Dear Friends in Christ,
If you go to Target, you will see the backpacks and pencils on display. It feels incongruous to me when I’ve just come from the swimming pool. And yet now is the time to prepare for the transitions of September.
As we prepare here at Grace, there’s a key question in front of us: what will our worship look like in the fall? More specifically, what will our schedule be? What new pattern will we follow?
While it would be nice to think of “going back” to Grace’s old service schedule, a variety of factors make that difficult, if not impossible. We don’t have the number of choir members we once had. We don’t know how many people are going to be coming to worship in the wake of this pandemic. La Gracia worship has moved into the nave, and we do not want to reverse that important step.
The staff and I have been considering any number of possibilities. We are putting as many creative ideas on the table as possible. And we are discovering, as we do, how interconnected our life together really is. One small change has a thousand unintended consequences.
As we think this question through, I want to hear from you. What most interests me is not (right away) the “solution,” but instead I want to hear what matters to you about your worship experience. Is it important to have incense? To be able to sleep late? To have church done before your toddler’s nap time? To hear beautiful music? To have no music? As I get to know this community better, part of what I want and need to learn is what makes worship precious to each of you.
Here, again, we face another area of change. And change often brings loss. But it also brings opportunity and, with opportunity, hope. Is there something you’ve always wished Grace could do but never thought it possible? Now may be the time.
Whatever schedule we take on, we will do it as a one-year pilot through June of 2022. If it works, alleluia! If not, we’ll try something different. We are God’s people, and if you read about the Israelites in the wilderness or Jesus’s disciples walking with him to Jerusalem, you know that God’s people can adapt and grow and risk.
My hope is to get this question settled by the middle of August, so we can move forward with planning for the fall and move forward with our life together into the future God has for us.
Yours in Christ,
Anne+