Happy New Year!

Hi.  I know I have not been posting for a while, but I have a good excuse.  It is the one thing I am extremely thankful for this year.  I gave birth to my wonderful son Colton on October 6th.  Every baby is a miracle but I feel that Colton is especially a miracle, since my husband and I have been praying for him for 9 years.  We have been through a lot to have a child, but I can say that God has been with us the whole time helping us with our frustrations and helping our doctors help us have a child.  The El Cajon congregation as well as a lot of other members of the Community of Christ have also been praying for us and have been wonderful friends through this whole process.

Now that I am a mom I am a little busier but I will be trying to blog more and I look forward to sharing with all of you and hearing your comments.  Have a wonderful holiday season!

 

Is God Picking on Me?

I read a wonderful article from Chabad‘s online magazine.  For those of you who do not know about Chabad, they are an ultraorthodox group of Jewish people and one of their missions is to help people learn more about God, Jewish traditions and scripture and to help people and families become the best that they can be.  This article is called “Is God Picking on Me?” and it is about how to deal with life when we are feeling like the world is against us and how to look at your situation in a more positive way.  I hope you enjoy it and if you need this article right now, I hope it helps you.

Is G‑d Picking on Me? Saved by a tow truck driver By Aron Moss

Dear Rabbi, Does G‑d pick on some people? I think He is picking on me, because I have suffered one loss after another for much of my life. It seems that as soon as I have survived one tragedy, another one comes crashing down on me. I always bounce back, but I am starting to take it personally . . . Answer: There was once a tow truck driver who lived near a muddy old country road. Every day he would jump into his truck and drive a mile or so to a particularly sludgy bend in the road, and every day his truck would get stuck in the mud. But it was a trusty old truck, and its chunky tires and growling engine would always be able to beat the mud and climb up onto solid ground. Most days, as he drove along, he would encounter other motorists who had unknowingly ventured onto the muddy road and gotten stuck in the bog. Some of them had been trapped there for hours, haplessly revving their engines and watching their wheels spin aimlessly in the muck. The truck driver would appear like a savior and offer them a tow, drag them out and set them back on the road. The truck driver’s son once asked him, “Why do you always drive down this muddy road? You always get stuck in it. Why don’t you take your truck somewhere smoother, where the road is clear and dry?” “That’s the whole point,” said the trucker to his son. “My tow truck has the power to get through that mud. The only reason I pass by there every day is to find others who are stuck and can’t get out themselves. That’s what a tow truck is for.” Some souls are like tow trucks. They somehow have the strength to burst through the thickest and muddiest roads of life. No matter what life throws at these people, they muster the inner fortitude to get through. And so they keep getting thrown into the abyss, over and over again. What these souls probably don’t even realize is that they are helping others. When you face a tough time and beat it, you bring light into that dark place, which can shine a path for others who are stuck in their own darkness. It could even be that the only reason you had to pass through that dark roadway is to help drag other souls out of their darkness. Sometimes we help others directly, by sharing our experiences and teaching a new way to those who can’t see a way out. Or it may happen indirectly. The mere fact that you went through it and survived blazes a pathway, opens a door, and other suffering souls whom you may never meet suddenly find a way out of their quagmire and are set free. So perhaps you are a tow truck soul. Perhaps sometimes you are being towed. We all experience both. But if we would realize that every time we conquer our own darkness we may be helping someone who can’t help themselves, we would be inspired to keep on trucking.

 

Testimony

Hello!  I thought it would be interesting to share a testimony by Patti Walrod, who is one of the members of our congregation and the Community of Christ.  Some of you may be wondering what draws people to our church or what experiences do they have when they attend one of our services?  Patti’s testimony gives an insight into that.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

So I wanted to offer up my testimony. The time was 1977-1979 and I was in junior high. Donny and Marie were popular at that time and I was fascinated by their religion, like a lot of people. By 10th grade I was in high school and I have memories of scouring through religions of the USA books to learn more about this LDS faith. Meanwhile my Mom told me about my own family connection with the LDS –faith. My great grandparents came from Denmark as LDS converts and settled in SW Utah. My grandfather was never baptized as LDS, and never attended after he left home.

So the more I learned and read, the more I would stumble into this “other church”, the RLDS/Community of Christ. I was 15 at the time and living with my parents – one time I filled out an LDS info card and “oops” the LDS missionaries came knocking. I remember my parents not being happy with me. So my thought was “maybe this Community of Christ would be more acceptable to my parents vs the LDS.” Around the same time a woman in the LDS church was strongly supporting the Equal Rights Amendment, Sonia Johnson, was being kicked out of the LDS church. It was ugly and to me as a young lady in high school I got this strong sense that the LDS church wasn’t the best place for me.

So as I was working on a project with my Mom, I was poking around in the yellow pages of the phone book and I learned there was a “churches” section. I found a local congregation of the Community of Christ, the Clairemont Congregation in San Diego, California. So one day after school I rode my bike over to the church and peaked in the windows and saw a HUGE COFFEE POT. I remember thinking “OK that means they view the Word of Wisdom differently, I wonder what else is different?”

In December of 1979 on a Sunday in between Christmas and New Year’s I went to church, I snuck over – I was afraid of my parents’ reaction so I went while my Mom was still asleep and my Dad was golfing. I got to meet a few folks (some still even attend there!) and the pastor. I went home that Sunday thinking “I will be baptized in this church in 8 months – August 31st 1980”…and I was  I made my decision but it was extremely important to me that my parents would accept my decision.

So what drew me? I believed that the teenager Joseph Smith Jr had a powerful experience with God when he was a teenager, which told me that God paid attention to teenagers..essentially that I was a person of worth.  The message of Jesus Christ was found in the pages of the Book of Mormon for me. I wanted to be baptized and I wanted it done as Jesus led as example, by immersion and with repentance.

Also (in hindsight this next thing cracks me up) it wasn’t one of those “crazy churches with female pastors”  At the time there were Scientology “churches” in San Diego that had female pastors and they just seemed crazy to me.

I remember a tract that I was given – it showed a young Korean woman holding a baby and it said inside it that “you have brothers and sisters all over the world….” And to be a part of a group like that was powerful to me.

Another important thing to me was that living the gospel was a 7/24 experience, it wasn’t something that was just talked about – it was lived. That also was very important to me…I didn’t fully understand why, it just seemed right.

That God is still active and involved with our lives, and the world, that God guides this church in it’s sacred role of being peacemakers and building God’s kingdom. Is this “the true church”? That’s an awfully big question and for me all I know is that this is where I feel called to be.

I haven’t veered much from this over the years – a lot of specifics have changed in 32 years. Female pastors aren’t crazy (ok maybe some of them are but they make  our best pastors!) I am not worried too much about what Joseph Smith exactly experienced in the grove. He had an experience and that’s fine with me.

I don’t study and read as much as I used to – because I found myself so caught up in the details I felt I was missing the point – and the point is..The Kingdom. The two greatest things are those two commandments that Jesus focused on  ” ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’

I firmly believe everything we do, every act of service, every moment of “ministry of presence” is focused around these two commandments. Collectively our salvation (eternal life with God) Is dependent on our sharing and serving these commandments.

 

Rummage Sale for Spectacular!

Come one come all to the annual Rummage sale this Saturday, May 19th, starting at 7am!  The sale will be at the El Cajon Community of Christ at 115 Cajon View in El Cajon.  It benefits our youth who will be going to Spectacular.  This will give them a chance to play sports and other activities and meet other youth from the Community of Christ from all over the world!

If you have any items you wish to donate, please contact me at cofchristelcajon@gmail.com.  We are looking forward to seeing everyone on Saturday!

 

SwIMC Webcast #1

There is a new webcast on youtube from our Mission Center President Terry Read and our Financial Officer Ryan Sharp about the events that will be happening in our Mission Center.  The video is informative and fun to watch and they will be doing more of these webcasts in the future.  I heard from a few people that they had trouble finding the video so I am posting here for your enjoyment!  Have a good week!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IW-UBxfpZSo

 

What now?

After Easter is over and we have experienced the joy of Jesus’ resurrection, spent time with our family and friends and maybe had some Easter candy, we sometimes wonder, “Now what?”.  I was pondering this question when I thought of an experience that I had at our sunrise service on Easter morning.

We have a cross that we use each easter that we ask people to put flowers on.  The reason for this is that we are taking a terrible thing such as Jesus’ crucifixion and changing it into a beautiful thing by recognizing that Jesus overcame death.  We also acknowledge that due to this event, we can can change our lives also and have a new life by following Jesus.

Our cross had an accident on the way to the service and the horizontal bar fell out of the truck that was transporting it and broke into several pieces.  Since the cross was broken, we were not able to stand it up, but we decided to put the vertical part down on the ground and then place flowers were the horizontal part would have been.

We were sad that the cross we had for so many years had been broken, but after some reflection, we realized that this is a metaphor for our lives.  There have been many times in my life when I have been through trials that I thought I would never get through, but God has always been there to help me through them.  Sometimes it was not quite the resolution I wanted but in the end it was the best solution for me.  Our cross was broken but we made the best of it and it turned out to be even more beautiful.  I will post a picture of it so you know what I mean.

I hope you had a wonderful Easter and will continue to be blessed through out the year!

 

Upcomming Events

Hello.  We have some exciting events comming up! 

Our first event is our piano recital at our El Cajon congregation.  It will be Saturday, March 31st from 12:30 to 2:30pm. We will have a potluck and then the recital.  Come out for some great food and entertainment!

Our second event is our Easter Sunrise Service, which will be at Mission Bay at 7am on April 8th, Easter Sunday.  From Highway 8 West, exit West Mission Bay drive and go about 2 miles to Ventura Cove which is on the right, before the Bahia Hotel.  I have always had a wonderful experience at this service and it is beautiful to see the sunrise in the morning, especially on Easter. 

We will also have services at our El Cajon congregation at 10:30 followed by an Easter Egg hunt!  We welcome you to any of our services and be sure and bring the kids for fun after the 10:30 service!