Hello, dear church!

I missed being in church with you Sunday and I will not be with you this coming Sunday either. I will be in Abilene for the funeral. I am not sure I can stand being away from you for this long! I watched the service last week and will do so again this Sunday. Thanks to all of you who have sent cards, phone calls, and texts. And to Veta for the wonderful dinner and dessert! You spoil us and we are so very grateful for you. It is very hard to lose someone you love. I know many of you have experienced this kind of loss more than once in your lives. I take great comfort in knowing that my church has my family in its prayers and holds space for us in this time of grief. You are all a blessing from God.

REMEMBER OUR CONCERT THIS SATURDAY NIGHT: DOOR’S OPEN AT 6:30 pm.  The music starts at 7:00 pm. We will have light refreshments after so that you may visit with each other and with the performers. Nicholas and Cassandra have planned a wonderful performance for us. I promise you will not be disappointed. 

Please pray for Carol Bennett. She is the proud owner of a brand-new knee! Surgery was 6/25 and she will be out for a few weeks.

I received an email today from Marilyn Thomas. Marilyn wants to donate a Yamaha baby grand piano that belonged to her late husband. If you are interested in owning this marvelous instrument, please call me or text me and I will give you Marilyn’s contact information. If I don’t hear from anyone, I will share the information with the Central Texas Conference. We have to find a home for this beautiful piano and honor the memory of Marilyn’s husband.

There are no words for how much I miss you, Mary

Our bible story for the week was about Esther, who lived with her older cousin, Mordecai. The King chooses Ester to be his new queen and brings her to the palace to live. Queen Esther is Jewish, but her husband the king does not know this. The king’s helper, Haman, doesn’t like the Jewish people. So he tricks the king into making a law that will have all the Jewish people killed.

Mordecai convinces Queen Esther to intervene with the King to save her people. Esther approaches the king and tells him that she is a Jew and that Haman wants to kill all her people. She begs the King not to allow this to happen. The King is upset with Haman. The King doesn’t want Esther or her people to be killed, so he makes a new law to keep Queen Esther and her people safe. As an elite woman, it would have been easy for Queen Esther to remain silent and allow her people to be killed, but Esther put her own life at risk to save and bring peace to the Jewish people. Sometimes it is hard to be a peacemaker in difficult circumstances; but with the help of God, we can all do this.

It was a little late for Father’s Day, but we took this opportunity to show Dad how much he is loved. Each one glued small stones around a heart made of wood and wrote “Dad, you rock!” on the heart.

Hope he loved it! See you in church on Sunday. Blessings