Christmas

When: All Day From December 26, 2017 to January 1, 2018

Location: Durant, Mississippi

‘Project Christmas House’ is a project of the Purchase District that builds a house every year for families that have lost their homes due to natural disasters and who fall through the cracks of conventional help. This year’s Christmas house will be built for a single mom with 4 children whose home was destroyed by a tornado. She is on a fixed income and has no insurance.

Reidland UMC members, Coley Maness, and Bill Carr joined the group of 14-20 others from the Purchase and Mississippi District to build the house this Christmas.

Be strong and courageous, get to work. Don’t be frightened by the size of the task, for the Lord my God is with you. He will see to it that everything is finished correctly! 1 Chron. 28:20

Greetings!
To the People of the Church in Reidland, Grace to you and Peace, Who belong to God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,

{ A salutation similar to Paul’s in First Thessalonians 1:1}

It is my blessing to write to you as the pastor of Reidland United Methodist Church in this season of celebration and gratitude.

We honor a tradition in this church to make a special offering in the season of Advent as an expression of our Thankfulness for God’s blessings. The March to the Manger is an occasion in the liturgy of the worship service when every member of the community is invited to step forward individually or as a family group to express adoration for the gift God has given us in the birth of Christ.

Gift giving has taken on huge importance in the Christmas Season. For generations the Christmas catalog was a high point in the yearnings of children. I know I wore the ink off the pages of the Sears Catalog as a child. The material part of Christmas has only grown over the decades.
My prayer this season is for the spiritual gifts of God to be recognized in a deeply transformational way and for every gift to represent what Christmas means.

As the church community invites every member to be blessed by Christ present in His birth we should make our most profound responses in repentance, forgiveness and witness to our faith.

We sent by US Post a letter with an offering envelope to all the mail addresses we have on record.

I hope you will receive your mail in a day or two. If you do not get our letter in a few days please let us know. When your letter arrives, gather your family, be still for a moment with loved ones, and Pray a Prayer of Adoration for Him that Saves. And then consider if this Christmas Offering in your March to the Manger is the most significant gift you offer in this season.

We will March to the Manger after the Christmas Cantata this Sunday, December 17, the Third Sunday in Advent.

Indeed, “O come let us Adore Him.”

Yours in Christ,
Reverend Brent Porterfield