Rev. Andrew's Adventures

Community UMC, Quincy “Are We There Yet? Joy” Rev. Andrew Davis December 15, 2019 Isaiah 35: 1-10 Matthew 11: 2-11             As we are a little further into our Advent journey this morning, the questions “are we there yet?” Or “is it over yet?” might be getting a little more intense as we get closer to Christmas.  As of today, we are halfway there, although Christmas Day is only a week away from this coming Wednesday!!  It’s coming up faster than we may have imagined and surprisingly, I’m way ahead of the game this year when it comes to preparations, as all the worship bulletins are pretty well done, the choir is ready for their big moment at the Courthouse Sing this afternoon and will be ready for the 7:00pm Christmas Eve service, and the pageant is coming together nicely for next Sunday.  I can say for me, as busy as this season has been, I am actually feeling a good deal of peace, hope, and joy this year.  I’m really feeling more like Clark Griswald or Buddy the Elf

Community UMC, Quincy “Are We There Yet? Hope” Rev. Andrew Davis December 8, 2019 Isaiah 11: 1-10 Matthew 3: 1-12 How’s your Advent journey going so far?  Have you said, “are we there yet?” as we make our way to Christmas?  I admit that I feel a little off kilter with Advent this year, as I am used to talking about my favorite word, hope on the first Sunday of Advent, not the second Sunday.  Better now than never, though.  With the way the Scriptural  texts fall  in the RCL, we started with peace last week, which makes sense since this is the time of the year where we hear the message of “peace and good will on earth and towards all” as we prayer to welcome the prince of peace, and because we are always in need of peace, in our world and our hearts.  Like peace, we are always in need hope as we continue  our Advent journey, even though our journey might take us through the dessert, up the mountain, back into the valley, or even when we have unplanned stops along the way.

Community UMC, Quincy “Are We There Yet? Peace” Rev. Andrew Davis December 1, 2019 Isaiah 2: 1-5 Matthew 24: 36-44             Since we are coming off of Thanksgiving and now looking towards Christmas, the holidays can bring back memories of getting in the car or hopping on a plane or train to visit loved ones.  How many of you remember such trips to visit family during the holidays?  The longest I think my family traveled for Thanksgiving or Christmas that I can remember was to Cameron Park, as work schedules often prevented us from traveling out of state.  Yet during seminary, I was able to escape to Amesbury, MA one year and Nashville for Thanksgiving other years, then would fly back home on Christmas morning for a couple weeks.  I didn’t mind the flights to Boston or Nashville since they were relatively short, although the flights back to CA could be a stretch.  Inevitably, that dreaded phrase, “are we there yet?” would start crossing my mind about the last hour of t

Community UMC, Quincy “Abiding in the Reign: Allegiance to the Reign” Rev. Andrew Davis November 24, 2019 Jeremiah 23: 1-6 Luke 23: 32-43             Once again, time has flown by this year, as here we are at the edge of another holiday with Thanksgiving coming this Thursday, then it will be all about Christmas until December 25.  Meanwhile, in the church, we come to the end of the church year with today being Christ the King, or Reign of Christ Sunday.  It’s one of those preacher’s conundrum’s, as we have both Thanksgiving and Christ the King Sunday, as this is the first time this has come up in my time of being a pastor.  While Thanksgiving has been around much longer, Christ the King Sunday is a fairly new construct in the Christian year, as we look at Jesus’s kingship this morning and conclude our November worship series, “Abiding in the Reign.”    To set some historical context for this morning, Christ the King Sunday was created in 1925 by Pope Pius XI.  During t