Hello everyone,   I hope all is well.

Scripture lessons for this Sunday's service

This week we continue our summer sermon series, Blessed to be
Stressed. This series looks at how God is at work in the midst of
stressful times.

I am planning three more sermons in this series, and the topics will
be fellowship, laughter, and joy. As people who are blessed to be
stressed (in the various ways we¹ve been talking about, such as in
the attached sermon), we are also given the blessing of special
friendships, humor, and rejoicing. There is something about our
Christian understanding of stress that shapes our experience of
these wonderful things.

Our lesson this week comes from the beginning of Paul¹s letter to
the Philippians. Can you sense the distinctive bond between
Christians here?

"Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in
Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the bishops and deacons:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ. I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying
with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your
sharing in the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident
of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it
to completion by the day of Jesus Christ. It is right for me to
think this way about all of you, because you hold me in your heart,
for all of you share in God's grace with me, both in my imprisonment
and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my
witness, how I long for all of you with the compassion of Christ
Jesus. And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and
more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what
is best, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless,
having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through
Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God." (Philippians 1:1-11)

Paul was writing this letter from prison (a source of stress to be
certain!), but look at how he is able to remain focused on what is
important with his friends.

As always, I look forward to your questions and comments, and I look
forward to seeing you in worship.

Peace and best wishes,

David

blessedtobestressed.pdf