Spiritual Peaks

As Christians, we all have spiritual peaks and valleys, and this week so far included two spiritual peaks for me--in addition to the usual joy of worshiping with my Christian family at Central.

The first was last night when over 300 of us gathered at Cincinnati Christian University with members of the Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, and Church of Christ to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Thomas Campbell's Declaration and Address. In this document he called people to go back to the Bible and use the Bible as the sole source of our name and the sole direction for our lives. These three faith traditions all came from the break of the Presbyterian Church with Campbell. See http://greatcommunion.org/ to learn more about it. The Elmwood Church of Christ where son Josh's family worships was also involved in a similar gathering of 700 people at 11 Sunday morning. They began with a powerful video that you can view at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppPrZt0SgeI .

In Cincinnati, we had three speakers, one from each strand. One of the university professors dressed as Thomas Campbell read some of his propositions from the document. The congregational singing was marvelous. The person who spoke before we shared communion commented on the great harmonies.

There were over 40 people there from our congregation and probably 70+ from Churches of Christ in the Cincinnati area. I met Everly Rose, wife of another minister, and we hit it off right away. When she said she didn't know if she could remember my name, I said, "It's Anita with an L. That sometimes helps." She laughed and answered, "Mine is Beverly without the B." So we bonded through our unusual names!

The second spiritual highlight of my week was our mothers of preschoolers' Bible study this morning. I adore these young women who come together to share their lives and their love for the Lord. Most Mondays, it's half prayer group, half Bible study. Today it was all prayer group. Sharing praises and problems and praying about them bonds in a way that nothing else does. We are blessed to have our dear Fay, wife of one of our elders, who keeps the children (3-6 children, ages 3 weeks to 4 years) occupied in the basement playroom while we meet around the kitchen table. And we prayed for daughter Kelsey, who doesn't yet qualify as a mother but will in April. We're excited that we can finally tell this good news for our family. Blessings overflow!