Weekly Update// Pastor Chris
Dear Asbury Family,
About five years ago, Amanda was pregnant, and we found out God was blessing us with both a boy and a girl. When we announced that the names of our children would be Hannah and Noah, somebody approached me and said, “Why are you naming your son after somebody in the Bible, but not your daughter?” Please allow me to clear up any confusion – Hannah is named after somebody in the Bible. In fact, we’ll be looking at her story in worship this Sunday (August 14)! I hope you’ll join us for our 9:30am or our 11am service. In addition to looking at Hannah’s story in 1 Samuel 1:1-20, we’ll be celebrating Holy Communion.
I want to thank all of you who came to one (or more than one!) of our three Godspell performances last weekend. Wasn’t it a wonderful production? A huge thank you to Tamara and Lance Alexander, Hannah King, Kendra Roark, Bonnie Stout, Larry and Eve Koch, the cast and performers, and all those who were involved in Godspell in some way. (It’s always risky when you name names because you’re bound to leave someone out!) I also want to let you know we collected $2,663 in donations. I am grateful for each and every person’s generosity to our church.
Since school started back up in our community on August 10, let me close this note with a prayer for the new school year.
Gracious God, we lift our students to you today.
They’re ready to receive your blessings and they commit themselves to studying and learning in the school year ahead.
We ask for your blessing on each of them.
Further, we ask for your blessing on their backpacks. They will hold the schoolwork of each student and will be carried from home to school and back again.
As these students carry their backpacks, may they be reminded of the love and care that surrounds them each school day.
We pray as well for the teachers, administrators, and workers in our schools. May they also be sustained by your blessing.
May they be reminded that we embrace their call to serve students and surround them with our love and care as well.
We pray in the name of Jesus whom we seek to follow day by day. Amen.
(adapted from a prayer found on umcdiscipleship.org)
Blessings,
Chris