Sunday Night Mind Dump

• I absolutely LOVE celebrating mothers at church every Mother’s Day!!
• I thought Pastor Chuck’s sermon was just great. I think it would be hard to be a mom and not walk away from that sermon feeling blessed.
• Marty and Carolyn did a great job of welcoming a family that was visiting today. They had a young child and Marty and Carolyn showed them around, answered questions and introduced them to staff and others. Way to go.
• I had lots of fun being part of Everyday Faith: My Bible today. That’s the class that is for 3rd graders and their parents. I shared my Bible with them–how I love to use colored pencils in it. They were learning about prophets and Marsha Peth gave a GREAT illustration about what prophets are that I plan to steal for when I teach about prophets.  As part of learning to care for the poor, the kids made bags for us to take to the orphanage in Haiti next January.
• I was pretty overwhelmed at Pastor and Jason leading the kids in blessing me at 11:15 service. I don’t quite know what to do when those two are nice to me.
• Lots of people wished me a Happy Mother’s Day–which is so kind and I accept those wishes gratefully. I do think it is unfair to compare what I do to what moms do day by day everyday for their kids. They are heroines to me!!
• So fun to see Megan back in church. It is hard to believe it was only a week ago that her trials and tribulations started. God is good and has provided a lot of healing for her. HOORAY!!!
• Kristina is very excited about her new study Bible. I’m excited for her!

 

One Reason Mission Trips and Workcamps Matter

Seth Godin wrote about intentionally building community in groups today. A man after my own heart! Taking the time to intentionally build community is so important. Seth Godin might not say it, but I believe it’s most important because God created us to be in community:

Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. -Romans 12:5

Godin talks about one of the benefits of community:

The challenge is to look at the rituals and events in your organization (freshman orientation or weekly status meetings or online forums) and figure out how amplify the real reason they exist even if it means abandoning some of the time-honored tasks you’ve embraced. Going around in a circle saying everyone’s name doesn’t build a tribe. But neither does sitting through a boring powerpoint. Working side by side doing something that matters under adverse conditions… that’s what we need.

This is one reason Mission Trips and Workcamps matter. We send groups of people out to God’s world to do His work and they naturally build community. God uses that to reach the world for Him. It’s a cool system. 

 

That’s how the Spirit rolls…

So, I’m singing away at the closing song for worship on Sunday (” Trading My Sorrows”), doing the motions from VBS. Out of the corner of my eye I see other VBS kids and volunteers doing the same thing and I thank God for that connection. When I get out to the lobby, John Hughes says to me, “You know what I love? I love it when we sing songs from the Haiti mission trips like ‘Trading My Sorrows’  and I look around and the other Haiti missionaries are singing away and doing the motions. That’s good stuff.”

And I think to myself, “Isn’t cool how the ministry of VBS impacts worship? Or is it the ministry of worship that impacts VBS? Or is it the ministry of Haiti that impacts VBS? Or maybe the ministry of Kingdom Quest impacts the ministry of Haiti?” And then I remember it’s YES to all of the above and more, because that’s how the Spirit rolls...

The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit. – John 3:8

 

Haiti Photos

Got my pictures uploaded!

If you’d like to see all 188:

Haiti Mission 2009

If you want to see my Top Ten:

Haiti 2009 Top Ten Photos

 

Haiti, Here We Come!!

The First Trinity 2009 Haiti Mission Team is heading out tomorrow. Most of the team will go in the morning. Us church-worker types  (and relatives) will be at church and leave later in the day.  Here’s some fun facts about the team, the trip and how you can keep up with what God is doing while we’re there:

• There are fourteen of us going:  Chuck Whited, Jon Whited, John Hughes, Dan & Renee Gietz, Sarah Doster, Marty Doster, CC Huang, Bill Reich, Karen Cassidy, Tracy Bramwell, Anne Miller, Sue Steege and Allen Werk.
• Two of us are Pastors (Chuck and Allen)
• Four of us are first-timers (Marty, Sarah, Jon and Bill)
• Two of us are college students (CC and Sarah)
• One of us is a teenager (Jon)
• One of us is a member of Immanuel Lutheran Church in Tonawanda (Bill)
• One of us is a pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church in Batavia (Allen)
• We are carrying some emergency IV medication with us for Yelline Isidor’s father-in-law who was in a motorcycle accident on New Year’s Eve. They could only get a little of the medicine from the UN. Please pray we will be able to deliver the medicine without incident and that Yelline’s father-in-law will live until we get it there.
• We are hoping to build a church on Ile A Vache (an island off the coast of Haiti). Just a little project.
• The donations for bricks for the church on Ile A Vache continue to come in (thank You, Jesus). Our next-door-neighbor at First Trinity, Lois, stopped by today while the team was rehearsing and packing and gave us $10 more dollars for bricks, with tears in her eyes. Wow. God uses this to use so many of us!!
• We are carrying love from many with us, including: gift bags for the orphans from the Everyday Faith My Bible class last Spring, soccer balls and Jesus bears from VBS kids, sheets and medicine and all kinds of donations from the people of First Trinity. What an honor to be the curriers. Things cannot be shipped or mailed to Haiti (that infrastructure just doesn’t exist), so us carrying things is a big deal.
• We are going to lead a mending class for the ladies of the church in Les Cayes (Pastor Chuck will be head teacher).
• We are going to have at least one revival meeting on Ile A Vache.
• We have prayer partners. What a lovely and sweet thing. We are thankful for you if you’re one of our prayer partners.
• You don’t have to be a prayer partner to pray!
• We will be posting updates on this blog. Notice my twitter feed to the right on this blog? A lot of the updates may come via Twitter this time around, due to a lack of electricity. The Twitter feed will also show up as my status on my Facebook, if you are on Facebook.

 

Sunday Night Mind Dump

• Gotta’ love Sue Brese…we had talked about adding another “set” of communion assistants at the 8:45 service to help communion go more quickly. This morning, she said, “any reason we can’t try that today?” And there really wasn’t. Big thanks to Laura Zimberg who made the switch at the altar with supplies and to Jason,  and Jim Brese who stepped up to be communion assistants.
• There was a coup in Carlin Opferbeck’s small groups (Crossroads) today. I don’t really know what that means, but I’m reporting the facts, as they were shared with me.
• Paul Gerlach came to me during the 8:45 service and said he watched one of our neighbors have a real problem backing out of their driveway because our some of our worshipers had partially blocked their driveway. I so appreciated his willingness to be proactive: he put notes on those windshields, as well as a “we’re sorry” note with some danishes to the house where we didn’t park well. It is SO important that we be kind to our neighbors!! What kind of message does it give if people headed to church are in such a hurry that they are willing to fudge on the neighbors’ driveways?  I pose this question: what could we do that would actually make our neighbors HAPPY when worship comes, instead of cringing? Let’s get creative!
• Renee Gietz told me there’s a family that is using the money from taking their pop cans back to spend on buying bricks for our sister church in Haiti. What a great way to get the kids involved in missions! Another person told me that at Thanksgiving, their extended family will be talking about how to handle gifts this year. She’s going to suggest that they buy bricks in honor of each other instead of gifts. How cool is that?
• It was fun to have Jaime Christ’s mom Phyllis here this weekend. The next time we see her, her new granddaughter will be here!
• Kingdom Quest was a little on the wacky side today. The kids were really into shouting “I belong to Jesus! Satan take a hike!!” Great thing: one boy said to his Shepherd, Lindsey Wert: “I don’t have a Bible. Is there a Bible I could have?” Yes, there is! Lindsey signed the Bible and gifted it to this young man. Love it!!
• Got some feedback on the women’s retreat that said, “I would have invited a friend who doesn’t go to church, but there wasn’t enough information.” Thankful for the feedback. Makes me sad. We will do better next year. If you are interested in going (Nov. 7-9), there’s still space. Emaill me: ssteege@firsttrinity.com. I can get you a schedule with the session titles and pricing information. You can put the same weekend on your calendar for next year!
• Bills. Ugh.
• I cannot get over how bad the Cowboys are tonight. It is hard not to be happy when a Jerry Jones team is getting pounded.

 

Sunday Night Mind Dump

• I had fun being a substitute in the Handbell Choir at 8:45. They are planning to play once a month–and it’s beautiful stuff. I was disappointed in myself because I played a lot better in the rehearsal than I did in the service. Sue Brese reminded me that for the most part people listening just don’t notice the mistakes. Grace.
• It was also fun to hear Mike Van Der Puy’s trumpet (did he also play at 5:30?). And I love the red Reformation paraments (paraments are those colored fabric art pieces that get changed around on the altar when the seasons of the church year change).
• The Kingdom Quest Large Group team used flash paper as part of the drama today (Gideon’s torch). O MY! The flame leapt so high. The kids loved it! As Cathy Mongielo said in an email tonight: “Thanking God that I still have eyebrows”.  Wendy Morris, who is the up front leader during Large Group time and I were talking about the great give and take the kids give during the Large Group teaching these days. They are really engaged. I was blown away when Wendy asked, “How do we get God’s power, anyway?” and Andrew answered, “The Holy Spirit.” Wow.
• Writing Monday morning, now: Joyce Benzler told me she picked up some Honey Crisp apples at Budwey’s yesterday as a result of the Children’s Message. I’m also giving one to Kathy Figini who says she loves Golden Delicious apples but can never find them. I bet she’ll love a Honey Crisp!
• I LOVED the drama about Pride. Karen Cassidy writes some really great stuff and I thought the actors did a great job, too. Joe Zimmerman is one creepy Satan. It helped me see how many different voices pride can take. Pride really gets us stuck.
• I so appreciated all the sellers of things being willing to go with our new plan of keeping the selling out of the lobby. It just feels a lot better to me to have that space available for connecting with people. Even our Thrivent branch was willing to make the switch.
• My brother Eric sent me a text saying he was glad the Bills lost because it helped him in his fantasy football league. Nice brother.
• I forgot to talk to Jason about Ohio State on Saturday night–bad loss. Now I can combine with a conversation about the Browns good win. Can’t remember how the Saints game came out.
• Preschool still needs some prayer partners. What’s needed now is people to pray for our awesome staff. They’re here daily sharing God’s Word with the children and families. Comment below and we’ll get you connected.
• Here’s what I noticed about the Craft Show: it’s a great day to connect with people coming through the building. I noticed Pastor Chuck having some great conversations with people–some I hadn’t seen here in a long, long time. There’s money that gets made and a mission that gets lifted up and conversations that get had…great work by Kim Taylor and all those who helped.

 

I always liked Mary Ann better than Ginger…

Look! Three Mary Ann’s working at the same time at the Bake Sale today…although Mary Civiletto (on the left) is quick to point out that she is only Mary Ann when she’s in trouble, otherwise it’s just Mary.

 

Haiti Craft Show & Bake Sale: Biggest Help You Can Give Us

The Haiti 2009 Mission Team is gearing up for their trip in January. It costs about $1500 for each of us to go. Our biggest fund-raiser is the annual Haiti Craft Show and Bake Sale.  Want to know the single best way for you to help the Craft Show?

SHOW UP AND BRING A FRIEND!! Foot traffic is our best friend in this venture!

Come this Saturday, 10am – 4pm.  There’s a free Veggie Tales movie in the sanctuary at 10am (thanks to Life Resources–my all time favorite Christian bookstore). Have some lunch. Buy a cookie. Take a look at the crafts. It’s a great way to spread the word about what God’s doing in Haiti, too!

 

Pray for Haiti…

This image from September 8, 2008 was provided by the U.S. Navy. Homes seen in Port De Paix, Haiti remain flooded after four storms in one month have devastated the area and killed more than 800 people. The amphibious assault ship USS Kearsarge (LHD 3) has been diverted from the scheduled Continuing Promise 2008 humanitarian assistance deployment in the western Caribbean to conduct hurricane relief operations in Haiti. (Emmitt Hawks/U.S. Navy via Getty Images)