Weekly Update// Pastor Will

Hi friends!

I hope the new year is treating you all well so far! This coming Sunday we are starting a new sermon series on The Lord’s Prayer titled Pray Like This. Do you pray The Lord’s Prayer often? Is it formational in your faith? My time in seminary gave me a

deep appreciation for The Lord’s Prayer, even though it has been very present in my journey of faith. Seminary, like most schooling, comprises a lot of information. Here, it is our faith, the ins, the outs, the ups, and the downs. Sometimes it was easy to feel overwhelmed with all the info and my brain felt like mush. Even more, mush than it usually feels like! Thankfully, the smart people at Duke knew this type of feeling would happen and put us in Spiritual Formation groups.

Spiritual Formation groups consisted of 7-8 divinity students,

usually in their first year, they would meet once a week for an hour. I felt like I drew the short straw because I got a group that met early Tuesday morning on campus way before my next class. However, it all worked out in the end. Not only did it give me extra time to work on homework and read and read, and some more reading while I was at it, but the Spiritual Formation was more beneficial than I originally realized. In that group, we laughed, cried, and grew together, and a lot of that was around The Lord’s Prayer. It was what

we opened with and what we closed with. Each week we would take a different line and focus on it and let the conversation organically take shape. Sometimes we stayed close to the topic and other times we were way in left field. Either way, we were okay with it and trusted the Spirit to guide us. Wherever the conversation led, we would always come back to The Lord’s Prayer. It was centering for us. Almost like a home base. That’s where my excitement for this

series stems from.

Wherever or however you feel about The Lord’s Prayer, I hope

you’ll join us as we talk about this special prayer that Jesus taught us!

Looking ahead, we have our Glow Party put on by our children’s ministry on Friday, January 20th. If you’re able to volunteer,

please let Laura know by following this link: https://vbspro.events/p/events/70035C. Last year was a

tremendous success, and this year will be the same! See you all Sunday at either of our services, 9:30 am Celebration

(Contemporary) or 11:00 am Traditional. Both are live-streamed on either Facebook or YouTube.

Take care and God Bless!

Pastor Will