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Hi everyone! I trust your week is going well, and that November is off to a good start in your household. With the beautiful fall we’ve had so far, it doesn’t quite seem possible that we’ve turned the calendar to month #11. But it’s here, and in fact we’re almost a week in! (I can always tell when November has arrived, because in our house that’s when Christmas decorations start to appear. We figure if they can play carols and decorate stores, then why can’t we enjoy some lights at home as the days begin to get darker?)

The spread of bright red poppies has also been a reminder that Remembrance Day will soon be here. I’m glad for Remembrance Day. It’s good to be surrounded by reminders of just how privileged we are to live in a country where we have abundant freedoms, and of the uncomfortable but important truth that those freedoms exist because a very large number of people were willing to pay a significant personal price to preserve our freedoms. I confess that in the midst of ordinary life, I can go a long time without thinking about that truth. (It used to come up more often when my parents were alive, as my Dad was a WWII veteran. Since they’ve gone Home, there seems to be less reason to talk about that aspect of Canada’s history.)  Remembrance Day helps me to live in gratitude. I hope it also nurtures understanding and appreciation in the hearts and minds of an upcoming generation who have been blessed to grow up in peace, but who do not always fully understand the price of peace and the disciplines that are needed to preserve it.

As usual, we’ll take a couple of minutes to pause and remember on Sunday morning. The trumpet solo and moments of quiet aren’t specifically connected to our worship as Christians, but they are certainly appropriate for us as blessed citizens of Canada.

We will also celebrate another form of remembrance on Sunday which is intimately bound up in our faith as Christians. We’ll share communion together again this week, partaking “in remembrance” of our Lord’s death and resurrection. There, too, I’m glad for the regular opportunity to pause and reflect and feel the weight of what Jesus has done for us all over again. I don’t know about you, but I find that it’s easy to become so familiar with the truth of Jesus’ death, so comfortable with the idea, that it just becomes another historical fact in my mind that may or may not stir my heart the way it should. Of course it matters—more than anything else! Of course it was an amazing act of love and sacrifice on our Lord’s part! Of course it has transformed my life! But even the most powerful truths can begin to feel “ordinary” unless I take the time to reflect on them and let that truth really sink in again.

So it’s good to stop, regularly and frequently, and really ponder the wonder of the cross and all it means. I’m so glad our Lord gave us communion as one regular way to do this. It will be good to celebrate—and hopefully to really feel—what He has done again this week. I find that even as I think about communion in preparation, something of the wonder comes to me again. May that be true for all of us this week.

Stepping back into the ordinary, here are a couple of additional news items as I think about what’s happening around church.

First, Fiona will be away for a few days to participate in the memorial for her father-in-law, who recently passed away. Please be in prayer for Fiona and Kevin and their family—for safe journeys and a good time of comfort and care for all. The church office will be a little quiet this Friday and next Monday through Thursday as a result, though we’ll do our best to cover the essentials. (It will be especially quiet on Wednesday the 11th, since the office will be closed for the Remembrance Day holiday.)

Second, if you think of it, please pray for the many pastors and spouses from churches across our CBWC family who will gather for their annual pastors’ retreat in Banff next Monday. Pray for safe journeys on winter roads (they have real winter there!), and pray that this will be a time of refreshing and renewal that encourages pastors and spreads through them to churches across BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. This year Diane and I will participate, so you can be praying for us as well.

Meanwhile, have a wonderful week. I look forward to worshipping together again on Sunday. Richest blessings until then!

—Pastor Ken