Welcome to The Greek Orthodox Church of the Annunciation Sacramento, California.
Whether you are a first-time visitor, a one-time visitor, or you have just moved into the area and are looking for a new church home, we welcome you in the Name of our Lord, God, and Savior, Jesus Christ, and we ask His blessing upon you!
What is your purpose in life? Do you have direction? Do you have a sense that your life has meaning? Most of us live demanding and stressful lives. We are distracted with what we are doing and less concerned about why we do and where we are going. Most of us must balance work, family, our own private lives, and the pressures of the world around us. All of us face struggles: work, difficult relationships, grief, sickness, and the inevitability of death. All of us struggle as well with our own inadequacies and our own dysfunctional and sometimes self-destructive tendencies. Yet all of us long for some sense of fulfillment and meaning in our lives and for a remedy for our bad behaviors. From time to time, we ask ourselves the question: “Why am I here on this earth?” Some of us might also ask the questions: “Is there a God?” and “If there is a God, how can I know Him?” If you are searching for answers, we would ask that you read and consider carefully the following brief summary.
We are Christians. By saying this, we are stating that we believe that God exists and that He is responsible for the existence of the universe and all life in it. We believe that God has made Himself known to people from the earliest dawn of human history, and He has made Himself known to people most fully through a man named Jesus. Jesus (in Hebrew “Joshua”), whose birth we celebrate at Christmas, was born in what is today modern Israel just over 2,000 years ago. According to the people who knew Him, He lived a startlingly perfect life, won the respect of many, gathered a group of followers, taught many things, including some very challenging concepts, performed some extraordinary healings and other acts of power (miracles), and also made some extraordinary claims. He claimed to have existed from all eternity and to be the Son of God and by nature, God Himself! Many came to believe that He was who He claimed to be, that He was the long awaited “Messiah” or “king” of Israel (in Greek the “Christ” or “anointed one,” a royal title).
Tragically, the leaders among his own people rejected Him and His claims, denounced Him to the Roman authorities, and the Romans executed Him in around A.D. 30. But this was not the end of Jesus. Instead of remaining in the grave, against all odds and beyond all hope, He came to life again. He appeared to His followers in a real, physical, but incomprehensibly powerful body. They were skeptical at first, but Jesus continued to appear to them. They witnessed the victory of a man over the most powerful of forces, death. Jesus claimed that His death had been predicted long ago, that His death was voluntary, that He died in order to take upon Himself all of the sin (selfishness, abuse, hatred, immorality, etc.) of all people. He said that by His death He had won a victory over death that would extend to all people. He also promised that He would leave this earth, but that He would come again and bring human history to its conclusion.
After meeting with and teaching His followers for 40 days after his coming to life again, physically He did leave this earth to take His former place in the spiritual dimension (the “Kingdom of God” or “Heaven”) from where He came. Now, today, Jesus Christ lives and He offers to each of us the opportunity to know Him and to enjoy His forgiveness for our wrongdoing as well as to embrace all of His love and power! As fully Divine and fully human, He is the bridge between ourselves and God. He is true enlightenment. He can be your friend and your Master! He offers direction. He offers purpose. He also offers to us the prospect of a never-ending life in His coming Kingdom.
We would like you to know Him! If you would like to talk further to us about this, please speak to our pastors or to one of our ushers. Or, you can call the church office during the week. We will not pressure you to make any decisions, but we want to share with you what God has given to us and to hundreds of thousands of Christians through the centuries!
Once again, we welcome you. We are glad to have you here, and we pray that you experience the powerful presence of Jesus Christ in our fellowship!
Please fill out the information card that you should have received with this booklet. If you would like a call from our pastor, or, if you are interested in any of the ministries of our church, or, if you want to receive our monthly newsletter, please indicate this on the card.
"For God so loved the world that He gave His unique Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life!” John 3:16