It happened just a few days ago in Budapest, Hungary. We celebrated our first-ever yearly meeting of the Evangelical Friends Churches in Eastern Europe. People - all kinds of people - gathered: Hungarians, Romanians, Gypsies and a few Americans.

  •  We were united in our love for Christ and by our desire to know Him and to make Him known.
  •  We were blessed by fellowship, "unity of heart and mind" and excellent, extended times of worship. (On the final Sunday, for example, we enjoyed two worship services, totaling over 7 hours.)
  •  We were challenged by the enormous need: most people in Eastern Europe do not attend any church and even more do not know what it means to have a personal relationship of love and discipleship with Jesus Christ.

It was a time when Christmas and Thanksgiving came together.

Christmas is all about the coming of our Savior - the word becoming flesh, the God of the universe birthed as a baby so that He might connect with us humans on our fleshy, physical, personal terms.
Thanksgiving is all about gratitude, overflowing thankfulness, a wondrous sense of how much God has lavished upon us: his love, his Son, his purpose, his power, his presence, his future, his forgiveness, his friendship.

And when we try -

(after all, try is all we can do, given our finiteness, our inability to fully comprehend the fullness of God's grace and gifts)

when we try -

to put together this unprecedented news of our Savior coming to us in such unprecedented ways - virgin conceived, stable-room birthed, word becomes flesh, God with us, watch him teach and heal and care, see Him on the cross, meet him on the resurrection side of the empty tomb

when we try -

to get our arms and our hearts around the amazing love and grace of Jesus we have a chance to express an unstoppable thankfulness and experience wonder and worship - the kind Jesus called, "in spirit and in truth."

During this season of Thanksgiving and Christmas,
I want you to know how very deeply I value and appreciate your partnership in Christ - here in the States across our nearly 100 EFC-ER churches and related ministries - and around the world as God gives us opportunity to multiply ministry for His glory and the blessing of thousands.

May you know - better yet, may you experience - the blessing of a season filled with thankfulness, heart-felt worship of our Savior and Lord and a rich generosity toward people.

Sounds just like Jesus, doesn't it?
Yours and His,

Dr. John P. Williams, Jr.
General Superintendent, EFC-ER