Twice a month I serve a small rural congregation. Average Sunday attendance is around 12 or so, but this morning we had unexpected largesse with a congregation of 23. Is this one of those struggling congregations just barely hanging on in a country town with high unemployment and a dim future? Not likely! Over coffee and donuts after the service, the congregation gathered to acknowledge the over abundance of blessings that are theirs. Each one took an envelop in which to make personal donations earmarked for particular needs in the community, hundreds of dollars from their outreach fund were dedicated to other needs here and abroad, two parishioners took on responsibility for outfitting the needs to two impoverished children, $500 from a discretionary fund was given to the local food bank, and a couple of hundred more was dedicated to the family of a minister whom they did not know, in another town, and from another denomination, whose house had burned down. All this from a congregation that cannot afford a full-time pastor and worships in a tiny little hundred-year-old building in need of repair. Driving up there twice a month to worship with them is truly one of the greatest joys of my ministry.
thanks for sharing your driving partner with me! god was generous in multiple ways this weekend!!
lovely,gives me hope.ThanksB
About the \”hundred year old church building in need of repair\”: I have just learned that, a hundred years ago (about 1908), Dayton was a prosperous farming center, one of the largest towns in the state of Washington! \”Ichabod\”–how is \”the glory departed\”! But it is a brave and generous congregation in Grace Church!
let\’s hear if for generosity and hearts of fullness rather than scarcity!! thanks for reminding us that some congregations do survive doing outreach and mission when all might suspect they should just close down.
Geez CP one of my two congregations is (or at least has been) of about the same size. Even when they were \’a break of a memory of an idea\’ sitting on the edge of the A702 there was this glimmer that let everybody know they were going to be okay. And they are.
RRThanks for the note. One of these days we\’re going to head up your way just because we\’ve never been that way before. It may have to wait for the stock market to improve a bit.CP