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SPECIAL MUSIC IN WORSHIP TOMORROW
Guest musicians will join us at the 10:30 a.m. worship service tomorrow: Jason Posnock and Andrea Pettigrew will play violin and Katie Hamilton will play cello. David and Kathye Gresham and Pastor Mary will join them to present a special prelude.
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NOISY OFFERING THIS SUNDAY
Our next "noisy offering" will take place this Sunday, January 6, when the children will collect your pocket change in metal buckets (hence, the
noise
). The purpose of these offerings is two-fold: to support worthy programs and to promote their understanding of and participation in Christian stewardship.
This time, the offering will benefit
Rise & Shine, which
provides after-school and summer programming to economically disadvantaged and racial minority children that focuses on enriching children, empowering parents, and encouraging community.
A team of several people from Good Shepherd offers tutoring assistance each month at Rise & Shine. This offering will specifically help fund much-needed math resources for the children and new carpeting.
Start rounding up your change now! If your change jar happens to be low, bills and checks will be happily accepted by the children. Come be a part of making a joyful noise!
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INTERSECTIONS CLASS
The Intersections Class discusses a variety of topics that connect faith and life during the Sunday School time (9:10 to 10:00 a.m.). The program part of the class runs from 9:30 to 10:00 a.m., but people are welcome to come early and stay late to chat and enjoy refreshments. Please come join us in Room 6 to share your perspectives and hear from others. Here is the January schedule:
January 6
- "Uplifting Christmas Gifts" article in Living Lutheran magazine.
January 13 -
What Is Godly Play? Come and See
.
The
Education Committee has been looking into using the Godly Play curriculum in our pre-K and elementary Sunday school. The curriculum includes three years of lessons to introduce Bible stories and elements of the liturgy to children. The stories are acted out with materials that help the children remember the lesson and retell it in their own words. Parents, prospective teachers, and any others who would like to learn more are invited to this demonstration.
January 20 -
Crazy Christians: A Call to Follow Jesus
- a look at Michael B. Curry's book.
January 27 - Sabbath Rest
- a look at the book Sabbath as Resistance: Saying No to the Culture of Now by Walter Brueggemann and "Those That Cry Out for Rest and Relief" article from Women of the ELCA's Café.
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DiGG CLASS UPDATE
The Delving into God's Grace adult class is on hiatus in January, but will return in February. More details will be coming soon!
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PASTORAL CARE
Pastor Mary and Hank will be on vacation beginning
Tuesday, January 8, through
Monday, January 14. Pastoral care will be provided by Pastor Ellen Dozier (828-403-3988 or
[email protected]). Ellen will also be preaching at both services on
January 13.
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WOMEN OF THE ELCA EPIPHANY PARTY
"The Women of the Church" are having an Epiphany Party at Barbara Meyer's house at noon on Tuesday, January 8. It is a pot-luck and fried chicken and drinks will be provided. Please bring a dish to share. 2019 activities will be discussed. Husbands and friends are invited. RSVP by email (
[email protected]
) or sign-up on the bulletin board.
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CHRISTMAS DECORATION REMOVAL
On Wednes
day, January 9
, helpers are needed to remove decorations from the church. If you can help with this work, please come anytime between 10:00 a.m. and approximately 3:30 p.m. Thank you!
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2018 END OF YEAR STATEMENTS
2018 End of Year Statements
are in your mail slots. Please take a moment to pick yours up in order to save postage on mailing. If you have any questions, please contact Jane Madsen at 828-489-7667 or [email protected].
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CONGREGATIONAL MEETING
On Sunday, January 20, at 12:00 p.m., please join us for our annual congregational meeting and to vote on the proposed 2019 budget. We will be holding a potluck luncheon. If you are able to bring a dish, please sign up on the sheet on the bulletin board. Thank you!
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GOOD SHEPHERD'S LIBRARY
Did you know that Good Shepherd has a library? We do, and you are welcome to use it! The Conference Room contains catalogued books (thanks to our librarian, Annette Blum) and a list of the books in the library, which you can look up by title or author. There are books on a range of topics, including theology, church history, health, and social justice. Questions? Just ask church staff.
Here are some books in the library that you might be interested in:
Talking to Alzheimers: Simple Ways to Connect When You Visit with a Family Member or Friend by Claudia J. Strauss
Not Alone: Reflections on Faith and Depression by Monica A. Coleman
Waiting for Good News: Living with Chronic and Serious Illness
by Sally L. Wilke
Dignity and Grace: Wisdom for Caregivers and Those Living with Dementia by Janet L. Ramsey
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PICK UP YOUR DISHES
Please see the back table in the Fellowship Hall for any dishes that you may have left behind. The items will remain on the table until
January 20, at which time, if they are not claimed, we will donate them. Thank you.
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JOIN THE TRASH TEAM
Needed - four exceptional people (men or women) to join the TRASH TEAM. This is one of the church's oldest and most revered working groups.
Duties - On Mondays, for one month collect trash all throughout the church and take it to the curb by 9:15 a.m. Office and kitchen recyclables go to the recycle bin. Working time is 30 to 40 minutes depending on the amount of time you spend talking with the office staff. Months open are February, September, October, and December.
Outstanding training provided!
Contact Fred Weed ASAP and choose your month. 828-877-6154.
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COMING SOON AT GOOD SHEPHERD . . .
Sunday, January 6
8:00 a.m. Worship Service (Sanctuary)
9:00 a.m. Coffee Hour & Fair Trade Sale (Fellowship Hall)
9:10 a.m. Confirmation Class (Pastor's Office)
9:10 a.m. Intersections Class (Room 6)
9:10 a.m. Elementary Children's Sunday School Class (Rooms 3 & 4)
9:10 a.m. Nursery/Preschool Class (Room 1)
10:30 a.m. Worship Service
(Sanctuary)
11:30 a.m. Coffee Hour & Fair Trade Sale
(Fellowship Hall)
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NEW MEMBERS CLASSES
Are you interested in exploring membership at Good Shepherd? Our next series of New Members classes will begin after the 10:30 a.m. worship service on
January 27 and run for the next three Sundays at that time. Contact volunteer coordinator, Jody Schuld (937-644-2029 or
[email protected]) or the church office (828-883-3680 or
[email protected]) for more information or to sign up.
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COMMUNITY CARE CORNER
The "Community Care Corner" feature in the weekly newsletter allows us to update you on people for whom we are praying or to submit a new prayer request. If you have an update on someone or a new prayer request to share in the Corner, please email or call the church office ([email protected] or 883-3680) by noon on Thursday.
Erin Whiteaker, Debra Whiteaker's daughter, who is expecting a baby boy in February, is experiencing some rather painful times as a result of a cyst.
Hank and Mary Shore's nephew,
Zach Lantelme
, and his wife,
Anna
, were able to hold baby Micah for the first time this week. Anna's blood pressure is normalizing and Micah is off a ventilator and able to breathe with a CPAP machine.
Tracey Propst
, Sid Propst's daughter-in-law, is experiencing ongoing complications from diabetes.
Grace Rehme, Marci Kuhlman's mother, is continuing to recover from pneumonia.
Dan Bergen, long-time college friend of Dave Kuhlman, is suffering from several serious ailments.
Hampton Schulz, grandson of friends of Robert and Jane McKeown, has kidney cancer. Hampton has had surgery to have the tumor and one kidney removed and is now undergoing chemotherapy and radiation treatments.
Mark Glaeser, friend of Karen and Mike Anderson, has learned that his cancer has spread into his lymph nodes.
Carol Maquire, Arthur Raynolds' cousin, has been diagnosed with cancer of the bile duct which is considered inoperable.
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SERVING THIS SUNDAY
Ministers
.........................................................................
The People of Good Shepherd
Pastor.................................................................................................Mary Hinkle Shore
Minister of Music.....................................................................................David Gresham
Organist......................................................................................................Vance Reese
Coordinator of Outreach Ministries.......................................................Kimberly Dunbar
Children's Ministry Coordinator................................................................Heather Merritt
Assisting Minister.................................................................Annette Blum / Lorel Durlak
Reader...................................................................................Ellen Dozier / Bob Milligan
Ushers.....................................
Henry Dixon & Darrell Dixon / Jane & Robert McKeown
Acolyte & Crucifer............................................................Annette Blum / Zia McConnell
Greeters.............................................
Bob & Ginny Landwehr / Hal & Patricia Galloway
Child Care During Sunday School..........................................................Debbie Cooper
Elementary Sunday School Teacher........................................................Jackie Jenkins
Elementary Sunday School Door Person......................................................Jia Emaus
Child Care during Worship........................................................................Barb Jackson
Altar Care.....................................................................................................Sue Barrett
Communion Bread.......................................................................................Sue Barrett
Tellers........................................................................Mike Anderson & Jane McKeown
Doorkeeper of the Day...........................................................................Mike Anderson
Coffee Hour.....................................Bruce & PJ Larson / LCGS Fellowship Committee
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FAIR TRADE SALE THIS SUNDAY
On January 6
at both coffee hours, come visit the fair trade sale in the Fellowship Hall, where you can purchase an assortment of coffee, chocolate, tea, and other fair trade foods. Each sale benefits small-scale farmers around the world.
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GETTING AHEAD SERIES AT SHARING HOUSE
Sharing House is offering another Getting Ahead series beginning on Wednesday, January 16. The class is designed to help people imagine and create a more stable financial future for themselves and their children, and will meet on Wednesdays from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. at Brevard Wesleyan Church. If you are willing to provide snacks for the class, please see the bulletin board for more information and to sign up. Questions? Contact Kimberly Dunbar in the church office ([email protected]t or 883-3680). Thank you!
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SUPPORT THE BAND GOING TO PLAY AT CARNEGIE HALL
The Brevard High School Band has been invited to perform at the 2019 New York Invitational Music Festival next spring. This festival offers young musicians the opportunity to play in one of the world's greatest music venues, the Isaac Stern Auditorium/Ronald O. Perelman Main Stage in the famed Carnegie Hall. One of the band members is our own Joe Smith.
In order for every band member to be able to have this once-in-a-lifetime experience, the band needs to raise $150,000. This can only happen with considerable support from the community. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation payable to "Brevard Band Association" and mailing it to BHS-Bands, P.O. Box 1491, Brevard, NC 28712. Thank you!
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UPDATE ON THE YAGMS IN SENEGAL
Article submitted by Kathleen Milligan.
When I was a faculty member at Muhlenberg College, one of my responsibilities was preparing student teachers to confront the realities of working with diverse populations in underfunded, urban schools. Most of Muhlenberg's students are white and most are upper-middle class.
I recruited an African-American colleague to help me with this. We designed a workshop to help student teachers identify their attitudes towards the wide array of students they were about to encounter and consider the implications of their attitudes. The student teachers were invited to post anonymous descriptors under poster headings such as "homeless," "LGBTQ," "Latino-American," "African-American," "teenaged parent," Asian-American," "gang member," etc. "European-American" was always included among the categories. Our students were surprisingly honest, and blunt in their choice of descriptors. Equally surprising was the nearly universal failure of our students to self-identify as "European- American." They consistently described European-Americans as newly arrived immigrants who probably did not speak English. When we pointed out that most of them were European-Americans they were initially puzzled and sometimes resistant to the label. They thought of themselves as the default setting in America: the normative background against which all others were compared.
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YAGM Rachel H. with two friends.
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As I read the blogs posted by this year's YAGMs on the
YAGM website (look below Pastor Kristin's picture to access the current YAGM blogs), I am touched and heartened at how quickly and thoroughly these young people are learning they are not the world's default setting. I am struck with the profundity of the challenge they are experiencing in Senegal. It is one thing to spend seven hours a day in an urban school system where 20 plus languages are spoken and quite another to live 24 hours a day for months on end in an alien culture where you are one of very few Westerners and you do not speak any of the several languages you hear around you. The experience is humbling and life-changing. These YGAMs spend a great deal of time in prayer- asking God for support, for strength, for guidance, for understanding, and for discernment of God's will for them as strangers in a strange land. I encourage you to read their blogs and join me in praying for them and rejoicing in the transformation God is accomplishing in their lives.
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STORIES OF FAITH IN ACTION
Editor's note: This is a story from the ELCA's 2018-2019 Stories of Faith in Action.
A Camp Call Connection
The summer before Nate Berkas started high school, he went on a camping trip that would change his life. Berkas said his faith journey began in earnest on a five-night visit to the Boundary Waters with Voyageurs Lutheran Ministry, an ELCA camp in Cook, Minn.
"It was the first opportunity for me to feel and see and experience God in a really tangible way," Berkas said. He went on several more trips to the area throughout high school before becoming a camp counselor in college, when he spent four successive summers working with youth at camp. "I realized through that experience that I was really passionate about outdoor ministry and really interested in pursuing that as a profession," Berkas said.
The next step in his journey came through acceptance into the ELCA Young Adults in Global Mission (YAGM) program, which is funded in part by Mission Support. Berkas, who grew up in Madagascar while his parents served as missionaries there, applied for YAGM because "it was my own opportunity to see God at work in various ways around the world and to be formed and transformed by our companions."
A highlight of Berkas' YAGM year serving alongside companions from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Southern Africa was a weeklong camp in Cape Town. The experience affirmed in Berkas the importance of "outdoor ministry and creating space for young people to come that's outside of their normal context ... and to send them back renewed and refocused."
After returning home, Berkas served for five years at the ELCA churchwide organization, stewarding the relationships between ELCA missionaries and their sponsoring congregations. His experience with the many facets of nonprofit management would later be an asset when he accepted his current position. "While I loved so much of what I was doing [to support churchwide global ministries], where I feel most called is going back to that canoe trip after eighth grade and thinking about how formative that was for my life," he said.
Today, Berkas is site director at Wilderness Canoe Base-another ELCA camp in the Boundary Waters-where he gets to give young people the same experience he had as a camper. "I feel a deep call to this type of ministry," he said. "I'm grateful for the way that all of this has worked together to shape where I am."
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