Cancellations

The weather forecast was not good this weekend. Several Baptist churches cancelled their services. I was waiting to see if the church I was preaching at was going to close. Nope.

When I arrived the church parking lot was starting to ice. I decided to not chance the slight slope of the drive way and entered through the back. Once I made my way into the church, I realized the person I had seen walking down the sidewalk had entered through the front. She was sharing that the Baptist church she normally attended had cancelled all services including their online offering and the Baptist church across the street wouldn't have worship for another hour, so she decided to check us out. As worship started I realized the pianist from a neighboring Baptist church had joined her grandmother in her pew and the mother of the session leader was also in attendance though she has attended a neighboring church for thirty years.

I had the opportunity as I talked about Advent and the path we are on as we await the second coming to restate my affinity with this congregation that I had tried to share last time I was here. I shared again that I felt I was on a similar journey trying to discern my future and be faithful to where God was leading me as the congregation.

During prayer time, I prayed for the requests and then thanked the Lord for all the new faces in the congregation, thankful that we could be there for them during the weather event, thankful to be sharing worship with them. A church member came up to me after worship to share that she was a member of that congregation and had been her entire life and didn't understand the reference to the new faces! Oops. I immediately pointed out the woman who had attended for the first time because her church was closed, the granddaughter who was here because her church was closed, and the mother who was there to visit. She stepped back her complaint, thankfully.

After refreshments, as the congregation hung the greens, I sat and talked to two gentlemen about grief during the holidays. One had lost his wife a year ago (I had done her funeral along with his mothers two years earlier) and the other had recently lost his father whom he had been caregiver for. It was a very nice conversation and I left feeling uplifted.

I'll be back next month with a new message and hopefully without any verbal missteps!!