April 2024 Newsletter
Dear friends,
This month, the season of Easter continues. It is a season of 50 days, from Easter Sunday to Pentecost Sunday, which will be celebrated this year on May 19.
Amid so many troubles and sorrows in the world, this season focuses on the Easter message that love is stronger than hate and death will never have the last word.
May this focus encourage us and strengthen us to be Easter people, striving to follow Jesus our Savior, who showed and shows us how to shine God’s light of love and justice into the world.
One of my favorite hymns for Easter season was written by Brian Wren:
Christ Is Alive!
Christ is alive! Let Christians sing.
The cross stands empty to the sky.
Let streets and homes with praises ring.
Love, drowned in death, shall never die.
Christ is alive! No longer bound
To distant years in Palestine,
But saving, healing, here and now
And touching every place and time.
Christ is alive! and comes to bring
Good news to this and every age,
Till earth and sky and ocean ring
With joy, with justice, love, and praise
Blessing in this holy season and in every season,
Barbara
Upcoming Events
- Saturday, April 6: Men’s Breakfast – all men welcome
Meet in front parking lot: 8:20 AM - Saturday, April 13:
Drive Through Collection of Non-Perishable Food for Open Pantry
1-3 PM in the back parking lot of the church - Saturday, June 1: Vendor Fair/Community Yard Sale
- April 7: New Fundraiser for the Church - Texas Roadhouse
Bring flyer with you
Community Organizing within the Congregation
This presentation showed us how to identify and move forward with projects in the community that are controlled by the congregation.
The first emphasis is the need for Power, defined as the ability to act. This includes both Relational Power (People with influence) and Financial Power (Money). People with influence can include Moderators, both current and former, Youth Group Leaders, Committee Chairs, and long-time members. Building Financial Power means involving Stewardship, Finance, and the Treasurer.
The method of organizing a project is to utilize the Cycle of Organization which proceeds as follows:
- Listening and Discussing Issues and Ideas with Relational Power people to gain support for the project.
- Identifying Leaders and issues to move forward.
- Research and Power Analysis to determine what is needed.
- Taking Action to achieve Goals of the project and deal with the reactions to it.
- Evaluation of the results actions taken to achieve the goals.
- Listening and Further Discussing Issues and Ideas with Relational Power people to determine continued Project progress. This is essentially a reassessment after initial goals are met to decide, “What’s Next?”
All the material was well presented and interesting.
It was interesting to me that at the NST Meeting, Bob Loesch’s summary of Foster’s work with the Afghan family was quite a lot like the organizational method presented at the Super Saturday presentation.
Charlie Shultz
Worship for all Ages
A worship service with both adults and children attending was held during this workshop.
Children learn by observing adults around them. They acquire the language of worship by observing the words of adults and the minister.
The leaders talked about an area for children in front of the church during the service. This would be for a small church with no Sunday School. Some parents desire to have children with them during the service, too. Children can participate by singing and using shakers and hand motions. Children love rituals and repetition. Scripture can be read by older children.
Our church has a time for the children with the minister early in the service. Then they go down to God Time with adults that teach about the lesson learned during the service.
This workshop had a little coffee hour at the end.
I enjoyed the workshop very much as I’ve worked with children and many ideas were given to use with them.
Beverly W. Shultz
Recorded Worship Services
Along with in-person worship service, we offer pre-recorded worship services, posted each week (and for special services) on YOU Tube, on our Foster Memorial Church Facebook page and on our church website: http://www.fostermemorial.org/videos/
Worship services are also provided in print through the mail each week for people who do not have access to the internet.
The next gathering for the Fosterians will be on Saturday, May 18 beginning at noon.
There will be a light luncheon served with a free will offering to pay for the costs of food. After lunch, there will be a fun time with the focus on spring and mothers. The gathering will end with discussion of preparations needed to be done for our Vendor Fair/Yard Sale scheduled for June 1. All women of the church and friends are invited to this gathering. Please let Lori or Judy know that you plan to attend.
Corned Beef Dinner
Thanks to everyone who worked on the dinner and raffle. Special thanks to Jim, our lead cook. Thank you to everyone who supported the dinner. We raised just about $2000 for our ministries. Photo shows some of the members of the kitchen/helping crew.
