Dear Grace Church Family, This Sunday is the third Sunday in Advent.  It is known as Gaudette Sunday.  The word Gaudette means, “rejoice!”  On this third Sunday, we will light the pink candle for joy.  It is fitting that our Cantata is this Sunday as well.  It is going to be a Sunday not to miss.  I have had the privilege of…

Dear Grace Church Family, Though the season of Advent is the season of waiting, the concept should not be foreign to us.  There is something we are all waiting for in life.  Maybe you have been waiting for a new job, maybe you are waiting to pay off some debt that has been piling up, maybe you are waiting to feel less…

Dear Grace Church Family, Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!  May your time with friends and family be richly blessed.  I have my aunt from Richmond, Virginia visiting.  You might have heard me tell a story or two about her.  When I was a child, she would bring me to church with her.  I would sit in the pews and wait for her to…

Dear Grace Church Family, Life is full of unpredictable moments.   Part of living is dealing with the ebbs and flows of circumstances.  As many of you know, I was scheduled to get my port removed a couple of weeks ago.  It should have been a quick procedure.  I was to get the port removed, spend the night in Tampa, and head back to Merritt…

Hello Grace Family! I pray that everyone has had a wonderful week. Can you believe it is getting close to Thanksgiving? We are in the season of turkey and all the trimmings! It is a time where we tend to think about gratitude, and we all have something to give our thanks. So, what are those things for you? For me, I have five wonderful grandchildren who…

Hello Grace Family!  There comes a time when life is so noisy we need a quiet place. We need to take a step back away from all the demands on our time and just listen to our soul. And in doing that we also open space up for God to speak to us. The question becomes, do you have a quiet place.…

Hello Grace Family!  I am having a hard time believing today is the first day of November! October went by so fast! But then we lost a week because of hurricane Milton as we prepared our homes and businesses, waited for the storm to go through our area, and then put everything back together. It was a lot. And then we begin setting up the…

Dear Grace United Methodist Church Family, Pastor Beth and I had the wonderful gift of gathering with other clergy in our District this past week!  It was a good opportunity for me to meet colleagues in this area and our DS, Sharon Austin, organized a wonderful training for us on Church Vitality.  We worshipped together, learned together, and dreamed together!  One of the…

Dear Grace Church Family, By the time you receive this communication, my hope is we will all have weathered the storm coming our way as I write this.  There are things I know even before the storm reaches land.  I know we are going to be called to be the church now more than ever before.  There are things I am not…

Dear Grace Church Family, This Sunday is Laity Sunday.  It is a very special day in the life of the church.  It is the day we honor the role of laity within the life of the Church.  I have been so impressed with the number of “high capacity” leaders at Grace UMC.  A high-capacity leader is one that takes on an area…