"Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy" (Exodus 20:8), and "do not neglect meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but encourage one another all the more as you see the Day drawing near" (Hebrews 10:25)

The story is told of three gray whales battered, bloodied and struggling for breath at a hole in the ice off Point Barrow, Alaska. Whales are mammals, and unless they could find oxygen they were doomed. How could they be transported five miles past the ice pack to open sea?

Rescuers began cutting a line of breathing holes about 100 yards apart in the six inch thick ice. For eight days they coaxed the whales from one hole to the next, mile after mile. Along the way one whale vanished and was presumed dead. But finally, with the help of the Russian ice-breakers, the whales, named putu and Siku, swam to freedom.

For the believer, worship is like a string of breathing holes the Lord provides for his people. All week long we are submerged in the cold, dark waters of greed, temptation, selfishness and hatred. God has provided us one day out of seven to rise from the darkness and breath in the fresh air of the kingdom. In God's presence with God's people, we are loved, encouraged, and coaxed along on our journey until that day when the Lord Jesus forever shatters the ice cap.

Calvary, like many churches, has gone to two services on the Lord's Day. Most churches will do this on Sunday morning when there is a lack of space, or when there is an interest in providing two kinds of services - traditional and contemporary. Our choice was to include an evening service at 5 pm. This service provides a greater freedom in personal testimony and prayer, gives us another opportunity to hear the Word of God read and preached, and enables us to enjoy another opportunity to worship, fellowship and take the Lord's Supper at the end of the Lord's Day. The greatest gifts that we offer at this service are the gifts of our Calvayr family who share together in the good blessings of God.

One man who consistently missed the morning service because of work has come in the evening every week. Let me encourage others of you who miss in the morning to take this second opportunity to breath in the fresh air of heaven. A morning and evening worship helps to mark the whole day as holy, setting brackets around it to remind us that Sunday is a day set apart to the Lord.

In our 75th year as a congregation, I remind you that for most of those years we offered up a morning and an evening sacrifice of praise. Somehow, out of neglect or indifference, or a need to prepare for a busy week, we relegated the evening service to the basement where we store old artifacts of an earlier day.

The t.v. show Antiques Roadshow has people bring out of their attacs and basements old artifacts that were thought to be useless and worthless in today's world but were discovered to be treasures that are worth thousands of dollars. A book written by Houdini in 1921 was bought at a yard sale for 25 cents. Bearing the author's signature on the inside cover, the book brought $3,000 at auction. It is my prayer that we will discover the true value of what we have hidden away for too long.