

So I invite you to take as many as you would like to distribute in the next week.

And our scouts try to keep them staffed there.

It's probably Christmas somewhere.

So the tree is not too late, you know, and the spirit of Christmas lives all year.

So we know that.

But it really is a lovely opportunity their scouts have made, so please please do help yourself.

Uh, because I often forget and I drive by people and like I don't know what to do.

And the reminder is pick up another one.

Um this week, on Thursday, is our third speaker in the Epiphanies of Respect series.

Uh, this is Rabbi Stuart Federal, who's going to join us in person here in the sanctuary from 6 to 7 p.m.

You can also stream him on our YouTube channel.

Now, our presenters have asked that we not store those videos.

If you miss it, I can email it to you.

But he'll be here from 6 to 7.

And Rabbi Federo has really invited us to come with as many questions as we can think of.

What our speakers have done that I think is amazing the last two is they've talked about how they came, how they came to their faith tradition and what it means for them on a daily or even like life basis.

And I've been very touched that people were willing to share those things.

You know, the mechanics we can often look up online, but to hear, you know, how this enters that part of the brain we call the heart and saturates.

Their life has been really lovely.

So Rabbi Federer will be here Wednesday.

And I want to remind you, he went to Reform Seminary, but he's a rabbi at a conservative synagogue, which means he's like in the middle in the world of Judaism.

And in two weeks, Rabbi Matt from Galveston is a reform rabbi at a reform synagogue.

So we'll we'll get to hear sort of from the horse's mouths how they how they express those traditions differently.

You may wonder why we're having two different rabbis, and it's because unbelievably anti-Semitism is on the rise.

I just I cannot understand that.

And so for us to understand the heart of faith and the way that it guides our Jewish brothers and sisters into deeper holier living.

That's that's kind of a big order for us this year.

So again, that'll be this Thursday night.

This coming Saturday is our next fresh food distribution with the Galveston County Food Bank.

So you can show up outside in the parking lot at 7.45.

You'll probably want to cope.

We'll be done by 10.

And usually we serve somewhere between 70 to 90 vehicles representing 365 to 450 persons.

And again, that's the Saturday.

In fact, we'll be doing it the next two Saturdays in a row, which is not normal, but it's the food bank schedule.

So this Saturday coming up and the next or next week on Sunday is what we call the parish annual meeting.

Uh it has three agenda items elect the vestry, elect the council representatives, approve our parish budget.

Uh that happens at 9:15 in here.

We will also stream it on YouTube, and you can type questions into YouTube and we'll read them, or there'll be two microphones uh here as well.

Uh it's great to celebrate the work we've done over the last year.

We'll get to hear from our head of school and our family minister about you know where we've been and the vision for the year.

Uh this is also a great opportunity to hear about the visions uh, you know, for the for the parish and ministry in 2022, God willing.

So uh so really invite you to come a little bit early for that.

If you're able to, next week it'll be 9 15 to 1015, and then we'll have worship at 10 or 10 thirty.

Continue to walk in love.

As Christmas loved us and gave themselves for us and offering and sacrifice to God.

All things come of thee, O Lord.

This is the table not of the church, but of Jesus Christ.

It is made ready for those who love him and those who want to love him more, so come.

You who have much faith and you who have little, you who have been here often and you who have not been for a long time or ever before, you who have tried to follow and you who have failed, come.

Not because the church invites you, it is Christ.

He invites you to meet him here.

Let us give things to the Lord our God.

It is very neat, right, and our bounding duty that we should at all times and in all places give thanks unto thee, O Lord, holy Father Almighty, everlasting God.

Cause in the mystery of the word made flesh, thou hast caused a new light to shine in our hearts, to give the knowledge of thy glory in the face of thy Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Therefore, with angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify thy glorious name, evermore praising thee and saying, Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory, Hosanna in the highest.

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest.

All glory be to thee, O Lord our God, for that thou didst create heaven and earth, and didst make us in thine own image.

And if thy tender mercy didst give thine only Son Jesus Christ to take our nature upon him, and suffer death upon the cross for our redemption, he made there a full and perfect sacrifice for the whole world, and did institute, and in his holy gospel command us to continue a perpetual memory of that, his precious death and sacrifice, until his coming again.

For in the night in which he was betrayed, Jesus took bread.

And when he given thanks to thee, he broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, Take, eat.

This is my body which is given for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

Likewise, after supper, Jesus took the cup of wine.

And when he given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink this, all of you.

This is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for you and for all for the remission of sin.

Do this as oft as ye shall drink it in remembrance of me.

Wherefore, O Lord and Heavenly Father, we thy people do celebrate and make with these thy holy gifts, which we now offer unto thee, the memorial thy son hath commanded us to make, having in remembrance his blessed passion and precious death, his mighty resurrection and glorious ascension, looking for his coming again with power and great glory.

And we most humbly beseech thee, O merciful Father, to hear us, and with thy word and Holy Spirit to bless and sanctify these gifts of bread and wine, that there may be unto us the body and blood of thy dearly beloved Son, Jesus Christ.

And we honestly desire thy fatherly goodness to accept this, our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, whereby we offer and present unto thee, O Lord, ourselves, our souls and bodies.

Grant we beseech you that all who partake of this holy communion may worthily receive the most precious body and blood of thy Son Jesus Christ, and be filled with thy grace and heavenly benediction.

And also that we and all thy whole church may be made one body with Him, that He may dwell in us and we in Him, through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.

By whom and with whom and in whom, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, all honor and glory be unto thee, O Father Almighty, world without end.

Amen.

And now, as our Savior Christ hath taught us, we are bold to pray.

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory forever and ever.

Amen.

These are the gifts of God for you, the people of God.

Feed on them in your hearts by faith and with thanksgiving.

Faithful God, in the wonder of your wisdom and love, you fed your people in the wilderness with the bread of angels and using Jesus to be the bread of life.

We thank you for feeding us with this bread.

May it strengthen us that by the power of the Holy Spirit we may embody your desire and be renewed for your service through Jesus Christ our Savior.

Amen.

May Christ the Son of God be manifest in you, that your lives might be a light to the world.

And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit be with you this day and remain with you always.

Amen.