Friday, December 16, 2016
Dear Resurrection Family,
I hope you are staying warm today on this cold winter morning (actually, winter doesn’t officially begin until December 21 – so a cold fall day!). This weekend we’ll mark the last Sunday of Advent, turning to the story of Joseph and Mary’s 70-mile journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem, required by the Emperor’s decree that all Jewish men and their families should return to their home towns for a census. This journey occurs around the date Mary was due to deliver the Christ child. Have you ever been forced to take a journey in life you did not want to take? As part of the sermon we’ve interviewed Pastor Katherine Ebling Frazier and her husband, Pastor Andy Frazier – they are expecting their first child this next week and their interview reflecting on Mary and Joseph’s journey will make you smile. This will be a beautiful and inspiring weekend in worship at all our campuses.
Christmas Eve Candlelight Services will be held at our various campuses on Friday and Saturday, December 23 and 24. We will have a total of 27 Candlelight Christmas Eve services at our four locations. At Leawood this is our last Candlelight Christmas Eve in our current sanctuary. We’ll give a 30-second sneak peek inside the new sanctuary as we begin the service. Each campus pastor is including in their e-notes recommendations for which services to attend. Here’s my suggestions for Resurrection Leawood:
First, remember we’ll have all our new parking lots open for the Christmas Eve. The best parking will be on the south side of the new sanctuary – my hope is to have it lit up inside so as you walk to the existing sanctuary you can take a peak in the windows.
Here’s a list of the services and how full they were last year:
December 23 –
5:00 pm Full but not overflowing
7:00 pm 500 seats available
December 24 –
1:00 pm 1,000 empty seats
3:00 pm Sanctuary - completely full and hundreds in the narthex
3:00 pm Student Center – some seats available
3:00 pm Wesley Chapel – some seats available
5:00 pm Sanctuary – completely full and hundreds in the narthex
5:00 pm Student Center – seats available
5:00 pm Wesley Chapel – some seats available
7:00 pm Sanctuary – 200 empty seats
9:00 pm Sanctuary – 400 empty seats
11:00 pm Sanctuary – 300 empty seats
I’ll preach live at all the Sanctuary services. The chapel and student center will have live music but the sermon will come via video from the sanctuary. We’ll have the same candle lighting in each service. You can find a complete list of service music styles by clicking here.
Thank you to the 600 people who have already signed up to volunteer to help with Christmas Eve candlelight services! We’re still in need of volunteers at each campus and for each service. Those at the campuses, please check your campus pastor’s e-notes for details. At Leawood our most urgent need is for nursery workers at the 3 pm service (we need 49!). You can sign up to help in the nurseries by clicking this link. We are also still in need of ushers and greeters – click here. And volunteers to help in the parking lots –Parking Greeters: click here and
Shuttle Drivers: click here. Finally, we’ll have hundreds of first time visitors to the church on Christmas Eve – our aim is to drop a coffee mug by each of their homes as a personal “thank you” for attending and an encouragement to join us again. This is a very important part of our outreach. Could you deliver a few mugs on the day after Christmas to visitors in your zip code area? I’m planning to deliver mugs to some of our first time visitors myself and hope you will join me. You don’t need to sign up to deliver mugs you just need to stop by in the Narthex and pick up mugs that are in your zip code. If you would like to see a brief video on how to deliver click here. It takes about 2 minutes, but the impact is really important.
On Sunday, December 25 – Christmas Day – we’ll have one Sunday morning service at each of our campuses. Leawood, Resurrection Blue Springs, and Resurrection Downtown will have a service at 10:45 am while Resurrection West will have a 9:30 am Service.
I’ve awakened each morning this week with a song from Christmas at Resurrection on my mind. This year’s Christmas at Resurrection was beautiful and inspiring. We had church groups come by bus from Oklahoma, western Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa and Missouri as well as 10,000 from the metro area. I want to thank the hundreds of people involved in this year's Christmas at Resurrection. This year’s performance will be rebroadcast on Sunday, December 25th at 7:00 pm on our website at Rez Online by clicking here.
You likely know that our KidsCOR Early Learning Program (formally called Discovery Ark) - is an accredited preschool by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). Every 5 years, the NAEYC conducts a site visit of each accredited preschool to assess and hopefully renew the accreditation for that school. Our site visit took place by the NAEYC recently, and we have received our results. Not only have we retained our accreditation, but we scored 100% in 7 out of the 10 assessment areas. It is extremely rare for a preschool to score that high in so many areas. The seven areas that scored 100% were relationships, teaching, health, teachers, families, community relationships, and leadership and management. These are incredible results and they reflect the excellence in early childhood education that our children’s preschool provides. I’m so proud of our administrators, staff and teachers! If you or someone you know is interested in more information about our preschool, please click on this link.
Just a reminder, as you plan your year end giving, you should have received your giving statement a week ago if you receive eStatements. Paper statements will be mailed today. Thank you for fulfilling your pledges! The 10,000 Reasons capital campaign period ends April 1 so we’re nearing the end of that campaign. Thanks to all who have already fulfilled their pledges. To find out more about our Christmas Eve offering, 100% of which goes to projects benefitting children in poverty, click on this link.
Finally, this last Tuesday Judson Studios completed the installation of 55 more panels of the stained glass window – it is now two-thirds completed. The Kansas City Business Journal ran an article with some great pictures yesterday if you’d like to take a look. Here is the link.
I look forward to seeing you in worship this weekend as we remember the journey Joseph and Mary made from Nazareth to Bethlehem just before the birth of Jesus.
In Christ’s love,
Adam
The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection
13720 Roe Avenue
Leawood, Kansas 66224, United States
913.897.0120
www.cor.org
-------
No comments:
Post a Comment