We had an amazing Confirmation Service this past Sunday and witnessed eleven young people remember and affirm their baptism, making their faith their own. It was my privilege to be the lead teacher for confirmation this year. I appreciate the guidance and support from Pastor Brad, who stayed involved through each step of the process and came to class at key theological moments when I needed an assist. The approach to confirmation was re-imagined, including writing a new curriculum, which enabled me to utilize information I have been learning the past two years at Palmer Seminary. We shifted sessions from the Sunday school model to eight extended workshops on Sunday afternoons. This approach allowed us to form community and build relationships with each other, to dig deeper into our theological questions and to learn how to love Jesus more fully in our hearts and minds. These young people taught us how to love Jesus better, as much as we taught them how to love Jesus better.

Two important concepts emphasized in the confirmation program were guiding the students to be active in the life of the church and worshiping together in community. For this reason, confirmands were required to keep track of how they contributed to our church community. Some wrote letters or visited our shut-ins, some cleaned the church, some found ways to serve outside in the local community, some helped with the livestream of the worship, some ushered, and many helped to prepare the communion elements by putting them in baggies month after month. Everyone had to do seven trackable events. Interestingly, once our confirmands shared in multiple acts of worship or service, their involvement became more of a habit and most ended up with more than seven!

Building on this concept, we took seriously the idea of the congregation being responsible to teach these young people from baptism to confirmation. For this reason, Pastor Brad encouraged me to find three strong members of this church to lead as mentors and teachers along side of me. During the confirmation service I acknowledged and thanked these confirmation teachers, Rick and Denise Gray and Ken Lee. It was apparent in our time together that the Kingdom of God had prepared and orchestrated us to come together in this sacred season as teachers. The Spirit of the Lord was often felt during our games and teaching time together.

We also had many behind the scenes people assist. Lynne Tomlinson and Vivian DiCristofaro secured new fabric for our confirmation stoles and cut out about ninety of them, enabling us to share our tradition of decorating lovely stoles with two other churches during our progressive retreat. Mike, Sharon and Patsy Byle joined our teachers in providing significant help on the retreat.

Our progressive retreat was a retreat on the move this year, as we connected with two other UMC congregations for an amazing weekend. St. John’s hosted about 120 people on a Friday night, helping all the confirmation students from the three churches get to know each other through ice breaker games, worship, s’mores by the campfire, and a challenging fireside devotion from Pastor Brad on our theme of Identity in Christ. On Saturday we had an entire day at Hopewell UMC where things got serious, as the students opened up and shared about false identities that had been placed on them. One by one they named those lies and claimed their new identity in Christ. Our day concluded in a worship service with anointing. On Sunday we were at West Lawn UMC where we talked about John Wesley’s theology of grace based on the image of a house. Pastor Brad and I literally stood on the porch of an old house to illustrate prevenient grace. In our closing worship service, I had the honor of praying for all our confirmands as I placed the stoles they made on their necks and declared the meaning of their name in Christ before we all shared in communion together. Being able to explore our faith among other Methodists in a suburban, rural, and urban setting brought more meaning to our program and gave us a larger sense of community and belonging.

This transformative experience was evident in the witness that four of our confirmands shared this past Sunday. Together they represented the confirmands in the 2022 class very well. It was a joy to see these students profess their faith and be confirmed into full membership here at St. John’s Ivyland. I pray God continues to bless them and walk with them in their life of faith. I also pray that same prayer for you and me. May God’s grace prepare us, redeem us, and continually shape us into the people we were created to be.

 

PS: To learn more about our confirmation program or to read our curriculum, check out our website at: https://www.stjohnsivyland.com/confirmation

or on our homepage:

The hallway for Classrooms A – E IS CLOSED to general traffic on Sunday mornings. Only children and their parent/guardian(s) will be permitted in this hallway. If you enter the church through the back door and do not need to check in children for Sunday School, please turn right down the hallway past Fellowship Hall and around to the Sanctuary. If you are checking in your child for Sunday School, please proceed to the mobile check-in cart outside Classroom A in the Education Wing.

Youth Sunday School

MUSIC MINISTRY

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Please contact Lou Lescas at stjohns820@gmail.com if you are available to help. 

 The Upper Room

Six Mondays starting April 18th at 6:30 in the Parlor.  There will be a sign up sheet in the Narthex. Cost of the Study Guide is $9.00, payable the first session. Books will be available that night. Leaders are Barbara Schneider and Carol Campbell. Any questions, please call Carol

at 215-364-0942.

The purpose of this study is simple: by journeying through these six lessons you will get to know Jesus--and, therefore, God--like you never have before. And by learning more about the person Jesus was and is, we come to understand more clearly the people we were created to be.

Anxious People is about a group of people held hostage after a bank robbery who get to know each other, and they end up helping each other and helping the bank robber to find her way out of the mess. It's quintessential Backman: quirky, heartwarming and uplifting.

We will meet on Wednesday, May 11, at 10:00 AM and 7:00 PM in the Grace Cafe. Please join us; all are welcome. Facilitators Barb Schneider and Carol Campbell

Contact Paul Henry at phenry605@verizon.net for Zoom info

Saturday, May 21st

online (click here).or through the church email at stjumc@aol.com. 

if you desire to renew the listing for 2 additional weeks. 

Pictured are four baby blankets and several baby hats destined for The Baby Bureau in Warminster, plus larger children’s hats for World Vision’s Knit for Kids program. Last month, children’s hats were donated to the Ukrainian Education and Cultural Center, Jenkintown, for dispatch to Ukrainian refugees in Poland.

Once you've registered, you can either make donations by debit or credit. Lenten Offerings may also be received through our website.

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email Lou Lescas at stjohns820@gmail.com

address, phone, email, etc.