We were so happy to have a wonderful group of young people on Sunday. We started a new study. Jade read the Bible story to us; the kids listened quietly as Jade read. They could answer almost every question we asked! Our story begins with God creating light and dark. These serve as markers for time. There was evening and there was morning; this divides the story into seven days. The world was created from a formless void and great darkness, God created light to complement the darkness. Each day the light pushes away the darkness and gives way to a new creation. For six days God worked at creating new things for us to use and survive on. After all His wonderful work, on the seventh day, God rested. Each day the light pushes away the darkness and gives way for a new creation. Creation is an ongoing process and God remains in the process. We too can bring light into the world through our creativity. We are an expression of light. God’s light lives within each of us. Children are incredibly creative and bring so much light into the world. We let their light shine when we encourage their creativity and see it as very good! See you in church on Sunday to work on our creativity.

Blessings, Miss Vickie, Miss Sue

We are blessed to have Brian McClosky putting together a flyer to be mailed to the immediate area informing families about the Sunday school program our church has to offer along with other special services.

We have a lesson prepared every week for our youngsters. And we share this lesson with everyone who will listen! It seems that the early Christians loved to get together and celebrate! This week we learned of yet another festival that included all people. The Festival of Booths is an observance of when the Israelites were in the wilderness; God provided them booths to dwell in. This festival was held at a time in ancient Israel when the harvest season was over, and it celebrated all that God had provided His people to survive.

This festival was filled with prayers of thanksgiving to God for His fruitfulness. Much like our Thanksgiving, I am sure this was much more inclusive; everyone was invited! This is a good lesson for everyone to remember to include everyone in our meetings and our prayers. See you in church.

Blessings, Miss Vickie, Miss Sue

Our story this week was about a Festival of Weeks. This is not something that we hear a lot about, but in looking closely, it resembles our Thanksgiving. The Israelites are instructed to celebrate with everyone. Their families, their servants, anyone who lives in their city, and immigrants among them, they were to remember the widows and orphans. Both the poor and the marginalized were included in this celebration and were allowed to enjoy and partake in the blessings of the land.

Today the festival is filled with prayers and thanksgiving to God for fruitfulness. Many people stayed up all night studying the Torah. The Book of Ruth is read during Shavuot. The story of Ruth reminds God’s people of Ruth’s sacrifices which were rewarded by God’s steadfast mercy and love. The words are familiar: “Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you live, I will live. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.” The primary purpose of this festival was for people to show gratitude for all they have.

This week, the kids enjoyed painting watering cans and next week we will fill them with painted flowers. This weather has taken a toll on our flowers, so we are painting wooden ones! See you Sunday.

Blessings

It was obvious last Sunday that our kids were taking advantage of the last weekend before school starts. I certainly missed them!

Since this Saturday is Miss Vickie’s birthday, I picked up Bundt cakes to celebrate. We had a cake for Miss Vickie and baby Bundt cakes for each of the kids! Bridget was even there to help with any little children we might have. We had our lesson ready about the Passover.

The Passover is a Jewish holiday that honors the exodus of God’s people from Egypt. The most central part of the Passover is the seder meal. One prominent part of this meal is the unleavened bread. This bread is used to represent both the sadness and the hastiness in which the Israelites left Egypt. There was no time to allow the bread to rise.

The festival of Passover is one of great joy. People come together to remember God’s protection and God’s mercy for His people. When we celebrate Passover, we can celebrate all that God has done for us and trust in His promises.

Bring Mom and Dad to church this Saturday evening so we can celebrate the wonderful music our church has to offer! See you there!

Blessings

Our lesson was a little different this week! Have you read about the year of the Jubilee? This was a celebration of wrongs and debts. We can all understand that there are people in our community who are having a hard time getting what they need, including basic needs for living, while there are other people that have more than enough. This Bible story tells us to create equality for all people. This is to be celebrated because God created all of us as equals. At the end of seven years, you were to release every creditor that owed you; you were not to collect this from his family, and you were just to release the debt. This was to be celebrated because God created each of us equal and we deserve to be forgiven and free. Jubilee was an act of justice, where at the end of seven years, your debts would be forgiven! This doesn’t work today, but we can still bless others with our acts of kindness and generosity.

Our kids were thankful for the “back-to-school” gift cards that were given to them for school supplies and for the kindness of the people that made our back-to-school party possible. Thanks for the hot dogs, movie, and popcorn that our kids got to enjoy. Even Mom and Dad appreciate your generosity of the gift cards! Getting the kids ready for school is expensive and these cards were blessings!

See you in church Sunday for a new lesson! Blessings