3255 Edgemont Blvd. North Vancouver, BC V7R 2P1 Ph: 604-980-6071 churchoffice@highlandsunited.org www.highlandsunited.org Rev Will Sparks, Lead Minister

Highlights December 11, 2016

Third Sunday in Advent

Joy: “Through the Eyes of Mary”

Every child is holy. Imagine the deep joy rising in the heart of Mary, the mother of Jesus.

Highlands Upcoming Events and Programs This list does not include rooms booked for outside rentals (Guides, AA, Alanon etc).

Highlands Event Calendar can be viewed on our web site at: www.highlandsunited.org

Sunday, December 11 9:30 am Coffee/Tea in the Welcoming Space 10:00 am Sunday Worship Service, Sanctuary 1:30 pm Bell Ringing Rehearsal, Room 201 7:00 pm Highlands Family Christmas Concert, 1:30 pm Bell Ringing Rehearsal, Room 201

Monday, December 12 9:00 am Highlands Quilting Team, Choir Room 9:00 am Saturday Lunch Hamper Assembly 1:00 pm Prayer Shawl Ministry, Choir Room 7:00 pm Seycove Secondary Concert (re-scheduled from Friday, Dec 9th) 7:00 pm Healing Hands, Chapel & Choir Room 7:30 pm Badminton, Gym

Tuesday, December 13 9:30 am ESL/ELL Christmas Party set-up 7:30 pm Higher Ground Christmas Concert, Sanctuary

Wednesday, December 14 7:30 am Men’s Breakfast, Eighties Restaurant

Thursday, December 15 5:30 pm Thursday Dinner, Gym (Last one for 2016!) 6:00 pm Genesis Too Choir Rehearsal, Sanctuary 6:30 pm God’s Free Spirits Choir Rehearsal, Choir Room 8:00 pm Spirit Singers Choir Rehearsal, Sanctuary

Friday, December 16 7:00 pm FUEL Youth Group

Saturday, December 17 1:00 pm Saturday Lunch at North Shore Neighbourhood House

Sunday December 18 9:30 am Coffee/Tea in the Welcoming Space 10:00 am Sunday Worship Service, Sanctuary 1:30 pm Bell Ringing Rehearsal, Room 201 3:00 pm Marcus Mosely Chorale Christmas Concert, Sanctuary

Highlands is re-working our Wifi System!! You may have noticed that our sanctuary and guest free wifi is unpredictable. It is time to assess the system in the hope of offering consistent quality wifi to congregation and guests, committees and working groups within the church.

So, we are looking for a wifi-master: someone with skills and a little time to work with the office and our provider to improve our wifi. If you have skills and interest, please talk to Carol or Will: 604-890-6071, churchoffice@highlandsunited.org, will.sparks@highlandsunited.org

Greeters Needed for Gospel Service 10pm Christmas Eve We are looking for a few people to help with greeting and handing out bulletins at our 10:00pm Gospel Service on Christmas Eve - it’s a fun job and you get to meet lots of lovely people who are all in really good moods (’cause, of course, it’s Christmas Eve!)

If you’d like join the Christmas angels, please speak to Joy Dancey (jdancey@telus.net)

Christmas Hamper Ministry Coordinated by our kind and efficient Lora Gardner will again respond to requests for help in this Christmas season. People in the congregation and community can contact Lora Gardiner or Will Sparks directly, on their own behalf, or on behalf of someone they know needs assistance. This ministry is supported by the Spirit Singers, the Local Connections Committee and through individual donations. For more information e-mail Lora Gardiner at: loragardiner@shaw.ca or by phone at: 604-987-0982

A Message from the Saturday Lunch Team:

Christmas Hampers for Saturday Lunch Guests Every Christmas, for the past 5 years, the Saturday Lunch team, with the help of others in the church and community, has given each of our guests a substantial hamper of food, toiletries, a hat, gloves and socks. We plan to do the same this year on December 17th. The items we include are listed on the next page. We like all the gift bags to be the same, so if you are able to donate, please consider giving multiple items of the same thing. For example, last year, one donor gave

20 cans of fruit. Some donors gave money so that we can purchase missing items, during the week before we give the hampers out. We received a wonderful gift of food, clothing and money from the North Shore Tai Chi Spirit groups. There was enough money that we were able to give each guest a $10 Walmart gift card. If you wish to be a donor please email Ruth Kershaw, ruthkershaw@telus.net and tell her what you'll buy or call her at 604-929-0421. She will keep a tally so we don't end up with 100 of one thing and none of another item. If you wish to donate money, please make the cheque payable to Highlands United Church noting Saturday Lunch Food Hampers. You can bring your donation to the church, clearly marked Saturday Lunch Hampers. We need all donations in by Sunday, December 11, but would be grateful to have them sooner. Place your non perishable donation in the Saturday Lunch Hamper boxes near the office and in the welcoming space.

This year again, the Scouts are contributing all the pasta and pasta sauce and the Highlands children and youth are making 60 care packages containing a Christmas cracker containing candy, hot chocolate, packages of oatmeal, jam and a hand-made card. The remaining items we'd like to collect are listed on the next page. We need all the donations by Sunday, December11th.

Blessings to you and your family for a wonderful Christmas season from the Saturday Lunch Team:

Wendy Grant, Dave and Judy Thomas, Wendy McNaughton, Lora and Brian Gardiner, and Ruth Kershaw

Items needed for each of the 60 gift bags

• Small Cans of Salmon or Tuna

• 540ml Cans of Chunky soup

• 284ml Cans of soup

• 398ml Cans of Baked beans

• Dry soup packages (Knorr, Lipton)

• 400ml cans of fruit

• Boxes of Kraft Dinner

• 225gm Boxes of crackers

• Small Bottles of Peanut Butter

• Socks: 30 pairs dark, warm Men’s socks

• Socks: 30 pairs warm Women’s socks

• Touques: 30 Men’s Black or Navy Thinsulate

• Touques: 30 Women’s variety of colours

• Gloves and mitts: 30 dark men's, 30 variety women's (we would like to give substantial gloves not the small stretchy gloves)

• Tooth brushes ~ individually packaged

• 130ml Tooth paste

• 350ml Shampoo-Conditioner (all in 1)

• Bars of soap

Sunday

Friends of Highlands' Caring Ministry What an active and involved congregation we have been for the last few weeks.......and how appreciative our families and community have been!

As we approach Christmas, our thoughts turn to members of our church family who are unable to get out and participate in the life of Highlands, or those who are ill or recently bereaved.

The Highlands Caring Ministry invites you to share the blessings of the Christmas season with friends, by delivering a small gift package to them, and having a brief visit.

The caring ministry gift packages will be ready to be picked up in the gym foyer at noon Wednesday, December 14th for delivery to our shut ins. If you are able to pick up a package or two and deliver them in the next week that would be wonderful.

If you are able to help in this way, it would be a real Christmas gift to many of our congregation.

Your willingness to participate is much appreciated, and on behalf of the Caring Ministry, may you all have a very Blessed Christmas season!

With thanks, Tanis van Drimmelen

How to Give Gifts that Give Twice: These are gifts that have real value, and keep on giving: because you are showing your love or friendship for someone close to you as well as giving something to someone who really needs it.

The ideas here benefit the ministry of Highlands partners.

Here’s how:

1. Buy a CD at the Action Table:

• “A Quiet Place”, supporting our Healing Hands ministry

• or “Time to Heal”, supporting First United

2. Donate to First United Church Community Ministry Society.

https://firstunited.ca/ or cheque, payable to Highlands United Church, marked First United.

3. Buy a Multifaith Calendar, “Love & Compassion”, at the Action Table; supporting the ministry of the Multifaith Action Society

4. Help Camp Fircom offer “camperships” for next summer. Last year, Camp Fircom celebrated its biggest summer camp season since the reopening, with 456 campers! The Campership (camping subsidy) program helped 50 children and families come to camp. Fircom’s historic mission of helping families, regardless of their background, access summer camp is still going strong. The success of 2016, however, means that the Campership Fund needs to be refilled so Fircom can help even more children and families next year: when Fircom is offering four full weeks of various summer camps.Support by contributing a one-time donation by cheque or online at www.fircom.ca

5.Choose a Gift with Vision from the Mission and Service fund of the United Church of Canada. Many wonderful partners benefit!

http://www.giftswithvision.ca/ Booklets at the Action Table.

6. Give a Kiva Gift Card: Kiva is a non-profit organization that helps people by organizing small loans. By lending as little as $25 on Kiva, anyone can help a borrower do something like start a small business, go to school, or access clean energy.

Giving a Kiva Card gives the recipient the opportunity to choose borrowers to support. When their loans are repaid, they can use those funds again and again to make even more loans on Kiva. It's truly the gift that keeps on giving! This US non-profit is not a Highlands partner, but is very worthwhile.

Go to www.kiva.org and click “Gifts” at the bottom of the page; or see the Action Table.

The Trans-Mountain Pipeline decision from the Climate and Environment Action Group (CEAG)

Two reports by our North Vancouver MPs which you may like to consider:

Jonathan Wilkinson, MP for North Vancouver and Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, has just released an open letter to the citizens of North Vancouver, explaining his position favouring the TransMountain Pipeline expansion decision. You can read his letter here:

http://jwilkinson.liberal.ca/

Terry Beech, MP for Burnaby North–Seymour and the Parliamentary Secretary for Science, in August presented a report opposing the expansion. You can read that report on his website: http://terrybeech-parl.ca/ He has not made a statement since the decision was announced but has been meeting with his constituents:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/terry-beech-mp-burnaby-north-seymour-faces-constituents-after-kinder-morgan-approval-1.3880540

It’s one more example of why climate change has been called a wicked problem:

“We can define climate change as an economic problem, a technological problem, a moral problem, a social justice problem, a land use problem, a governance problem, an ideological battle between left and right worldviews, or a lack of respect for God’s creation. Each approach will generate different responses, different ways to share the costs, and especially, different language with which to justify action. Or inaction, because some people will refuse to accept that climate change is a problem at all. This is yet another quality that it shares with all other wicked problems.”

-- George Marshall, Don’t Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change. p.96.

Community Events

Postponed to Mon, Dec 12—7pm

Community Events

A Message from Vancouver Youth & Young Adults VanYAYA This Friday we are hosting our Facebook Fundraiser — a fun way to shop online and help raise money for our Vancouver Youth and Young Adult bursary fund. In order to participate in this adventurous new auction, make sure you have added "Vancouver YAYA" as a friend on Facebook and wait for instructions on Friday. Bidding on items will take place as comments on item photos.

Also happening this Friday, December 9th, is the final Social Justice for Youth workshop — Gender in the Media — taking place at Canadian Memorial Church at 6PM. This workshop series, led by the organization Check Your Head, has been a free, fun and informative way to learn about the different social justice issues affecting us here in Vancouver (and all over the world). If you or your youth are interested in joining us for the final evening, please RSVP to andria@vanyaya.bc.ca

Coming up in the new year we have our annual Faith Quest retreat, taking place at Stillwood retreat centre at Cultus Lake, January 6th - January 8th. This event, for grades 7 and up, is an opportunity to challenge and wonder about the big questions of faith. A place where people belong because of their questions, energy, opinions and gifts. A place to have fun, bring all of oneself and explore what really matters. For more information contact Eric Hamlyn at eric@vanyaya.bc.ca or to register visit www.vanyaya.bc.ca

Finally, we would like to extend an invitation to all grades 10-12 students who are interested in joining the Children's Retreat Leadership Team. This is a wonderful opportunity to minister to children and share our faith in meaningful ways. The retreat is happening February 17-19th, 2017 and training dates will happen in advance. For more information visit www.imaginechildrensretreat.ca

While we recognize this is a busy time for so many of you, we do hope you can take a moment to join us wherever you feel called to. Whether that's exploring your faith, learning about the implications the media has on our day to day life, doing some Christmas shopping with a cause, or encouraging the people in your life to help lead.

We so appreciate your ongoing support and care and we wish you an absolutely blessed Christmas season. Blessings from your VANYAYA Ministry Team, Eric & Andria!

A Message from First United Church in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside: CURRENT NEEDS:

Donations of computer desktop workstations, 5 years or younger

TOOTHPASTE AND RAIN PONCHO’S - our most urgent need from the Reception hub is still for these items.

Please contact Heidi Morgan at hmorgan@firstunited.ca or 604-681-8365 x116 if you can help!

ENGAGEMENT OPPORTUNITY – Sewists (sew meets artist) Unite!

Our Operations Manager Jerri, is looking for some wonderful sewers who would be willing to sew table cloths (15) for the tables in our Dining area for Christmas. Supplies and more details will be provided, for those wanting to share their talents. This would be a gift that would keep on giving as we can use them again and again at Christmas time. If you can help, please contact Jerri Morrick directly at jmorrick@firstunited.ca or by calling 604-681-8365 ext 106

Community Events

A Request from Highlands Refugee Committee

Hasna Mohamed (our previously sponsored refugee) has now been here over one year and loves her new Canadian life and friends at Highlands. She has a full time job at Fishworks Restaurant on Lonsdale and continues English language education (also on Lonsdale). Hasna is now looking for a larger living space and would like your help. Do you, or someone you know, have shared accommodation or a small suite which could be rented at a reasonable rate? This would preferably have some cooking facilities , rent in range of $600/mo and be within walking distance of a bus route connecting to Lonsdale in North Vancouver. If you have a place in your home or know of a rental possibility please contact Peter Ackhurst at packhurst@telus.net or 604-926- 3235 Thank you! -Highlands Refugee Committee

Community Events

Concert postponed to Mon. Dec. 12 -7pm