Christmas

The Park District and Millwood Church of Christ make it happen!

Today our focus is on the Knox County Park District and the Millwood Church of Christ, who have teamed again to bring a new activity to the popular Fire and Ice event that benefits Food For The Hungry. Fire and Ice 2021 will be held as two drive-through events, one at Wolf Run Park and one at Millwood Church of Christ. The drive-through events are scheduled for Saturday, December 11 from 5 p.m. – 8 p.m. at both locations.

Luminaria will magically guide you through the Wolf Run Regional Park parking lot located at 17621 Yauger Road in Mount Vernon. There, Park District staff will be on hand to retrieve boxed and canned food items from your vehicle and accept monetary donations for Food For The Hungry. No need to park and leave your car as the drive-through luminaria will guide you to the drop-off point in the parking lot.

Across the county, the Millwood Church of Christ located at 10900 Millersburg Road in Howard also has luminaria to guide you through the church parking lot at a drive-through event. At this location church personnel and volunteers will be on-hand to accept canned and boxed food items and monetary donations for Food For The Hungry.

Click this SoundCloud link to hear Marcy Rinehart’s conversation with Lori Totman of the Knox County Park District!

Click this SoundCloud link to hear Wesley Boston’s conversation with Pastor Dave Jones at Millwood Church of Christ!

–          I was born December 8, 1925 in New York City
–          My parents were vaudeville dancers and I started dancing as a child
–          I was drafted into the US Army in 1943 and put on performances for troops
–          My father, godfather and I made up the Will Mastin Trio
–          In 1956 I starred in the Broadway musical, *Mr. Wonderful*
–          I became part of Frank Sinatra’s Rat Pack in 1959 and starred in *Ocean’s 11*
–          I died of throat cancer in 1990

I am…Sammy Davis, Jr.

Congratulations to Bob from Howard, who guessed correctly and wins the $5 gift card to Everlasting Cup!

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Dylan

December 8, 2021 0

More Christmas motivation!

Today we shared from the Our Daily Bread Christmas devotional book, ‘Celebrating Jesus.’

Jonathon shared ‘Mary Knew’ from Dave Branon:

Four-year-old Kaitlyn was oblivious to everything else in the room. There were no thoughts of stockings hung and wrapped presents. She was simply content to play with our manger scene and its nativity characters. What piqued my interest was something else she was doing as she moved Mary, Joseph, and the Babe around: She was singing “Mary, did you know?” over and over-words she had heard sung by others. As she held Mary, she poignantly asked her if she knew who her precious baby boy was.
Kaitlyn’s question for Mary is the vital one everyone needs to answer. Do we know that Jesus is the One predicted in Genesis 3 to strike Satan’s heel (v. 15)-to gain victory over Satan, sin, and death by His death on the cross? Do we know that He’s the Messiah promised in Isaiah 53 and the One Micah prophesied would be born in Bethlehem hundreds of years later? (5:2).
We know that His name-Jesus-means that He will save His people from their sins (MATTHEW 1:21). We also know that Mary’s baby grew up and chose to die on the cross as the Savior of the world (LUKE 1:31; 2:30-32).
The “Son of the Most High” (1:32) has invited us to know Him and be loved by Him. May we choose to know Jesus, our precious Savior, more and more each day!

Joe shared ‘Captain of a Motley Crew’ from Glenn Packham:

As a child, I always found Christmas Eve one of the most A exciting days of the year. I knew there would be presents in the morning, a feast that night, and a candlelight service at church. But it was also exciting because I never knew who was going to end up at our house for dinner. My parents loved inviting people who were alone or had nowhere to go to come share a meal with us. Folks from church, from their places of work, our friends from school-it was always a motley crew.
David was on the run from King Saul and in need of good friends to surround him (1 SAMUEL 22:1-2). He needed the right community to help him in his crisis. Instead, what he found were hundreds of men who were also in trouble-those “in trouble or in debt or… discontented” (v. 2). Yet, David became captain over the motley crew and they trusted him.
Jesus-the true and better David-is exactly the kind of person who gathered those around Him that society had discarded. Throughout the gospels, it’s often the sick and the disabled, the outcast, and the sinner who find belonging and healing in Jesus. The church is meant to be a kind of cave of Adullam (v. 1). It’s not a perfect community, but a ragtag group in need of a loving, healing Captain.

Name a place that’s open on Christmas Day:
1. Grocery store/Walmart/Kroger (23 votes)
2. Gas stations (20)
3. Fast Food restaurants (19)
4. Waffle House/Denny’s (12)
5. Movie theaters (8)
6. Airports (5)
7. Hospitals (3)
8. Hotels (2)

Congratulations to Tysha from Mount Vernon, who guessed correctly and wins the $5 gift card to Everlasting Cup.

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Jonathon

December 6, 2021 0

Christmas NZ Top 10 for 12/3/21

This week we are bringing you (in no particular order) 10 of the top NEW Christmas songs for 2021! Click the songs for links to lyric videos and audio.

10. We The Kingdom – Still Can’t Sleep on Christmas Eve
9. Anne Wilson – I Still Believe in Christmas
8. Zach Williams – I Don’t Want Christmas to End
7. Cade Thompson – Angels We Have Heard on High
6. Cochren and Co. – Christmas (What the World Needs)
5. Newsboys – The Christmas Song
4. Ryan Stevenson – Heart and Soul of Christmas
3. Jordan Feliz – Feliz Navidad
2. Jordan St. Cyr – Rejoice
1. Tasha Layton – Giving Christmas Away

for NEW MUSIC FRIDAY, we added to the list!

Mac Powell – Jesus Christ is Born

Love and the Outcome – Christmas Lights

For King and Country – Heavenly Hosts

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Zoe

December 3, 2021 0

The promise of Immanuel – delivered!

Today’s Monday Motivation continues with a Christmas theme:

The word Immanuel means, as we learn in Matthew 1:23, “God with us.” The coming of the Christ child fulfilled what Isaiah wrote in chapter 7, verse 14: “the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.”

In his book Hidden Christmas, Pastor Timothy Keller shares that for centuries, the Jewish religious leaders and scholars had known that prophecy, but did not think that it should be taken literally. They thought it was simply predicting the coming or arrival of some great leader through whose work, God would be present with his people.

However, Matthew writes that this promise is greater than anyone imagined! It did not come true figuratively, but literally. Jesus Christ is “God with us,” because the human life in Mary’s womb was a miracle performed by God himself. Then Jesus, with his life, his claims and his resurrection, convinced his closest followers that he was not just a prophet telling them how to find God, but God himself coming to find us.

Keller writes that this claim, that Jesus is God, gives us the greatest possible hope. Why? Because it means this world is not all that there is…it means that there is life and love after death and it means that evil and suffering will one day end.

And it is not just hope for the world, but hope for you and me personally. A God who was only holy would have not come to us in Jesus. He would have just demanded that we pull ourselves together and be moral and holy enough to be worthy of relationship with him. But our God is fully holy and fully human – so he doesn’t send someone else – he comes himself! Jesus is one of us – and that should give us all hope!

Christmas Gift Exchange winners today:
Becky from Howard and Krista from Howard! Remember the grand prize drawing is Thursday morning on The Morning Thing!

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Todd

December 21, 2020 0

The season of waiting, arrival and revelation!

Today’s focus is on Advent, provided to us from the writings of Rob Staples, professor of theology emeritus at Nazarene Theological Seminary:

Advent is preparation for Christmas, not Christmas itself. It is only in commercial advertising that the Christmas season begins the first of December (or the first of October!). In the Christian calendar, Advent is the season including the four Sundays preceding Christmas. Christmas Day is December 25, and the Christmas Season itself is the 12 days from Christmas to Epiphany. Remember the song, “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” with “a partridge in a pear tree?”

Epiphany, which celebrates the coming of the Magi, the first Gentiles to acknowledge Jesus as King, is January 6. Epiphany means “showing” or “unveiling” and thus “unveils” the truth that salvation was for Gentiles as well as Jews.

Advent differs from Christmas in the same way Lent differs from Easter. Both Advent and Lent are times of preparation—Advent for Christmas and Lent for Easter.

The Christian calendar, unlike the calendar on our walls or desks, does not begin January 1. It begins the first Sunday of Advent. Advent is that season when the Church turns its gaze in two directions—past and future. It looks backward as it prepares to celebrate the birth of Christ in Bethlehem, and it looks forward as it engages in self-examination in preparation for Christ’s Second Coming in glory.

The word “advent” comes from the Latin adventus, which means “coming” or “arrival.” Thus in certain contexts it means the same as the Greek parousia. However, the latter term occurs in the New Testament only with reference to the Second Coming. During the Advent season, both these “comings” of Christ are embraced in the Church’s worship—His coming in the Incarnation and His coming at the end of the age.

Advent emphasizes hope, and it is this hope that makes Advent a proper preparation for Christmas.

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Todd

December 16, 2020 0

The light of Christmas!

Today’s Monday Motivation comes from Isaiah 9:2, 5-7 (NIV)

²The people walking in darkness
have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness
a light has dawned.

⁵Every warrior’s boot used in battle
    and every garment rolled in blood
will be destined for burning,
    will be fuel for the fire.
⁶For unto us a child is born,
    to us a son is given,
    and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
    Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
    Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
⁷Of the greatness of his government and peace
    there will be no end.
He will reign on David’s throne
    and over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it
    with justice and righteousness
    from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the Lord Almighty
    will accomplish this.

One of the first indications of the Christmas season is LIGHT. The appearance of lights seemingly everywhere – on trees, with candles, above streets; there is radiance all around us.

Lights are not just for decoration of course, they are symbolic.

In his book, Hidden Christmas, Pastor Timothy Keller says one of the most important spiritual truths at Christmas is this: the world is a dark place, and we will never find our way or see reality unless Jesus IS our light.

Keller writes that the word ‘darkness’ in the Bible refers to evil and ignorance. The world has evil and untold suffering. The world also has no one who can cure the evil and suffering. We look towards the earth and our human resources to try to fix the world. We think we can end darkness with intellect and innovation. That’s the ignorance.

So the message of Christmas is NOT, “we will be able to put together a world of unity and peace.” The message, instead, is a humble one: “Things really are this bad and we can’t heal or save ourselves. Nevertheless, THERE IS HOPE.”

Notice the verse in Isaiah doesn’t say the light comes from the world…it says that upon the world a light has dawned. It has come from the outside, and Jesus has brought that light to save us! Because, as John 8:12 says, He IS that light!

Today’s Christmas Gift Exchange winners were Pam from Fredericktown and James, also from Fredericktown.

Thanks for listening!
– Joe

December 14, 2020 0

NZ Top 10 for 12/4/20

Praise the Lord it’s Friday – here’s this week’s countdown:

10. Josh Baldwin – Evidence
9. Josh Wilson – Revolutionary
8. Zach Williams f/Dolly Parton – There Was Jesus
7. Elevation Worship f/Brandon Lake – Graves into Gardens
6. Matthew West – Truth Be Told
5. NEEDTOBREATHE – Who Am I
4. We The Kingdom – God So Loved
3. Tauren Wells f/Jenn Johnson – Famous For (I Believe)
2. Chris Tomlin f/Lady A – Who You Are to Me
1. CAIN – Rise Up (Lazarus) – 1st week at #1

NEW MUSIC FRIDAY – new Christmas songs this week:

for King and Country f/NEEDTOBREATHE – O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=draHA_9MS18

Matthew West – The Hope of Christmas

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27rMrWqJsNA

Leanna Crawford – Christmas Dreamin’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzlZjnBI-ao

Here’s Leanna’s bus tour version video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIvyvUomsdA

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Zoe

December 4, 2020 0

NZ Top 10 for 11/27/20

Praise the Lord it’s Friday and Happy Thanksgiving weekend! Here’s this week’s countdown:

10. Elevation Worship f/ Brandon Lake – Graves into Gardens
9. Danny Gokey – Love God, Love People
8. Josh Wilson – Revolutionary
7. Matthew West – Truth Be Told
6. NEEDTOBREATHE – Who Am I
5. Zach Williams f/ Dolly Parton – There Was Jesus
4. Tauren Wells f/Jenn Johnson – Famous For (I Believe)
3. We The Kingdom – God So Loved
2. CAIN – Rise Up (Lazarus)
1. Chris Tomlin f/Lady A – Who You Are to Me (4th week at #1; 3rd straight week)

NEW MUSIC FRIDAY + video links – new Christmas music for 2020 from:

Francesca Battistelli – Behold Him

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulGqyckf-oI

Also watch the ‘making of the album cover’ video by clicking here!

Marc Martel f/Amy Grant – The Christmas Waltz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iptEtoTdl-I

Micah Tyler – Feels Like Joy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeVBCFfZXW4

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Alyssa

November 27, 2020 0

NZ Top 10 for 11/13/20

Praise the Lord it’s Friday! Here’s this week’s countdown:

10. Colton Dixon – Miracles
9. Matthew West – Truth Be Told
8. NEEDTOBREATHE – Who Am I
7. Josh Wilson – Revolutionary
6. Danny Gokey – Love God, Love People
5. Zach Williams f/Dolly Parton – There Was Jesus
4. Tauren Wells f/Jenn Johnson – Famous For (I Believe)
3. We the Kingdom – God So Loved
2. CAIN – Rise Up (Lazarus)
1. Chris Tomlin f/Lady A – Who You Are to Me (2nd week at #1, also #1 on 10/30)

NEW MUSIC FRIDAY – we added three new ones this week, including two Christmas songs!

Jeremy Camp – Out of My Hands