Upcoming church events

I've been feeling a tad overwhelmed the last few weeks. I'm working to put together a few things that will be coming to fruition over the next few months. It would be one thing if our church had sufficient numbers to let other people lead these things, but I have to live with reality which is that I'm the one that has to lead, plan, and execute all of them. It doesn't help that our most supportive church couple will be away for about six weeks when a lot of these things will be taking place.

First up is the children's choir. I've been procrastinating a bit on that because it is one of the more difficult tasks. With Elise working, with Shelley also working many evenings now, and with the couple out, I wondered how the choir was going to work out. It looks like Elise will be able to arrange her schedule to be present at the choir. So this will be starting up this coming Thursday. My plan is to work on a short Christmas musical, A Shepherd's Story. We did this at the Tualatin Church a few years back. I need to locate the accompaniment CD that I hope is somewhere in one of the boxes labeled, "CDs."

Next up is the four-night seminar at the end of this month on the topics of creation, evolution, God, and people (Out of Thin Air by It Is Written). I put up some flyers a little over a week ago, and about half of them had disappeared. I suspected there are some people that object to the topics. I put up a couple more this morning, and had my suspicions confirmed because one of them was gone just an hour later. As long as church events don't try to influence or challenge peoples' beliefs, and/or applicable only to church members, then those flyers seem to last for a long time. I am annoyed by it, but remaining upset over that isn't going to do any good. I'll avoid replacing the ones at locations where they disappear quickly and be persistent about keeping flyers posted in the other locations. I've also asked the Christian radio station, KRSA, to announce this event. I'm also purchasing a 2-inch ad in the local paper to run for in the next two, weekly issues.

Finally, starting mid-October for about two weeks, I plan to host in our home, another series of meetings (HeartQuest by Faith for Today). If I find that there are some who attend Out of Thin Air are ready to learn more, I want to invite them to HeartQuest. There are also a number of people in town that I would like to invite as a way to encourage them to re-engage in Christian fellowship. And finally, I think this series could be a good way for our kids to learn more about our beliefs in preparation for baptism.

Hanging out without any real plans yet is the Stop Smoking seminar that we would like to hold. The schedule hasn't quite worked out yet. We just might have to wait until January for this one. November could have worked, but with the Messiah performance at the end of the month, I won't have the time and energy to put into another event. December is, of course, out of the question with holidays and other related programs happening then.

So that's the rundown of most of the big things that are coming up in our lives for the remainder of this year. Now to take care of the little things, like tomorrow's sermon...