Worship on March 16
It was Palm Sunday. Everyone seemed to enter the sanctuary with a sense of excitement and expectancy as each person was handed a palm frond.
Jeff Need led our opening announcement time. Kim N, Chris W, Linda O and Carol M were among the people who shared joys or prayer concerns.
Mary Gray was our liturgist of the morning. She called us to worship by reading from some quotes from Winston Churchill about how success and failure do not follow us throughout our life. But, she added that God does.
Linda Ostler was our song leader of the morning. We opened up by singing, “Hosanna, Loud Hosanna” “Let’s Just Praise the Lord” and “The King is Coming.” While singing each of these hymns Linda encouraged the people to wave their palm leaves. It was a cool sight throughout the sanctuary.
The Pastor led us in a time of prayer.
Heather Underwood beautifully sang a song about spring filling the air. It was a very uplifting gift to the congregation.
Betsy Remaly taught the children’s time. She talked about the events on Palm Sunday. She asked the children what kind of float they would like to ride up. They answered “a Barbie float”, “Princess” , “Army” , “Veterinarian” , “Flying Hotdog” and “Hillbilly School Bus”.
Betsy went on to talk about how Jesus used a donkey. That’s not much of a float. Even so, it was a parade to honor God. Are we able to honor God in all we do?
The pastor announced that the churched approved the purchase of a piece of land north of our current parking lot. Now we need to make it legal with the state. He called the Youth Group forward. 4 youth and 3 represented the 25 who returned from an event called Acquire the Fire. They talked about how God spoke to them during this event.
Following the offering we sang the hymn “Because He Lives”.
The scripture reading was from John 12:12-16.
The pastor talked about how the Gospel of John says that the people imitated the party for Jesus. This is an illustration of how we can go directly to Jesus. We don’t need anyone permission. We need the group to make worship exciting. We can worship alone each day.
The people shouted to Jesus, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” The pastor asked if there is anyone who has blessed our live because they came in the Lord’s name. Is there a Sunday school teacher or relative or friend who has blessed your life because they did ministry in God’s name? This would be a great week to write them a note to thank they for being faithful.
The pastor had encouraged the congregation to read “The Screwtape Letters” by CS Lewis during the season of Lent. He concluded this reading this week by talking about some of the images that Screwtape uses in chapter 31 when he talks about death. It was a powerful image to think about the freedom we gain when we are freed from our skin in this world.
The closing hymn was “I Believe in a Hill Called Mount Calvary”.
About 154 people enjoyed our Palm Sunday worship service.
