My new website is launched but it still needs a few adjustments. Please see my new website: www.markwilliamennis.com
I hope that you will begin to follow me on my new website.
My Website is changing
God, may we? Yes, you may!
Monday Ministerial Musings
By Rev. Mark William Ennis
2024 Blog #4
January 22, 2024
God, may we? Yes, you may!
People my age grew up playing the game of “Mother, may I?” In this game, one person is picked as the mother and others asked the mother to take different types of steps. Some of the types of steps were interesting. You might ask to take a giant step, an umbrella step, a baby step, or a rabbit step. To take such steps one must ask, “May I?” and the mother would respond, “yes you may.”
I am reminded of this game as I look at the progress, we have made in beginning an Hispanic ministry in our congregation. We have planned this for eight years and have suffered a few futile attempts. For some reason, things were not working well in bringing us toward this outreach. Perhaps it was our lack of ability. Maybe God was not ready to bless our efforts. After several years of futile attempts and asking God, “May we?” God responded, “Yes, you may!”
One year ago, we found a seminary student, who is a native of Columbia, to begin our outreach to Hispanic neighbors and build an Hispanic congregation that will be part of our congregation. This student, Ivan Gil, began work with our classis toward the goal of ordination as a minister of word and sacrament.
Even as he continues his work within our congregation, our nomination committee nominated, and our congregation elected him, to be an elder of the congregation. This will, with the consent of consistory, allow him to be an elder who preaches and be an elder who can serve Holy Communion to this Hispanic Congregation.
Just a few days later, Ivan received a letter from the Reformed Church Ministerial Formation Certification Agency (MFCA). He has been accepted into the program. This is an important step toward his ordination. God granted he, and us, another giant step forward.
Thirty years ago, Hispanics began moving into our community but most of our congregations did not even notice. A decade ago, we tried to do Hispanic outreach, but we really did not know how. Now, God has shown us the way and has allowed us to take a giant step forward.
We are not content to stand where we are. There is plenty more to do to make our Spanish-speaking worshiping community a sustainable one. We continue to ask God, “may we take another step-forward?”
Have you ever been frustrated in your plans, either personal, or for your faith community? Have you ever prayed, “God, may I?” but never heard a response from God, or even worse, heard, “no you may not!” Sometimes we are not ready for the blessing and God will not grant us the blessing until we are ready, or God is not yet ready for reasons we cannot comprehend. Or, perhaps, what we are asking is not in accordance with God’s will.
If God won’t let us take a giant step, or even a baby step, then we must ask ourselves if we are doing what God wills and if maybe we need to better prepare ourselves to receive the blessing. Then, perhaps, God will allow us to take giant steps like he has at our congregation.
#ReformedChurchInAmerica #PastorMarkAuthor.com
#BergenCounty #BergenfieldNJ
#HispanicOutreach #ElderOrdination
#WaitingForGod #God’sTiming
To read more of Pastor Mark’s writings, please look at his website:
My new website, markwilliamennis.com will be launched soon. Please watch for future announcements.
Pastor Mark Cast New Episode
In this episode, Pastor Mark discusses childhood game of “Mother, may I” in the context of asking for God’s blessings. Sometimes we have to wait until the time is right to receive his blessing.
Pastor Mark is a Christian Pastor, author, blogger, and sometimes background actor. He brings all his years of life experience to ask spiritual questions about the ordinary events of life.
Go to this link to hear the podcast: https://rss.com/podcasts/pastormarkchat/1311062/
Coming Soon…
Monday Ministerial Musings
By Rev. Mark William Ennis
2024 Blog #3
January 15, 2024
Finishing the work of Dr. King
Today we celebrate the life, and mourn the death of, Dr. Martin Luther King. Most people that I know refer to this day as “MLK day.” No matter what we call it, it is good that we celebrate his birthday and the work he did during his short life. He was horribly murdered when I was nine years old, and he was only thirty-nine years old.
I remember the fear that white adults had of him when he made speeches, supported civil rights, called for voting, and fought against discrimination. Whites who were in power largely liked the system that was in place and feared losing power if black people were given equal rights. He, and his movement, scared a lot of powerful white people.
I grew up thinking that Dr. King was all about race and racial relations. It was only later in my life that I realized that his causes were much more than that. His major concern was violence, and he made many enemies when he preached against the Vietnam War. For him, economic oppression and discrimination were simply other forms of violence used against people. In this aspect, his work is like that of Gandhi, whose work he studied.
Today, as we celebrate Dr. King’s birthday, I hope we will celebrate the gains that have been made in civil rights, even though we still have a long way to go. Perhaps there is no legal discrimination, but we still have, I am told by black friends, small acts of aggression against them. They tell me that despite being well dressed and professional there are still times when they are looked at with suspicion in certain places. These same friends report that there is a reluctance among white people to invite black people into their homes. According to them, discrimination used to be legal and systemic, now it is largely subtle and done by individuals. The technical term is “micro aggression.”
Dr. King’s work was not always about the macro and systemic. He also addressed the individual work that each person could do for others. He encouraged people to do good works for one another.
In 1957 he made a speech in Montgomery, Alabama and in his address, he is quoted as saying, ““Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others? ‘” What are we doing for those in our neighborhoods and communities who need our help? I pose this for all of us to consider.”
To honor Dr. King, today and every day, we ought to ask ourselves the question, “What are we doing for others?”
What are we doing for others? Let us carefully and sincerely ask ourselves this question today.
#ReformedChurchInAmerica #PastorMarkAuthor.com
#BergenCounty #BergenfieldNJ
#MartinLutherKing #Justice
#DoingForOthers #MLK
To read more of Pastor Mark’s writings, please look at his website:
Pastor Mark Cast
In this episode, Pastor Mark discusses the great work of Dr. Martin Luther King and calls on each of us to do small acts of assistance toward our neighbors as Dr. King asked us to.
Pastor Mark is a Christian Pastor, author, blogger, and sometimes background actor. He brings all his years of life experience to ask spiritual questions about the ordinary events of life.
Go to this link to hear the podcast: https://media.rss.com/pastormarkchat/feed.xml
My new book will be out soon
I’m excited. My new book should be out in just a few weeks, just in time for Lent.
Pastor Mark Cast
In this episode, Pastor Mark discusses issues of life and death and asks us to contemplate if we live lives so that people will miss us when we are gone.
Go to this link to hear the podcast: https://rss.com/podcasts/pastormarkchat/1292483/
Pastor Mark is a Christian Pastor, author, blogger, and sometimes background actor. He brings all of his years of life experience to ask spiritual questions about the ordinary events of life.
Results of my Cat’s Death
Monday Ministerial Musings
By Rev. Mark William Ennis
2024 Blog #2
January 8, 2024
Results of my Cat’s Death
Ivan, my cat with a lot of personality, died this week. One morning he was sitting on my lap purring and demanding my attention. In the evening, when I returned home from the office, he was howling. It looked like he had suffered from a stroke. He was not moving except for his vocalizations. I carried him up the stairs and laid him on a blanket on the couch and sat next to him. He let out a few more howls and died as I was petting him. My other two cats gathered to attend his death. It was almost like they were having a private wake.
It was sad to see him die, and now the house his quiet without him. Of my three cats, he has been the one with the most personality. He let his presence be known, insisted on getting attention, and was quite naughty from time to time. My other cats were playful with Ivan, less so with one another. Ivan certainly was the center of the cat socialization.
Ivan wasn’t always such a wonderful cat. My daughter first met him when she lived in Pennsylvania. The cat originally lived with a woman who had all kinds of troubles. During a hurried leave, this woman gave this cat to a third party to care for. The third party had trouble with the cat. She already had a male cat and her cat, and the new cat, were in mortal combat. Ivan was an angry cat.
My daughter knew the third party who had unceremoniously been presented with the cat. She came to visit and was warned about this “angry cat.” She sat down and observed this “angry cat” in the doorway. The cat glared at her, and she met his gaze. This continued even as she continued to converse with the woman that she had come to see.
After a while of her staring at him, he approached her, and she detected a slight purr. Soon the cat was rubbing her leg. Next, he jumped in her lap and demanded her attention and insisted that she pet him. The cat went home with my daughter that day, to the great relief of this third party who had been the recipient of the cat. A few years later, my daughter relocated to New Jersey. She and this new cat took up residence with us for a while.
He quickly ingratiated himself with my female cats and made himself at home. Rather than being angry, he was the happiest cat I had ever known. Sometimes I wished that he was a little less friendly. It is difficult to work when a cat is sitting on one’s lap. Yet, Ivan the cat had nine great years together.
And now I am missing this silly, naughty, cat who brought me so much companionship. He did, however, bring me a few wise lessons. The first is that if cats, or people, are behaving badly, perhaps it is because they are put in a bad circumstance. There are times that we see people behaving badly, or in ways that we consider evil, and it is not because of their nature, it is because they are in bad circumstances. Perhaps the way to keep people from behaving badly, is to find out why and help them fix the circumstances that they are living in. Ivan the cat behaved well when he lived in a different circumstance and so can people.
The second lesson is that we leave a mark in this world, for better or worse. Ivan’s death has left a void in my life. We have effects on other people as well. Do we live lives that are such that others will miss us when we are gone? When we die, will people say, “thank God” or will they say, “we miss you?” We can’t decide when we die, but we can decide if people will miss us when we do.
Let us help others to live their best and let us live lives that will cause us to be missed when we are gone.
Pastor Mark Author 