Sunday Morning Sermon: Sunday's sermon is titled “After Jesus Was Born” from Matthew 2. The Old Testament reading is I Kings 10:1-13, and the New Testament reading is Philippians 2:5-11.
There will be only one MCC in-person service this Sunday at 9:00 AM.
Live streamed Virtual Church (link) is available streaming at 9:00 AM.
Virtual Foyer on Zoom (link) at 10:15 AM.
The recorded services are also available on MCC YouTube Channel (Link).
Week 44 of 52 Hebrew Words Every Christian Should Know by Dave Adamson: “Week 44 of 52 Hebrew Words Every Christian Should Know by Dave Adamson: “Revach” = spacious place. In the 20th century, Germany’s leaders infamously used the concept of “lebensraum” or “living space” to justify their perceived need to expand. The Hebrew word includes not just land, but also the ideas of breathing and being refreshed. Consider these uses of the word in the Old Testament:
“He brought me out into a spacious place” (II Samuel 22:20, also Psalm 18:19; 118:5).
“You have set my feet in a spacious place” (Psalm 31:8).
It makes even more sense when we learn that the Hebrew word for Egypt – “mitzrayim” – also means narrow place. So just as the Israelites were rescued from the narrow place of slavery in Egypt and delivered into the spacious place of the Promised Land, we can trust God to deliver us from our narrow places into His spacious place of refreshing.
MCC News: Merry Christmas! Thank you to all who helped make our Christmas Eve service such a grand success. If you missed it, it was essentially “Sing Along with Nathan” accompanied by a borderline angelic congregational choir.
Thanks to Ellen and Heather for masterminding the cookie decorating Christmas gifts for our Sunday school kids. If we missed you for any reason, please speak up. The baker is local, and I expect that we will do a supplemental order in January.
If you have an MCC Sunday school kid living at your house, you should be on the lookout for a gift from your teachers this weekend. It’s a cookie decorating kit from a local bakery. If you have not received yours by Monday, please let me know. We compiled this list from the sign-in database we have been using, but we don’t want to overlook any children at Christmas. If you just wish you were an MCC Sunday school kid, let us know and someone will come see you next week.
This week is part 4 of 5 of our Advent series called “Prepare the Way” based on the first three chapters of Matthew’s gospel. The message is titled “After Jesus Was Born,” and it will cover all of Matthew, chapter 2.
Please join us for worship at Melbourne Community Church this weekend, however you can. The live service begins at 9:00 AM, and it is live streamed on our YouTube channel. The full service is available on our website after that.
Our “virtual foyer” Zoom meeting is group of attenders who connect briefly (about 45 minutes) after the worship service. Newcomers are always welcome. Please let me know if you would like to join us this Sunday, and I will send you a link.