12/28/2008

It’s been a busy week at the Power House in Baltimore, Maryland.



It started out Sunday with Morning Worship. Ed and Darlene were back in town for the weekend, which surprised many people at church that morning. Tamara and Crystal did the final reading and lighting of the Advent candles during the service.



Kaleema also came to Morning Worship. She’s the person who has been in charge of the Diggs-Johnson Middle School kids when they’ve used the church building as a part of their community development training.



The kids worked on two different projects during Kids’ Church. First, they colored nativity scene pictures as thank-you gifts for Diane for bringing the horses the week before. After that they made a Christmas craft as a gift for parents, neighbors, or teachers. We had leftover cookies from the week before so we frosted them and gave them out to the kids as snacks.



We had a small group gather for Evening Worship. Afterward, though, people got to work. The Smeads mopped the floor and reset the building in preparation for Christmas Eve. Tamara and Vonceil took a couple of young women to Target to shop with some gift cards that were given to them through the church.



On Monday and Tuesday we continued our distribution of fliers for the Christmas Eve service. They were two of the coldest days of the season so far. Between the two days we probably distributed around 1300 invitations. We had a few hundred left over as a result of being slowed down by the cold.



We did get a variety of responses to the fliers. I was able to visit with several people who planned to come and I fielded questions about the service from quite a few others. I also got an email from a man who kindly asked not to receive any more invitations as he was an atheist. I was glad that he was able to find and use our web site so easily.



Monday and Tuesday also included other preparations for the service. We had candles to buy, new video cables to test, and copies to run. Vonceil put the lyrics of the songs on Power Point so we could project them this year rather than running off pages and pages of print.



Diane stopped by on Tuesday afternoon. She picked up the pictures we’d taken of the kids on the horses and received the thank you drawings the kids had made. She was still very excited about her experience up here and looking forward to doing it again.



During the day on Wednesday Tamara, Bryce, and I set up the church for that evening’s service. We arranged the worship center, reconfigured the sound system, and set up and decorated tables to help hold candles. In all, we had 118 candles ready to be lit for the service. We then moved the pulpit and worship center out of the way so the NA group could meet that afternoon.



We had a good number of people come to the Christmas Eve Service. I don’t know an exact number who were there as it was a little too dark for me to see everyone from up front. In years past, we had to keep the spotlights on so that people could read the text of the songs but this year we could turn them off because of the words being projected on the wall.



During the service Tamara and I read through the Christmas story in Luke and Matthew. Charlotte came up with her keyboard and provided amazing leadership to the group as they sang the hymns and carols. I offered a brief message and Ron provided a Christmas blessing for the group. Vonceil ran the computer and projector.



We had a wonderful mix of people come to the service. Of course, many of those who faithfully attend a weekly service were there as well as those who come mainly for holidays. Some folks connected with the Towson and Dundalk congregations drove in for the service. A few of our newer kids came and one group brought their grandmother with them. We had a few people who had responded to the fliers and some people whose primary contact with the church thus far was Family Bowling Night. We also had some people we hadn’t seen for a long time, including a young adult who was active here during his middle and high school years who arrived with his girlfriend and one month old baby.



As is our tradition, the offering that night was our “Christmas Gift to Jesus.” This year we chose to again send this offering to the church’s AIDS Orphans projects in Africa. During the service we raised $647.02 for that cause.



During the day on Friday we cleaned up from the Christmas Eve service and got things reset for the weekend’s activities. While finishing the preparations for Pizza Church one of our neighbors stopped by. His grandmother, who lives a few blocks away, was in the final stages of cancer and he wondered if we could set up a time to visit with her. We decided to go together the next morning.



With people out of town or at work I ran Pizza Church solo on Friday night. We had good groups throughout the evening, though clearly some of the kids in the first group had gotten lots of candy for Christmas. We also had a few kids we hadn’t seen in a long time as they had moved away but were back in town visiting family for Christmas. Every single kid who came was wearing at least one new item of clothing that they’d gotten for Christmas.



Vonceil, Bryce, Onalee, and I went over to the church Saturday evening to start setting up for Sunday and to let Vonceil go through the logistics of baptizing someone. With the font still empty we got in walked through procedures while the kids did put away the Bibles we used at Pizza Church and then folded up some extra chairs that were out. Vonceil and Onalee finished that task while Bryce helped me start filling the font.



That night brought our monthly Sundae Church. The kids were quite into their new gadgets they’d gotten for Christmas so while we were visiting they were also texting each other.



Looking ahead to next week we have an amended schedule of activities. We will not have SonRisers or Adult Disciples on Wednesday and the church will be closed on Thursday for New Years. Tamara and I will begin transitioning her into the role of financial officer for the congregation. I’ll spend some time this week putting together a curriculum for Adult Disciples and another for our youth programs for the coming months.



Along with the individuals and activities mentioned, please keep the following families in the forefront of your prayers:



The Brannon Family

The Boozer Family

The St.Thomas Family

The Walker Family

The Zerwonka Family

The Torres Family

The Banks Family

The Taylor Family



Thank you for your continued prayer support.



Jeff and everyone at

The Power House

“Building the Kingdom of God Here and Now”

PowerHouseMD@Juno.com

www.pigtownchurch.org