5/18/2008

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



It started out Sunday with Morning Worship. We had a few people come with their mothers to celebrate Mother’s Day together. We also had a lot of people come and go during the worship service. By the end of the hour, we really weren’t sure as to exactly how many people had been through the door for at least part of the service.



Because it was Pentecost the topic for the sermon was about the Holy Spirit in our lives today. As we were leaving, Patricia asked about taking one of our remaining recycling bins for a neighbor who had asked for one. When she came back by me she was carrying two. She said, “I got over to the stack and just felt like I should take two instead of one. I don’t know why, but that’s the kind of thing we’ve been talking about today so I thought I’d better.” She let me know the next time I saw her that as she was going home another neighbor stepped outside and asked her how to get one. She was glad to provide him one immediately.



At Kids’ Church we reviewed the story of Pentecost then talked about Mother’s Day for a while. The kids made key chains as gifts for their moms.



We had a small group at Evening Worship. Among the group, though, was a kid we haven’t seen too much of lately hoping to get some additional attendance credits so he can go to camp.



We learned this week that we were approved for a grant from Baltimore Fun-D and the Annie E. Casey Foundation to launch a virtual bowling alley this fall inside the church. The monies will provide about half what we need to start the program. We’re now on the lookout for Nintendo Wii games.



A strong storm came through the area on Sunday night and Monday. It blew the banner off the back of the church. When Danny took what was left of it into the building he discovered that we had a major leak of rain water. It was in the same spot that we thought had been repaired. The builder is coming back out to see what can be done. In the meantime, it’s quite a mess in our entry way.



The Citizens of Pigtown met at the church on Tuesday evening. Later that night we had our monthly priesthood meeting. With the craziness of summer upon us, we spent quite a bit of time synchronizing our calendars. We also were able to discuss some exciting plans for fall, including the virtual bowling alley and coordinating with the University of Maryland School of Nursing for different health screening programs.



For the second week in a row, 102 kids participated in SonRisers on Wednesday morning. While there I learned that Tony, a young adult who used to be active in church when I first got here, had been shot in the chest and was in the hospital. There were lots of rumors as to what happened, none of which seemed quite right. I was able to get up to the hospital several times this week to visit with him. He requested baptism upon his release.



That night the Adult Disciples group continued its study of “Prince Caspian.” Next week they’re going to watch “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” together. They’ll be going to see the movie “Prince Caspian” together in June.



As I was leaving the hospital on Thursday I ran into Charlene. She’s a church member who works in the food service at the hospital and she was just arriving at work. When she found out why I was there she took Tony’s room number and said, “I’m going to make sure he has some special things with his meals. Just don’t tell him where they came from. He needs to be blessed.”



Friday night brought Pizza Church. This marked the official beginning of our distribution of camp invitations. I’d run into a couple of parents the night before so a few kids got things early.



On Saturday Tamara and Jenn went to the Mission Center Young Adult Retreat in Virginia. They seemed to have a good time and made some connections about camp staffing.



Here in the neighborhood we spent the day doing a lot of visiting. We had two people in two different hospitals. We also started to track down parents to get kids registered for camp. We were able to get 10 kids registered for camp and one registered for Spectacular at Graceland. We also visited several other parents who were still deciding about sending their kids to camp and were able to get invitations to some kids who were not at Pizza Church on Friday.



Looking ahead to next week we’ll have our regular schedule of activities. In addition, I’ll be attending a seminar at Saddleback Church. We currently have three baptisms scheduled for Sunday, May 25, so we’ll be doing some preparation visits with those being baptized and encouraging some others to be baptized, too. We’ll continue working on getting signatures on camp forms. Next Saturday is our monthly Sundae Church.



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



Joe

Denira

Charlie

Michelle

Amber

Scott

Walter

Brenda



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