Posted on 22 Apr 2011
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O God, who for our redemption gave your only begotten Son to death on the Cross, and by his glorious resurrection has delivered us from the power of our enemy.
Grant that we who celebrate with joy the day of our Lord’s resurrection, may be raised from the death of sin by your life-giving Spirit.
Grant us so to die daily to sin, that we may evermore live with him in the joy of his resurrection, empowered and transformed by your grace in and among us.
O Lord, so stir up in your church, indeed in each of us, that Spirit of adoption and reconciliation that is made possible by your grace revealed in Jesus the Christ, that we being renewed in both body and mind, may worship and serve you in sincerity and truth.
We pray this in the name of the same Jesus Christ our Lord who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
Posted on 04 Apr 2011
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Dear Friends,
We are in the midst of the holiest season of our Christian faith as we have been walking our Lenten journey, soon to enter Holy Week, following our Lord to the cross and then to the empty tomb as we rejoice and praise God for Christ’s glorious resurrection.
It is important for us during these days of Lent to take time to:
+ reflect on our lifestyles
+ reflect on our priorities
+ reflect on our faith in Jesus Christ
+ and reflect on how we are living out our faith.
Can someone tell that you are a Christian from the way you live your life? Some people find it helpful to give something up for Lent. I’m not sure if they do it as a discipline or as an excuse to temporarily suspend a bad habit or for both reasons. I am not someone who follows this practice as I don’t find it helpful in bringing me closer to God. However, the positive aspect I find when people give something up for the Lenten season is that they realize that Lent is a time to live life differently.
A more meaningful Lenten practice that I recommend is to carve out some time during the day when you can spend time with a Bible in your hand and maybe even a devotional.
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Posted on 14 Mar 2011
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Revealing Deeper Layers of Meaning in our Building
If you go to the Richard Smith Memorial Gateway in Fairmount Park, you will find two curving, neobaroque arches adorned with thirteen individual portrait sculptures, two eagles astride globes, and architectural reliefs of eight allegorical figures.
James Hamilton Windrim (1840-1919) is the subject of one of the busts; he faces forward and looks off to the left. Windrim was the architect for this church. He also designed Philadelphia’s Masonic Temple, the Girard Building at 12th and Market Streets and several of the buildings on the campus of Girard College; he had been a member of the first graduating class of the college.
Windrim’s design for First Presbyterian was Gothic Revival of a length of 137 feet and an extreme width of 88 feet. The apex of the roof rises 66 feet from the ground, and the spire is 150 feet. Alterations to the building over the years, however, have changed the dimensions of the structure but not the intent of it as a house of God and a place to worship God “in the beauty of holiness.”
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Posted on 21 Feb 2011 . 1 comment
1816: Rev. Bourne Serves as an Anti-Slavery Witness
Black History Month is the appropriate time to recall this church’s first protest against slavery; it was expressed in the call to the ministry and the support of one of the first Presbyterian ministers to denounce “the soul damning sin” of human bondage.
The February 27, 1816 entry into the minutes of the vestry [today’s Session and Deacons] of “The English Speaking Church in Germantown” [today’s FPCG] noted that ”Presbytery being informed that a Mr. Bourne is preaching in the congregation in Germantown without being introduced to the vacancy by a Committee appointed for the purpose of introducing strangers to our vacancies, and that the said Mr. Bourne has been deposed from the office of the Gospel ministry by the Presbytery to which he formerly belonged, it was on motion resolved that the preaching of said Mr. Bourne in the Germantown congregation is deemed irregular.”
In 1815, 195 years ago, this church called the Rev. George Bourne of South River, Virginia, to the pulpit. Before his arrival in Germantown, however, he was expelled from the ministry by the Presbytery of Lexington, Virginia, for his denunciation of slavery.
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Posted on 20 Dec 2010 . 9 comments
Reflections by Dr. David Gregg
Dr. David Gregg was the pastor of the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn and the president of Western Theological Seminary. His voluminous writings on faith were well known a century ago. Here are his thoughts on the celebration of Christmas:
Christians, stand at Bethlehem and open every door and window of your being Christward.
Look backward. Look forward. Magnify Bethlehem. Recount to your souls the things for which it stands. It stands for the “fullness of time.” It stands for the fulfillment of glorious predictions. It stands for the realization of those burning hopes which made the heroic men [and women] of the past. It stands for the coming of the Son of God Himself into our nature. It stands for the glorious past and for the more glorious future. As the dawn carries in it full day, it carries in it the salvation of [men and women], and the triumph of the right over the wrong, and the coming millennial glory of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ.
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