A Humbling Experience

    It is the Monday after the Sunday before. And what a blessed morning. 

    In 'rewiring' our Sanctuary bundles (those bits of paper in the slots in the pews), our focus is three-fold.  

    We Welcome, the expression of our love of neighbor to our guests and visitors and people who may be returning after some time away, to which we respond with joy and thanksgiving.

    We Pray, in communication with our God, but for those worshipping with us, this prayer is of a particular sort, our response to intercede in prayer for those who particularly ask via our prayer requests.   

    We Give, expressing our love for neighbor in action.  It is said that the true measure of a church's mission is to be found in its Budget, not its Mission Statement.  That is a bold accusation and a challenge to us to define the measure of our faith in terms of generosity.  Our response is one of thanksgiving and careful stewardship to maximize the benefits of giving in a complex financial world. 

    Yesterday, I spent a few minutes with the team that responds to the generous Giving of our members.  We are blessed with folks who take that work so seriously (and to our team, I think this is the moment that God was preparing for when He poked me to come see you).  

   This morning, I have before me a welcome paper and a prayer request.  This is the humbling part.  It is one thing to create an abstract system, to talk about names and connections, to live into the grace of expectation that the Lord has people He is ready to send into our midst.  It is something else to be entrusted by someone that people in this church will pray for them.  It is a blessing to have the privilege of reaching out to a guest in our midst, to thank them for coming, to invite them back.

    It is the Monday after the Sunday before. 

    Pastor Peter

PS-Anyone know the origins of or where we can get more of the postcards and cards with envelopes that have beautiful line drawings of the church on their faces?

PS to the PS-Next steps are Response Teams for our Sanctuary bundles, to welcome, to pray, to follow up on the generosity of our people. Right now, we have one person to respond in Welcome, one person to respond in Prayer (to these particular prayer offerings), and two people (to the best of my knowledge) to respond to the Giving to our church.  If doing something like this plucks a chord on the heartstrings of your faith, please let me know.

Peter