You are invited to Worship on August 31 at 10 am Service.
The bulletin for this Sunday is available for viewing HERE.
You can worship live on ZOOM by clicking the link below:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/9658816441 Meeting ID: 965 881 6441
You can also watch Sunday services at your convenience by going to our website “watsonville1stumc.org” and click YouTube or Facebook. Each Sunday worship will be uploaded on Sunday afternoon for your viewing.
Ordinary Time
In God’s Eternal Time
Sunday, August 31, 2025, 10 am
Children’s Time: “What Is Prayer?” by Pastor John
Special Music: None but the Lonely Heart, Marina Thomas
by P. Tchaikovsky
Message “The Nature of Contemplative Prayer” Rev. John Song
We live in a world that values action, movement, and achievement. And often even our times of rest or vacation are overloaded with a long list of things to do. Many people begin spiritual practice with habits of high activity in place, and want to approach prayer and meditation from a goal-driven perspective. The best gifts we can give ourselves is the permission to simply be in silence—not striving, not doing, not even really meditating.
This Sunday we will examine the subtlety and the elusive nature of contemplative prayer that unites us with the divine.
1 King 19: 11-13
The Sound of Silence
God said to Elijah, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
There’s a quiet place
in my head like an egg
hidden in a nest. A place
I go when the world is loud.
A moss-green forest with birds.
Where do you go when the world is loud?
~ Kate Coombs
“The quieter you become,
the more you can hear.”
~ Ram Dass
