Annual Craft and Bake Sale - November 21st, 9 AM, First Federal Bank
Bring your donations to the Parish Hall on Thursday, November 20th from 6-8 PM for pricing. Matching funds will be applied from Thrivent.
Help Trim The Tree and Decorate - Saturday, November 29th at 9 AM.
We will be decorating the sanctuary and Parish Hall for Advent/Christmas. Your help would be appreciated!
Poinsettias
The Altar Guild will be ordering poinsettias for our Christmas Eve service. They are red and will come in a 6 1/2 " pott. The price is $7 each. Stratton Greenhouse will be donating 50 cents to Lutheran Social Services for every poinsettia sold. Envelopes are available in the back of the church. Deadline is December 7th. Checks should be made out to the Altar Guild.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Special Worship Opportunities in November
From Pastor Katherine:
Thanks be to God! These words are the words that conclude nearly every worship service at St. Peter’s. These words are ready on your lips after you are encouraged to “Go in peace and serve the Lord.” There are a few of you that say those words with a lot of gusto. Hopefully you don’t speak those words so emphatically because you’re relieved that church is over! I hope your experience at worship made you extra-thankful for everything God has done for you, and that’s why those words come pouring out of your mouth: “Thanks be to God!”
In this month of Thanksgiving, there are plenty of opportunities for you to give God thanks through your worship and praise. We hope you will join us. Here are the highlights:
Thankoffering Sunday is Sunday, November 9th.
This service is a tradition at St. Peter’s, led by the Women of the ELCA group. Thankoffering is an offering given as an expression of thanks. Among early Christians, when a bountiful harvest was completed or a son returned home safely from war, they would gather in worship to thank God for these great blessings and collect offerings for the particular blessings received. Early in the 1900’s, small Thankoffering boxes were given to women, who placed them in a special location in their home to be a visible reminder of blessings received. Coins were added to these boxes almost daily as a particular blessing was noted. The women of the congregation would come together once a year to make a public collection of their Thankofferings.
There are moments in each day when we should be thankful to God. It can be something as significant as a child’s first step, recovery from illness, or landing a new job. It can be something as ordinary as seeing your child off to school complete with lunch and homework, making it home safely after rush hour on the expressway, or listening to birds while walking through your back yard. When any of these significant or ordinary moments happen, we can say thank you to God.
Lutheran women have a tradition of combining their prayers of thanks with offering gifts. That’s why we have those Thankoffering boxes. When that moment happens and we are thankful, we place an offering into the box as a further expression of our thanks. Thankoffering boxes are still available in the back of the church if you would like to start this tradition at home. These boxes will be collected during the November 9th service.
A Community Thanksgiving Feast
Hosted by the Delphos Ministerial Association, will be held on Sunday, November 23rd from 4-6 PM at the Delphos Eagles (1600 E 5th Street). This is a chance to get together with Christians from the other churches in Delphos and celebrate God’s gifts together. In addition to good food, there will be a time for worship. The meat and stuffing will be provided, but you are invited to carry in a side dish or dessert.
Giving-Thanks Meal: Wednesday, November 26th at 7 PM
Did you know that the word Eucharist means “Thanksgiving?” Before you celebrate your family’s Thanksgiving meal, join us at the church on Thanksgiving Eve to celebrate the Eucharist with your church family. We will gather in the Parish Hall for prayer, scripture, and a “family style” Lord’s Supper which will be shared around a large table. Children who do not normally receive the sacrament will be given a special treat so they may a part of this celebration of sharing, forgiveness, and remembrance. The service will be brief and is meant to give you some “breathing space” – a time to relax and reflect on the greatest gifts of God in the midst of an otherwise hectic time. A special offering of food items will be taken to benefit the Interfaith Food Pantry. Donation suggestions are given later in this newsletter.
Guitar-led Worship on Sunday, November 30th
Our organist will be out of town, so we are putting our congregation's guitarists to use. If you play guitar and would like to join in, please talk to Pastor Katherine and she will put you in touch with the right people!
Thanks be to God! These words are the words that conclude nearly every worship service at St. Peter’s. These words are ready on your lips after you are encouraged to “Go in peace and serve the Lord.” There are a few of you that say those words with a lot of gusto. Hopefully you don’t speak those words so emphatically because you’re relieved that church is over! I hope your experience at worship made you extra-thankful for everything God has done for you, and that’s why those words come pouring out of your mouth: “Thanks be to God!”
In this month of Thanksgiving, there are plenty of opportunities for you to give God thanks through your worship and praise. We hope you will join us. Here are the highlights:
Thankoffering Sunday is Sunday, November 9th.
This service is a tradition at St. Peter’s, led by the Women of the ELCA group. Thankoffering is an offering given as an expression of thanks. Among early Christians, when a bountiful harvest was completed or a son returned home safely from war, they would gather in worship to thank God for these great blessings and collect offerings for the particular blessings received. Early in the 1900’s, small Thankoffering boxes were given to women, who placed them in a special location in their home to be a visible reminder of blessings received. Coins were added to these boxes almost daily as a particular blessing was noted. The women of the congregation would come together once a year to make a public collection of their Thankofferings.
There are moments in each day when we should be thankful to God. It can be something as significant as a child’s first step, recovery from illness, or landing a new job. It can be something as ordinary as seeing your child off to school complete with lunch and homework, making it home safely after rush hour on the expressway, or listening to birds while walking through your back yard. When any of these significant or ordinary moments happen, we can say thank you to God.
Lutheran women have a tradition of combining their prayers of thanks with offering gifts. That’s why we have those Thankoffering boxes. When that moment happens and we are thankful, we place an offering into the box as a further expression of our thanks. Thankoffering boxes are still available in the back of the church if you would like to start this tradition at home. These boxes will be collected during the November 9th service.
A Community Thanksgiving Feast
Hosted by the Delphos Ministerial Association, will be held on Sunday, November 23rd from 4-6 PM at the Delphos Eagles (1600 E 5th Street). This is a chance to get together with Christians from the other churches in Delphos and celebrate God’s gifts together. In addition to good food, there will be a time for worship. The meat and stuffing will be provided, but you are invited to carry in a side dish or dessert.
Giving-Thanks Meal: Wednesday, November 26th at 7 PM
Did you know that the word Eucharist means “Thanksgiving?” Before you celebrate your family’s Thanksgiving meal, join us at the church on Thanksgiving Eve to celebrate the Eucharist with your church family. We will gather in the Parish Hall for prayer, scripture, and a “family style” Lord’s Supper which will be shared around a large table. Children who do not normally receive the sacrament will be given a special treat so they may a part of this celebration of sharing, forgiveness, and remembrance. The service will be brief and is meant to give you some “breathing space” – a time to relax and reflect on the greatest gifts of God in the midst of an otherwise hectic time. A special offering of food items will be taken to benefit the Interfaith Food Pantry. Donation suggestions are given later in this newsletter.
Guitar-led Worship on Sunday, November 30th
Our organist will be out of town, so we are putting our congregation's guitarists to use. If you play guitar and would like to join in, please talk to Pastor Katherine and she will put you in touch with the right people!
Sunday School Note and Christmas Program Info
We will have Sunday School class on November 30th instead of taking a break for Thanksgiving. This year’s Christmas program is entitled “Christmas Letters” and is being led by Kathy Vorst and Cindy Weitzel. If your child does not regularly attend Sunday School, please be sure your teacher knows that you want to participate.
Hospice Ministry Representative Visiting on November 23rd
Donna Grimm, Past President and Consultant from Community Health Professionals will be visiting our congregation on November 23 to talk about the new In-Patient Hospice center currently being built in Van Wert that will serve 5 counties. She will also discuss the importance of meeting the spiritual needs of the patients and families when they face a terminal illness, the need for patients to face unresolved issues, and the last wishes of terminally ill patients. Donna has worked with Community Health Professionals for over 33 years and has first hand experience in dealing with terminally ill patients and their families and knows the importance of spiritual peace. Donna will be available after the service to answer any of your questions. If you would like to give a gift to help fund the chapel for the hospice center, special offering envelopes will be made available for that purpose. Checks may be made out to Inpatient Hospice Center.
Church Council Nomination Forms Due November 16th
Each year in early December, new officers are elected to the church council. The church council meets monthly, and prayerfully provides leadership and guidance within the church. This year, we would like to include a brief biography on each candidate on the ballots. We do this so that those who run will prayerfully consider their call to serve, and that those voting may prayerfully consider who to elect. If you are interested in running for church council, please pick up a candidate information form from the church office, and return it by November 16th.
Order Your Commemorative Ornaments Today!
We have ordered custom ornaments from Bronner’s in honor of the church’s 150th anniversary. The ornaments are white with gold detailing. Each ornament features the church’s name, a picture of the church, and the text “1858-2008: Celebrating 150 Years.” The ornaments are $7 each. They make great gifts for family and friends! Order envelopes are available at the back of the church. For those of you unable to get to the church building, please send a letter to us indicating how many ornaments you would like and enclose enough payment to cover your order. Also include your phone number so we can contact you when the ornaments arrive. Checks should be made out to St. Peter Lutheran Church. Supplies are limited – order today!
Recycle Your Old Cell Phone at the Church and Support a Good Cause!
Women of the ELCA has teamed up with the Women’s Funding Network and the Good Deed Foundation to recycle 250,000 cell phones by May 1, 2009! Money raised through the recycling campaign will be used to:
1. Support programs that lift women and families out of poverty;
2. Help provide lasting solutions to climate change, a major contributor to poverty worldwide; and
3. Provide 911 emergency phones for senior citizens and people at risk.
In the United States alone, more than half a billion cell phones are no longer being used and are ready for recycling, and another 11 million phones are added to that total every month!
Participation is easy! Just drop off your old cell phone in the recycling box located in the Parish Hall of the church. Learn more by going to www.gooddeedfoundation.org/welca.
1. Support programs that lift women and families out of poverty;
2. Help provide lasting solutions to climate change, a major contributor to poverty worldwide; and
3. Provide 911 emergency phones for senior citizens and people at risk.
In the United States alone, more than half a billion cell phones are no longer being used and are ready for recycling, and another 11 million phones are added to that total every month!
Participation is easy! Just drop off your old cell phone in the recycling box located in the Parish Hall of the church. Learn more by going to www.gooddeedfoundation.org/welca.
Pizza Hut FUNdraiser
Sunday, November 16th
Dine-in OR Carry-out between 11 and 8!
The Fellowship/Outreach committee is hosting a Pizza Hut FUNdraiser on Sunday, November 16th. To participate, simply dine in (or carry out) at Pizza Hut between the hours of 11 AM and 8 PM, and present a coupon (available at the church) when you pay. 10% of your purchase will go back to the church. It’s that easy!
A group will be gathering at Pizza Hut just after worship on Sunday, 16th for a time of fellowship, and you are certainly welcome to join us then. The lunch buffet will be served from 11-2, which is always a great deal.
And there’s more great news - you can take copies of the coupon and give them to friends and family to use on our behalf. Won’t you help us spread the word and get as many people as possible to join us on the 16th?
All proceeds will benefit the work of the Fellowship/Outreach committee. Their purpose is to draw the congregation closer together through fellowship activities, and draw more people into faith in Christ by reaching out to our neighbors. They have plenty of ideas, but no money in the budget to use for their efforts. A fundraising event like this will really help them take off with new plans and projects.
Dine-in OR Carry-out between 11 and 8!
The Fellowship/Outreach committee is hosting a Pizza Hut FUNdraiser on Sunday, November 16th. To participate, simply dine in (or carry out) at Pizza Hut between the hours of 11 AM and 8 PM, and present a coupon (available at the church) when you pay. 10% of your purchase will go back to the church. It’s that easy!
A group will be gathering at Pizza Hut just after worship on Sunday, 16th for a time of fellowship, and you are certainly welcome to join us then. The lunch buffet will be served from 11-2, which is always a great deal.
And there’s more great news - you can take copies of the coupon and give them to friends and family to use on our behalf. Won’t you help us spread the word and get as many people as possible to join us on the 16th?
All proceeds will benefit the work of the Fellowship/Outreach committee. Their purpose is to draw the congregation closer together through fellowship activities, and draw more people into faith in Christ by reaching out to our neighbors. They have plenty of ideas, but no money in the budget to use for their efforts. A fundraising event like this will really help them take off with new plans and projects.
NOOMA
Join Us for Four Weeks of NOOMA
Adult Sunday School (8:45 AM) – November 16 through December 7th
What is NOOMA? The name NOOMA is an English phonetic spelling of the Greek word pneuma, which is commonly translated to “spirit” or “breath”. Nooma is a series of short films on DVD. Each class session will feature one of these short films (10-14 minutes) and then we’ll have time for Bible study discussion about God and our lives. The video series is hosted by Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville, Michigan. (Visit the NOOMA website for more info.) Please join us as we consider the following topics:
Rain – Sunday, November 16th
Things don’t always work out the way we want them to, or the way we think they will. Sometimes we don’t even see it coming. We get hit with some form of pain out of nowhere leaving us feeling desperate and helpless. That’s the way life is. Still, it makes us wonder how God can let these things happen to us. How God can just stand by and watch us suffer. Where is God when it really hurts? Maybe God is actually closer to us than we think. Maybe it’s when we’re in these situations, where everything seems to be falling apart, that God gets an opportunity to remind us of how much he really loves us.
Flame – Sunday, November 23rd
What’s up with the word “love”? It doesn’t have much meaning when we use it so loosely. Maybe we don’t really get it. Maybe we don’t understand what real love is. What it involves to really love somebody. What it means to give yourself to someone else. We mistake things like friendship, commitment, or lust for love, but God wired us a certain way to experience all that love was really meant to be. Not to hold us back or to make us miss out on the best that life has to offer. God created love, and wants us to feel it all in the way it’s meant to be felt.
Trees – Sunday, November 30th
We want to know why we are here. If our lives really matter. How our religion is relevant to this life. Today. We want to understand what significance this minute, hour, week, m onth, and year has to our lives. To our world. We need a God who cares about this life, in this world, right now. We want to understand why everything we think, everything we say, and everything we do matters. We don’t want to just sit back and wait for something to happen or someday to come. We want to know if all the choices we make now will shape our world and lives for eternity. Because we want our lives to have meaning today, and our lives today to have meaning forever.
Noise – Sunday, December 7th
Why is silence so hard to deal with? Why is it so much easier for us to live our lives with a lot of things going on all the time than to just be in silence? We’re constantly surrounded with “voices” that are influencing us on how to think, feel, and behave. Movies, music, TV, Internet, cell phones, and a never-ending barrage of advertising. There’s always something going on. Always noise in our lives. But maybe there’s a connection between the amount of noise in our lives and our inability to hear God. If God sometimes feels distant to us, maybe it’s not because he’s not talking to us, but simply because we aren’t really listening.
Adult Sunday School (8:45 AM) – November 16 through December 7th
What is NOOMA? The name NOOMA is an English phonetic spelling of the Greek word pneuma, which is commonly translated to “spirit” or “breath”. Nooma is a series of short films on DVD. Each class session will feature one of these short films (10-14 minutes) and then we’ll have time for Bible study discussion about God and our lives. The video series is hosted by Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville, Michigan. (Visit the NOOMA website for more info.) Please join us as we consider the following topics:
Rain – Sunday, November 16th
Things don’t always work out the way we want them to, or the way we think they will. Sometimes we don’t even see it coming. We get hit with some form of pain out of nowhere leaving us feeling desperate and helpless. That’s the way life is. Still, it makes us wonder how God can let these things happen to us. How God can just stand by and watch us suffer. Where is God when it really hurts? Maybe God is actually closer to us than we think. Maybe it’s when we’re in these situations, where everything seems to be falling apart, that God gets an opportunity to remind us of how much he really loves us.
Flame – Sunday, November 23rd
What’s up with the word “love”? It doesn’t have much meaning when we use it so loosely. Maybe we don’t really get it. Maybe we don’t understand what real love is. What it involves to really love somebody. What it means to give yourself to someone else. We mistake things like friendship, commitment, or lust for love, but God wired us a certain way to experience all that love was really meant to be. Not to hold us back or to make us miss out on the best that life has to offer. God created love, and wants us to feel it all in the way it’s meant to be felt.
Trees – Sunday, November 30th
We want to know why we are here. If our lives really matter. How our religion is relevant to this life. Today. We want to understand what significance this minute, hour, week, m onth, and year has to our lives. To our world. We need a God who cares about this life, in this world, right now. We want to understand why everything we think, everything we say, and everything we do matters. We don’t want to just sit back and wait for something to happen or someday to come. We want to know if all the choices we make now will shape our world and lives for eternity. Because we want our lives to have meaning today, and our lives today to have meaning forever.
Noise – Sunday, December 7th
Why is silence so hard to deal with? Why is it so much easier for us to live our lives with a lot of things going on all the time than to just be in silence? We’re constantly surrounded with “voices” that are influencing us on how to think, feel, and behave. Movies, music, TV, Internet, cell phones, and a never-ending barrage of advertising. There’s always something going on. Always noise in our lives. But maybe there’s a connection between the amount of noise in our lives and our inability to hear God. If God sometimes feels distant to us, maybe it’s not because he’s not talking to us, but simply because we aren’t really listening.
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