Christmas has come and gone, can you believe it? It seems like it was just yesterday that we were celebrating Thanksgiving… and here we are getting ready for New Years!
Christmas at the Red Bluff Vineyard this year was truly remarkable! We had three services! And what’s totally amazing is that people came to each of the services! We estimate having over 600 people come out to our three services and were extremely happy see so many new guests! Great job, everyone! We pray that God touched every single person’s life in some unique way and that Jesus was glorified!
Download our Christmas Podcasts
If you missed the services, I actually did two different sermons, one in the morning and one for the evening services.
In the morning, I finished up our Caroling through Christmas series by looking at “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” (you can download the podcast here). In the sermon we read from the Gospel of Luke and explored why the inclusion of the shepherds was so important to the Christmas story. This finished our look at a few Christmas carols, which ended up being a really fun sermon series to do. If you missed any of the December sermons, you can find them all on our podcast (free downloads yo).
In the evening, the Christmas Eve sermon was “Advent Hope” (you can download the podcast here). In a conversation the previous week, pastor Wes had made a remarkable statement to me — the Christmas story is about new beginnings! And from there we went! Looking to the Gospel of Matthew, the Christmas Eve sermon reminded us about why we can have hope and how Jesus’ birth invites us into the story of God.
So much to be thankful for
There are so many people to say thanks to, that I’m afraid I’m going to miss someone! But we would not be able to have had such a great Christmas at the Vineyard without the amazing volunteers that we have! From our greeters to our snack bar to our musicians and sound technicians! From our Vineyard kids volunteers to our support staff to our ushers! Everyone who served over the Christmas Eve services made it possible for us to share Jesus with literally hundreds of people!
I was blown away by how awesome everyone was. During the services, I watched as dozens of people enjoyed Rachel Sandow’s beautiful coffee and hot cocoa bar! And seeing how friendly all of our greeters and ushers were during the services was exactly what we’re trying to do here at the Vineyard. Amy Schutter clearly had the coolest shirt of the day as she handed out bulletins and Yasmine Amador the friendliest smile ever! And a huge “thanks” to Nancy McClure and Robert & JoAnn James and all of the many others who help organize and carry out so many part of our hospitality team!
And our musicians and singers and sound techs! They spent time preparing and practicing and wasn’t it just beautiful?
Finally, I want to just tell you that our leadership and support staff are amazing. Linda and Niki and Wes and Dawn (my wife, so make sure she knows I wrote this!!!)… wow. Thanks so much for all you do!
God is very faithful!
