Our annual meeting on October 13 was a turning point in our life as a church family. Rather than conducting a business meeting filled with reports from all the various ministry teams and committees, we celebrated the new additions to our family by honoring those who had been baptized in the past year plus those who had transferred their membership.
Just as a new mom and dad will celebrate the arrival of a new member to their family, the church celebrates new life as well. Sometimes it’s easy to get bogged down in the activities of day-to-day life; we get up, go through our daily tasks, eat a couple of meals, go here and there, and go to bed. Sometimes the days blur into weeks and weeks blur into months, and the years just seem to fly by—and we miss a lot.
As we head into the fall and toward Thanksgiving, our minds tend to focus on celebration. Despite the fact that the calendar between October and January often turns into one giant to-do list, we find ourselves celebrating the past year. Not only do we celebrate the arrivals of new life, but we celebrate marriages, anniversaries, promotions, graduations, and all sorts of other milestones. We celebrate with those who continue to live long, healthy lives and with those who are able to celebrate another year of life despite cancer or other illnesses.
As God’s family, we must continue to celebrate these things together. We must continue to praise God for the blessings of what we have plus the blessing of answered prayers. Most importantly, we must continue to celebrate those who turn back to God and give their lives to him. While we continue to work together to make more disciples of Jesus, let us remember his words from Luke 15:10, “I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”