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What Gifts Shall We Bring?
Sunday, January 5 @ 10:30 am - 11:30 am
Our very own Board of Trustees Members will share with us the gifts they bring and receive by serving on the Board.
How to Attend
We encourage masks in all buildings. Read more about our In Person Guidelines here.
• To virtually attend, please Zoom in using room number 989 3107 9078, passcode: chalice.
• To phone into the service, call 669-900-6833, Meeting ID: 989 3107 9078.
For those joining, please mute as soon as you enter the room, so everyone can hear. Please note, the services will be recorded, but at this time, there are no plans to share the recording.
More Information
Religious Education for children and youth happens during worship on Sundays. Children and youth arrive in the Sanctuary for the just a little bit and welcome in Sunday with a story and song. Then, they attend their own programs in the Education building. Learn more here!
If you don’t have a chalice, but want to light one, check out our Making a Chalice at Home page.
In person services are followed by coffee hour.
Children’s Story
Sermon Audio
What Gifts Shall We Bring?
Sermon Text
Ann Fletcher
I BRING TO EAST SHORE THE GIFT DANCE:
I have always loved to dance. From Kindergarten on I enjoyed ballet, tap, and many other kinds. For the past 20 years I have practiced NIA which integrates dance, healing, and martial arts. I can dance when seated or getting ready for bed.
Artful movement takes me away from unproductive thinking and brings awareness of form and freedom. It stimulates positive and creative energy to fill my life with purpose and joy. I ASPIRE to be the sacred dancer in these excerpts from a poem by Isabelle Andres
She dances to the rhythms of her life,
Attuned to the choreography of her heart,
She floats in the harmonious space of her notes,
Bringing to life in the spur of a moment a whole orchestra,
She makes visible the invisible
She awakens in those who watch her,
The sacred seed of their own heart,
She dances wholeheartedly,
She is alive
FROM EAST SHORE I RECEIVE the GIFT of PURPOSE.
Steven Charleston in his book Spirit Wheel Meditations from an Indigenous Elder says I stand in the midst of creation’s wheel
And watch in wonder the quiet majesty of its turning.
We are in the care of a love without limit or definition
Under the protection of a love that never looks away.
I strive to understand what this limitless and protective love really means, even when terrible things happen. I want to believe that kind of love is possible within our better natures. When I feel discouraged or overwhelmed, East Shore brings me back to the big picture—awe of the universe, humility and hope, inspiration to start anew and walk together with others for mutual benefit.
I BRING EAST SHORE THE GIFT OF EARTH
I resonate with Robin Wall Kimmerer’s ideas about RECIPROCITY in her books. I Strive to understand my Relationship with Earth and all living things. Kimmerer asks if we really love the earth. And if we think the earth love us back.
I bring a commitment to Growth, Cycles, and Hope: Gardening through the seasons of 50 years, seeing the amazing promise of a drab dahlia tuber or vegetable seed transform into a beautiful and useful plant, and learning how to nurture that. I love the quote:
“You can count the seeds in an apple, but you can’t count the apples in a seed.”
FROM EAST SHORE I RECEIVE the GIFT OF MEANINGFUL and JOYFUL EXPERIENCES IN COMMUNITY
- Opportunities to connect with East Shore’s bit of earth through work with Grounds Team folks. Opportunities with Climate Action Ministry to make an earth where all living things can thrive.
- Opportunities to grow my own capacity to give and receive. Our services and many group activities broaden my perspectives about how to bring greater love, justice, and peace. My relationships with others here enrich my life.
- For example, I received this rock with the word VOICE from our past associate minister Joan Montages. I keep it on my desk as a reminder, to the introvert that I am, to be courageous, to contribute my thoughts with both love and integrity, even when I am not sure and even when it seems hard.
My sister sent me this excerpt from Clarissa Estes book, Women Who Run With the Wolves. It paints a picture of the GIFTS I HOPE to RECEIVE FROM and GIVE TO EAST SHORE.
Butterfly Woman is the fertilizing force. Carrying the pollen from one place to another, she cross-fertilizes, just as the spirit fertilizes the mind with night dreams…She brings the opposites together by taking a little from here and putting it there. Transformation is no more complicated than that. This is what she teaches. This is how the butterfly does it. This is how the spirit does it.
