Sermon Notes – November 23, 2019

Harvest 2020 at St. Elizabeth’s

Dear Friends,

I am writing to you to ask for your help. St. Elizabeth’s is getting ready to celebrate Harvest with the aim of celebrating God’s blessings in our homes, in every kitchen, in every school, in every neighborhood, in every town, every city where we reside and in every place of prayer.

Our Harvest celebration’s aim is to lift up people like you – people of faith and spirit to become Givers of Thanks for all God has done. Harvest is more than just one Thanksgiving Day, but a movement in which we are constantly called to celebrate God’s actions in our world; a movement that must energize people and communities to answer the call to celebrate not only our own personal blessings, but to celebrate the blessing called EARTH by joining with others to assist in sustaining a healthy environment and leaving a legacy for our children.

Harvest reminds us we are part of a movement for personal and collective transformations to build a life connected to each other and to the Earth. The fruits, vegetables and flowers which we are hoping to use for our celebrations are simple backdrops for a greater story of God’s loving act of creation and our responsibility to assist in sustaining it.
Our Harvest celebrations proclaimed that the earth and all people are sacred.

We need your help to continue this movement – Your financial support, your spiritual support, and your emotional and moral commitment.

By now you would have received an envelope in the mail.  Please do not overlook this letter or discard the envelope but view it as an invitation to share in the joyful responsibility of proclaiming your commitment with your financial support of our Harvest movement and our Annual In-Gathering.

We need your support by joining in our worship celebrations on Sunday November 24th at either of our scheduled celebrations at 8:00 am or 10:00 am.  Kindly bring along food donations in cans or boxes to assist in our Thanksgiving Food Drive that assists the hungry and needy in our community.  Or, to support this effort monetarily, please go to our website to St. Elizabeth’s website (www.stelizabethschurchnj.org) and go to the Donate Tab to contribute to our Thanksgiving Food Drive or mail a check to St. Elizabeth’s Episcopal Church PO Box 510, Elizabeth NJ 07207.

We need your moral support by you joining your voices to the Harvest movement in seeking to sharing in the lives of others as together we are called to build a community of love reflecting God’s loving presence among us. We need your support in building a more environmentally friendly world to leave as our legacy.

I am embracing this Harvest Movement for 2020 launching in November 2019 by being a role model for my children in how I approach the environment, how I hope to increase my reach into the community, how I give to the Church and how I praise God for all of his blessings.   You too can give generously so we can embrace and praise God in so many ways together!
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Let us give thanks for what God is doing among us and what we are about to do…..transform our world to reflect God’s beauty and grace.

Rev. Canon Andy J. Moore