Category: Worship

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Singing our way to Christmas

Karen zumbrunn 3Celebrate the season with Christmas carols at Princeton United Methodist Church — starting with the Advent Extravaganza on Sunday, December 9, 4 to 7:30 p.m. Listen to the children’s choirs and Sunday School classes present the Christmas story and join in the singing. Then enjoy dinner and crafts followed by dessert and caroling, led by Dr. Karen Zumbrunn. (If your last name begins with A to L, bring a side dish. From M to Z, bring a dessert.) Questions? anna@princetonumc.org.

Then at the United Methodist Men’s breakfast on Sunday, December 16, Dr. Zumbrunn plays and shares stories behind the carols. The delicious hot breakfast begins at 8 a.m. and the program is at 8:30 a.m. All are welcome. Please RSVP to umm@princetonumc.org or 609-924-2613 by Friday, December 12 at noon.

That night, December 14, 7:30 p.m., the combined choirs, directed by Hyosang Park and Tom Shelton, present Lessons and Carols From Around the World. A freewill offering will be taken.

On Sunday, December 21, at 4 p.m., the sanctuary hosts the New Jersey Gay Men’s Chorus as it presents Masters of Good Cheer.

And then — the candlelight services on Christmas Eve, 6 p.m. for families, a traditional service at 8 p.m.  Youth choir alumni are invited to sing with the youth choir: rehearsal at 7:15 p.m. in Room 203.

“People, look east and sing today: Love, the Lord is on the way.”

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Methodists Respond to Ferguson

In response to Ferguson, the Greater New Jersey Conference will hold a “Just in Time” Prayer and Reflection for Justice and Peace, on Sunday, December 7, 5 PM, at Trinity United Methodist Church, 1985 Pennington Rd. Ewing. Contact welcome@magnoliaroadumc.org or 609-388-8852
The keynote speaker will be Rev. Gilbert H.Caldwell, civil rights activist. Huffington Post blogger, and retired Methodist minister. A former public defender, De’Travius A. Bethea, will also speak. Reverend Vanessa M. Wilson JD, chair of the conference’s Commission on Religion and Race, will facilitate.
The conference initiated the Conversations about Race Series as a safe forum for clergy and laity to discuss issues of race, ethnicity and culture, as well as gain tools to equip participants to build bridges for full and equal participation of racial and
ethnic people in the total life of the United Methodist Church.
“Just in Time” indicates that the session is being convened as an immediate response to a recent event. In this case, it is the Ferguson, MO grand jury finding of no indictment of Officer Darren Wilson for the shooting and killing of an unarmed
teenager, Michael Brown. This session is designed to be informational, educational and inspirational, as we examine the situation in Ferguson; as well as, the bigger context of race, religion and American law.

 

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Children’s Sabbath: November 16

2014 nov Shelton choirJoin us on Sunday, November 16, for a Children’s Sabbath service, when the youngest members of our church will lead worship at both 9:30 and 11 a.m. Fourth graders will receive their Bibles and read from them. With Pastor Anna Gillette the fourth and fifth grade class will deliver the sermon.  Led by Tom Shelton, the children’s choirs — shown here in rehearsal — will  sing. All in all we look forward to a very special time, when together we worship God, our loving parent.

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Meeting Tom Shelton

Tom's meeting

Eager to meet Tom Shelton, the successor to Yvonne Macdonald, more than 50 people flocked to the Fellowship Hall after the worship service on August 10. Pam Bradley, from the Staff/Parish committee, introduced him: With 22 years of youth choir experience, Tom has bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and is assistant professor of sacred music at Westminster Choir College ; he is also associate director of the Princeton Girlchoir and conductor of its Cantores ensemble.

“Children and youth are an important part of ministry,” said Tom, telling how excited he is to be joining the ministry here. “When children and youth lead worship, they are giving of themselves.”

Tom wants the choirs to include everyone and encourages children and youth to invite their friends. We can try to arrange carpools. The Lower Elementary Choir will meet on Wednesday, 4:30 to 5:30 p.m., and the Upper Elementary Choir from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., with the first rehearsal on September 10. The Youth Choir rehearses on Sundays from 5 to 6 p.m., and the first rehearsal is September 7.

Tom was peppered with questions from children, youth, and parents. From second graders in the front row, “Will we play instruments? Will there be parties? ” (Yes to both!) . Other than moving the elementary choir rehearsals from Tuesday to Wednesday, he plans to make no immediate changes to PUMC’s excellent music program, saying, “As we go forward together we will make any changes together.”

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Passing the Baton: Yvonne to Tom

yvonne headshot on web now 2011tom-175

This press release announces Yvonne Macdonald’s retirement and Tom Shelton’s appointment as director of music for children and youth

“When children and youth feel what the lyrics are saying, the beauty comes alive,” says Tom Shelton. He is the new director of music for children and youth at Princeton United Methodist Church (PUMC), succeeding Yvonne Macdonald, who retired from that post after 40 years.

“Passing the baton to Tom Shelton is a joy and an honor for me,” says Macdonald. “Easing the transition is my belief that seeds sown over the years both in faith–and in music — are blossoming. I know the choirs are in excellent hands.”

With 22 years of youth choir experience, Shelton has bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. He is assistant professor of sacred music at Westminster Choir College of Rider University and conducts the Princeton Girlchoir’s high school ensemble. He is also a prolific composer and aims to write special pieces for the PUMC choirs, ages three through high school. Shelton will be assisted by Anna de Groot.

Schools can teach character development, says Shelton, “but in church we can teach spiritual values. I encourage each child to relate the essence of the song to a personal experience in their lives.”

“We plan to make no immediate changes to PUMC’s excellent youth music program,” says Shelton.

Located at the corner of Nassau and Vandeventer in Princeton, PUMC is a diverse congregation whose members come from many surrounding communities, backgrounds, and faith histories. For information on joining the PUMC choirs, call 609-924-2613 or office@PrincetonUMC.org or www.princetonumc.org.

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Sally: Proclaiming the peace of God

IMG_3369Catherine Williams gave the inspiring message at the funeral for Sally Ross on Monday, April 28. Here is the text of her sermon, based in part on Sally’s obituary and on Psalm 139.

At one point Catherine quoted the obituary, “Sally was committed to building a supportive church community. She was an active member of the PUMC, sang soprano for the choir, served on numerous committees, assisted with countless fundraisers and did practically everything but preach.”

It is this last phrase – did practically everything but preach – that I find interesting. I am a currently a third year doctoral student of Homiletics (preaching) at Princeton seminary, and one of the things I have constantly wrestled with in my study is a working definition of preaching that I find satisfactory.

I’m thinking of this dictum that has been dubiously attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi that says, “Preach the gospel at all times and when necessary use words.”  On that basis, I do think that Sally did a little preaching herself.

But there’s one other message Sally preached that quilters and crafters may comprehend more easily. Again Psalm 139 is my reference point because the Psalmist speaks of a God who is involved in the details of our lives. The Psalmist reflects, “For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well.”

It was as though the Psalmist could see God leaning over a masterpiece, working with deft, nimble hands to create a unique, one-of-a-kind person – right from the womb. Anyone of the unique, one-of-a-kind quilts or handmade shawls and garments made by Sally is a picture that paints a thousand words of God’s intimate, creative involvement in our lives and indeed in the world.

Yes, I would contend that Sally did everything in church, including a little preaching. She may have found this notion hilarious, but she did. She proclaimed the unconditional love of God through her friendships. She proclaimed the wisdom of God through her timely counsel. She proclaimed the steadfastness of God through her persistence and resilience in her fight with cancer. She proclaimed the peace of God, even in her dying….

For the complete text, click here.

 

 

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Landscape of Lent: Palms

2014 4 13 palm doors

Rev. Jana Purkis-Brash delivered a message on “Palms” on Sunday, April 13, 2013, based on Matthew 21:1-11, and 26:14-16. To read the sermon, click here. She closed her message with these words:

We who are called to have the mind and spirit of Jesus betray him when we allow our own self-interest, our own prejudices, our own tacit acceptance of the status quo to limit the ways in which we could help make God’s kingdom a reality here on earth, as it is in heaven.

We betray Jesus when we see people in need and close our hearts against them.

We betray Jesus when we gather wealth (coins) into our own hands while others live in hunger and poverty.

We betray Jesus when we know what he would do but are afraid to do it.

We betray Jesus when we ignore the love he insisted upon and embrace hate.

Palms of praise easily can become palms of betrayal. And because of that, because of our human insistence on hating, hurting, and hoarding, Jesus opens his own palms in love and dies even while pleading for humanity, “Forgive them, Father, they don’t know what they are doing.”

Sometimes, I think we do know what we are doing, or failing to do. But the amazing thing about the love of God in Jesus is that when we fess up to our sin and confess it,we are embraced by the grace that was given to us through those palms.

Palms of praise, palms of betrayal, palms of loving grace: “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,” and may those who go in his name be a blessing as well.

Today as you leave worship you will be given a palm of praise, receive it and carry it remembering that we are called to praise the living Christ. Today you will also be given a coin, receive it and carry it reflecting on how you betray Christ. Journey through this week anticipating the pitcher and basin, the bread, the cup, nails and finally resurrection celebration. In this week, fully prepare to meet the risen Christ.

2014 13 crown of thorrns(the crown of thorns was on the altar)

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Landscape of Lent: Cave

2014 4 6 stones box 2014 4 6 stones

In the story as told in the gospel of John, said Catherine Williams in her sermon on April 6, Lazarus probably  counted on Jesus coming to heal him. She imagined how he would have felt:

“You take to your fevered bed that night in hope. You rise next morning feeling frighteningly worse than last night, and you ask for news of Jesus. . . Now the sun has begun to set; Jesus is still not here. By now you feel yourself enveloped in a thick, dark cloud of disappointment, anger, fear, and abandonment. You wonder if this what death feels like…

Sometimes we feel abandoned, like Lazarus, Catherine said. She quoted theologian Gordon Lathrop’s book on the ‘little deaths’ we face in the course of living. Lathrop speaks of “moments of physical sickness or disability, or the moments of letting go, of moving on, or of facing failure, all of which can be described in metaphoric language as having something of death about them.”

To Lathrop’s listing she added: strained or severed relationships with living persons, mental and emotional pathologies, loss of employment or underemployment, loneliness, betrayal, and a host of other little deaths that begin to close in around us, cutting off our hope, our connections, even our faith, and leaving us entombed by circumstances beyond our control. . .

Near the end of her message, she pointed out that Lazarus’s name meant “God is my help,” and that he had no idea where, or how close,  his help was.

He only knew he was trapped in circumstances utterly beyond his control, and could see no way out. Which means that for the person in the cave, all I’ve said until now may mean absolutely nothing. But the fact that you are here in this gathered community of faith is symbolic of something hopeful. It symbolizes that you are part of a wider community that cares, and that believes the life of God has the power to destroy death, and that the light of Christ cannot be overpowered by darkness.

(The entire message is here.)

Altar design by Debbie Meola and photos are by Edem Timpo.

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Landscape of Lent: Water

 2014 water altar The Landscape of Lent: Water

A Sermon by Jana Purkis-Brash

Sunday, March 23, 2014. 

Jana’s topic was the story in John 4: 5-42 about the Samarian woman at the well. For the complete sermon, click here.

Her conclusion:  Over and over again Jesus defied the rigid boundaries imposed by the religious and social leaders of his time. You can look at some of what he did in a contemporary context, and some of it will bother you and maybe even make you angry, as it did the Pharisees and Sadducees.

If Jesus were physically present today,

  • He would visit the Ukraine.
  • He would have dinner with prostitutes and drug addicts.
  • He would surround himself with people of poverty.
  • He would embrace and the Gay, Lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community.
  • He would call on us to pray for terrorists.

Jesus is alive today. And we are his body. We are his presence. We are called to have his mind, and to act as best we are able to discern as Jesus would. To ask and take seriously the question of what would Jesus do in our time moves us well beyond the wristbands that were popular years ago and into the often uncomfortable and sometimes socially unacceptable places where we acknowledge that all people of all nations, all cultures, all religions, all genders, all ages, all races, all sexual orientations, all incomes, all accomplishments and all sins are God’s own children and our sisters a2014 water jugnd brothers seeking the water of eternal life.

And that, my dear friends in Christ, is the most significant witness of all… the one you make. Drink deeply of the living water that Christ offers and share that life giving water with others who need it so badly.

Altar art by Debbie Meola, photographs by Edem Timpo.