Scott Fillmer » christmas

Christmas Eve, Where Christ Lights Up the Darkness

Scott Fillmer — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 02:54:07 +0000

It was a wonderful night at Cornerstone tonight celebrating the coming birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. I always love the candles, it is such a reminder that Christ is the one who brought light into the darkness of this world, and walked among us as well. Merry Christmas everyone.

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Come Join The Cornerstone Church Food Drop 2012

Scott Fillmer — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 22:35:18 +0000

This year at our church to celebrate Christmas, instead of doing fancy decorations and traditional garland we have been planning for quite a while now to do a “food drop” for the Auburn area. So if you were to walk around the church right now you will see boxes everywhere. A Christmas tree made out of boxes, presents made out of gigantic boxes, and the filled and returned boxes we started to give out this past Sunday. The way we have tried to communicate this on our own website is that we are never more like Jesus then when we serve others. And throughout the month of December, Cornerstone members and attenders (or anyone who wants to be a part giving back to our community) will be given the opportunity to serve others using a simple box. We are asking everyone to:

Pick up a box and packing list from the Cornerstone lobby.
Pack the box full of food for families in Lee County.
Return the filled box to the church by January 1, 2012.
Saturday, January 7, gather at Cornerstone and pack the SUV’s, minivans and pickup trucks with these boxes and head out to specific communities to pass out these boxes to families in our area. (We will work with the Food Bank of East Alabama to target the communities in the greatest need.)

This is an opportunity to make a tangible difference in someone’s life by offering basic necessities that many of us take for granted. We can make the New Year great for our community with our simple gift of a box of food, and we are trying to have over 1,000 boxes filled by January 1st. For more information you can also visit the Cornerstone Food Drop 2012 info page, or visit Lee’s blog post as well.

If you are reading this and saying to yourself, I don’t go to Cornerstone so that’s nice and all but who cares… well, you don’t have to, but you can still participate. If you are in the Auburn-Opelika area, just come by the church lobby and pick up a packing list and a box and return it before January 1st.

Either way, whether you participate or not, I hope you can make it a priority this Christmas to go beyond the normal gift giving and remember others who are not as fortunate. I love that about Cornerstone, and I love seeing the church be the church. We need to think, learn, study, and understand God’s word, but we also need to go… and do. How can we say we believe what the scriptures say unless we actually do what it says. I hate the commercialization that always goes along with this time of year, but I love this. Hope you will help make it a success as well.

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Merry Christmas to My Blogroll with Some Linklove

Scott Fillmer — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 23:13:12 +0000

This is usually one of the busiest days for getting from place to place with family functions, but for us, it is normally a nice quiet day here at the house. Today was similar. I was able to take a nice bike ride and enjoy some quiet time here at our house. I do this every so often but for Christmas today I wanted to highlight some of the blogs I read that are based somewhat on or about our faith in Jesus. So are you on the list? If not, please let me know, I love to add new blogs to my feed reader and it might be I just haven’t come across your blog yet.

Some here is some Christmas link love for some of the blogs I read.

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50,000 Pairs of Shoes in 50 Days :: Update

Scott Fillmer — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 17:37:43 +0000

Christmas is fast approaching and soon (for some) the gifts purchased up to this point will translate into a lousy January, but if you haven’t finished quite yet, please consider the 50,000 Shoes campaign. I wanted to give a quick update to my post back in November called Soles4Souls Blogging Challenge, 50,000 Pairs of Shoes in 50 Days. As b/ said in his post, there are so many worthy charities around this time of year, but one that is truly worthy is spending just $5 for 2 pairs of shoes for someone who doesn’t have any shoes.

I was listening to a song called “The Christian” this morning when I was getting ready for work, and it made me think, is how people see Christians, or perhaps how we see others who call themselves Christians? The third verse really stood out to me (in bold below) as I thought about the 50000 shoes campaign and how easy it should be for us bloggers to meet the goal put forth by Anne Jackson (they are even giving away really cool stuff like a Nintendo Wii and a MacBook).

What good does it do to just talk. I love when I find people who have taken their blogs or websites and have actually done something worth wild. Even if they don’t reach their goal it was great to see how many shoes have been donated from total strangers across the Internet. Consider these verses below. They may not have anything at all to do with shoes, but this (secular) song points out how we put ourselves first.

It’s a hell of a time to be thinking about heaven
Didn’t you forget the golden rule
You’ve been acting like Jesus owes you a favor
But he’s a little smart for you to fool

You complain how you forgets the gospel
You remind them seek and you shall find
Maybe youth will have a time for seeking
After they clean up what you left behind

You were right there when the plate was passed last Sunday
That’s the second time you’ve been to church all year
Could you really call yourself a Christian
If charity cost half as much as beer

You pray a little more as you grow older
You get religion as your hair turns gray
But you don’t need to worry about hereafter
Just worry what you’re going to do today

Cause it’s a hell of a time to be thinking about heaven
Didn’t you forget the golden rule
You’ve been acting like Jesus owes you a favor
But he’s a little smart for you to fool
Yes my friend I think you’ve blown your cool

—- The Christian, [Buffett]

After reading Tony Morgan’s post about 50,000 shoes called All Talk and No Action?, where he talked about the correlation between words and action, I was quite disgusted, or more like disappointed I guess. At that point, over 3500 blog posts had been written about the 50,000 shoes and only 1500 of those posts translated into the action of actually purchasing a pair of shoes. That means not only did not all the blog writers donate, but they also didn’t get any of their readers to donate either. We are talking $5 here, less than that cup of coffee at Starbucks or that 12-pack at the grocery store.

Just a quick look this morning found these blog posts from just the past few hours and days. Let’s be bloggers of action, not just words.

My blog has approximately 100 subscribers. If each one of us donated $5 that would translate into 200 pairs of shoes. Deb and I are going to go ahead and make another Christmas donation and I would ask my readers if they were led to give to a worthy cause this Christmas check out 50,000 shoes. I know Anne Jackson personally (although briefly) and I know she has put a lot into achieving this goal. You can’t go wrong by giving someone a pair of shoes who doesn’t have any.

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How is Your Simple Christmas Going :: Friday Feet

Scott Fillmer — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 00:25:04 +0000

Our church has been going through a series called Simple Christmas and it was going well until this week. This week has been so incredibly crazy for me I haven’t even had time to do a blog post. Part of it is the photo in my Friday Feet post today. You can see a better description of this new entry into our house here.

I have a huge list of blog entries and all kinds of new posts to do here, hopefully I can get to them over the weekend. Have a nice weekend everyone.

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Doing Simple Christmas with Living Water International

Scott Fillmer — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 15:05:18 +0000

Our church started a new series yesterday called Simple Christmas (see Advent and A Christmas thought) marking the beginning of the Advent season, and what started on Black Friday as the Christmas shopping season.

Today is Cyber Monday as it has been called, the day when online retailers do their big sales and discounts that the B&M stores did on Friday. One of the ways Deb and I are going to celebrate Christmas this year is In keeping with the series theme we started on Sunday we are going to make a few donations to Living Water. So, if you were expecting to get an actual physical Christmas present from us this year, this might be it. Our church already knows the impact a well can have (see Day 1 and Creative Chaos 14 // Allowing God to Work in Your Church), when our church raised over $30,000 to dig a well (and much more) for a sister plant church in Uganda. Anyone involved will tell you it was an incredible experience, and it doesn’t take much to make a difference.

This of course isn’t the only way to make Christmas simple again. The idea is to keep our focus on Jesus this Christmas and not the chaos and craziness that goes along with the Christmas shopping frenzy and that might be something totally different to your family than it is to my family. Since Deb and I are in a house of two (minus the dogs), we don’t normally go nuts for any holiday, but our focus is not always on Jesus either.

Merry Christmas everyone.

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Thanksgiving Photo Shoot for a Christmas Card

Scott Fillmer — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 01:30:39 +0000

Thanksgiving weekend is just about to wind down and move into the 25 day rush to Christmas. It was a nice weekend with some nice rain showers and lots of food. I just finished watching one of the more lousy versions of the Iron bowl (if you are an Auburn fan) over the last few years and it ended in an Alabama romp. Alabama played well and will have a full plate next week coming up against Florida in the SEC Championship game.

Early on Thursday I did a quick photo shoot for Dale and Larry Fillmer (that would be mom and dad) for their Christmas card. Here are a few from the shoot that were my favorites (don’t think any of these made it on the card, but these were the ones I liked). Looking forward to the new series that starts tomorrow at cumc called Simple Christmas. Something we can all take to heart, focusing on what is important at Christmas and why we celebrate the holiday in the first place, can’t wait. If you are in the Auburn area, come by at 9am or 11am and see what it’s all about.

I am really looking forward to this Christmas season and all the possibilities of the upcoming new year. I always look forward to the changing of the new year. It always seems to bring change and a new time of growth for my family, as it is with many, and I can’t wait to see what the Lord has in store for us in 2009. Celebrating a Simple Christmas is going to be a great place for my family to transition into the new year.

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Giving Up Thanksgiving For Christmas This Year?

Scott Fillmer — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 15:29:44 +0000

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone. I am sitting here about to turn on the Macy’s Day Parade and for some reason thinking about Christmas and New Years Day and beyond. For some reason this year it seems like we have skipped over Thanksgiving and are bolting ourselves into the Christmas day time. Retail stores are probably trying desperately to bring in people early this year, and around town I started seeing Christmas displays and hearing Christmas music over the intercom before Halloween was over.

I don’t remember Christmas coming right after Halloween last year but it seems to have creeped its way farther up the calendar this year. I like Thanksgiving and would like to take one of these at a time before we go on to the next one, but I realize that Thanksgiving is not a real big commercial season and no one gives presents from Best Buy at Thanksgiving (thank goodness). If there is no commercial purpose for the holiday, it seems that most businesses, TV and radio will just skip over day now. I hate rushing through life. We rush here and there all day every day and I would like to celebrate one holiday at a time. Deb and I are not real big fans of holiday days anyway, it always disrupts the routines of everything, but I would like to enjoy one before going on to the next.

So, today being Thanksgiving I figured I would do the typical what I am thankful for post. A few things I am thankful for.

My Savior
My wife, family, friends
that I have food to eat, a place to live
I am able to live in a free country
clean water and shoes

Those are nothing earth shattering of course, but still something I am continually aware of and thankful for. Early this week on Tuesday a friend of mine, Josh, did a great explanation of why we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, why it is important, and what was going on at the time. It was during the Passover Celebration as explained in Exodus, but when Jesus and the disciples celebrated passover supper, Jesus spoke and said:

Matthew 26: 26 While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take and eat; this is my body.” 27 Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. 28 This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. 29 I tell you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father’s kingdom.” 30 When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.

Jesus “gave thanks” during this celebration dinner, and today we give thanks as well. I do like to remember that this is generally an American holiday (see Thanksgiving is a U.S. Holiday, Think Global) and we should not forget that this is not a world-wide holiday. Last year, Deb and I spent the holiday on our boat (sort of) for a few hours and ended up coming back home after their wifi went down (see here). It’s a year later and we are going to spend the day here at the house with my father-in-law David, (see Deb’s mom’s blog) and watching some football.

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Merry Christmas to Everyone on the Top 15 List

Scott's Misc — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 14:05:33 +0000

I am replacing my normal Monday morning top 15 list with a holiday greeting for everyone this week. I hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas and holiday season. I have taken some time off writing, as many of the bloggers have, and I am getting ready to gear up for next year. There have been some really interesting articles written over the last and I am going to include those in my normal weekly post on Monday when everything gets ramped back up again. Until then, I hope everyone has a wonderful and restful time this week.

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Christmas at a Marina is Beautiful with Light on the Sailboats

Scott Fillmer — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 01:25:40 +0000

Christmas time at a marina is really pretty. All the boats get all dressed up and at night they light up the sky with Christmas lights. Sailboats with masts rising 40 feet above the water line is really a site to see. I can’t imagine how it looks up north where it is so cold there is probably not a sole that wants to step outside, but down here in the Gulf Coast, it is at least bearable (for us that is mid-60′s).

We made it down to the marina tonight just in time to see all the masts with their lights on (our is the one in the middle that has no lights on it at the moment).Â Trying to take a photo on a moving platform, in the dark, of lights, is not the easiest thing to do, but you get the idea.Â If you have never visited a marina in the winter or during Christmas, it is one of the best times to be there.

Being that I have been a photographer for more than 10 years now I have a hard time adjusting to taking images without a tripod, especially AT NIGHT. But, a tripod does little use on a sailboat that is constantly in motion, so this is the best I could do with hand holding, lights, at night. It was a wonderful site at night.

There were some very strange unique displays as well, but I always love seeing lights to celebrate our Savior’s birth. DK and myself would just assume you leave lights up for Christmas all year round but that doesn’t seems to want to catch on (unless you are really lazy). Maybe we will start a trend.

This display was one of the rather unique ones of the season. This is not a sailboat but a charter boat and yes, that is a Christmas tree at the top.

We didn’t put up any lights this year but we did enjoy those who did. Maybe next year. That is DK’s head just over the rail line (knitting) as the sun is going down. It was a wonderful weekend.