Dear Friends,
The weather on Sunday provided us 100 + worshippers at the Van Wickle House in Somerset an delightful backdrop to celebrate the Lord’s Day! The children sang, a special children’s sermon was performed, and well known hymns were sung, followed by a great amount of sandwiches and salads for the outdoor picnic.
This Sunday, we return to the cooled interior of Fellowship Hall for our worship. But mark your calendars for the concert with Loraine Nelson Wolf on September 11 at 7 PM. See below for details. It’s for a free will offering. Also, please note that on Sept. 12th, we will be having our RALLY DAY and worship returns to 10:30 am.
Monday, August 30
Personnel Mtg 8:30 am
Fundraising Mtg 7:30 pm
Tuesday, August 31
House of Manna 4 – 7 pm
Wednesday, Sept. 1
Staff Mtg 9:30 pm
Choir Rehearsal 7:30 pm
Thursday, Sept. 2
House of Manna 4 – 7 pm
Sunday, September 5
Celebration of the Lord’s Supper
Set up of chairs in Fellowship Hall 8:30 am
Singing w/ Ben 9:00 am
Worship 9:30 am
Teacher Training Event 11:15 am
First Reformed Church is offering a free concert by Lorraine Nelson-Wolff and her family of performers on Saturday, September 11 at 7:00 pm.
Come for a night of inspirational songs and stories with the Billboard & ASCAP award-winning composer, singer, and pianist. Lorraine’s husband, Godfrey, and daughter, Lauren Nelson, are her special performer guests.
Tagged as:
Music,
Rally Sunday,
song gift weekend
For children between the ages of 3 and 13! August 23rd – 27th, 9:00 a.m. – noon, this is a combined event with the four collegiate Reformed Churches and will be hosted by the Highland Park Reformed Church.
Tagged as:
VBS
Another school year is drawing to a close, but not without some celebration. Our last day of class will be on Jun 20th. On Jun 27th, we will officially mark the close of the school year with an Open Air service on the steps of our sanctuary (weather permitting, of course!) and a picnic. In the meantime, the children will be once again working with Ben to prepare wonderful music for the open air service. Our Little Lambs will end the year studying the acts of the apostles after receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. The Big Lambs have a variety of interesting topics in store.
Finally, please note that each week’s bulletin will now include the Bible verse and topic of the Sunday School lesson for the day.
On Sunday, May 9th, Sandy presented a children’s sermon celebrating those in our congregation who have served as a Sunday school teacher at some time in the past, and inviting those who wish to become a part of this long tradition. Many in the congregation that day were surprised to hear Sandy tell that we have the oldest continuously operating Sunday School in the country (1779 — present). The torch has been passed many times in 211 years, and it must continue to be passed. Please join our teachers group and help carry our tradition into the future!
Over the past several months, we have seen a shift in our building usage. At the beginning of the year, Calvary Chapel moved from our upstairs in the Education Building. We are now preparing for the Pine Grove Nursery School to begin it’s renovations. Already we see the first signs of them with the preparation of a playground area in the front of the Education Building. If the weather warms up, we will soon see a green rubberized mat poured out over the rubberized mulch. It will be spongy – What fun!
Beginning in April, the Word of Life Congregation, which was worshipping in our sanctuary, will be moving to a new location. On the final March Sunday, Hartmut and I received a heart-felt farewell from their congregation, including a card and a bouquet! They are very grateful for the good relationship we have tended over the last five years, and wanted us to share this with entire congregation. They are moving to a location, which is closer to their membership. Their vivid worship on Sunday afternoons will certainly be missed by all of us. We wish them God Speed!
Throughout March and into April, our church has offered the 2010 Census free access to our Fellowship Hall for the purpose of testing new census takers. From about 2:00 until 7:00 pm on Fridays, there has been a continuous stream of applicants. This is just another way that we have opened our buildings for community use.
Tagged as:
building usage,
Calvary Chapel,
Pine Grove Nursery School,
Word of Life Congregation
This year’s Lenten adult education class is rather large. In addition, we have a home for each of the six sessions. The nice part is that both the content of the class as well as its constituency of participants and host families provide great opportunity for long-term church members and newer folks to get to know each other.
Truly, this class is an exercise in inclusive ministry! And of course, as you read this, you can still join either for a single session or for the remainder. We meet Friday nights at 8:00 p.m.
Each session’s subject provides another window to the world. We do not want to be a church with siege mentality, where the most prevalent question would be how to keep our faith pure while the world goes berserk. Instead, the world is God’;s creation, and we are some of its stewards.
Consequently, our sessions deal with diverse subjects. How do we respond to evil in the world? Where is our faith when we discuss neurological science and the theory of evolution? What does our faith say regarding the reality of disabilities? How do Christians deal with the phenomenon of the day-and-night society that knows no Sabbath? What happens when homelessness challenges our faith?
Does any of this wet your appetite? Then come and see us Fridays during Lent!
Tagged as:
Lenten education
submitted by: Margaret Coakley and Erie Beemsterboer
This month in worship we have several Lenten series and services taking place. We started the Lent season with a collegiate service. This year it was our turn to host Second Reformed Church, Suydam Street Reformed Church and Highland Park Reformed Church. The service was very moving with the imposition of ashes, hand washing and the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. Following it was a delicious Feast of Sausages which people enjoyed.
An Adult Education class series is being offered on all Fridays of Lent. The series will be led by Pastor Hartmut and held on Friday nights at 8:00 p.m. at various church members’ homes. The theme is Living Our Faith in a Messed-Up World. On Feb 19th, the series started at house of the Pastors. On the following dates, the families mentioned will host the next session. All are welcome to attend any of these.
Feb 26th – the Feketes
Mar 5th, the Waanders
Mar 12th, the Vande Buntes
Mar 19th, the Novacks
Mar 26th, the Hances
We thank all of these generous people to open their houses for these classes.
Like last year on Maundy Thursday, there will be a Seder meal followed by a Tenebrae Worship service. This service was very well received last year, and I know people are looking forward to having this service again. See the article about this elsewhere in the newsletter. And the first Sunday of April we will celebrate Easter. Again special elements for the service are planned.
Looking further ahead on the calender: For our annual Rally Sunday in September, we are working on something really special. It will be a full weekend of special events. The dates to put on your calendar are Sep 11th and 12th. We will host Lorraine Nelson-Wolf in a Song Gift Weekend. More details will be announced later.
Tagged as:
lent
