You’re in the right place!

You have found a place to encounter God and people who care about you – just as you are, right where you are, anytime. Our welcoming, energizing community worship premiers at 10:30 AM every Sunday in the beautiful and historic Red Brick Church. We are fully accessible, and street and lot parking is available. Get news and event information in your inbox every week by subscribing to our weekly Connections email newsletter. Just send your email address by text message:

Text COLDSPRINGNJ to 22828 to get started.

Get your Advent Worship Guide (click here)

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Message and Music preview!

We are discovering God’s joy at the edges of Christmas!

Message Preview

This third week of Advent is about experiencing our Christmas DNA in the margins. On the edges of life. While we often gravitate towards the center, We will find God’s joyful intervention in our world at the curbs and outer boundaries, where we least expect it. Just ask John the Baptizer. He was wondering if Jesus was the One because, from his point of view, something about Jesus wasn’t adding up. We will see how Jesus sets him straight with the crowds surrounding the prophet John by the Jordan. We will also hear Isaiah’s shocking prophetic message for everyone to rejoice as God leads us to discover hope and healing. This week, find hope and encouragement to live your very best life not only in the center but also in the margins.

Music Preview

We begin with our Advent countdown that sets the theme for our worship experience. Jayne McDonough will accompany Beverly Mate singing “The Snow Lay on the Ground”.This is one instance where we can see how one Christmas Carol was built upon another as the refrain quotes the original Latin refrain of O Come Let Us Adore Him. Our first hymn today is “The First Nowell.” Nowell is the English form of the French Noel, a shout of joy formerly used at Christmas.

We close with Angels From the Realms of Glory. This familiar carol was first published as a poem in the Christmas Eve 1816 issue of a newspaper in Sheffield, England. The tune name celebrates the location of a prominent Presbyterian Church in London, sometimes called the “Presbyterian cathedral.”

Whatever your religious affiliation, or none at all, we all hear Jesus say, “Come to me all who are overburdened, and find rest for your soul!” Everyone is welcome at Cold Spring Church. Yes, everyone!

Enjoy sitting with others from greater Cape May as we worship together. We simplified our service and made participation even easier with our Worship Guide and lyric videos displayed on a large screen.

Worship with us on YouTube (click here)

Physical distancing is recommended but not required!

You have found a place to encounter God and people who care about you – just as you are, right where you are, anytime. Subscribe to our weekly Connections email newsletter. Sign up here!

Energize your life and discover the amazing love of Jesus! This week is the perfect time to join us in person for worship. Enjoy live music, solo, lyric videos, and a message of hope from God’s word.

We are excited to welcome you to worship in our historic Red Brick Church that premiers on Sundays at 10:30 AM.

You’re in the right place!

You have found a place to encounter God and people who care about you – just as you are, right where you are, anytime. Our welcoming, energizing community worship premiers at 10:30 AM every Sunday in the beautiful and historic Red Brick Church. We are fully accessible, and street and lot parking is available. Get news and event information in your inbox every week by subscribing to our weekly Connections email newsletter. Just send your email address by text message:

Text COLDSPRINGNJ to 22828 to get started.

Get your Advent Worship Guide (click here)

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Message and Music preview!

Experience the Story from the original Christmas Storyteller

Message Preview

The Second Sunday of Advent invites us to prepare for something fantastic. News that’s worthy of being shouted from the mountaintops, or posted to your Instagram account, or texted to a friend. Yes. It’s that fantastic because there is nothing ordinary about the preparatory days that lead us to celebrating Christmas. We will flesh out God’s story as we hear the prophet Isaiah tell of a messenger to come. Five hundred years later, John the Baptizer fulfilled the prophecy and prepared the way for Jesus.

Christianity is a religion, but so much more. We don’t follow a religion. We follow Jesus, the Peace of God that forever connects divinity with humanity. God becoming human is in the Church’s (and our) spiritual DNA as we become transformed by the transcendent into the imminent. The Word and Spirit became flesh and blood. Christmas is the story of this peace connection of the divine and human.

This week we will connect with John the Baptizer who expressed empathy. Empathy is rooted deep within the DNA of our church, but it can be developed, and improved, through learning. Understanding and clarifying our own values, but also understanding others’ values, is essential to authentic living. Expressing empathy is essential for effective storytelling—storytelling that can transform lives. We too often tell a Christmas story about us. But its so much more. When the story is all about the storyteller, little empathy is expressed and impact on others is marginal. And stories rooted in ourselves alone are rarely interesting or effective. But when the storyteller internalizes the Story and pays attention to others, captures the experiences, emotions, and context of the listeners, empathy rises, which empowers life-changing behaviors.

Don’t talk to their minds, talk to their hearts. —Nelson Mandela

John the Baptist does just that in our Gospel reading and message this week, and we can too.

Music Preview

We begin with our Advent countdown that sets the theme for our worship experience. Jayne McDonough will accompany Beverly Mate singing. Our first hymn is Hark the Herald Angels Sing. The tune for this carol was composed by Mendelssohn, who himself was a Messianic Jew. It is from the second chorus of a cantata he wrote in 1840. The cantata commemorates Johann Gutenberg and the invention of the printing press. Mendelssohn strictly warned that his composition had a purely secular purpose. However, in 1856, long after both Wesley and Mendelssohn were dead, Dr. William Cummings ignored both of their wishes and joined the lyrics by Wesley with the music by Mendelssohn for the first time. As a result, the modern version of this beautiful, gospel-centered carol was born, and generations ever since have made this hymn a Christmas favorite.

We close with Go, Tell It On The Mountain. The refrain theme comes from Old Testament passages in which praise to God for his acts of deliverance. Acclamations are shouted, both literally and metaphorically, from the mountaintops (Isa. 42:11). While the three stanzas tell the essence of the Christmas story, the refrain underscores the missionary impetus of the Christian church: “As you go, make disciples of all nations” (Matt. 28:19). The “Go, tell,” which initially applied to the singers caroling on the university campus, signals us to leave the comfortable confines of Christian worship and “Go, tell” the message of Christ’s redemption to the whole world.

Whatever your religious affiliation, or none at all, we all hear Jesus say, “Come to me all who are overburdened, and find rest for your soul!” Everyone is welcome at Cold Spring Church. Yes, everyone!

Enjoy sitting with others from greater Cape May as we worship together. We simplified our service and made participation even easier with our Worship Guide and lyric videos displayed on a large screen.

Worship with us on YouTube (click here)

Physical distancing is recommended but not required!

You have found a place to encounter God and people who care about you – just as you are, right where you are, anytime. Subscribe to our weekly Connections email newsletter. Sign up here!

Energize your life and discover the amazing love of Jesus! This week is the perfect time to join us in person for worship. Enjoy live music, solo, lyric videos, and a message of hope from God’s word.

We are excited to welcome you to worship in our historic Red Brick Church that premiers on Sundays at 10:30 AM.

You’re in the right place!

You have found a place to encounter God and people who care about you – just as you are, right where you are, anytime. Our welcoming, energizing community worship premiers at 10:30 AM every Sunday in the beautiful and historic Red Brick Church. We are fully accessible, and street and lot parking is available. Get news and event information in your inbox every week by subscribing to our weekly Connections email newsletter. Just send your email address by text message:

Text COLDSPRINGNJ to 22828 to get started.

Get your Advent Worship Guide (click here)

---

Message and Music preview!

Reboot your spiritual life with Christmas DNA!

Message Preview

Welcome to the first week of Advent as the lectionary and liturgical cycle reboots. Why a reboot? Many might surmise that since Jesus has already come, that’s old news. But the Good News is not just about a one-time, distantly past event. Jesus’ birth is an event from the past, but we retell and relive the Greatest Story Ever Told each year because that one event changed everything! The Christmas story is the DNA of our spiritual community as followers of Jesus. Our ADVENTure anticipates what is to come—watching and waiting for the promised Messiah— Jesus.

You will want to worship with us on the First Sunday of Advent when we hear the prophet proclaim, “The Lord is our Righteousness” (Jeremiah 33:16). Advent is the time to realize that God is still doing marvelous things and continues to enter and transform our lives. When Jesus “moved into our neighborhood” (John 1:14), he moved in for good! Jesus is not historically bound to the past. We can enjoy a dynamic relationship with Christ right now and into the future!

During the four weeks of Advent that culminates on Christmas Eve, we watch and wait for Jesus’ spiritual reboot of our lives, transforming our world, communities, and lives. How will we experience hope? By watching and waiting, actively engaging, and being open to the Spirit of Christ today, this Advent season.

In our Gospel reading from Matthew 25:36-44, we hint at the radical nature of Christ’s entering our world. We watch in hope—(What are you watching for during these unprecedented times?) and wait in hope. If you were waiting for a sign, this is our Christmas reboot.

Music Preview

We begin with our Advent countdown that sets the theme for our worship experience. Jayne McDonough will accompany Barbara Cain singing There’s A Song In the Air. Following the message we will sing and enjoy the lyric video Come Thou Long Expected Jesus. With it’s opening invitation “Come,” this hymn sounds the note of hope and anticipation that characterizes the Advent season (from the Latin adventus “coming”). Its blending of memory and hope helps us to give voice to our present faith as we stand between the past and the future. Before the benediction we will sing O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, a solemn and delicate carol originally written in Latin with a title of ‘Veni, Veni, Emmanuel’ about 1710. The English translation of this Advent carol came about in 1851 when the priest and scholar John Mason Neale’s version was featured in the pages of The Hymnal Noted – a key text in the history of hymns. Let’s join in watching and waiting for the promised Messiah, Emmanuel (God is here).

Whatever your religious affiliation, or none at all, we all hear Jesus say, “Come to me all who are overburdened, and find rest for your soul!” Everyone is welcome at Cold Spring Church. Yes, everyone!

Enjoy sitting with others from greater Cape May as we worship together. We simplified our service and made participation even easier with our Worship Guide and lyric videos displayed on a large screen.

Worship with us on YouTube (click here)

Physical distancing is recommended but not required!

You have found a place to encounter God and people who care about you – just as you are, right where you are, anytime. Subscribe to our weekly Connections email newsletter. Sign up here!

Energize your life and discover the amazing love of Jesus! This week is the perfect time to join us in person for worship. Enjoy live music, solo, lyric videos, and a message of hope from God’s word.

We are excited to welcome you to worship in our historic Red Brick Church that premiers on Sundays at 10:30 AM.