Thursday, October 22, 2020

Worship Update from Rev. Shirley

A WORD ABOUT WORSHIP
From Rev. Shirley 

Friends, we've loved seeing you in person for outdoor worship and hearing that many more of you are tuning in to online worship using You Tube. What a resilient congregation! God has made us tough.

I have applied for and received approval from Bishop Goff to start conducting worship inside the church when the health indicators go to low-yellow or green. The color system is based on Harvard's global epidemics data. Please everyone wear your masks and use social distancing so we can keep the virus spread down.

When we do announce in-person indoor worship is available, we will use the weekly eNews and Realm to communicate details about how to sign up. If you choose to remain at home, we will continue to livestream worship using You Tube. 

Until health indicators go favorable and I announce that we are offering indoor worship again, we will continue to offer in-person worship outside every Sunday at 10 a.m. so long as it's not raining and so long as the temperature is over 45 degrees. We will continue to offer holy communion (wafers only). Please know that, if you are staying at home to guard your health but would like a pastoral visit, Rev. Shirley and Rev. Richard are both happy to make house calls if you have an outside place to meet, or if you'd like to meet at the church on a weekday outside. The weather has been wonderful for this. If you have any questions or comments you'd like to share, please email Rev. Shirley, s.smithgraham@ccerva.org.

A WORD ABOUT CHRISTMAS

Since we know that hosting 1,800 people for Christmas Eve is not possible this year due to COVID, we have committed with our Gospel partners at Shady Grove Methodist Church to offer a drive-thru Christmas story. Through six outdoor stations that tell the story of the Messiah, from prophecy to Nativity to Jesus' charge to his disciples to love one another, costumed volunteers will tell the story that changed the world through song and spoken word. This is an opportunity for people inside and outside our churches to be touched by the Spirit of Christmas. Aching to do something fun for the holidays? Contact Rev. Shirley or Keith Tan if you'd like to be part of this wonderful event. And to round off Christmas Eve, once daylight falls, each church will offer its own small Christmas service. Inside if we can, outside if we must. Stay tuned for times and details.

Monday, October 19, 2020

Bear Witness to God's Fruitfulness! The Good Soil Video Series

 Watch all 6 videos in our special storytelling project!