Community Worship Gathering in January

Community Worship Gathering

Sunday, January 25

6:00 pm

Location to be announced

Get it on your brand spankin' new 2009 calendar now!

Coming in January: new LIFE Group configuration

Starting the first week in January, this new schedule for LIFE Groups takes effect:

• Monday LIFE Group at 5:30 pm, generally meeting at Ashley & Eric's house
• Tuesday LIFE Group at 6:00 pm, meeting at Allen & Sara's house
• Wednesday LIFE Group meeting later (probably 7:30 pm, but wait for confirmation on this) at Paul & Carlie's house

We'll be offering more details about this new LIFE Group configuration in the coming days, but plan to stay connected by participating regularly in one of these weekly New Light gatherings.

Advent Conspiracy continues!

Now that the season of gift-buying and gift-giving is coming to an end, it's time to prayerfully consider how you will participate in the Advent Conspiracy project we've been talking about since early November. 

Some of you have already contributed to a local project -- buying coats or boots for children in the Parkside neighborhood and/or helping families who've recently adopted children from foster care.  We really appreciate these gifts, which are already making a difference for local families who can use a little extra help this time of year.

During the month of January, we will receive your gifts toward the global project:  helping to install a water system at Humble United Methodist School, a school in Uganda that provides food, shelter, and education to about 250 children, most of whom are orphans due to the AIDS crisis or civil war.  Currently the school lacks a system that provides a consistent suppy of clean water for sanitation and cooking.  We're working through the United Methodist General Board of Global Ministries, an agency that has developed strict accountability measures, to ensure that 100% of your gift goes directly to this specific project.

In November, we issued an ambitious challenge:  that each of us match our giving to family and friends, dollar for dollar, with giving to help people in need.  How you will respond to that challenge is your call.  We hope to be able, as a New Light community, to make a signficant gift to assist with this project, so let's work together to see how we can honor the Christ Child by helping God's children in need in an area of extreme poverty -- poverty most of us can not begin to imagine. 

Please give your Advent Conspiracy gifts to Erica, Sara, or Allen, by the end of January.  Checks can be made out to New Light, memo "Advent Conspiracy."  Let's see if we can make a world of difference.

New Light this week

Just one LIFE Group this week

Monday evening ~ 5:30 pm ~ O'Naturals

If you're around this week, we hope you'll join others from the New Light community for a single LIFE Group, meeting Monday, Dec. 29 at 5:30 pm at O'Naturals restaurant, 83 Exchange Street in Portland.  Grab your favorite meal from the O'Naturals yummy menu, and then head downstairs to the community room on the lower level.  Erica will be leading, first in catching up after all the Christmas festivities, and then in a time of reflection as we anticipate the arrival of a new year.

I will light Candles this Christmas; 

Candles of joy despite all sadness, 
Candles of hope where despair keeps watch, 
Candles of courage for fears ever present,
Candles of peace for tempest-tossed days, 
Candles of grace to ease heavy burdens, 
Candles of love to inspire all my living, 
Candles that will burn all the year long.

Christ is born!

Merry Christmas!  We are writing from the mountains of North Carolina, where we're visiting with Sara's family for a few days.  We hope that you are with people you love, and that the spirit of Christmas continues to be alive in you.

Christ is born, and that is profoundly good news for the world!  It's the reminder that God loved the world God created so much, that God chose to come among us, to become one with us... not with power and might but in the most vulnerable, humble way possible:  as a tiny baby, born to a poor, young woman in an obscure village in a remote corner of the world.  Jesus was born not amidst the luxury of a palace but surrounded by animals (and all the smells that accompany them) in a stable;  not among the wealthy or respected but among the working poor.  Jesus' birth reminds us that God knows everything there is to know about what it means to be human.  More importantly, Jesus' life serves as an example of how to live in and through the love of God.

Maybe your gifts are unwrapped under the tree, or packed in a box, or waiting to be returned for a different size, but the gift of a newborn Christ continues.  God's light still shines in the darkness.  Hope springs eternal!  Christmas changes everything.

So we hope you'll continue to claim the promise of Christ's birth here in these days after Christmas, and that the blessings of a newborn Savior will carry you forward into the new year that awaits us, just around the corner.

Light and love,
Allen & Sara

Christmas Giving

A few months ago New Lighters were issued a challenge: to celebrate Christmas more simply this year by spending less on Christmas gifts for friends and family -- and then to match that amount, dollar for dollar, with a gifts to people who really need it. With a little help from Advent Conspiracy we are encouraged to spend the season worshiping fully, spending less, giving more, and loving all. We have pledged as a community to help in the following ways:

We are collecting coats and boots for children in Parkside Neighborhood who are without. If you have signed up for some, please bring them back as soon as possible as it is getting cold.

We are also collecting donations to help develop a water system for Humble United Methodist School in Uganda. Humble is a school that provides for the educational and spiritual needs of 250 children, most of them orphans to the AIDS virus and civil wars.

We are also receiving gifts of money to provide gift cards to two local families in need who have recently adopted children from foster care.

If you would like to make donations to any of these causes, please give the money to Erica. We would like to have the money for the gift cards by the middle of December so that the families can do shopping in time for Christmas.

This video is of a cool song familiar to most New Light folks called "Share the Well." It is a catchy and meaningful tune, give it a listen and think about ways you can celebrate a more Christ centered Christmas this year!

World AIDS Day

As I was spending a little time in quiet and reflection this morning, I found this testimony from a person living with AIDS in South Africa. I was impressed with the hopefulness in the midst of very difficult circumstances. We have a lot to learn from people like this. We also have a lot of work to do to irradicate AIDS and help those who are struggling as a result of the disease. One small way we are doing that is by giving money towards a well in Uganda at a school where many of the children are orphans because of the AIDS virus.

Here is one man's testimony of hope for the future:

The Community, friends, and family sometimes discriminate against and discourage us who are HIV-positive. Friends may avoid us because they think that people will assume they are also HIV-positive if they are seen with us. Family members may push us away because they believe our HIV status lowers the family’s dignity.

Yet I have hope. God saved South Africa during apartheid and the time of bloodshed among our people. We prayed for peace during elections, and there was peace. God is with us, and God’s presence can bring miracles. We who are HIV positive can forgive, forget, stop pointing fingers, and refuse to retaliate in anger toward those who discriminate and belittle. This is the way of Christ.

- Mathabo L. (South Africa)Prayers for Encouragement: Hope for Persons Living with HIV and AIDS, Malaria, Tuberculosis, and Other Serious Diseases