Joyce Meyer (featuring worship with Phil Wickham) is coming to Arco Arena from September 30th to October 2nd. The schedule is as follows:

• Thursday conference is at 7 pm.
• Friday’s conferences will be at 10am and 7pm, with our First Church potluck in the Arco Arena parking lot at 5:30pm.  Bring your lawn chair and cooler with a dish to share!
• Saturday’s conference starts at 10am.  Lunch plans TBD.

A ride share is being coordinated by Stacey Hernandez.

For more information on Joyce Meyer ministries, visit http://joycemeyer.org/conference.

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This event is a talent show / spaghetti feed / bake sale!  Share in a spaghetti feast and bring an item for the bake sale!  It happens Sunday, October 24th at 5:00pm in the sanctuary!  Be creative… what can you perform?

What are some of the reasons you do not come to church?

• “Church is boring.”
• “I do not believe in organized religion.”
• “Churches are always asking for money.”
• “I do not have to go to church to be a good person.”

We at First Church believe that “church” is meant to be a community.  A place where you can make friends who will love you no matter what.  A church friend is one who picks up the other end of the phone when you’re feeling that life sucks.  The church is unusual – it’s the only organization that exists for the benefit of those who are not yet members.  There are many good people in this world who are not Christian.  There are also many Christians who don’t go to church.  Then, you have many Christians who DO go to church who are not necessarily “good” people.

Going to church is never about being good or bad.  Somewhere along the way, people adopted the idea that attending church on Sundays makes a person better than someone who doesn’t.  The reality is that people who go to church are not necessarily “good”.  More often than not, they are just as messed up as anyone else and that’s why they go to church.

The church is not a select circle of the immaculate, but a home where the outcast may come in.  It is not a palace with gate attendants and challenging sentinels along the entrance-ways holding off at arm’s-length the stranger, but rather a hospital where the broken-hearted may be healed, and where all the weary and troubled may find rest and take counsel together.  Bring a friend or two and come back to church on Sunday, September 26th.

We’ll be waiting for you!

Most recently, Jon completed filming a feature film and soudtrack to be released later this year for Christmas called “Stagecoach Santa” and composed the soundtrack for the documentary film “Go The Distance”.  (http://www.gothedistancemovie.com)

Jon has also recently joined the creative team and 3D Production company Ridgeline Entertainment as a composer and producer.  (http://www.ridgelineent.com)  Ridgeline’s CEO and President Doug Stanley is the Emmy Award winning Producer and Director of Photography of Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch”.  Jon is producing 3D music videos and other 3D TV content for the networks with Doug as well as producing and composing music.  Jon also is head of Sales and Marketing and Producer at RC Pro Audio and Studios.  (http://www.rcproaudio.com)

As electric and acoustic guitars ring out, and as Jon sings of the appreciation of a life full of love, peace and harmony, the congregation finds themselves on this journey with Jon to the destination which is the joy of this music. Come on Sunday to see and feel it for yourself.

  Our total immersion into antiquity and wilderness is replaced immediately by the high-rise skyline and modern streets of Tel Aviv. The modern city of Tel Aviv was founded in 1909, the literal Hebrew translation is “Spring Mound”, on the outskirts of the ancient port city of Jaffa, or “Joppa” as it appears in the Bible.

  Joppa is first mentioned in Joshua 19:46 when areas of Canaan are being assigned to the various tribes of the Children of Israel.  It was allotted to the tribe of Dan, but Dan had problems actually occupying many of the areas it was given. (I blame paperwork)  Archeologically Joppa is first mentioned in letters from 1470 B.C. that record its conquest by Egyptian Pharaoh Thutmose III.

  The port of Joppa is mentioned several times in the Bible as the port from which Jonah set sail for Tarshish, Jonah 1:3; and as the port at which the wood 

for Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem arrived from Lebanon, Ezra 3:7.  According to some sources it (Joppa) has been a port for at least 4,000 years. We have dinner in the Old Town of Jaffa and walk along the sea-wall looking out on the gathering desk of this ancient port.

  Ben Gurion International Airport is considered one of the most secure airports in the world.  We check our luggage, trudge through multiple security checks for which we are grateful, and begin walking down the long broad inclined ramp toward the departure gates.

  Immediately adjacent to this ramp is its twin angled upward in which you can see those arriving.  I noticed this architectural feature when we arrived, configured in such a way that those coming to Israel went up; and those leaving went down.  It reminded me of the often repeated phrase in the Bible of going “up to Jerusalem”.

  Jerusalem, for the Jews, is always a destination to which you ascend.  It has nothing to do with relative elevations.  Elevations are about geography and math, but Jerusalem is about God.  You may be standing on Mt. Hermon, 9,232 ft. elevation; but Jerusalem, 2,000 ft elevation is still up from where you are.  Jerusalem was the site of God’s Holy Temple; the location of the Holy of Holies, the location of the Altar of God, the place where the High Priest once a year made atonement for the sins of the nation.

  The airport architect understood this; so when you come into Israel you walk up as it were to Jerusalem.  And when you leave you are symbolically leaving God’s mountain and God’s city.  I was smiling as I descended the ramp and thought about this.  Thousands of years later we are still celebrating God’s deliverance and care.

  On the return flight, and since, I have tried to mentally digest all I have seen and heard. Israel is a much more peaceful land than the impressions we receive in the media.  There are tensions and conflicts but the diverse populations of this tiny country seem to be much more adept at living and working with people day to day with whom they fundamentally disagree than we are.

  The land is a religious soup made up of ancient traditions and current politics.  Everybody has an opinion, a complaint, and ideas about what should be done. (They have 400 recipes for eggplant!) In groups they can be militaristic, but individually I found them warm engaging people. Apparently the vast majority of people of each ethnic, religious, or political persuasion just want to raise their families and get on with their lives.

  Some comments were made as I was planning this trip regarding the dangers.  In point of fact, except for the echoes of the firing range in Lebanon, I heard much less gunfire in Israel than I do in Sacramento.

  I buckled in and the plane lifted off the runway for home.  Leaving the Promised Land, but taking the Promise with me.

 See you Sunday,

Pastor Les Shelton