December 5, 2021

Two great things will be happening this Sunday. Best-selling author and one of the leaders of Red Letter Christians, Shane Claiborne, will be preaching at our 11:15 Sunday Service AND we'll be offering our Children's Programs again after a long break due to Covid. 

Many of us have traveled down to St. Simon's Island for January Adventure to hear speakers like Barbara Brown Taylor, Marcus Borg, and Brian McLaren. It's rare for us to have a nationally known speaker like Shane come to Asbury. Hope you will make every effort to attend. 

After Shane preaches at our 11:15 service, he will be leading a workshop that afternoon at 2:30. If you have friends who attend another church and cannot join us for worship, be sure to invite them to the 2:30 workshop. Childcare will be available. There is no charge for the workshop. It will also be Live Streamed.

If you are not familiar with Shane, here he is on YouTube:

As I previously mentioned, we will be starting our programs back for children this Sunday. Our nursery will be available for infants and toddlers, and we'll also have Children's Church for elementary age children. People working with our children will be vaccinated and will wear masks. Children older than two years old are also to wear a mask. If you have any questions, call the church office or contact Ellie Covington, our Director of Children and Family Ministries.

We know that our Live Streaming Ministry keeps us connected to those who live far away and those who cannot attend the services due to health conditions or job conditions or for some other reason. I want to say a special "Thank You" to Barri Marshall for her great work with our Live Stream Ministry. Each Sunday, Barri is in the "Control Room" of the Education Building in order to make things happen outside our building. She helps us get the message out to people all over the world. Thank you, Barri!

We are now having coffee and hot chocolate in the courtyard after our Sunday services (weather permitting). It has been so good getting to spend time reconnecting with everyone. We hope you will stay and fellowship with us as we sip our warm beverages together.

Even though December 5th is the first Sunday in the month, we will not have Holy Communion this week since we had it on Celebration Sunday and because we'll have it at our Christmas Eve Service. 

That's right! This year we will be having a Christmas Eve Service. Due to Covid, we're not quite ready to have all of the wonderful Gretchen Greene Dancers back with us, but we still will have a powerful service. AND we will plan to go Christmas caroling after the service in the neighborhood. I so missed the caroling last year and look forward to it this year!

Thank you to each of you who made your financial pledge to God for the ministry of the church for the coming year! Some of you even took a step forward, increasing your pledge for next year. I can't tell you how much this matters as it helps shape what we can do in ministry next year.

If you haven't made a pledge for 2022, and you consider Asbury your church home, you can still make it by bringing it to the church on Sunday, by mailing it in, or by calling Claudette at the church office. Thank you!

Our theme last week for the first Sunday of Advent was, Making Room for Creativity and Imagination. This week on the second Sunday of Advent, the theme is: Making Room for Others. We will be singing one of my favorite hymns: When the Poor Ones. And the choir's anthem will be the wonderful Mark Miller song, Draw the Circle Wide. 

Hope you will be with us on Sunday to welcome Shane to Asbury and to welcome the Asbury children back to the church!! It's going to be a great day!

In Christ’s love,
Billy