12/3/2006

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

It started out Sunday with a very dirty church. With Danny sick last weekend we hadn't had time to keep things up. He and Gary put in some serious elbow grease in getting the building ready that morning for the week's activities.

During Morning Worship we looked at the life of John the Baptist as we began our preparation for the Advent season. At Kids' Church we decided to do one more "Draw the Bible" lesson covering the Christmas story. We had a small group for Evening Worship.

Our annual tax bills began arriving from the city this week. Since churches don't pay property taxes, the city has come up with a variety of "owner fees" that serve a similar purpose. After 7 years of trying they still don't have the address right on all the correspondence from the city so we'll pay all we get and watch to make sure we don't end up in tax sale again.

We also got our insurance bill this week. Unfortunately, it was still based on the square footage before the addition. We filled out and sent in all the paperwork and are a bit anxious to see how high the new bill will be.

On Tuesday afternoon the original building we had rented for the Power House was auctioned off. Some of us had planned to attend the auction to find out how much is sold for but no one from the church ended up being there to find out. The roof had caved in quite some time ago and many of the windows were missing. We later heard that it sold for around $57,000.

Tuesday's evening news on the television headlined with a story about a stabbing at the high school that serves our neighborhood. We heard from the kids quite a bit of information that the news didn't report. One student was stabbed and four more were arrested in the incident.

Betsy called this week. She had moved away from the area some time ago and called to let me know that she and her new baby would be in town over Christmas. She's hoping to have a baby blessing for the boy while she's in town. We've been playing telephone tag all week trying to set up a date.

101 kids participated in our SonRisers activities on Wednesday morning. That was despite the fact that many high school students stayed home due to the previous day's events. That evening the Adult Disciples group continued their study of the Gospel of Mark.

I got a request from a local landlord this week. He's been happy with the tenants he has who are active in the church and wanted to know I we had people looking for a place to live.

We finally got some recycling bins in the church. It's been on the "to do" list for a year but finally happened. our paper, glass, plastic, and aluminum will no longer be in the trash.

Friday night brought Pizza Church. We had big groups for the first and third sessions. A sudden downpour about 20 minutes before the second session started limited the size of the second group. Six kids were new to the church and a few others were new to Pizza Church though they had attended other activities.

So far, we've had 444 different kids participate in at least one church activity at the Power House (not including Bible School)since July 1. This is in line with recent years and a bit higher than last year at this time.

Our candle sale orders came in this week. As I was distributing some of them on Saturday afternoon I stopped at Violet's house. She invited me in where she, Josh, and Vivian were working on a cleaning project. She wanted to show me the award certificates Josh had received this week from TESST College of Technology for the work he's done in training to become an electrician.

While getting the sermon ready at the church on Saturday night five kids came by the church thinking it was time for Solid Rock Cafe. They were a week early. Among them were two boys who had been long-term members of the church moved away without notice this summer. They don't live very far away and hopefully will be able to begin regular participation again.

Looking ahead to next week we'll have our full schedule of activities. In addition we'll be voting for World Conference delegates during Morning Worship. We also have our monthly priesthood meeting this Tuesday evening. Throughout the week we'll be distributing fliers inviting people to the petting zoo we're bringing in next Sunday (12/10) along with our bake sale which coincides with it. Next Saturday is our monthly Solid Rock Cafe.

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

Sharon
Larry
Nate
Leila
Tammy
Janet
Markia
Matt

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