PVUMC930 - We've Set the Table for You

When preparing for Thanksgiving dinner this week, you may have paid a little more attention to the details than for your usual evening meal. You may have set the table with the good silverware, or you may have chosen to serve Aunt Mary's favorite vegetable. You welcomed guests, both old and new, attended to the details of the preparations, and set enough places at the table so everyone felt they belonged.

This Sunday, we will welcome guests, both old and new, to the new 9:30 worship service. We've been making preparations for months, hoping that our guests will feel comfortable and cared for. We've been praying for them even before they walk through our doors. We've been choosing components of the service with the guests in mind. And just like your family gathering this week, we hope all who enter our home will feel like they belong.

If you are looking for a church home, we invite you to join us this week at 9:30. Come as you are - jeans are okay. We'll have coffee and refreshments ready as you walk in. The kids can go to the nursery (0-2 yrs) or to Sunday school (2yrs - 12th grade), or join you in the service. The worship service will last about an hour.

Immediately following the service, we will invite you into Fellowship Hall for more coffee, conversations, and a mission/service opportunity. We want to show our gratitude to the teachers in our community by giving them Thank You cards. You and your family will be invited to join us to help. The older kids can help us create cards and the younger ones (0-PreK) are welcome to stay in the nurseries. This will be an informal time and  you can join us for a few minutes or an hour as your schedule allows.

Please join us this Sunday for an opportunity to grow, belong and serve.

Grow, Belong, and Serve

God was definitely with us this morning. Pastor Nathan simply asked the group when and how we might continue to meet on a regular basis now that the 9:30 service is starting. The discussion quickly shifted from how we might find a time for the CORE group to meet, toward how we could connect new people. We want our guests to feel like they belong from their first visit. We brainstormed ways to entice our new worship attendees to stick around for fellowship after the service so we might begin building relationships with them. It soon became clear that a service project could be the means to do that. God put the right people in the room this morning and provided the ideas. We left with a clear vision of what we were being called to do.

So, starting this Sunday, following the 9:30 service, worshipers will be invited to Fellowship Hall for coffee, conversation, and a short service project. Our vision is that this will be an opportunity for us to meet our guests in a more informal setting, and to provide our guest with a way to be connected and serving from their first visit. We plan to meet for a mission project like this every Sunday.

And beginning in January, we will form small groups for intentional faith development which might meet on a weeknight. We might start as one group or find that growth requires that we form several groups by that point to meet the needs of our 9:30 community.

I do hope you'll join us for worship at 9:30 and stick around for a service project. This week we'll be signing Thank You cards for the teachers at our neighborhood schools. There will be childcare for infant-PreK, and school-aged children will be invited to help us with a special project for the schools as well.

CORE group work opportunity

You are invited to come to the church this Wednesday, Nov 24, at 2PM in Fellowship Hall to set up for the service project on Sunday morning. (If you think you can make it, please leave a comment below so we'll look for you.)

Sunday morning, after the 9:30 worship, we will invite our guests to join us in Fellowship Hall for a quick service project, coffee, and conversation. We will be signing thank you cards for the teachers at our neighborhood schools.

Because there will be elementary age children joining us, we will be setting up a mural or poster for them to help decorate for the school. If you have a fabulous idea on the specifics of what that might be, please leave a comment below.

Celebration of Mission and Service Work @ PVUMC

You all are out of control...in a GREAT way! News came out this week inside our church about the Extravagant Generosity of this congregation. Because of this congregation's extravagant generosity, you are making a difference in this community and the greater world. Here are a couple of comments from Pastor Nathan Stanton's email to the congregation this week as well as some of my own thoughts and additions.

• We have finished payment on our Mission and Ministry apportionment (our church's share of support for global initiatives) for the 2010 year.

• As of this week we also have paid down debt we owe on the building to $309,000! Just two and a half years ago we had just under 1.2 million dollars still to pay off from building in 1998. By eliminating the current debt on the building, we will have more resources to continue to meet the needs of our community through new outreach programs.

Presentation of the Crop Walk Quilt, November 7, 2010

• The Crop Walk quilt was awarded to Pleasant Valley UMC for the third year in a row for raising the highest amount of donations among all participating churches. Pleasant Valley members and friends were responsible for almost $5,000 in donations to help with ministries that assist others living in poverty and hunger locally and around the world.

• This week, we finished the Operation Christmas Child with Cathleen Simeo making the delivery of 115 boxes on behalf of PVUMC!

• We had volunteers helping GraceMed with their dental checks on elementary students from Cloud Elementary. We had volunteers working with and walking the children between the school and clinic all day Wednesday and Thursday.

• Visit our Mission and Service page to see our current opportunities to get involved, including the Youthville Giving Tree initiative, now through November 30th.

We're out of control allowing the Holy Spirit to lead us where God is calling us to go. What are we learning? We are learning that when we let go and let the Spirit lead, miracles happen, people's lives are touched and changed and our lives are filled and changed as well!

Wrapping Up Preview Sunday

Preview Sunday for PVUMC930 was an extaordinary success this past Sunday! The morning went without a hitch. The details of worship were well taken care of and the new worship service also went smoothly. The people of Pleasant Valley UMC were in a different place as well. There was an energy with the expectation of starting something new in the church that seems to be taking shape and is catching momentum.

Sunday at 9:30, the CORE group for PVUMC930 will put a wrap on Preview Sunday with a discussion about the feedback received. Whenever you start something new you know that there are simply going to be holes in the armour from the very beginning and what you do is take the time to think through how you can improve and what the resources will be that can help with the improvement. The CORE Group has prepared themselves for this process.

A couple of consistent reactions by people were the inability to read the screen in the front of the church and the mode in which hymns were done. For a church that has rarely used video and projection during the whole service, the use of this medium through the whole experience makes a difference in each individual's worship experience.

Another innovation for PV was doing some of our traditional hymns in new ways. When you have done things the same way for decades the smallest change will take time to get used to. Putting some of the oldest and most cherished hymns to a different pace and music will throw anyone off.

What was obvious to me was the movement of the Spirit. I saw more teary eyes than I have seen at a Sunday morning service, ever, while serving PV. Worship is meant to present and show our passionate love to a God who gave us life and freedom to be, through Jesus Christ. As far as I am concerned, Sunday was a grand start to a great way to invite people (not the currrent group of attendees at PV) to life and freedom in Jesus Christ.

We'll discern what is important to reach new people with a new hope in Christ. We'll take the time to sift through what is important to reaching those who are not here yet. We'll also consider whether it is as important to consider issues that may stand as a point of discomfort for those who already attend PV but may not matter to a newcomer or guest. Our priority will be to reach those who are not at PV yet rather than create something folks at PV would feel more comfortable with if they attended.

I believe this is a great step for PVUMC! We'll continue to draw upon all of the resources and all of the wisdom that exists in the church and outside of the church to create new places for new people.

- Pastor Nathan

Feedback Needed

If you attended the preview service for PVUMC930 and didn't get a chance to provide feedback, here are several ways to contact us. Your opinion is so valuable because we aim to create a comfortable worship experience - a new place for new people.

Contact us by:

• comment on this blog post
• email or Facebook message the person who invited you
• email or Facebook message Pastor Nathan

Preview Sunday

Please join us this Sunday morning at 9:30 for a sneak peek at our new 9:30 worship.

• You can enjoy coffee and refreshments upon arrival. 
• You can wear jeans!
• Your kids can go to Sunday School or join you in worship.
• You'll be in on the refinement of our process.
• You can be a part of this exciting new adventure from the ground up!
• You are invited to tell us what you think - immediately following the 9:30 service.
• We need your participation to make this a relevant and authentic worship environment for people who haven't been to church in a while or are searching for a church home.

 Join us for worship and join in on the process.