🌸 Beautiful Flowers, Generous Hearts, and the Spirit of Christmas!
November 1–8, 2026 | Pender’s Gathering Place
Just in time for the season of giving, Flowers for Philippi is back!
Pender’s own Saundra Sandrock has once again been busy creating beautiful seasonal flower arrangements, and she’s sharing her talents to help families in need in Philippi, West Virginia.
From November 1 through November 8, Saundra’s handcrafted arrangements will be available in Pender’s Gathering Place, both during the week and on weekends.
Whether you’re looking for a lovely centerpiece for your Thanksgiving table, a thoughtful gift for someone special, or a little seasonal beauty to brighten your home, you’re sure to find something wonderful!
💐 Take What You Want — Give If You Choose!
There are no set prices for the arrangements. Simply choose the flowers you love and make a donation if you wish.
Donation Information:
Checks payable to: Pender UMC
Memo line: Philippi-Bonnie
Where: Pender’s Gathering Place
When: November 1–8, 2026
❤️ Every Dollar Makes a Difference!
100% of the money collected will go toward purchasing Christmas gifts for families in need in Philippi, WV.
This special Christmas outreach ministry is coordinated by Bonnie DeRouchie, who helps bring the joy and hope of Christmas to families in the Philippi community.
Through Saundra’s creativity, Bonnie’s dedication, and the generosity of our Pender family, we have another wonderful opportunity to put our faith into action and share God’s love beyond our church walls.
A heartfelt thank-you to Saundra for sharing her time, talent, and beautiful creations for such a meaningful cause!
Stop by the Gathering Place, pick out something beautiful, and help spread a little Christmas joy to our neighbors in Philippi.
Beautiful flowers. Generous hearts. Christmas blessings. That’s Pender love in action! 🌸❤️
🌟✨ United in Gratitude: A Multi-Church Thanksgiving Celebration November 19 at 6:00 pm ✨🌟
As the holiday season approaches, let’s gather in a spirit of unity and thankfulness with our friends from Christ Presbyterian, King of Kings Lutheran, Ox Hill Baptist, and Pender United Methodist Churches.
Join us for an inspiring service filled with joyous music, heartfelt reflection, and an opportunity to count our blessings in the warm company of our community. This year, we’re honored to have Pastor Bruce Johnson from Pender deliver a message that promises to uplift and resonate with the spirit of Thanksgiving.
After the service, we invite you to linger a little longer and enjoy a delightful reception. It’s a time for laughter, fellowship, and creating memories with both old friends and new.
Let’s come together to express our gratitude and celebrate the abundance of life’s gifts. We can’t wait to welcome you into this circle of thankfulness!
This simple mandate for cultivating gratitude and thanksgiving is the opening line in the catchy chorus of “Count Your Blessings,” a church music staple first published more than a century ago.
All these years later, the four verses and chorus can be summed up this way: Counting your blessings may be the antidote to feeling disheartened.
The remaining line of the chorus implores you to, after counting and naming the blessings, to “see what God has done.”
The faithful act of assessing blessings and acknowledging what God has provided in your life may give perspective when challenges and conflicts occur, as the four verses detail (see sidebar).
The author of these song lyrics acknowledges that you can feel burdened and life can seem unfair. So can counting your blessings really help when turmoil swirls around you and discouragement weighs heavy on your mind?
Such was the case for Jacob, who, in Genesis 28, is fleeing from his angry brother, Esau. When Jacob stopped for the night at a place he would later name “Bethel,” Jacob was in the midst of a bad situation. He was alone, scared and had nowhere to go. He also had no idea about how his circumstances might turn out. That night in a dream, God reassured Jacob that He was with him, that He had a plan for Jacob’s life and that He would not leave him. Jacob awoke the next morning with a change of heart and life didn’t seem so bad. “Surely the Lord is in this place,” Jacob said, “and I did not know it.” (Genesis 28:16)
Numerous stories in the Bible remind you to look beyond your circumstances to see you are not alone, that “the Lord is in this place,” providing anecdotal evidence of the importance of gratitude.
In addition to the anecdotal proof, the virtues of gratitude have been proven by science.
In a study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, the test group was asked to daily write down five things for which they were thankful. After doing this every day for one week, the test group reported better sleep patterns and a more positive emotional outlook than the control group.
Members from Perryville United Methodist Church in Perryville, Kentucky, perform “Count Your Blessings.”
Whether the song’s author was battling tough times when he wrote the lyrics is unknown. What we do know is that Johnson Oatman Jr., the lyricist, was a Methodist Episcopal minister who had a penchant for songwriting. “Count Your Blessings,” intended as a song for youth, first appeared in “Songs for Young People,” which was published in 1897 by the Methodist Book Concern, a precursor to The United Methodist Publishing House. Over Oatman’s life, he penned more than 5,000 songs, including the classic hymn “No, Not One.”
For “Count Your Blessings,” Oatman partnered with E.O. Excell, who put Oatman’s words to music. Excell operated a Chicago-based publishing business specializing in Sunday School materials and collaborated with the Methodists for numerous projects. Fun fact about Excell is that he is the same person who wrote the arrangement of “Amazing Grace” that is most often sung throughout the world today.
But back to “Count Your Blessings.”
Once “Songs for Young People” was published, “Count Your Blessings” became a favorite, quickly gaining popularity throughout the world.
One account from a London daily newspaper says that when the famous British evangelist Gipsy Smith presided over a meeting, he announced a hymn, saying, “Let us sing ‘Count Your Blessings.’ Down in South London, the men sing it, the boys whistle to it, and the women rock their babies to sleep to the tune.”
In addition to the upbeat, simple tune that people have found easy to remember, its message has been uplifting folks for generations.
“Like a beam of sunlight,” wrote J.H. Hall, Oatman’s biographer, in “Biography of Gospel Song and Hymn Writers, “(’Count Your Blessings’) has brightened up the dark places of the earth.”
Crystal Caviness works for UMC.org at United Methodist Communications. Contact her by email or at 615-742-5138.
