April 28, 2020

Christian Education

What an exciting year for Christian education: We started the year with a kick off on Blessing of the Backpacks Sunday.  After blessing the backpacks in the service we served hotdogs and snow cones out on the portico.   

Just a few weeks after we blessed our backpacks we had Homecoming Sunday where we celebrated our 1st, 3rd, 6th, 9th and 12th graders, saying a blessing over them and handing out Bibles. 

We also started Sunday School that week. We had three new Sunday School classes start in addition to the Mixed Adults class which has been going strong for years.  Our new classes included Peter Rupert leading a young adults class, Dominique German leading the 6th-12grade class, Sue Henderson teaching 3rd-5th grades and Robbie Staubes teaching 4k-2nd.  All classes came with a time change to the main service, our service was moved to 10:30 in order to incorporate our new Sunday School classes starting at 9:30. 

In September we also added two new Bible studies to our already existing Women’s Bible Study led by Sue Henderson on Wednesday nights.  A Men’s Study was started on Fridays at 6am and a Women’s Bible Study on Tuesday morning at 9:00am right after preschool drop off. These will continue throughout the summer in different zoom meetings. 

In October we enjoyed a great turn out at our Trunk or Treat event and we hope to build upon it this year by having more congregation participants decorating cars and opening it up more to the community.

Our Advent program was well attended but we are looking at new ideas to help incorporate more families and church member this coming advent. Our children's pageant during the service was a big hit and a blessing to all who participated as well as all who watched.

In January we began the long and difficult task of planning our first community wide vacation school. We partnered with Zion AME to reach a broader base.  We were all excited to see what the Lord could do on the East Side of Charleston.  We had a lot of plans in place and we were looking forward to our powerful week in June.  Unfortunately, due to the virus we have had to cancel our VBS for this year.  My heart is broken, but I know that the Lord has greater plans and that if he cares for even the sparrow then he has plans for the children around our church and in our community.

Moving forward there were plans to start meeting with the different age youth ministries: rising 6th grades through rising 8th graders and rising 9th graders through rising 12th graders.  It is still my hope to start bringing these groups together towards the end of the summer so that we can have strong groups for the fall and upcoming retreats with our presbytery.

Sunday School will kick off again this fall with more options and new exciting topics. We will also be looking at community small groups as well as strengthening our existing Bible studies. 

Of course, we will (hopefully) end our summer with Hands of Christ and Blessing of the Backpacks.

Thank you for the continued opportunity to serve among you and I look forward to seeing what the Lord has in store for our community in the coming months as we continue to adjust to new normals.

Blessings,

Sarah