MPC Connected - Wednesday, April 8, 2020

Let me know what you think.

MPC Family,

This Friday, we have the privilege of joining with our church family and with many churches in our area and our denomination (as well as a few other denominations) in a day of fasting and prayer. We are doing this day together for many reasons, but here are just a few:

1. This is a chance for us to humble ourselves and cry out to God in the midst of a great national and global trial. 

2. One of the hardest parts of the last month has been the separation we have been experiencing. While we will still be physically separated on Friday, praying and fasting together is one more way for us to be bound together as a church. 

3. Good Friday is a day in the Christian calendar set aside for mourning over at both our own sin and the fallen nature of our world. It's a time of longing for God to make things right in our world and in our hearts, and recognizing that His death on the Cross was necessary for to bring us both forgiveness and hope. It can be easy to rush past Good Friday and go right to the joy of Easter, but this is a chance for us to consider and be affected by the rhythms of Jesus' last week in Jerusalem. 

As part of the day of prayer and fasting, I'm planning on hosting a prayer meeting on Zoom on Friday at noon. You can contact me if you are interested in attending (if you need help installing zoom, click here).

We realize that everyone has varying degrees of experience with fasting, and this is okay! Please also know that your participation and how you participate is a matter of Christian liberty and wisdom. Having said this, one way we are suggesting to experience the fast together is to begin to fast from food and drink (continue to drink water while you are fasting!) after dinner on Thursday night. We have then timed our Good Friday livestream service for 5:30 PM on Friday so that you can, if you choose to, continue your fast through the service. After participating in this service, you can break your fast and begin to anticipate the joy of Easter Sunday. One note - when you do break your fast, start small and simple for the sake of your stomach - even after a day, your stomach won't do well (and you can actually hurt yourself) if you move directly from a fast to a feast!

We recognize that, for health reasons, fasting from food might not be for everybody. We completely understand - if you'd still like to participate, consider fasting from something else that day - maybe your phone, entertainment, caffeine, or something else. The ultimate idea is that the posture of our hearts be set towards humbly casting our concerns upon the Lord, who loves us and delights in hearing from us. We pray and fast not as a way to manipulate God into doing what we want, but as a response to his gracious provision. We know He has given us all that we need, even giving us His Son, and we can go joyfully go without some of the gifts He gives us for a season in order to focus on coming before Him. 

Especially if you are new to fasting, it might be helpful for you to read an article called "Fasting for Beginners" by David Mathis. 

In terms of what to pray for on Friday, click here to find a suggested prayer list from our denomination - a list that other churches in our denomination and our country will be encouraged to pray from. Of course, you can add to this prayer list any personal or MPC-related concerns that you become aware of in the next few days. 

If you have questions, don't hesitate to reach out - our contact information is at the bottom of all of these emails. Thank you and we love you and miss you!

Jeff

MPC Connected - Tuesday, April 7, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Dear Church Family,

Last Sunday, as I left the church building, I glanced over at the table by the front door and noticed the sign-up sheet for our annual Easter breakfast.  Two lonely families adorned the top of an otherwise blank page.  A lump grew in my throat.  As they say, oftentimes you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone (sorry if you’ve got that awful Poison song in your head now).  Of course, with Holy Week upon us, we are working to have a Good Friday service out to you by the end of the week, and Lord willing our little band will be at the church building to lead us all through an Easter morning service, but your absence will surely sting all the more acutely.   

In the meantime, what will you spend your time doing this week?  Let me make a few recommendations:

1. Read a Christian biography/Christian classic/church history.  I think one of the most important things we can do to help us through a tough time is to place our time in the context of history.  Augustine’s City of God or Confessions would both be good to sink your teeth into, given the extra free time you may have in your schedule.  The four volume work 2,000 Years of Christ’s Power is an excellent little series on church history.  Also excellent is Bruce Shelley’s Church History in Plain Language.  

2. Grab one of these dvds from wtsbooks.com while they are on sale.  I’ve mentioned Dispatches From the Front, but I’ve heard nothing but rave reviews about Tim Challies’ latest called Epic: https://www.wtsbooks.com/collections/dvd?_ke=eyJrbF9lbWFpbCI6ICJtYXguci5iZW5mZXJAZ21haWwuY29tIiwgImtsX2NvbXBhbnlfaWQiOiAiUGNKUWppIn0%3D

3. Watch or read a classic.  I am plowing my way through Joyce’s Ulysses and taking big sighs of relief with my third time through Orwell’s 1984.  And, you can’t go wrong with another viewing of Casablanca.

4. Play a game.  The Benfer home has acquired quite a few games over the past five years.  Three that we love to play are 7 Wonders, Ticket to Ride, and Dominion.  

Whatever you choose to do, I pray that you have a great week walking with our Lord.  

Love you and miss you,

Max 

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.  

MPC Connected - Monday, April 6, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Greetings MPC Family -

As we were singing in the empty sanctuary yesterday, I stood in the front row and imagined having everyone back with us in the sanctuary, and what it would sound like. It was a nice thought! You are missed. We hope you had a good weekend and we hope you were able to worship with us yesterday.

If you did miss the service or want to check it out again, it's still available on our YouTube channel.:

You can view all of our archived streams at https://www.meadowcroftchurch.org/livestreams.

Have a question about yesterday's sermon? Just fill out the form at the bottom of this email (if it's not working for you, just click here) and we will do our best to answer it, possibly on our "Between Two Sundays" show later in the week.

We're planning our Good Friday service for 5:30 pm on Friday on our YouTube channel. We'll also be encouraging our church to spend Friday fasting and praying, as able. We'll send a more detailed communication about this on Wednesday. 

Have a great day and we will talk to you soon!

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.  

MPC Connected - Friday, April 3, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Greetings MPC!

Jeff here. We are moving into a special time of the year, when we specifically remember the death and resurrection of Jesus. Max and I decided to spend a couple of weeks in passages that highlight Jesus' entry into Jerusalem and his resurrection. In between, we're planning something for Good Friday. We're not sure exactly what it will look like yet, but we are going to be calling for the church, as able, to join us in a day of fasting and prayer next Friday. We'll have more details for you next week, but we wanted to give you a heads up. We'll be joining with many churches in our area and our denomination (and a few other denominations) for this special and important day. 

How to Join Us for Worship

As a reminder, the church building will be closed to everyone except those directly involved with leading and administering the service. So, please stay home but tune in to our livestream at 10:30. We'll be streaming again at www.meadowcroftchurch.org/live. I will be preaching on Luke 19:28-44 - Drawing Near. Once again, we've further minimized the number of people in the sanctuary on Sunday, and so you will see Max and I up front and Erik will be leading music on his own. You can preview Sunday's songs by clicking here. 

To assist you in your at-home worship, you can download our bulletin, devotional guide and children's sermon sheet. Thanks again to Cathy for providing the children's sermon sheet!

Starting this week, we're also providing the sheet music for our songs so that those who enjoy having it for singing can print out and sing along. This music was included in the email version of this message. If you didn’t get it and would like the sheet music, send a note to Donna at mpcadminteam@gmail.com.

Between Two Sundays

Episode #3 is now available! We talk about:

• Last week's service, including a couple of questions from the congregation

• Our new song of the month, "Christ Our Hope in Life and Death"

• Why are we are celebrating Easter now and not waiting until we are all back together

We also took a break to tackle some more 1980s music trivia. It was another very close matchup! 

That's all for now. We will "see" you on Sunday and be in touch again on Monday. Please reach out if you need anything. 

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215. 

MPC Connected - Thursday, April 2, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Hi everyone,

Jeff here. I hope you are hanging in there. 

One of the things I've been doing at night, especially with the lack of sports on TV, has been catching up on some pleasure reading. I've read a little bit of Wendell Berry, but had never read his classic book Jayber Crow. It was so good, and it hit me hard in several spots. (Full disclosure: I am aware of people in our church who did not enjoy this book, and I am currently re-evaluating my friendship with them). 

One of the most interesting parts of this book is when Jayber Crow (the main character, a barber who spent most of his life in a town called Port William) critiques his local church and its young pastors who would show up for a brief season and then move on to a bigger and better place:

The preachers were always young students from the seminary who wore, you might say, the mantle of power but not the mantle of knowledge. They wouldn't stay long enough to know where they were, for one thing. Some were wise and some were foolish, but none, so far as Port William knew, was ever old. They seemed to have come from some Never-Never land where the professionally devout were forever young. They were not going to school to learn where they were, let alone the pleasures and pains of being there, or what ought to be said there. You couldn't learn those things in a school. 

I'm not here to offer critiques of young seminary students or preachers and/or church members who move on (it happens, often for good reason!). Instead, what struck me about this passage was the privilege of deep community. For all of us - pastor or not, we are in the process not just of learning about God or the Bible, but of learning where we are. This is true in our neighborhoods, workplaces and, yes, in our church. Over time, we begin to learn the delights of our community as well as the hardships. It's not a perfect place, but it's ours, given to us by a good God that loves us.

We don't know what the next few weeks and months are going to hold. There are dire predictions and we may be entering a season full of far more grief and lament than we are used to - but I'm comforted by the knowledge that I'm in a place full of people who are "staying long enough to know where they are" - where I am known and loved, (faults and all) with people committed to one another and to our Lord. He is with us. Thank you for being with one another even through this season of physical separation. 

Worth Reading 

Brett McCracken has a good post over at The Gospel Coalition that I probably need to heed more. A few years ago, McCracken came up with a "Wisdom Pyramid" - kind of like a food pyramid, except for knowledge and information:

He says:

Among the many distressing aspects of the COVID-19 global pandemic is the stress of information overload. Everyone has something to say about it. Millions of self-proclaimed experts chime in online, crowding out or contradicting real experts. Our minds are spinning because of this article we read, that tweet thread we saw, or any number of other charts, graphs, scenarios, and projections we’ve picked up on our streams.

Read the whole thing for some great advice on wisdom that will apply in this season and beyond. 

Worth Watching

My favorite seminary professor (Jonathan Pennington) interviews one of my favorite authors (Mike Cosper) - a little bit about how we live "disenchanted lives" and the need for us to "recapture the wonder. Also some great points about how the book of Esther (which we preached through over a year ago) is an excellent resource for Christians in our day and age. This is all done in Dr. Pennington's car as part of his "Cars, Coffee and Theology" web series. It's a light listen/watch that will still yield some food for thought.

Worth Hearing

Jim Waldron recommended this version of "His Eye is On the Sparrow." This is a song that was made famous by Mahalia Jackson - this version by Lauryn Hill and Tanya Blount is powerful and reminds us that as much as God cares for the sparrows, so much more does He care for us:

I also wanted to recommend one more - I was so sad to hear that COVID-19 claimed the life of Adam Schlesinger, the lead singer for one of my favorite bands, Fountains of Wayne. He specialized in unique, slice-of-life pop songs, exhibited by the simple and sweet "Hey Julie."

Worth Tweeting

"In God's economy, whether He is making a flower or a human soul, nothing ever comes to nothing. The losses are His way of accomplishing the gains." ~Elisabeth Elliot

— Elisabeth Elliot (@QuoteElisabeth) April 2, 2020

Worth a Laugh

An oldie but a goodie. pic.twitter.com/EGjivWVVFY

— 𝙼𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚢 𝙳𝚞𝚛𝚎𝚗 (@martyduren) March 29, 2020

That's all for now. Love you and miss you.JeffThough we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215. 

MPC Connected - Wednesday, April 1, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!    

MPC Family,

Each Wednesday during our quarantine, we'll be presenting different ways for you to serve your church family and your community during this season. Last week, you did a GREAT job providing drawings for Fair Acres - we are compiling them and sending them in to our contact there, who was very excited to hear about what you did! Thank you!

Serving our MPC Family

As a reminder, one of the best things you can do for the church family is to continue to pray for one another and check in with one another. Here is a link to our church directory (password protected, if you need the password ask us at mpcadminteam@gmail.com) - consider reaching out to one person a day either by call or text to check in on them.

Our deacons have been checking in with many people in the more "at-risk" categories - but if you have any needs during this season (someone to shop for you, etc.) - please reply to this email and do NOT hesitate to let us know. Our desire is that anyone at greater risk would be able to stay home completely while the rest of us help with any necessities. 

Serving our Community

One of our elders, Erik Michael, works in fundraising for the American Red Cross. They are anticipating a substantial need for blood donations in the weeks to come. The disease experts foresee our crisis potentially peaking in mid-to-late April. This will be a critical time for hospitals to be well supplied with blood. 

If you are in the most at-risk groups for COVID-19 (over 60 and/or underlying health conditions), we encourage you to stay home. However, if you are not in this group, the Red Cross is taking substantial precautions to ensure that blood drives do not become a means of spreading the virus. You can read more about their precautions and search for an appointment here: https://www.redcrossblood.org/donate-blood/dlp/coronavirus--covid-19--and-blood-donation.html

If you have additional questions, feel free to reach out to Erik at erik.d.michael@gmail.com. 

Thank you for considering this means of serving the community during this critical time!

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.  

MPC Connected - Tuesday, March 31, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!    

Dear Church Family,

As we head into another week of quarantine, I want you to know just how much I am longing to see you again.  I am so very grateful that the Lord has provided live streaming capabilities the past few weeks, and we have gotten positive responses from as far away as California.  I am thankful that, despite our distance, and because of the hard work of Jeff, Donna, Carmen, Stu, and Erik, we have been able to maintain a level of connectedness on Sunday morning.  However, my soul longs for the day we will all be physically gathered together again.  What a day of celebration it will be!

I'm sure most, if not all of us, have never experienced something like this in our lifetimes.  But something very similar happened during World War I, as churches were closed in Washington D.C. in 1918 due to the outbreak of the Spanish Flu.  I wanted to share with you two things.  The first is an article written by Caleb Morell detailing the outbreak and the responses by churches.  The second is a message preached by the Reverend J. Francis Grimke on the first Sunday that the public gathering ban was lifted.  It's not very long, but he says some very profound things.  Pastor Grimke was an African-American living in a time of great racial discrimination, and you can see just how powerfully the racism infected the city as much as the flu.  One of the most moving sections reminded me of our own situation.  

Grimke writes, "Another thing has impressed me during this epidemic.  It has brought out in a way that it highly gratifying, the high estimation in which the Christian church is held in the community - the large place which it really occupies in the thought of the people.  The fact that for several weeks we have been shut out from the privileges of the sanctuary has brought home to us as never before what the church has really meant to us.  We hadn’t thought, perhaps, very much of the privilege while it lasted, but the moment it was taken away we saw at once how much it meant to us.  One of the gratifying things to me, during this scourge, has been the sincere regrets that I have heard expressed all over the city by numbers of people at the closing of the churches.  The theater goers, of course, have regretted the closing of the theaters.  I do not know whether the children or the teachers have regretted the closing of the schools or not; I have heard no regrets expressed, but I do know that large numbers of people have regretted the closing of the churches.  I hope that now that they are opened again, that we will all show our appreciation of their value by attending regularly upon their services.”

I highly recommend that you take a few minutes today and read Grimke's entire message.  It is very informative, thought-provoking, and encouraging.  We miss you and love you.

In Christ,

Max

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.  

MPC Connected - Monday, March 30, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Greetings MPC Family -

The sanctuary felt so empty without you all yesterday. Thanks so much to the very few that came that helped us livestream the service. We hope you were able to enjoy it from home. It’s a privilege to worship our great King, even when we are apart. In case you missed it or want to watch it again, here it is:

You can view all of our archived streams at https://www.meadowcroftchurch.org/livestreams.

Have a question about yesterday's sermon? Just fill out the form at the bottom of this post (if it's not working for you, just click here) and we will do our best to answer it, possibly on our "Between Two Sundays" show later in the week.

Have a great day and we will talk to you soon!

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215. 

MPC Connected - Friday, March 27, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Greetings MPC!

Jeff here. Has it really only been a couple weeks of this? We are so glad that we'll be able, Lord willing, to virtually "meet" again on Sunday. 

Reminder on Drawings for Fair Acres

We would LOVE for the MPC kids to do drawings for the residents at Fair Acres! As a reminder, these drawings will be streamed by Fair Acres on their screens so they can be enjoyed by everyone there. This is a great way to serve a place that we care about. We have only received a trickle of responses so far - it would be great to have many drawings to send them! Send your drawings to drawings@meadowcroftchurch.org by Monday. 

How to Join Us for Worship

As a reminder, the church building will be closed to everyone except those directly involved with leading and administering the service. So, please stay home but tune in to our livestream at 10:30. We'll be streaming again at www.meadowcroftchurch.org/live. Max will be preaching on John 8:48-59 - Before Abraham Was, I Am. We've further minimized the number of people in the sanctuary on Sunday, and so you will see Max and I up front and Erik will be leading music on his own. You can preview Sunday's songs by clicking here. Thank you again to our A/V team for all of their hard work!

To assist you in your at-home worship, we are attaching our bulletin and devotional guide. When the children's sermon sheet is available, you will be able to find it at www.meadowcroftchurch.org/kids. 

Between Two Sundays

Episode #2 is now available! We talk about:

• Last week's service, including a few sermon application points

• Why we have a Call to Worship

• A couple of new songs for this week

Not only that, but we'll have some 1980s music trivia. I won't give away who won. But I will tell you it wasn't Max.

That's all for now. We will "see" you on Sunday and be in touch again on Monday. 

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.  

MPC Connected - Thursday, March 26, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Hi everyone,

Jeff here. I hope your week has been going well so far. 

So, it's March - and as many of you know I am a huge basketball fan. I've been to many tournament games, including a trip to the Final Four when I was a sophomore at Syracuse. We lost in the finals, but there will still some pretty great moments…

Amazingly, I married a woman who agrees with me that a perfect getaway involves watching or attending March Madness games. In 2018, Catherine and I took a long weekend and drove to Charlotte for the first two rounds of the tournament. The first day of this trip involved sitting in the upper deck and watching four college basketball games - that's right, about 10 hours of basketball.

We made it through three games. There was one game left, but it was going to be a laugher. #1 seed UVA was playing #16 seed UMBC (Max's alma mater). A #16 seed had never defeated a #1 seed. There were other, better games that we could watch on TV. We made the somewhat easy decision to leave the arena and go watch the other games.

A couple hours later, we were watching from our hotel with our jaws on the floor as UMBC cruised to an utterly shocking 20 point victory, making basketball history in the process. Yes, we got to see it on TV, but how we wish we had stayed to experience it live, with an arena full of other people.

You probably see where I'm going here. 

It's been so good to have the livestreaming over the past couple weeks, and it looks like that's what we'll be doing for the foreseeable future. I'm so thankful that we get to worship in this way, but I've just been more feeling how it pales in comparison to actually being together - and not just with an arena full of strangers, but with a sanctuary full of brothers and sisters in Christ. 

You know what, though? I'm glad that it pales in comparison. One of the ways that we can benefit from this season, if we allow it, is to cultivate a deeper appreciation of our embodied relationships. I've continued to think about the piece by Samuel James that I linked to last week and I'm becoming more convinced that he's right. 

The Biblical author Paul knew what it was to be separated from his fellow believers. In a letter to the church in Thessalonica, he said:

But since we were torn away from you, brothers, for a short time, in person not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face, because we wanted to come to you—I, Paul, again and again—but Satan hindered us. For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? For you are our glory and joy.

A few weeks ago, we left church assuming we'd all be together again the next Sunday. For now, we've been hindered from our times together. In the meantime, we have the opportunity to feel the absence from one another and cultivate the desire to be together again. Consider the day we are back together and consider the smile you will receive from your MPC family when we greet each other - and consider that this smile is but a dim reflection of the smile of God upon those that He loves. John Owen, an English theologian from the 1600s, said:

There is not the meanest, the weakest, the poorest believer on the earth, but Christ prizes him more than all the world besides.

Oh, by the way, Catherine and I missed basketball history but we partially made up for it the next day when we ran into the UMBC band, who were having the time of their lives:

Worth Reading 

Matthew Lee Anderson checks in at Christianity Today with On Living in a Pandemic Age - showing us how our fears of the virus (or other fears, whatever they may be) are tied to the fear of the Lord, a fear that "perfects" all of our other fears:

COVID-19 is a palpable reminder of how deeply insecure our lives really are, of how vain our pretenses to control the world can be. Fear of the coronavirus is not the fear of the Lord. Yet it is a sign of such a fear, a shadow that has fallen across our path that reminds us to look upward as we walk. When we are baptized into Christ’s death, we are liberated for life—for its completion in the knowledge of God who loves the irreplaceable and fragile life he has given to each of us. Moreover, when we love our lives as Christ does, we shall be prepared to lose them as he did.

Worth Watching

I promise to feature someone besides Tim Keller next week, but late last week he recorded a message for a lecture series called "Questioning Christianity" that the church he founded is doing in New York City. The topic was "Peace in Times of Suffering and Uncertainty." There is a message of about 30 minutes and then Q&A. I watched the message and it was outstanding. He started by comparing different worldviews and how they respond to suffering. One of the worldviews he analyzed was modern secularism, which he noted was the worldview least equipped to handle suffering. Keller then explained what Christianity has to offer and closed with steps to dealing with these trying times - 1) Weep, but trust (see the example of Job). 2) Pray, but think. 3) Reorder your loves. 4) Hope.

Worth Hearing

The music of Sandra McCracken has meant so much to me in recent years. She has endured much suffering, and as she walked with God through her suffering, she wrote a beautiful album of lament called Songs From the Valley. The opening song, "Fool's Gold", is gut-wrenching and wonderful, and its refrain is one for us to remember in these trying days:

But if it's not okay
Then it is not the end
And this is not okay
So I know this is not, this is not the end. 

Worth Tweeting

“I am overwhelmed and I don’t think I can do this“ is an understandable experience right now.

Turn it into a prayer.

— cнυcĸ degroaт (@chuckdegroat) March 20, 2020

Worth a Laugh

Much to Catherine's chagrin, I'm a huge fan of SCTV, which was a sketch comedy show in the late 1970s and early 1980s with lots of future stars like Eugene Levy, John Candy, etc. I'm not sure there's a better sketch than the one that depicts how it went when Michael McDonald sang backup for Christopher Cross (you'll either love this or be bewildered by it, but that's okay.)

That's all for now. Love you and miss you.

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.

MPC Connected - Wednesday, March 25, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Greetings MPC Family,

Each Wednesday during this season of separation, you will hear from us about a way you can be involved in serving our church and/or the wider community. We have two things for you today (one for the adults, one for the kids).

We'll start with the kids. We've reached out to Fair Acres Nursing Home, where MPC member Wayne Richardson typically leads a monthly worship service. We asked if they would welcome drawings from the kids in our church family. They were excited about this, and asked if we could collect drawings from our church kids and send them over electronically. These drawings will then be streamed on the tv screens in the facility for the residents to enjoy. If you have kids, would you please consider having them draw a picture - then scan it and send it to drawings@meadowcroftchurch.org. If you are comfortable with it, you can even take a picture of your child holding their picture. We will then collect the drawings/pictures and send them over to Fair Acres. Deadline for submitting your pictures is Monday, March 30. Thank you!

As for the adults, we're so thankful for those who have reached out and asked how they can help and serve the church right now. We will let you know if/when more tangible needs arise, but for now the BIGGEST thing you can do is check in with other church members. We're attaching a current church directory - would you consider texting or calling one other church member each day to see how they are doing? It could be a great opportunity to get to know people that you normally don't talk to, and for God to continue to build community during this time. Click here to access the directory - is password protected so that it can't be opened by people not involved with the church. If you need the password, drop Donna a line at the email address below.

We miss you and love you!

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.  

MPC Connected. - Tuesday, March 24, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Dear Church Family,

As we enter into another week of uncertainty, I thought I would share something with you that has been a great help to me.  Many years ago Glenn Parkinson, my former pastor, gave me a set of six little wooden blocks, exactly like the set that I had seen sitting on his desk, assembled in a "pyramid" shape.  He explained to me that he used those blocks for the purposes of Christian meditation.  Scripture instructs us to meditate (Joshua 1:8; Psalm 1:1-2; Psalm 77:11-12; Psalm 119:23), and Christian meditation is very different from eastern meditation in that, instead of being designed to empty the mind, it is designed to fill the mind with the truths of God.  

He explained to me that each of his blocks represented a biblical truth: Block 1 - God is Sovereign; Block 2 - God is Personal; Block 3 - God is Good; Block 4 - I am ruined; Block 5 - I am redeemed; Block 6 - I am God's instrument.  Whenever he felt himself beginning to go down a "rabbit hole" of despair because of hardship, he would knock the blocks over and begin stacking them back up, focusing on each truth while doing so.  He gave me a set as a gift and I began to do the same.  What I found was that, depending on what I was dealing with, sometimes I needed to work my way through the entire set.  But oftentimes, I found I only needed the first block (God is Sovereign) to help set my mind correctly.  Why?  Because I found that I had crowded God out of my mind and that the truth had been obscured by the problem at hand.

 At some point in our life, we learn a particular truth about God (i.e. God is Sovereign) and it gets filed away in the "S" box somewhere in the back our mind.  Somewhere along the road of our life, we get slammed by a trial (i.e. Coronavirus) and it moves front and center, crowding out the filing cabinet of truths we learned in Sunday school.  What we need is to dig that truth out, get it on the table, and lay that trial (Coronavirus), like a transparency (kids, ask your parents), on top of the biblical truth (God is Sovereign), which now becomes the background for the trial we face.  Put it this way: Your mind is going to be filled with something, so why not fill it with the truths of God's Word to help you put whatever you're dealing with in its proper context?  As another pastor I know used to say, "Begin with Jesus on the throne, and work your way back from that starting point until you get to the trial your facing." 

I know that there is so much confusion and uncertainty regarding this virus, the economy, and the future of our country and our world, but Jesus is on the throne of the universe, even now.  Meditate upon that, or any of the other magnificent truths found in the Bible.  I would be more grounded in them myself if I hadn't lost my set of wooden blocks in the move from Maryland to Pennsylvania.  I guess it's finally time I get some new ones. ;)

I know this is a difficult time, my dear brothers and sisters.  Know that we love you so very much and are praying for you every day, as we wait upon our Lord to bring this to his desired end.

In Christ,

Max

P.S. - To help churches that cannot gather for worship, Ligonier Ministries has made their entire catalog of teaching series free to use until the end of June, including the Ligonier Conference that just ended.  I think you will find many of the messages in their catalog to be helpful during this time.  You can watch them yourself, form a study with others in the church, or do a study at home with your family.  I can't recommend these resources more highly.

https://www.ligonier.org/

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.

MPC Connected - Monday, March 23, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Greetings MPC Family -

We hope you had a good weekend and that you were able to join us for worship yesterday. We missed being with you all very much. Special thanks once again to our A/V team and musicians for doing such a great job to serve all of us. 

In case you missed the livestream or want to watch it again, you can view all of our archived streams at https://www.meadowcroftchurch.org/livestreams.

Have a question about yesterday's sermon? Just fill out the form at the bottom of this post (if it's not working for you, just click here) and we will do our best to answer it, possibly on our "Between Two Sundays" show later in the week.

Have a great day and we will talk to you soon!

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215. 

MPC Connected - Friday, March 20, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Greetings MPC!

Jeff here. It's Friday, and that means that Sunday is almost upon us. Here is where we are at as our next worship service approaches:

How to Join Us for Worship

Originally, we were hoping to invite smaller groups to the Barn for our services. Obviously, the world keeps changing and the new statewide regulations mean that only people actually participating in the service should come on Sunday. This will be the case until further notice, unfortunately. Our COVID-19 page has been updated to reflect these changes. 

So, please stay home but tune in to our livestream at 10:30. We'll be streaming again at www.meadowcroftchurch.org/live. Max will be preaching on John 8:37-47 - Whoever is of God Hears the Words of God. Just like last week, we plan to have a full service with singing, confessions and so on. You can preview Sunday's songs by clicking here. Thank you again to our A/V team and musicians who will be helping us!

To assist you in your at-home worship,here are three resourcs - the bulletin, our devotional guide, and a children's sermon sheet (thank you Cathy Lane!)

Between Two Sundays

Yesterday, Max and I recorded the first episode of a new YouTube show called Between Two Sundays. It's about 40 minutes long, and we cover a bunch of topics - what last Sunday was like, why we're still preaching through John (for now), and lots of other stuff. Oh, there's also a Simpsons trivia challenge between Max and I. 

MPC Connected Schedule

For the duration of this season, we'll plan to communicate you each weekday - rather than just sending an email every time something comes up, we've landed on a schedule for being in touch with you:

That's all for now. We will "see" you on Sunday and be in touch again on Monday. 

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.  

MPC Connected - Thursday, March 19, 2020

Welcome to MPC Connected! With our church family separated, we will be communicating with you throughout the week in a more intentional way, including emails from Max and Jeff, opportunities to serve others, and more. Enjoy!  

Hi everyone, Jeff here. Hope you all are hanging in there so far this week. Our family is using a book called Long Story Short for a brief after-dinner devotional. The other night, the verse was Isaiah 9:7:

Of the increase of his government and of peace
    there will be no end,
on the throne of David and over his kingdom,
    to establish it and to uphold it
with justice and with righteousness
    from this time forth and forevermore.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

The connection in this passage was to Genesis 3, and the promise God makes that the serpent will eventually be defeated. Isaiah 9:7 promises that Jesus is indeed on His way to accomplish this. This is important by itself, but what struck me this week was just how long this story was in its unfolding. 

Even by the most conservative estimates, it was a few thousand years between Genesis 3 and Isaiah 9. After Isaiah's prophecy, it would be several hundred years before Jesus was born. And now it's been about 2,000 years since He ascended back to heaven. In the meantime, we wait for Him to finally and fully make good on all of His promises - to totally defeat evil and give us a new heaven and new earth. We are longing for that day. 

I've been thinking about how this time that we're experiencing is a microcosm of the much larger and longer story of the world. We are living in uncertain and, in some ways, scary times. The time stretching in front of us seems to get longer and longer. We started talking about distancing for a few weeks - now we realize it could be much longer. We are longing to all be together, but the time hasn't come yet. 

As we wait, it sure seems like a time for us to lean into the good longings we are going to feel. Consider the joy we will experience when we see each other again - when we sing and pray and hear God's Word together - when we eat way too many snacks after the service - when we laugh and talk about the week behind and the week ahead - when we greet one another not with appropriate distance, but a hearty embrace. I'm filled with joy when I consider that day, and filled with sadness that it's not here yet. In some ways, it's like the longing we feel as part of the bigger story - the longing for everything to be made new.

In addition to a few thoughts every week, I'll do my best to point you to some other things worth your time - some will relate directly to our faith, some will just be for you to enjoy and hopefully smile at. 

Worth Reading 

Samuel James is one of my favorite Christian cultural commentators. He wonders whether or not this virus will eventually end up driving us back to one another and increasing our social bonds:

There’s another version of this whole story that keeps playing out in my head and I can’t stop thinking about it. I can’t shake the feeling that an oppressive pandemic might actually be the one thing that disrupts the unthinking embrace of virtual social behaviors. When the toxic dust settles, I’m wondering if we’ll find that the punishment fit the crime, and that the anxiety of not knowing when we will see the people we love in real life is sadder than getting a new “Like” is fun.

Justin Taylor goes over J.I. Packer's understanding of having God as our Father - we could probably do worse than starting our day reminding ourselves of these truths:

1. I am a child of God.
2. God is my Father.
3. Heaven is my home.
4. Every day is one day nearer.
5. My Savior is my brother.
6. Every Christian is my brother too

Worth Watching

Last week, Max preached on John 8:30-36. This passage talks about the slavery of sin. An outstanding message on this topic (from another place in the Bible) comes from Tim Keller at the 2011 Gospel Coalition conference:

Worth Hearing

I've been really enjoying the sound of Shred Kelly, a Canadian folk band. Listen now before they get cool! Or so you can simply critique my taste...

And if Canadian folk isn't your thing, check out Rend Collective, who is doing a time of live worship on Friday at 5 pm on Facebook Live.

Worth Tweeting

A helpful nugget from Twitter:

Called my 91 year old grandma to check on her in light of the Coronavirus.

Me: “Grandma, are you anxious?”

91 year old sage wisdom: “No, we lived through the 1949 polio epidemic. We simply need to pray and trust God.”

— Jason Helopoulos (@Helopoulos) March 18, 2020

Worth Laughing At

Apparently the beauty of people singing to one another from their balconies in Italy is spreading to America.:

absolutely beautiful—people in lockdown in New York City are singing to each other from their balconies & windows pic.twitter.com/inz623LOqR

— Jamison Webb (@jamisonwebb) March 16, 2020

That's all for now. Love you and miss you.

Jeff

Though we are separated during this unique season, we want you to know we are available. We will be doing our best to stay in touch in many ways, but if you need prayer or just need someone to talk to, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. You can always send a prayer request to Donna (mpcadminteam@gmail.com). You can also email or call Max or Jeff or any of our elders. Max's email is mbenfer@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone # is 484-886-7726. Jeff's email is jeff@meadowcroftchurch.org and his phone number is 540-818-6215.