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May 2, 2021
Sermon: Love Is From God
Old Testament Reading: Psalm 22:25-31
New Testament Reading: 1 John 4:7-21
Preacher: Rev. Tom Groome
Assisting Pastor: Rev. Kelly-Ann Rayle
May 9, 2021
Sermon: A New Song
Old Testament Reading: Psalm 98
Preacher: Rev. Kelly-Ann Rayle
May 16, 2021
Sermon: Heirloom Seeds
Old Testament Reading: Psalm 1
New Testament Reading: 1 John 5:9-13
Preacher: Rev. Tom Groome
Assisting Pastor: Rev. Kelly-Ann Rayle
May 23, 2021
Sermon: The Holy Spirit Comes
Old Testament Reading: Ezekiel 37:1-14
New Testament Reading: Acts 2:1-21
Preacher: Rev. Tom Groome
Assisting Pastor: Rev. Kelly-Ann Rayle
May 30, 2021
Sermon: Do You Mean Me, Lord?
Old Testament Reading: Isaiah 6:1-8
New Testament Reading: Luke 5:1-11
Preacher: Rev. Tom Groome
Assisting Pastor: Rev. Kelly-Ann Rayle
Please check our weekly newsletter for more information on worship services.
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Listening Sessions -
Envisioning Our Future Together
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Dear Friends,
We have completed 6 of 12 listening sessions from April 11-26. We have had 55 people participate in these 6 meetings. At present we have only 12 people signed up for the 5 sessions that will take place in Dunlap. I am also moderating a listening session for Kendal residents on Monday May 3. I am hopeful we can have 20 +/- at Kendal. If we don’t see the registrations increase for the meetings in Dunlap, it will be very disappointing. That would mean that only 23.5% of the congregation expressed their thoughts and opinions on how church leadership moves forward from here and into the future. The listening sessions also give you the opportunity to express your views on the qualities we seek for the next installed pastor.
This step in the call process timeline is perhaps the most important, as it will be the basis from which the Pastor Nominating Committee (yet to be elected by the congregation) will write the Ministry Information Form (the church resume stating who we are and the type person we seek to lead us into the future).
For those who have already participated in a listening session, please encourage your friends to sign up if they haven’t already done so. Each session lasts approximately 1 ½ hours. I am including the questions that we will discuss during the sessions.
Please sign up or contact the church office to make your reservation today.
See you in church and bring a friend,
Tom
Looking in the rear view mirror (past)
· What have been the church’s greatest accomplishments in the past 5 years?
· What was the most important challenge or problem the congregation tackled in the past few years?
· What opportunity did the congregation miss in the past couple of years?
Looking in the bedroom mirror (present)
· What should be the top priority for the congregation and leadership of the church?
· How are we able to attract new members to our church?
· What is the biggest gap between what this church claims it is and what it actually is?
Looking through the windshield (future)
· What do you hope will be the most striking difference about the church in the next 5 years?
· Five years from now what will the church’s members consider the most important legacy of our current church membership?
· What qualities are you looking for in a new pastor?
· In what ways are you living into the mission statement?
We believe God intends for us to be sound in our faith, our service to one another, and our mission to our Lord Jesus Christ beyond our walls and doors. Our task is to understand, embrace, rejoice in, and share that intention.
There will be several opportunities for you to participate in a visioning study to determine how Lexington Presbyterian Church will discern God’s will for its next installed Pastor. It is vital that we get as many as possible to participate because your voice and your insights are important. Listening sessions will begin the week after Easter and continue through May. You can register for one of the listening sessions through Realm, or by calling the church office at (540) 463-3873. You only need to register for one of the events.
If you click the date below, it will take you directly to the registration link.
Listening Session Dates:
Sunday, May 2, 4pm
Sunday, May 16, 4pm
Monday, May 17, 7pm
Sunday, May 23, 4pm
Monday, May 24, 7pm
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Dear LexPres Congregation,
You may remember that Bill Klein told session in January 2020 that he was retiring. At the February session meeting Bronwen Boswell, Shenandoah Presbytery’s General Presbyter, and Nancy Meehan Yao, the Associate Presbyter, attended and explained the process to session. I then put together a flow chart and posted it on the kiosk between Brady and the Sanctuary to explain the general steps for all of you. Now that we are working through the steps with our Interim Pastor, Tom Groome, I wanted to again show you in a flow chart what steps we have taken and what needs to be done before we secure a permanent installed pastor. This is the Call Process. I’m sure you recall that we had additional steps that have been completed such as forming an interim search committee and church information was solicited and compiled through the CAT study. If you have any questions about the steps, please contact one of your pastors.
Mary Atthowe, Clerk of Session and Member of Communications Committee
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Notes from April 6 Session Meeting | |
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Call to Worship: Opened the meeting with a Responsive Call to Worship and a unison Prayer of Adoration. Rev. Groome read a scripture and shared reflections.
Congregational and Sessional Data: Current Membership: 374 (1 death and 4 confirmands); No congregational baptisms, births, or transfers reported; Pastoral concerns were shared; Deaths: Alice Richardson on October 6, 2020 (just confirmed in March); New Members: 4 confirmands-James Baker, Ainsley Carter, Jamie Johnson, and Emma Woody (examined and approved by session on 3/30/21 and confirmed on 4/4/21); Communications: 3 Thank You notes; Weddings: Approved Bill Klein as officiate at the wedding for Megan Keeley Mohan and Sean Mohan at their LPC wedding on August 21, 2021 (their original wedding was postponed in 2020 due to the pandemic).
Advisory Committees: Approved a contract from Blair Leigh for IT upgrades in the sanctuary for $5,144.54. Work will begin soon. Waiting for final contract from Lee Hartman for equipment needed to replace and update present equipment to improve virtual worship capabilities.
Administrative Committee: Examined financial statements through March 31; Updating the LPC Directory and REALM database; Studying the contract proposals for technology equipment from Lee Harman for the sanctuary upgrades for virtual worship; Committee proposed an extension of Kelly-Ann Rayle’s contract through December 31, 2021. Session approved the extension unanimously.
Christian Education: Children’s Ministry Subcommittee continues to work on the resource room and art room. Spring events include an egg hunt, ice cream and games at Hopkins Green and a hike. SS offered on zoom. Youth Ministry Subcommittee continues with Sunday meetings in person and work at RARA. A Pie Sale is planned for April 17 to raise money for a local organization that will be chosen by the youth. Adult Ministry Subcommittee had no changes. Campus Ministry Subcommittee has been contacting appropriate young people about Educational Grants from LPC as well as about the Shenandoah Presbytery Scholarship opportunity. An application for the Shenandoah Presbytery Scholarship submitted by Brooks Woody was approved and submitted to Presbytery.
Communication Committee: Thank you to all who are sending information to get out to the congregation and to Maggie for keeping communications organized and sent out.
Congregational Life Committee: Kevin Burke presented the Major Report of the work of this committee for the past year. Much has been impacted by the pandemic mandates.
Nominating Committee: Make suggestions to this committee for members of the 2024 Session Class.
Outreach Committee: Congregants are encouraged to sign up for the Prison Ministry Mentoring program.
Old/New Business: Approved Mary Atthowe as Clerk of Session through the end of 2021. Approved the Special Offerings for the year. Approved allowing Scout Troup 5 to meeting in-person in Dunlap each Monday. Mac Baker will have the room cleaned afterwards by the scouts and lock up the back door. Approved May Listening Sessions to meet in-person.
Mary Atthowe, Clerk of Session
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I was so glad that Andy Coffey asked your culinary ministry team to bake pies for the Youth Pie-By. We baked 60 pies in one day! We were tired when we finished, but it was a wonderfully satisfying type of tired. I have been asked for the Chocolate and Blueberry Pie recipes, so here they are. They are easy to make so let’s get baking! Skip Hess | |
Chocolate Pie
Ingredients:
1 ¼ Cups Sugar
3 ½ Tablespoons Cocoa
2 Large Eggs
1 - 5 oz can Evaporated Milk
¼ Cup Melted Butter
1 - 9 inch Pie Crust*
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Prepare pie crust.
In a large bowl, beat together sugar and cocoa powder.
Whisk in the eggs, butter, and the evaporated milk.
Whisk until the batter is smooth.
Pour batter into pie crust and bake for 50 - 55 minutes.
When pie is done, the filling will set and there will be a thin crust on the top.
Cool completely and serve.
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Blueberry Pie
4 Cups Blueberries**
¾ Cup Sugar
3 Tablespoons Cornstarch
¼ Teaspoon Salt
½ Teaspoon Cinnamon
1 Tablespoon Butter
1 - 9 inch Pie Crust*
1 Egg
Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
If using fresh blueberries, rinse and drain. It is perfectly alright to use the frozen blueberries. I let them thaw out for several hours in a colander over a bowl. In either case, water from the blueberries can make the pie too runny.
Combine sugar, cornstarch, salt, and cinnamon and sprinkle over the blueberries and gently toss to coat blueberries. Pour blueberry mixture into the pie crust and dot with butter.
For the top crust, you may do lattice strips or simply use another round of crust over the top and crimp. Cut steam holes in the top. Beat the egg and paint the top. You may wish to sprinkle sugar over the top. Bake for 50 minutes. Top crust will be golden brown. Remove and allow to completely cool before cutting.
*I use the store brand pastry that is in the refrigerated section. They come two crusts to a box and they are rolled up. Let them warm slightly and they are ready to go. You may make your favorite crust, too!
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Mother's Day Brunch
The Congregational Life committee is starting in-person events with the first one being our Mother’s Day Brunch! We will be following CDC/VDH guidelines by limiting capacity to 50 people in Dunlap Hall. Cost will be $8/individual or $16/family. The Brunch will take place immediately following the worship service.
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From Bill McCorkle, Director of Music | |
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Thanksgiving for Ruth Floyd!
Many of you heard Ruth Floyd’s beautiful singing in our worship service on April 25. I was particularly grateful to have found a lovely new (to us) setting of Psalm 23 in The Irish Presbyterian Hymnal (one of my new favorites), and to be able to adapt it into a solo anthem with handbells.
What many of you may not know is that April 25 was Ruth’s last Sunday at Lexington Presbyterian. She and Flash are moving to Richmond (with an interim period of several months in South Carolina). In Richmond, they will be close to their son, Jamie, and his family.
I can’t let Ruth depart without voicing my deepest appreciation and gratitude for all that she has meant to the music program of Lexington Presbyterian Church. She has been a pillar of the Adult Choir for all of her forty years here. She directed the Youth Choirs with me for some years and then took over direction of the Lam handbell program upon the retirement of Marjorie Phillips, leading the handbells for a decade. For many years now Ruth has been my faithful ‘back-up,’ directing our music when I have been on vacation, study leave, and on sabbatical.
Ruth has served this congregation on the Session and on many of its committees, and over this last pandemic year she and her husband Flash have given lavishly of their time and expertise, informing our work to maintain and improve the visual and sound quality of our virtual worship services, and taking the lead in the church’s progress toward a major equipment upgrade for our audio-visual programs.
I know that you all join me in giving praise and thanks to God for placing Ruth and Flash in our midst, and for their brilliant and generous sharing of their many gifts in the life and outreach of Lexington Presbyterian Church. We wish them Godspeed, and we look forward in hope to their many return visits.
Faithfully,
WMcC
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Lex Pres Youth Announcements | |
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LPC Youth Pie-By
The first annual LPC youth Pie-By was a huge success! The youth group raised over $900, which will be donated to a community organization of their choosing. Thank you to all who helped to make this event a success!
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Youth Group Events
May 8, 9am - Youth Group Hike at House Mountain; All are welcome
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Faith Village Spring Gatherings | |
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Faith Villagers (all ages through 5th grade) are invited to enjoy Spring at these outdoor events.
May 2, 3pm — Walk in the woods at Brushy Hills! We’ll meet at the Brushy Hills Trailhead on Union Run (Google knows where it is).
May 16, 3pm — Chalk the church! Come enjoy some snacks outside the church and we’ll decorate the sidewalks with colored chalk.
At least one adult per child, please, and observe the usual precautions: masks required, observe social distancing, and stay home if unwell.
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Our New "Faith Friends"
T-Shirts
Many thanks to Gaye Johnson for designing and ordering our NEW T-Shirts. We are in the process of handing out our NEW "Faith Friends" t-shirts to all our young people. We were a bit short on some of the sizes, so we are in the process of ordering more.
If your kiddo(s) has a RED "Faith Friends" T-Shirt in hand, please have them wear it to our future gatherings. If they do not have one yet, please wear anything RED!
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From the father of a Nigerian day student in the Rafiki School:
"I want to start by thanking the Lord God for the privilege of having my daughter in the Rafiki School where everything is about him and his Word is combined with formal education in order to bring up children who are not just academically sound but morally and intellectually sound.
Secondly, I thank the entire Rafiki School organization and sponsors all over the world for allowing themselves to be used by God to bless humanity. My daughter has been immensely blessed since she got into the school. Her character and academics have been highly commendable. She checks everything she does with the Word of God which she gets every blessed day from the school. One thing that is very significant about her is that she loves to bear other people's burdens which was on of the qualities she learned from the school.
Knowing all these gains, sometimes I become troubled when I think about my present income as a poultry farmer and my wife as a snack seller, knowing that I may not be able to support her financially in the future. But then our joy knew no bound when I was called to come and sign a consent document for scholarship. I pray that we should be favored. The Lord God who has started this work will be faithful to complete it through you in Jesus' name, Amen."
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It is a privilege for Lexington Presbyterian Church to be a part of the Rafiki mission through prayer, participation, and financial support.
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Pentecost Giving
April 5 - May 23, 2021
The Pentecost Offering, collected in late spring, supports ministries for youth and programs that serve at-risk children. Forty percent of the money collected through this offering remains with our church. Our young people typically direct how it can best support the needs of at-risk young people in Rockbridge County. The rest of the collection is shared with our presbytery and PCUSA.
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Important Messages for the Congregation | |
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A Big Proposal
Many years ago, our church started to make cassette audio recordings of each Sunday’s 11 AM worship service. Copies of the recording were driven all over the place to shut-ins who were physically unable to be present in the sanctuary. This was our first effort at using technology to share the Lexington Presbyterian experience.
COVID 19 and the last year of virtual worship have proven that we are woefully behind the times in our technological capacity. Indeed, our “normal” worship experience has changed little in the nearly 40 years I have been part of LPC. Until March of 2020, we functioned in much the same ways we did before daily use of the internet by ordinary folks was even a thought, much less a thing. Effort, creativity and determination cobbled together the virtual worship experience we have used for more than a year, using bare minimum resources.
Where do we go from here? The Session is considering a purchase of video equipment needed to support long term live streaming of worship in the sanctuary. Replacement of aging and sometimes unreliable sound equipment, together with sound interface for the live streaming of worship is also included in the proposal that is being evaluated. The entire package will ultimately require more than $50,000 in capital spending. Once in place, operation of the system may well require additional volunteer effort and some compensated staff. Given the challenges already present in the annual operating budget, there will be no choice but to make many changes in the staffing organization chart and in the allocation of our annual resources.
Some of our members might worry aloud that a permanent virtual worship experience will discourage folks from coming to church for live services. The question could be raised, do we have to do this? Do we even want to do this? How can we recapture what we used to be? Will we ever see a full sanctuary again?
Perhaps another question could be what took us so long to do this. Or even, what are we waiting for? Some may think that a whole new approach to outreach ministry is way past due. Evidence could be found in the fact that LPC family members in other states have been part of our virtual services this year. There is also evidence that change is needed in our own community given by a large body of folks who have church in a school gym and worship while enjoying a latte. A historic edifice and traditional worship liturgy may not hold all of the appeal we need for the future.
The most compelling argument that I have heard for investment in new ways of worship came from a member of our church who described the experience of his adult children, raised here in LPC and now moved away. When that generation shops for a church, they do the same thing as with any other search…they go to the web site. If the web site looks interesting, they watch a YouTube video of worship services in that church, maybe several. If virtual worship looks satisfactory, they send an email to question care for small children and to ask about young adult activities. Assuming an acceptable answer to the email, they may ask friends or work associates about the church. Passing marks from others might mean that finally at step five in the search, they will actually visit a service. If an informal alternative is available, that visit still may not be an 11 AM worship that is all bound up in tradition.
Getting to step five in the example above on a regular basis is going to require that we do some new thinking about how we share our worship experience. Please help your church find its way in this new world. Please participate in the listening sessions with Tom Groome. Please talk with members of the Session. Let’s go forward with a consensus that any bold, expensive and time-consuming initiatives are indeed things we simply must do.
-Dave Hawkins
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Rev. Kelly-Ann Contract Extension
Dear Friends,
At its stated meeting in April, the session approved the recommendation from the Administrative Committee to extend Kelly-Ann Rayle’s contract through December 31, 2021. Kelly Ann’s responsibilities will be slightly different. She will continue to provide leadership and oversite of Christian Education, and will now include pastoral visitation into her responsibilities. This change will become effective June 1.
Many members contacted Dave Hawkins, Mac Baker and me concerned about the prospect of lack of leadership for Christian Education, and specifically as it relates to children, and young families. The CAT survey revealed that we need to expand our efforts to attract young people, and we believe this will continue those efforts. As we are aware, LPC is an aging congregation, and Kelly Ann will provide pastoral care to shut-ins, hospitalized, etc.
We are thrilled that Kelly-Ann will continue to do ministry among us throughout 2021.
See you in church and bring a friend,
Tom
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Would You Like to Help Someone in Need? | |
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The Caring Friends group of Lexington Presbyterian Church provides short term meals to those experiencing life challenges, such as illnesses, deaths and births. Please contact Linda Franke to be added to our list to help others, or to just find out more information about this amazing group! You do not need to be a gourmet chef to participate! All are welcome! Thank you.
CONTACT LINDA FRANKE
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Usher Training
Are you interested in taking a more active role in worship? How about joining the Usher Team! Kevin Burke will be holding two usher training sessions. Please register on Realm, or by calling the Church office.
Wednesday, May 5, 5pm-6pm, at the Church
Tuesday, May 11, 7pm-8pm, Zoom
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Leah Circle to meet in person!
May 12 - 1:00 pm. Meeting to be held at the home of Liz Shupe. Everyone should bring a bag lunch. In case of inclement weather, the meeting will be held via Zoom at 2:00 pm.
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Lexington Presbyterian Church
120 South Main Street
Lexington, VA 24450
Phone: 540-463-3873
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