MAC KIRK

  2nd Sunday after Epiphany.  Lessons: Isa 62:1-5 Ps 96; 1 Cor 12:1-11 ;John 2:1-11; Message- " Jesus Manifested His Glory" "The Jews attached great importance to the high moments of life. Thus a wedding was not just a brief ceremony, but an experience shared by the entire community. The typical wedding feast could last up to seven days. That sounds strange to our modern way of thinking, but this offered a bright interlude in an otherwise dreary existence. The ceremony would begin on Tuesday at midnight. After the wedding the father of the bride would take his daughter to every house so that everyone might congratulate her. It was a community experience. Weddings were a time of joy. Years ago, when Johnny Carson was the host of The Tonight Show, he interviewed an eight year old boy. The young man was asked to appear because he had rescued two friends in a coalmine outside his hometown in West Virginia. As Johnny questioned the boy, it became apparent to him and the audie...

  1st Sunday after Epiphany. Isa 42:1-9 Ps 89:1-29 or 89:20-29 Acts 10:34-38 Luke 3:15-22  ; " Epiphany Living"   The first thing I do in preparing the message for the Sunday is to look at the season, and the lessons.  The hymn we will sing at the end of the service is a seasonal hymn in that it talks about this in one of the stanzas left out in the hymnal. "Oh, lead me, Lord, that I may lead The wand’ring and the wav’ring feet; Oh, feed me, Lord, that I may feed Thy hung’ring ones with manna sweet."   That is the point of Epiphany.  The Gospel is for all, not just for us here. Another vs left out " Oh, give Thine own sweet rest to me, That I may speak with soothing pow’r A word in season, as from Thee, To weary ones in needful hour."  Epiphany is manifesting and showing God's power and love to others , so that they too would be fed with God's manna. This is the example of the Wise men in Matthew 2 that we read last week..."there came wise men...

  A Beginning to the New Year Message. Second Sunday after Christmas Day:Jeremiah 31:7-14; Ps 84; Eph 1:3-14 ;Luke 2:22-40 or Matt 2:1-12 "Living without Christ Fred Craddock once told a parable about a man who moved into a cottage equipped with a stove and simple furnishings. As the sharp edge of winter cut across the landscape, the cottage grew cold as did its occupant. He went out back and pulled a few boards off the house to kindle the fire. The fire was warm, but the house seemed as cold as before. More boards came off for a larger fire to warm the now even colder house, which in return required an even larger fire, demanding more boards. In a few days the man cursed the weather, cursed the house, cursed the stove, and moved away. The futility that man felt is the futility of those who try to live the Christian life without Christ. He is the Word that was in the beginning with God and was God. And he is alive today. To those of us who are drowning he is someone we can hold on...