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God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more. (Rev 21:3)

"Rooted and Grounded in Love "

~ Ephesians 3:17

St. Dunstan's, Shoreline

Growing in Christ for 60 Years

St. Dunstan's Weekly Message
October 29, 2009

Who are the saints in your life?

As Christians, we have an interesting relationship with death. We believe that God calls us into a new way of living that transcends the natural order of life and death. Jesus teaches us to live in a way that allows us to participate in God’s Spirit of love. God’s Spirit of Love is eternal, unending, and more powerful than death.

At St. Dunstan's Church we are rooted and grounded in God’s love. God has given us the gift of love, and when we accept that love we begin to desire what God desires, to will what God wills. Our hearts are changed from hearts of flesh to hearts of love. We begin to live with compassion, work for justice, and seek mercy. Our lives take on a grand and beautiful purpose and as we participate in God’s work to perfect and finish creation. All of these ideas about God and love and life become real as we come together in worship, support one another in love, and as we go into our lives doing God’s work.

Each of our loved ones who has died has participated in this eternal life in a real and mysterious way. We trust that each of us, when we die, continue to be a part of God’s creation, of God’s Spirit, and of God’s love. That’s what we are talking about when we speak of life after death. The saints of God are all the people who have ever invested their trust and their love in Jesus and in the God that Jesus reveals. Every one of those saints is present with us every time we gather in the name of Jesus.

This Sunday we will celebrate the feast of All Saints. On this day we remember all our loved ones who have died. We thank them for their work as Christ’s hands and heart for the world and in our lives. We ask God to hold these saints in love, so that they will be a part of the perfected creation. We trust that we will be reunited with our loved ones when that new creation is finally realized.

This is going to be a beautiful service. The choir will perform two anthems composed especially for St. Dunstan's Church in loving memory of Luke Rogers. We will all write the names of the saints in our lives on slips of paper to place at the altar. We will raise these names to God in the midst of our Eucharistic prayer. After the service, we will process to the columbarium to say prayers for the saints who find their rest in that beautiful place.

Many Blessings,
The Rev. David Marshall

St. Dunstan’s Church Vestry Stewardship Statement 2010

We believe - that God has blessed us abundantly in our unique communion as the body of Christ here at St. Dunstan’s. As His children, we deeply love God the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ, and we are called and entrusted to be energetic, good and gracious stewards of the gifts He has bestowed upon us.

We commit -

To giving the best of our time and talents as we work for the people of St. Dunstan’s, a community of diverse people joyfully worshipping God and serving others.
To making our stewardship pledges with thanksgiving in response to God’s abundant blessings.
To making our stewardship pledges a priority commitment and our witness to the gospel of Christ.
To making our stewardship pledges an act of faith in our spiritual home and in each other.
To giving proportionally a percentage of our income as the first fruits of our harvest.
To working individually and as a group to make a difference in the growth of our church. We believe that our church will grow through “THE POWER OF ONE”: each person prayerfully committing, if possible, to increase their 2010 pledge by a proportional percentage of their income and to increase their time and talent gifts to the church.

We invite the people of St. Dunstan’s to join us in making these commitments.

Set your clocks back Saturday night

Daylight savings time ends at 2:00 AM on November 1st. Be sure to set your clocks back an hour so that you don’t arrive at church an hour early! Enjoy the extra sleep and we’ll see you at our celebration of All Saints’ Day.

What about God believing in us?

On Wednesday at 11:00 AM the “God in Real Life” group will ask: Believing in God is important, but what about God believing in us? Believing that we can actually be the kind of people we were meant to be. People of love, compassion, peace, forgiveness, and hope. People who try to do the right thing all of the time. Who act on the endless opportunities around us every day for good, beauty, and truth. It’s easy for us to sometimes get down on ourselves. To feel “not good enough” or feel like we don’t have what it takes. But maybe if we had more insight into the culture that Jesus grew up in and some of the radical things he did, we’d understand the faith that God has in all of us.

Read This Sunday’s Lessons

The Bible starts with the story of creation and ends with a vision of a new creation. We live in the middle. The old creation is not complete. As Christians, we believe that we are a part of what God is doing. We are God’s hands and heart, completing the work that Christ started. On the feast of All Saints we remember all our loved ones who have followed Jesus, doing God’s work, helping to complete and perfect God’s world.