Dr. Martin Dotterweich is a specialist in the Reformation in Scotland and the history of the Bible in English as well as Chair of the Department of History and Political Science at King University. He attended Wheaton College, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, and the University of Edinburgh, where he earned a PhD. Martin and his wife, Heather, have been members of FPC since arriving in Bristol in 2004. They have two children, Kathleen and Peter.

The Stewardship Committee is thankful for more than $492,000 in pledges for 2018. While that's nearly $130,000 short of last year's pledges, we are grateful for this blessing of pledges in these uncertain times. Please pray earnestly for our congregation, officers, and staff as we face some hard decisions.

Our Stewardship Vision Verse this year has been 1 Peter 4:10: "Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms."

I wish I had followed my parents' words more carefully. My dear Dad would let me know when I was not yet smart enough to know how much I didn't know. One example was when I wanted to drive the farm tractor at 12 and he said I wasn't ready. He was protecting me from myself, trying to spare me the consequences of my overconfidence. I just knew I could do whatever I had seen him do. How hard could it be? So I disobeyed, climbed up onto the tractor's seat, and tried to drive it. Only then did I realize that my skinny legs couldn't even reach the pedals. My selfishness had blinded me to the truth. Psychologists call this part of the human condition the Dunning-Kruger Effect, named after David Dunning and Justin Kruger of Cornell University.

In simple terms, it meant that I could not accept what I didn't know and that the less I knew, the more I tended to exaggerate my abilities, which further prevented me from seeing my inadequacies or from appreciating the expertise of others. On the other hand, Dunning and Kruger found that someone who is a true expert tends to overestimate the abilities of others and fails to realize that their own abilities are unusual and exceptional.

The solution to this dilemma is to look at ourselves with humble minds, accepting ourselves truthfully as the flawed and sinful children of a loving God. Then we are better able to recognize our sins and seek forgiveness. Furthermore, through humble hearts, we more readily forgive others and give of ourselves generously to meet their needs. Good stewards are humble.

Today's sermon about the master, the talents, and the three servants reminds us that we are servants to the living God who have been blessed with precious, personal talents. If we deny our sinful nature and hide from our sins, they will continue to deteriorate our hearts and lives. By recognizing our imperfect nature, we are open to receiving God's loving grace and sharing that grace with others as good stewards.

Let us learn from this lesson to live as loving servants, humble and honest with ourselves and with God, without the regrets that we woulda, coulda, shoulda acted differently. Let us live as faithful stewards of the time, talent, and treasure with which God has blessed us, investing in one another. Let us live in such a way that we look forward to the words of our master, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant."

Busy builders at last year's event.

Our fall semester of Wednesday night programs will wrap up in style November 29, when all generations of our congregation converge on the Fellowship Hall to make gingerbread houses. This annual activity is always fun for everyone, so do plan to be there. Please join us at 5:30 p.m. for a fellowship dinner of chili and potato bar, salad, and dessert, then stay to build your house. See you then!

Sunday opens the season for ordering poinsettias to decorate our sanctuary in Advent, which begins December 3. Order forms will be available in the church office and in worship for the next two Sundays. To order a plant in memory or in honor of someone, bring or mail your order form and payment to the church office or place it in the offering plate during worship through November 26. Each poinsettia plant costs $15. You can pick yours up after the Christmas Eve service. The deadline for orders is Monday, November 27.

The Worship Committee has uncovered a trove of note cards featuring a picture of our beautiful rose window! We are offering them to the congregation for a suggested donation of $5 for a pack of 10 with envelopes. The 5 x 7 cards are printed on good stock and blank on the inside. They would be great to have on hand when you want to send a greeting or prayer to someone you've been thinking of. A pack would also make a nice gift. You will find the cards outside both worship spaces. 

FPC member Geneva King, along with the provisional class of the Junior League of Bristol, is collecting donations through the end of November for local victims of domestic violence served by Abuse Alternatives and the Children's Advocacy Center. They need basic toiletry items for women and craft supplies for children; please see the lists below. A labeled bin for donations is in the Fellowship Hallway. For more information, email Geneva at [email protected]. Thank you!

 

Care Package Needs
Abuse Alternatives	Children's Advocacy Center
Shampoo	Popsicle sticks
Conditioner	Googly eyes
Body wash	Gems
Toothpaste	Yarn
Detergent (small bottles)	Beads
	Pipe cleaners

 

Sunday's music participants: Sanctuary Choir.

Sunday's music: The setting of our anthem, "Jesus Shall Reign," is by W. Glen Darst (1896-1986), a Texas composer of more than 150 compositions. Especially appropriate on Christ the King Sunday, the text by Isaac Watts is an adaptation of Psalm 72, which affirms the Lordship of Jesus. It is #265 in our hymnal.

Organist's footnotes: The theme for this week's organ music should be "something borrowed, something new," because all three pieces borrow from former traditions, and recast them in new molds.

Félix-Alexandre Guilmant (1837-1911) was an accomplished and extremely prolific composer. Unlike Charles-Marie Widor, who produced a great deal of music in all the main genres, Guilmant devoted himself almost entirely to works for his own instrument, the organ. Guilmant's compositions were conceived with the Cavaillé-Coll organ of La Trinité (where he was organist) in mind, and are therefore symphonic in style and form. His "March upon Handel's 'Lift Up Your Heads'" (our prelude) is from his Opus 15, Pièces dans différents styles pour orgue, livraison 1. It quotes the main musical theme of the famous chorus in Handel's "Messiah": "Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in."

KING'S WESTON (our offertory) is the tune composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams in 1925, to which the text "At the Name of Jesus" (Caroline Maria Noel, 1817-1877) is associated (see hymn 264 for the complete text). John Hebden Schaffner (1945-1995) used motivic

	Ralph Vaughan Williams in 1958

material derived from "At the Name of Jesus" in his "Organ Motet for Christ the King." Motets are usually described as mainly vocal musical compositions from the late medieval era to the present. Schaffner weaves the voices of the organ to "sing" his motet. I have played this piece before, but I don't think I truly understood it until I heard a recording of Carson Cooman playing a similar piece of Schaffner's, his "Elegy on an Original Ground" (1994). Schaffner's style is straight out of the Renaissance, sounding simultaneously old yet new. Schaffner was a self-taught pianist and organist who composed and published a number of keyboard works with publishers including Concordia, Augsburg Fortress, World Library Publications, Belwin-Mills/Alfred, and Wayne Leupold Editions.

OLD HUNDREDTH is a hymn tune in Long Meter from Pseaumes Octante Trois de David (1551) (the second edition of the Genevan Psalter) and is one of the best known melodies in all Christian musical traditions. The tune is usually attributed to the French composer Louis Bourgeois (c.1510-c.1560). Although the tune was first associated with Psalm 134 in the Genevan Psalter, the melody receives its current name from an association with the 100th Psalm, in a translation by William Kethe entitled "All People that on Earth do Dwell." John Ferguson's (b. 1941) arrangement of "Old Hundredth" (our postlude) is a toccata employing very quick rhythms alternating between the left and right hands. You may never have heard "Old Hundredth" sound so new!

Sunday, November 26

8:30 a.m.       Worship, Fellowship Hall

9:45 a.m.       Sunday School

11:00 a.m.     Worship, Sanctuary

3:30 p.m.       Stewardship Committee

3:30 p.m.       Christmas Pageant Rehearsal, Sanctuary

Monday, November 27

5:30 p.m.       Adult Handbells

7:00 p.m.       Session of Elders, Room 123

Tuesday, November 28

9:30 a.m.       Staff Meeting, Room 117

10:00 a.m.     Morning Prayer Group, Conference Room

6:00 p.m.       Venture Crew 3, Room 165

7:00 p.m.       Boy Scout Troop 3, Scout Wing

Wednesday, November 29

9:30 a.m.       Women's DVD Bible Study, Coffee Klatch Room

4:45 p.m.       Savior's Singers Children's Choir

5:15 p.m.       Baby & Toddler Care, Rooms 34-36

5:30 p.m.       Fellowship Dinner, Fellowship Hall

6:00 p.m.       Pastor Nominating Committee, 

                        Room 117

6:00 p.m.       Middle School Gathering

6:15 p.m.       Gingerbread House Event, 

                        Fellowship Hall

7:00 p.m.       High School Small Groups

7:15 p.m.       Sanctuary Choir

7:30 p.m.       8:30 Worship Team, Fellowship Hall

Thursday, November 30

7:00 a.m.       Men's Bible Study, Parlor

12:00 p.m.     Noon Bible Study, Room 117