I hope—and suspect—that you are still basking in the wonder of your Christmas experience. The “eagerest” of beavers among you might already be putting away some of your Christmas decorations. But the Toone family barely got their tree up in time for the holiday! Let me explain. For the first time in years, the four […]
Reflections on 2018
Happy New Year, my Sweetheart Church! Someday when I look back over my long ministry at Chapel Hill, I suspect I will remember 2018 with particular fondness. Because it appears that this was the year when God, in his kindness and for his purposes, did something that is all too rare. Let me explain. For […]
GLOW-mentum!
Merry Christmas! You feel the buzz, don’t you? A level of excitement like we haven’t experienced in a while. A sense of momentum and growth that is just contagious. Take last weekend’s GLOW. We were blown away when more than 520 worshippers showed up for this innovative “Christmas by Glowstick.” We have a name for […]
You have to be broken to GLOW!
I saw this story on Facebook the other day, and I wanted to share it: I was in Dollar Tree last night and there was a lady and two kids behind me in the long line. One was a big kid, one was a toddler. The bigger one had a pack of glow sticks and […]
I’m proud of you!
I don’t remember being so nervous about a sermon. We had decided to try something different: to use a classic Christmas movie to illustrate our Advent sermons. We were going to kick off with “Elf”…and I can’t tell you how nervous I was that we would get it “right;” that we would find the right […]
Getting “Reel” for Advent
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and Cyndi and I got to spend ours with our daughter, Rachel, a minister in our Evangelical Presbyterian Church denomination who is serving as the Dean of Spiritual Formation at Montreat College, a Christian school in Billy Graham country near Asheville, North Carolina. (In fact, Rachel lives literally next door […]
Saturday in the Sanctuary
This weekend we will once again move our Saturday service to the Sanctuary for those who would like to have their Sunday morning free to watch the Seahawks crush the Panthers. It’s worth noting that every week, our Saturday service is identical to our 10:45 am service, so if you normally come to 10:45 but […]
The Spirit Is Working
Sunday after service, a long-time member came up to me and said, “Wow, the Holy Spirit was really working this morning. Something is happening in our congregation. It feels like the days when we were worshiping in the gym!” For those of you who have come since 1994 (the last time we worshipped in the […]
Festival of Hope Overturns the Tables
We still have space available for the Women’s Breakfast! Reserve your seat now! Every November, the Gathering Place at Chapel Hill is filled with beautiful, fair trade products from around the world for Festival of Hope Weekend. For many of us, our Christmas shopping begins and ends at Festival of Hope. But Festival of Hope is […]
A festival of stories
Festival of Hope is about stories. It’s about craftsmen, artisans, farmers—people our God created and loves deeply. It’s about the power our purchasing decisions have to employ parents, empower women, and restore dignity to our brothers and sisters around the world. Over the years of hosting Festival of Hope, Chapel Hill people have been able […]