Dear Church Family,

NOVEMBER….what an interesting month.  Especially this year.  With the election tomorrow, Thanksgiving in in a few weeks and the 1st Sunday of Advent is coming early this year on the 29th.   It will be a fascinating month.

With the Thanksgiving/Advent/Christmas season not that far away there are some holiday traditions that mark this season in our church.  First our season kicks off with our Thanksgiving baskets.  In years past we have collected food and purchased turkeys for Thanksgiving baskets for needy families.  Our WMU and women’s ministry have led in this outreach.  Stay tuned for details on that effort.

OPERATION CHRISTMAS CHILD (OCC) is another compassionate outreach where we collect boxes and fill them with items that individuals and families have purchased and send them to Compassion International for underprivileged children around the world.  Our boxes are in, so pick up yours and get to shopping.  The OCC boxes need to be returned to the church by Sunday, November 22nd – that’s just 3 weeks away. 

December is also a month where we highlight the Lottie Moon Global Missions offering.  Please consider giving above and beyond your regular tithes and offerings to the church and give what you can to this vital program that promotes missions around the world.

Finally, we have had an Angel Tree located in the FMC that is “decorated” with “ornaments” made of paper that indicate the gender and age of a child that needs a Christmas gift.  Again, stay tuned for details on that important effort.

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Church Family News 

Prayer Ministry.  Daniele Cushing has been burdened to help our church grow in intercessory prayer.  Here are the opportunities to gather for prayer:

  • Sunday mornings at 9am in the Philathea room with Pastor Frank. We will be praying for our morning worship services as well as for our church.  If you cannot join us, you can call in using the number and code below.
  • Wednesday evenings at 7:30pm via phone. The phone number is:

712-432-8399 and the access code is:  279785#

A Note on the Contemporary Worship Service (CWS).

I have heard through the church “grapevine” that there is a perception that the 9:30am CWS is a permanent change to the Sunday morning schedule.  I don’t know where this perception originated but let me be clear and say this: nothing could be further from the truth.  Dear church, let me remind you of what I published in two FTP’s articles in May and what I said publically.  When we planned for the “re-gathering” of the church, as a result of the Covid-19 restrictions being relaxed, we temporarily moved the CWS time to 9:30am from 8:45am for the following reasons:

  1. If we exceeded our capacity in the CWS at 9:30am we needed to allow for a third CWS earlier in the morning starting at 8:15. (To date we have not had to do that as we have stayed under the 60 attendee threshold)
  2. By starting at 9:30am this benefited the praise band and A/V team in that they could come in a little later and prepare for the service.

 

Rest assured once the Governor lifts the restrictions we are still operating under and allows 100% attendance, the Sunday morning schedule will revert back to what is was before.  Hopefully, when that occurs, we will be able to restart our children’s programs, student ministry program, Sunday School and have our Sanctuary Choir rejoin our TWS.  I for one am looking forward to that day!

Happy Anniversary.  I remember when Terri and I hit our 20th anniversary “many” years ago, we thought it was hard to believe we had been married that long and now it’s been 45 years!  But that pales in comparison to TED and MARGARET LEWIS who will soon celebrate their 70th Wedding Anniversary on November 3rd!  HAPPY ANNIVERSARY YOU TWO!

Worship attendance (November 1):

CWS:  43

TWS:  11

Remember in prayer:

  1. Jamie Schumann’s mother who is facing several serious medical issues.
  2. April Colgan’s daughter, Katie who was in a severe car accident this past Sunday
  3. Bettie French who hit a deer driving home from church this past Sunday and received some slight injuries.
  4. Members of our church family facing surgeries and other life issues.
  5. All our frontline workers, in and out of our church, who work hard each day serving and protecting us during this pandemic.

 

I love you all,

Pastor Frank