This Week from Caitlyn
"...but be filled with the Spirit...giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" -- Ephesians 5:18-20
Dear beloved in Christ,
I heard it said recently that, from the perspective of a student, COVID has affected three years. It changed the end of the school year in 2020, it changed all of schooling last year, and this year we are once again gearing up for a new year with precautions of various kinds in place. That is a long time in kid years!
I hear a variety of feelings from some of you as we face this new year. I hear hope for a vaccine for younger children to be available soon. I hear trepidation about what classrooms might look like. I have heard stress and frustration and worry. And I've also heard excitement and yearning and curiosity and joy. Just this last week I was in the store grabbing a couple things, and I watched a little girl run by my aisle. She had a sparkly notebook hoisted high above her head. "Mommy! Mommy! Can I have this one for my Math Class?!"
New years and new beginnings are often full of mixed emotions, but there is still a spirit of joy and anticipation and curiosity which is not quenched. Even in the midst of it all, there is much still to be grateful to God for, to rejoice over. Gratitude is at the heart of resilience. As our Epistle reading will remind us this week, in all times and for everything, we pause to give thanks to God. (Perhaps, most especially, for sparkly notebooks).
This Sunday, we will pause to give thanks and ask God's blessing on our students as they embark on this new year, offering up to God the whole mix of feelings we have about it. Please have your student bring their backpack to the 10:30 AM or 5 PM service so we may ask God's blessing on them and celebrate them as a congregation. We'll have Snoballs on the lawn after the 10:30 AM service, too.
I know that many are cautiously waiting until your children are old enough to receive the vaccine themselves. At the 5 PM service on Sunday masks will be required of all who attend. There is also ample room to physically distance. At both services, Mitch will invite our students to gather around the front steps for an interactive sermon. (He'll be masked for the sermon in both services.)
Then on September 12th we'll pause to give thanks and celebrate the beginning of our program year at St. Martin's. Our programming is beginning later than usual to allow time for the students to settle into the particular routines of this school year, and to give us time to assess how we might safely offer programming to our children both in-person and at home. Alex, our new youth minister, and I will be announcing those details in the near future.
There is much to give thanks for as our new school year and program year begins. Where do you see joy? Hope? Expectation? Blessing? How will you pause and offer to God thanksgiving in all times?
In Christ,
Caitlyn+
