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Brothers and sisters,

Back in 2019, while I was the pastor at Sharon Baptist Church in Smithfield, I preached a series of sermons that used Christmas carols as points of emphasis. It was very similar to our “Faith and Art” series, but with carols instead of art pieces. On the Sunday of Peace, I wanted to focus on the idea that the things God desires are different from the things people desire. In particular, I wanted to focus on the second verse of one of my favorite carols (as printed in the 1991 Baptist Hymnal) and the righteous indignation of the carol’s author. With that in mind, here’s what I wrote back then:

Now, the carol I wanted to take a little closer look at today is our final hymn this morning, It Came Upon the Midnight Clear. I have always loved this particular hymn. As a child, it was mostly because I liked the tune — it is so different from the sound of most Christmas carols. As I got a little older I started to like it more because of the presence of the angels. Now as an adult, I love it because of the fact that while this carol is certainly more melancholy than most of the others we’ll sing over the next few weeks, the writer, Edmund H. Sears, never gives up hope. He dreams of a world, as he says, “When peace shall over all the earth Its ancient splendors fling,/And the whole world give back the song Which now the angels sing.” Sears was a pastor all the way back in 1849 and while his exact inspiration is not known, most folks seem to think he wrote this carol in response to the many wars raging in Europe and in response to the end of the Mexican-American War. And so I love the kind of resilient hope that comes from the second verse. In the first verse the pastor establishes that the song the angels are singing is “Peace on the earth, good will to men.” Not only that, but the song comes from “heav’n’s all-gracious King.” And so in the second verse he writes, “Yet with the woes of sin and strife The world has suffered long,/Beneath the angel strain have rolled Two thou-sand years of wrong;/And man, at war with man, hears not The love song which they bring:/O hush the noise, ye men of strife, And hear the angels sing!” Sears believed deeply that the war, the violence, the strife that was afflicting his world was not God’s intention. In this carol, the angels sing God’s message of peace and good will, and Sears is confident that one day the world will sing along with the angels. But at the moment, it seemed to him that people would rather continue on with their sinful ways. They’d rather drown out the music of heaven, with the noise of worldly power. And so I love that line, “O hush the noise, ye men of strife, And hear the angels sing!”

So many things in our world clamor for our attention. So many of those things claim that they can offer us hope, peace, joy, and love, but only if we’re willing to ignore the truth — that the angels have been singing a song of peace over the world for thousands of years, but we’ve allowed ourselves to listen to “men of strife” instead. This Advent, I’d encourage you to push back on the things that cause you strife and hear the angels sing, “Peace on the earth, good will to men.”

Grace and peace,
Pastor Ben

Brothers and sisters,

Advent is almost here! Even though I’m writing this article on November 19th, the next Illuminator will not come out until after Advent has begun! So, let me run down the Advent schedule for you all and tell you about the special services we are having here at Hope Valley to celebrate the birth of Christ.

First of all, Sunday, November 30th will be our Hanging of the Greens service. This service happens during morning worship and is a time for us to celebrate and participate in the joy and the ceremony of Advent! It is a service of readings and carols in which we finish decorating the sanctuary and explain the meanings behind all the various decorations and symbols on display. It is a dynamic service in which people will move about the sanctuary, special carols will be sung, and all will be invited to contemplate what Advent means for us. Make plans to be here that Sunday!

The next special service will be on Sunday, December 14th, again during morning worship. That Sunday, the musicians at our church will be leading us in our annual musical service. This year, the title is, “Peace on Earth”. The choir will sing. The handbells will play. The children of the church will sing. There will be readings that bring out the message of Christmas. And immediately following that service, there will be a reception—a time of fellowship for all of us to gather, share some food, and catch up with each other before the last big push toward Christmas. All are invited to come, so tell your friends, family, neighbors, etc.

Finally, on Wednesday, December 24th, we will have our Christmas Eve Candlelight and Communion Service in the sanctuary. That service will start at 5:00 PM. This ser-vice always ends up being a delightfully intimate service. It’s the night before Christmas, meaning much of the hub-bub and preparations have been finished, and there’s just a general sense of peace and quiet that comes over the world. In that peace, we gather at the church to hear the Christ-mas story, sing familiar songs, take Communion together, and light candles as we welcome the Light of the World. It serves as a moment to catch our breath before the holiday itself—so come and celebrate with us!

There are other Christmas events happen-ing throughout this time as well—check the rest of the Illuminator for those. But I look forward to worshiping with you all over the next month as we celebrate the birth of Christ once again.

Grace and peace,
Pastor Ben

Brothers and sisters,

A few weeks ago, I went up to Charlottesville, VA with some friends in order to go apple-picking. We’d planned the trip for months, talking about how the four of us wanted to do something that felt quintessentially “fall”, if that makes sense. And we had a wonderful time! We ended up picking a literal bushel of apples, meaning I came home with a lot of apples. Fujis, Granny Smiths, Staymans, and Winesaps—all of them freshly picked, all of them delicious. Now I had a quandary: what to do with ¼ bushel of apples?

I started out by making a batch of apple freezer jam using some of the Granny Smiths and the Staymans. That jam has been delicious layered between pancakes on Saturday mornings. The Fujis and Winesaps have made their way to the office with me as afternoon snacks. But the main thing I wanted to make was a fresh apple cake, specifically the fresh apple cake my mother used to make.

So, I texted Dad and asked him if he could find the recipe anywhere in Mom’s old cookbooks or recipe cards. And he delivered, though not the way either of us was expecting. He texted me five pictures of five different recipes from Mom’s cookbooks and said, “It was one of these, but I don’t remember which one.” Each of these, by the way, was drawn from either the Methodist or Baptist cookbooks from various churches in Mom’s hometown, Ahoskie. I looked over the recipes. Some were more helpful than others—one suggested I bake the cake, “in a warm oven till done”—but I chose one to bake, and set to it. And you know what? I picked the right one! My kitchen smelled like Mom’s kitchen. The cake looked like hers. And, most importantly, it tasted just right!

When I was telling Dad about my cake, he asked me which recipe I’d used and how I’d known to pick that particular one. So, I said, “Well, there was one picture where the page looked like it had wrinkled from being wet. Mom didn’t always dry her hands that well after she washed them, so I figured that water damage was from her. Also, that recipe called for a 325° oven and Mom always used to say fresh apple cakes take forever to cook. This was also the only recipe that called for nuts and Mom loved desserts with nuts in them. Finally, I saw where the recipe called for cinnamon and nutmeg, but I remember Mom always saying she didn’t like nutmeg so any recipe that called for it, she’d sub in cinnamon. So, you know, that made it obvious.” Dad just laughed and said, “Oh, is that all? You two really did know each other well, huh?”

We celebrated All Saints Sunday this past Sunday. We talked about all the ways those who came before us have shaped us and shaped our faith. But there are a lot of different ways folks shape us, aren’t there? And even when it’s not explicitly faith-related, they can shape how we see the world, can’t they? It’s a gift to be able to live together as a church family and be shaped by such a cloud of witnesses, to be able to encounter challenges and draw on the faith and ideas of others to meet those challenges. Who are the folks in your life who have shaped you as a person and as a Christian? What are the things you still do that they taught you? Can how can that memory provide you with comfort?

Grace and peace,
Pastor Ben

Brothers and sisters,

In just a couple of Sundays, we will be celebrating All Saints Sunday. Now, if you’ve been coming to Hope Valley for a while now, you know what things typically look like on All Saints Sunday. You know what this Sunday means to folks and for folks. But for those that may not know about All Saints Sunday or for those of you who may be thinking, “I remember we always do some-thing that day, but I can’t remember what,” let me tell you a little bit about it.

All Saints Day has been celebrated by the Catholic church for centuries. Basically, it is a holiday on which Catholics remember and celebrate the saints of the Catholic church, i.e. Saint Peter, Saint Christopher, etc. They will also celebrate anyone who died for their faith. (By the way, we get our word, Halloween, from All Saints Day. “All Saints” can be written as “All Hallows” and since “All Hallows” is on November 1st, that makes October 31st “All Hallows Eve,” aka “Halloween.”)

However, as time has gone on, Christians—particularly us Protestants—have begun to refer to all believers as “saints,” since that is one of the words used by Paul to describe us. And so, we Protestants have be-gun to celebrate All Saints Sunday on the first Sunday of November. All Saints Sunday, then, is a time to remember those Christians that have come before us and celebrate their lives and their faith journeys. It is a time to contemplate the ways in which we have been shaped by “so great a cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1; NRSVUE).

It is also a Sunday on which we honor specific church members and/or the immediate family members of church members who have passed away within the last year. It’s a time when we can come alongside their family and remind them that we love them, that we are with them. It is a time to remind them that we loved their family member, too. It’s a time to catch up, tell stories about the person, and be grateful for all they meant to each of us.

This coming All Saints Sunday, we’ll be remembering five people who have gone on to glory: Bonnie Lyon, J.J. Bush, Dorothy Moore, Herb Finch, and Carolyn Tippett. During the service, we’ll read their names and have any family present stand. Then, we’ll light a candle for them and ring a bell. It’s a touching moment as we remember them.

So, plan to be here on Sunday, November 2nd as we remember those saints who have gone before us. Come to honor their legacy. Come to spend time with their family. Come to worship a God who promises us that death does not have the last word.

Grace and peace,
Pastor Ben