A New Day Is Dawning

In the Gospel reading for this Wednesday in the fourth week of Advent, we hear from Luke who tells us about Mary’s visit to her cousin, Elizabeth. The women play a key role in Luke’s Gospel as we see here:

In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leapt in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leapt for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.’

And Mary said, ‘My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’

And Mary remained with her for about three months and then returned to her home. (Lk 1:39-56).

Mary’s song of praise, which we call “The Magnificat,” tells us that the coming of Jesus heralds a new way. It will not be business as usual. There will be a change, a turning around 180 degrees, in Greek “a metanoia.” Emmanuel, God with us, is coming to turn things upside down. He is coming to scatter the proud in the thoughts of their hearts, to bring down the powerful from their thrones, to lift up the lowly, to fill the hungry with good things and to send the rich away empty. The day is at its darkest hour, but a new day is dawning.

Let us pray: Come Lord Jesus, do not delay; give new courage to your people who trust in your love. By your coming, raise us to the joy of your kingdom, where you live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

CHRISTMAS FLOWERS

Tammie Taylor has the following Christmas Flower offerings. If yours is not on the list, please let Tammie know at galvestontam@aol.com:

In honor of Carol Hogan from Joe Lombard
In honor of their family, especially Chase, Brayden, Daria and Van from Bill and Tammie Taylor
In memory George Derrick and in honor of Nellie Derrick from Tom and Jillian Bain
In honor of The Rev. Chester and Mary Makowski from Tom and Jillian Bain
In memory of my parents and my sisters from Earlie Evans
In memory of Lester and Alberta Bain from Tom and Jillian Bain

CALENDAR REMINDERS

Christmas Eve Eucharist Rite II at 5:00 p.m. on 24 December.

Feeding of the volunteers at William Temple: St. Augustine will feed about 30 volunteers on the week that the workers will be helping us with the Community Garden. This will take place the first week of January. I will obtain the final details from the Diocese of Texas Episcopal Disaster Relief coordinators.

16 January 2010: the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, the Most Rev. Dr. Katherine Jefferts Schori, and the Rt. Rev. C. Andrew Doyle will be at St. Augustine.

PLEASE REMEMBER EVERYONE ON OUR PRAYER LIST, especially Cindi, Carol, Lee, John, Bob, Peggy Moore Elliott and the family of the Rev. Janet Gilmore.

Your servant in Christ,

Fr. Chester J. Makowski+
St. Augustine of Hippo Episcopal Church
Galveston, Texas 77550

Saying "Yes" to God

On this Wednesday in the fourth week of Advent, we hear from Luke who tells us about Mary’s encounter with God’s messenger, and we see how different her response is from Zechariah’s:

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.’ But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’ Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin?’ The angel said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.’ Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’ Then the angel departed from her. (Lk. 1:26-38).

Unlike Zechariah, who thought that it all depended on him so what God wanted to do was impossible because he and his wife were too old, Mary is “perplexed”, Luke tells us, but she cooperates with God saying, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” She understood the angel’s statement that “nothing is impossible with God.” Nothing. Some of us respond like Zechariah who is quick to limit God, others respond like Mary who cooperates with God, trusting in God, and not placing limits on God. As Paul tells us, God can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine. Mary knew that. Today, be open like Mary. God can do the impossible, even with you.

CALENDAR REMINDERS

Christmas Eve Eucharist Rite II at 5:00 p.m. on 24 December.

Feeding of the volunteers at William Temple: St. Augustine will feed about 30 volunteers on the week that the workers will be helping us with the Community Garden. This will take place the first week of January. I will obtain the final details from the Diocese of Texas Episcopal Disaster Relief coordinators.

16 January 2010: the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, the Most Rev. Dr. Katherine Jefferts Schori, and the Rt. Rev. C. Andrew Doyle will be at St. Augustine.

PLEASE REMEMBER EVERYONE ON OUR PRAYER LIST, especially Cindi, Carol, Lee, John, Bob, Peggy Moore Elliott and the family of the Rev. Janet Gilmore.

Your servant in Christ,

Fr. Chester J. Makowski+
St. Augustine of Hippo Episcopal Church
Galveston, Texas 77550

We Find the Almighty Where We Least Expect Him

In the Monday of the fourth week of Advent, we hear from the prophet Isaiah who writes:

A shoot shall come out from the stock of Jesse,
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.
The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him,
the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.

He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
or decide by what his ears hear;
but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist,
and faithfulness the belt around his loins.
The wolf shall live with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain;
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea. (Isa. 11: 1-9).

Israel waited; it waited for the Lord. Israel longed for the restoration of the kingdom, but God had a much bigger plan! God’s plan was to restore all creation, not just Israel, but all of humanity. The Messiah, the anointed one, the long expected one did not arrive with great fanfare and in full armor, but in humility and in vulnerability, as a babe. Moreover, this babe was and is Emmanuel, which means “God with us”. God himself took on our very vulnerability as humans and became like us in every way, even death. When we read the words from the prophet Isaiah, we can see Jesus in those words.

You and I must look for Jesus not only in days past, but in our present, as we look for him to come again. Today, remember to look for Christ. Look for Christ this week. Jesus will be where you least expect him.

Let us pray: Purify our conscience, Almighty God, by your daily visitation, that your Son Jesus Christ, at his coming, may find in us a mansion prepared for himself; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

THANKS TO ALL OF THE WONDERFUL CHEFS WHO HAVE BEEN MAKING BREAKFAST! Thank you to Jo and Jim Bremer who started the ball rolling again with our breakfast fellowship on Sunday mornings. The recent breakfasts have been, well, nothing short of spectacular! Thank you to Pat Tate and her crew, Melva Pope and Liz Mack, who did a wonderful breakfast with grits that were out of this world; to Carol and Joe Hogan and Peggy Tuthill whose breakfast rivaled the Galvez, and to the Lidstone Family who made from scratch biscuits and gravy, hash browns and topped it all off with eggs with sausage! Thank you so very much for your ministry!

CALENDAR REMINDERS

Christmas Eve Eucharist Rite II at 5:00 p.m. on 24 December.

Feeding of the volunteers at William Temple: St. Augustine will feed about 30 volunteers on the week that the workers will be helping us with the Community Garden. This will take place the first week of January. I will obtain the final details from the Diocese of Texas Episcopal Disaster Relief coordinators.

16 January 2010: the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, the Most Rev. Dr. Katherine Jefferts Schori, and the Rt. Rev. C. Andrew Doyle will be at St. Augustine.

PLEASE REMEMBER EVERYONE ON OUR PRAYER LIST, especially Cindi, Carol, Lee, John, Bob, Peggy Moore Elliott and the family of the Rev. Janet Gilmore.

Your servant in Christ,

Fr. Chester J. Makowski+
St. Augustine of Hippo Episcopal Church
Galveston, Texas 77550

Maria Stewart

During Advent, we hear from the prophetic voices of John the Baptizer, but also from voices like Maria Stewart.

In 2009, the Episcopal Church provisionally adopted the commemoration of Maria Stewart (Maria Miller) who was born in 1803 in Hartford, Connecticut and died on this day in December of 1879. She was an African American public speaker, abolitionist, and feminist. At the age of five she became an orphan and was sent to live with a minister and his family, where she was a servant in their home. She later moved to Boston, and married James W. Stewart. He died after only three years of marriage, and she was cheated out of a considerable inheritance. She then embarked on a short (1831-1833) writing and public speaking career, for which she is best known. Her most famous speech was Religion and the Pure Principles of Morality The Sure Foundation on which We Must Build. This and others were published in William Lloyd Garrison's The Liberator.

She later moved to New York, and then to Washington, D.C., where she was head matron of the Freedman's Hospital.

Collect of the day: God, in whose service alone is perfect freedom: We thank you for your modern prophetic voice Maria Stewart, who testified that we are made not by the color of our skin but by the principle formed in our soul. Fill us, like her, with the hope and determination to break every chain of enslavement, that bondage and ignorance may melt like wax before flames, and we may build that community of justice and love which is founded on Jesus Christ our cornerstone; who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

CALENDAR REMINDERS

Christmas Eve Eucharist Rite II: 24 December at 5:00 p.m.

Adult Christian Formation: The Advent series continues next Sunday.

Bishop’s Committee Meeting: Next Sunday to discuss the Presiding Bishop’s visit on 16 January and the year end matters for Diocesan Council.

Please remember everyone on our prayer list, especially, Cindi, Carol, Bob, John, the Huellar family and Lee.

Your servant in Christ,

Fr. Chester J. Makowski+
St. Augustine of Hippo Episcopal Church
Galveston, Texas 77550

Sing a New Song

Psalm 33 is one of the appointed Psalms for today, Thursday in the third week of Advent. The Psalmist prays:

Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous.
Praise befits the upright.
Praise the Lord with the lyre;
make melody to him with the harp of ten strings.
Sing to him a new song;
play skilfully on the strings, with loud shouts.
For the word of the Lord is upright,
and all his work is done in faithfulness.
He loves righteousness and justice;
the earth is full of the steadfast love of the Lord.
By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,
and all their host by the breath of his mouth.
He gathered the waters of the sea as in a bottle;
he put the deeps in storehouses.
Let all the earth fear the Lord;
let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
For he spoke, and it came to be;
he commanded, and it stood firm.
The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing;
he frustrates the plans of the peoples.
The counsel of the Lord stands for ever,
the thoughts of his heart to all generations.
Happy is the nation whose God is the Lord,
the people whom he has chosen as his heritage.
The Lord looks down from heaven;
he sees all humankind.
From where he sits enthroned he watches
all the inhabitants of the earth—
he who fashions the hearts of them all,
and observes all their deeds.
A king is not saved by his great army;
a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.
The war horse is a vain hope for victory,
and by its great might it cannot save.
Truly the eye of the Lord is on those who fear him,
on those who hope in his steadfast love,
to deliver their soul from death,
and to keep them alive in famine.
Our soul waits for the Lord;
he is our help and shield.
Our heart is glad in him,
because we trust in his holy name.
Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us,
even as we hope in you.

We are preparing to “sing a new song” as we approach Christmas where we will celebrate not only Jesus’ birth over 2000 years ago, but His coming again, and most importantly, Christ’s presence in our hearts and among us. Jesus delivers our souls from death; He is our help. Rejoice and be glad, and sing a new song. Amen.

CALENDAR REMINDERS

Christmas Eve Eucharist Rite II: 24 December at 5:00 p.m.

Adult Christian Formation: The Advent series continues next Sunday.

Bishop’s Committee Meeting: Next Sunday.

Please remember everyone on our prayer list, especially, Cindi, Carol, Bob, John, the Huellar family and Lee.

Your servant in Christ,

Fr. Chester J. Makowski+
St. Augustine of Hippo Episcopal Church
Galveston, Texas 77550

Guide Us Lord

The Epistle reading for today picks up where yesterday’s left off in the Second Letter of Peter. The community is warned about false teachers:

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive opinions. They will even deny the Master who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves. Even so, many will follow their licentious ways, and because of these teachers the way of truth will be maligned. And in their greed they will exploit you with deceptive words. Their condemnation, pronounced against them long ago, has not been idle, and their destruction is not asleep.

For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of deepest darkness to be kept until the judgment; and if he did not spare the ancient world, even though he saved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood on a world of the ungodly; and if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction and made them an example of what is coming to the ungodly; and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man greatly distressed by the licentiousness of the lawless (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by their lawless deeds that he saw and heard), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment —especially those who indulge their flesh in depraved lust, and who despise authority. Bold and willful, they are not afraid to slander the glorious ones. (2 Pet. 2: 1-10).

How does one discern what is false? How do we recognize a false teacher? This can be a difficult task.

First, prayer is necessary. We must be open and listen to the Holy Spirit. God speaks to us in the silence of our hearts.

Second, anything that separates us from God is, more likely than not, false. To be sure, there will be times in our lives when we will have dry spells and feel that God is distant, but a separation from God is usually indicated by what we do and how we treat others. If someone advocates lashing out at others, I would beware. People who thrive on division may very well be false teachers, and always being angry is a sure sign of someone who is a false teacher.

Let us pray: O God, by whom the meek are guided in judgment, and light rises up in darkness for the godly: Grant us, in all our doubts and uncertainties, the grace to ask what you would have us to do, that the Spirit of wisdom may save us from all false choices, and that in your light we may see light, and in your straight path may not stumble; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

CALENDAR REMINDERS

Christmas Eve Eucharist Rite II: 24 December at 5:00 p.m.

Adult Christian Formation: The Advent series continues next Sunday.

Bishop’s Committee Meeting: Next Sunday.

Please remember everyone on our prayer list, especially, Cindi, Carol, Bob, John and Lee.

Your servant in Christ,

Fr. Chester J. Makowski+
St. Augustine of Hippo Episcopal Church
Galveston, Texas 77550

You Know

The appointed Epistle reading today is a continuation of Peter’s Second Letter. Today we read:

Therefore I intend to keep on reminding you of these things, though you know them already and are established in the truth that has come to you. I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to refresh your memory, since I know that my death will come soon, as indeed our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. And I will make every effort so that after my departure you may be able at any time to recall these things.

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, ‘This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’ We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven, while we were with him on the holy mountain.

So we have the prophetic message more fully confirmed. You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by human will, but men and women moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. (2 Pet. 1: 12-21).

There is a billboard on the New Jersey side of the Lincoln Tunnel which goes into New York City placed by the organization American Atheists which reads: “You KNOW it’s a Myth. This Season, Celebrate REASON.”

Today’s Epistle reading takes issue with the billboard. Those who profess not to believe in God certainly take a great deal of time and effort in attempting to refute God’s existence. One might almost say that they are “dogmatic” about it, even trying to “evangelize” those who do believe.

In the miracle of the Incarnation, the eternal God takes on human mortality, the omnipotent God takes on human vulnerability; God the creator becomes the created. I have to admit, that’s not very reasonable, but neither is love. Love that sacrifices is not reasonable. Just ask any parent.

You and I know love is not a myth. Celebrate the Reason for the Season, the Miracle of the Incarnation, the Word become Flesh, Jesus Christ.

THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO MADE SATURDAY’S BBQ FUNDRAISER AN UNMATCHED SUCCESS! Thank you to Neil Strawder who came home to help and who brought all of his BBQ buddies with him, and thank you to each and every one of you who made this work. St. Augustine is blessed with people who are filled with the Holy Spirit and who work to build God’s Kingdom in our part of the world. Melva will have the final accounting, but from the initial numbers, it appears that St. Augustine’s has outdone itself! Here is a link to the Houston Press article on the event and St. Augustine’s:

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/eating/2010/12/neil_bigmista_strawder_returns.php

CALENDAR REMINDERS

Christmas Eve Eucharist: 24 December at 5:00 p.m.

Adult Christian Formation: The Advent series continues next Sunday.

Bishop’s Committee Meeting: Next Sunday.

Please remember everyone on our prayer list, especially, Cindi, Carol, Bob, John and Lee.

Your servant in Christ,

Fr. Chester J. Makowski+
St. Augustine of Hippo Episcopal Church
Galveston, Texas 77550