Summer Fun/Summer Growth

Ever since I was a kid, I have always looked forward to summer. Summer was a time for vacations, no more school and weekend trips to the lake. How could you not love summer?

As an adult, I still look forward to summer, even though it means higher temperatures and higher electric bills. Vacations these days are not merely about fun, but have to be paid for. And rather than being a time for relaxing, summer seems to be even busier than the rest of the year. But I still love summer.

Summer is also the time for summer camp, which for me always meant church camp. I have been attending summer camp, in one form or another, with very few interruptions since the early 1970s. I have been a counselor, speaker, director and sponsor. I have served on and even chaired presbytery committees. Summer camp has always been a big part of my life.

Liturgically, summer is the time of growth. If you notice the parament cloths in the sanctuary, they are green all summer long. On the church calendar, this reminds us that most of life is spent not in special events like Christmas and Easter, but in the daily drudgery of life.

So how can we put these two ideas together? How do we join the excitement of summer camp with the liturgical idea of growth? It’s all about spiritual growth. This summer we have a great opportunity to expand our faith in and dependence on God. Since many regularly scheduled activities take a break for summer, why not use that extra time to grow in your spirit, to nurture your soul?

We would like to offer several new and improved opportunities for you to do that here at the church. First, the new. As many of you may have heard, we have started a new Bible study in the Gospel of John on Sunday evenings at 7:00 p.m. Our hope was to provide a time when even those who have been busy or out of town for the weekend can meet together. We figured that most people would be back by Sunday evening. We meet in the Fellowship Hall, and T. J. Teague has prepared a special something for kids. We sing for a little bit, a few praise songs with guitar accompaniment, and we look at the Gospel of John verse by verse in a loose, discussion-style lesson taught by the pastor. It has been a long time since most of us have had such a focused and deep experience with the Scripture, and even some of our most regular “old timers” have commented that they have learned something. I hope your schedule is flexible enough for you to come join us.

As for the improved, Amy McAlister has some new ideas and is infusing some new energy into the children’s Sunday School department. This summer they will be studying some of the Superheroes of the Bible, like Moses, Sampson, and David. They will be using puppets, crafts, and computer-aided lessons to experience in a new way who these awesome characters were, and how we can avail ourselves of some of their super powers! If your kids haven't been to Sunday School in a while, I think they will really like it. Some kids have already said they don’t want to miss a single Sunday! So join us this week at10:00 a.m. downstairs. Just follow the sound of fun!

We are also very excited about Vacation Bible School this summer. Mark your calendar for July 22-26 starting at 5:00 p.m. This year’s theme is Kingdom Rock, where kids learn to stand strong for God. We always need a lot of volunteers be able to manage the numbers of kids we have, so please contact Amy or Willa in the church office if you want to help. We need teachers, crafters, game players, feeders, and crowd controllers. Just remember, we can’t do it without you!

I hope your summer is shaping up to be both relaxing and exciting, and that it will be a time of growth for you, not just physical, but spiritual. I am still excited about all our kids that go to summer camp, from Camp Lochridge to MO Ranch. But don’t forget that there’s still a lot of growing we can do right here at home.