Just a quick note this week to thank everyone who made Sunday a grand adventure as we “traveled the world” and celebrated World Communion Sunday. From those who helped with music and liturgy to those who decorated and fed us, it was a blessed day. We come from many places and backgrounds. It is great to bring as much together as we did Sunday. I keep saying, it takes all of us to BE US. Thank you all.
Pastor Tripp will be preaching Sunday as I will be in Providence, Rhode Island for the 20th anniversary celebration of the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists (and the 40th anniversary of American Baptists Concerned.) As an AWAB board member, I have chaired the planning team for this event and will be preaching at the concluding communion service on Monday. The theme is “Coming of Age: A Living Jubilee.” If you’d like to know more about it, check out the web site at www.awab20.org. I will take an extra day of vacation while I’m in the East and will be back in the office on Thursday, October 17. Please call the church office or Pastor Tripp if there is a pastoral emergency.
Sunday, Pastor Tripp will be preaching on “The Welfare of the City” based on Jeremiah’s letter to the exiles in Babylon instructing them to pray for the welfare of the city in which they were exiled. It must have been quite a challenge to those captives to be told to pray for the well-being of their captors, yet that is the word Jeremiah brings from God. For whom would it be most challenging for you to pray, to desire their well-being?
Our intern, Doug Davidson, will be leading Adult Spiritual Formation, continuing the series, Animate:Faith, this week focusing on a video with Nadia Bolz-Weber as she reflects on the significance of the cross. Come at 10:00 AM on Sunday for worship. Bring along a family member, friend, colleague, neighbor or stranger to share in worship; then, stay for Adult Spiritual Formation.
May God’s new thing flourish within us and among us.
Pastor Rick
