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FATHER MARK’S ANNOUNCEMENTS 1) As announced yesterday, Vonnie Rubottom’s funeral service has been moved to Bridgeman Funeral Home in order to accommodate a larger number of guests. The family invites you to attend, beginning at 1:00 P.M. It will be an Episcopal service. 2) Last Saturday the diocese-wide Annual Council was held via Zoom, and it was certainly much different than years past. What it lacked in fellowship and collegiality, it made up for in brevity. Two takeaways: first, the Bishop and Trustees have done a great job managing the diocesan finances during this difficult time. 2020 will not have a dramatic effect on the overall financial health of the diocese, and 2021’s budget is realistic and doable. Second, we continue to be led by an extremely capable, energetic, and visionary Bishop and staff. Here is a link to the Bishop’s annual address, which will give you a clear sense of what I mean by that. https://www.dropbox.com/s/4uwstlw7ffkm24w/Bishop%27s%20Annual%20Council%20Address.mp4? 3) As you know, we are closed again for public worship due to the surge in local COVID-19 cases. This rise in cases is more sudden and dramatic than the one last summer, and by now most of us have seem a direct impact on our lives – either ourselves or someone we know and love has been diagnosed with the disease or quarantined due to close contact. Our church is not immune so we continue to do everything we can think of to keep you safe, including following the Bishop’s guidelines around public worship, which I fully support. Here are the highlights of our policy:
4) All of this is a hardship for sure. I don’t like it one bit and I know you don’t either. But because I know it is the right thing to do I willingly abide by it and enforce it here. So far our region has not been hit as hard by the virus as others, but that seems to be changing these last few weeks. It would break my heart if any of you fell seriously ill from this disease, so I pray that you will protect yourselves and those you love by following the simple steps of wearing a mask, keeping your distance, avoiding inside face-to-face meetings when possible, and using good hand hygiene. These are the best tools we have at this time to avoid increased spread. No doubt a vaccine and treatments are on the horizon, but it may be another year before they are widely available and working. So for now, do what you can to protect yourself and others. It is an act of Christian witness keep others safe, even when it is inconvenient or difficult. Happy Birthday!! Happy Anniversary
Sandy Gibson October 17 Christian & Stacy Bach October 24 Josh Halstead October 22 Samuel Selzer October 22 Haley Sauer October 25 Al Williams October 27 Prayer Requests: The prayer request sheet is still just outside the office in the church and is updated weekly. Anyone may still email your prayer requests to me at stfrancis@allophone.com. If you do not have email, just call the church and leave a message. Since, I am back in the office, the requests must be received on by Wednesday at the latest, for them to be included in the Sunday Bulletin for that week. If the request is received after Wednesday, they will be added to the next Sunday Bulletin. We will follow the same process and keep the names on for two weeks. Once the prayer request is received, it is added to the prayer list and then I email the names to have them added to the Prayer Chain and to the Daughters of the King. ***Daily Devotion for Thursday October 22, 2020*** The Great Commandment The 5 Steps – Pause * Listen * Think * Pray * Go Pause Take a moment to breathe, to reflect on the past day, and to pray: Did I search for happiness in things or in my relationship with the Creator? Did I find ways to express my love to God and those around me? God, open my heart to be more like Christ. Listen The truly happy person doesn’t follow wicked advice, doesn’t stand on the road of sinners, and doesn’t sit with the disrespectful. Instead of doing those things, these persons love the Lord’s Instruction, and they recite God’s Instruction day and night! Psalm 1:1-2 Think I don’t know anyone who does not want to be happy, yet experiencing happiness in this crazy world is a real struggle for many, including myself at times. We often experience moments of feeling happy when we see cute puppies, get invited to the big party, get a good grade on a test, get lots of “likes” on social media, or have a good hair day. But what about happiness that is lasting, happiness that doesn’t go away when thing don’t go our way? Psalm 1:1-2 says that those who are truly happy love the Lord’s Instruction and recite it day and night. They stay away from people and situations that will bring them down and pull them away from God. They seek God’s guidance through scripture and prayer and stay on the right path. Will it be easy and will everything go our way? No way. But we can be assured that God loves us and will see us through. And that, dear friends, gives me a deep sense of happiness that the world cannot take away. Stella Perrin Pray God, help me to see that following your way instead of doing things my way is best and is the path to being truly happy. Give me eyes to see beyond the circumstances around me and trust that you are working to bless me. Amen. Go Go, Offering yourself fully to God, faults and all, Believing that God loves you without reservation, As you seek to love God and the world with all that you are. ***For those of you that would like to access these devotionals daily, you can go on this website: www.d365.org Gina’s Office Hours Tuesday 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. Wednesday 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. Thursday 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. Comments are closed.
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