April 7, 2021
Alleluia!
Christ is Risen!
Our worship this Easter Sunday was so full of life and celebration. The trumpets, the sunshine, and the crowd all added to the beauty of that holy day. In fact, our worship all week lifted my spirits in a way I didn’t realize I needed. I pray the same is true for you. We are so close to the end of this pandemic! With that hope, I am excited to announce more opportunities for worship.
As
you may know, our plan is to continue worshipping outside at 9:30am through the
month of April. Starting in May, for the first time in over a year, we will
have more than one worship service on Sunday mornings. You will recognize these
services well. The morning will begin in the sanctuary with a traditional
service, which will be live-streamed. A second service will meet in the parking
lot and will continue to feature the same blend of traditional and contemporary
music we have come to know this year.
For
the time being, registration and capacity limits are still only needed when we
worship inside. When inclement weather forces us to cancel an outside service,
we will let you know the night before via email, the website, and our
smartphone app.
If
there is anything we have learned this year, it is that pandemic worship makes
plenty of work for everyone. With an expanded Sunday morning, we will need many
more volunteers, including more ushers, more lectors, more musicians, and more
folks working the sound and video rooms. We need your help! If you have ever
wanted to step into any of these roles, now is the time. Simply send an email
to receptionist@stmarklc.com to
get started.
Pandemic
worship also takes time. When we worship outside, our band members need two
extra hours just to make it all happen. Indoor worship takes extra time, too.
And as we learned on Easter, we need more than 30 minutes to reset the parking
lot between services. For these reasons, here is our new Sunday schedule,
beginning May 2nd:
9:00am - Traditional Worship in
the Sanctuary
11:00am - Blended Worship in the Parking Lot
Our
last Sunday with a single, 9:30am service will be April 25th. That is the day
we will also celebrate our 60th anniversary in worship, and it’s fitting that
we will all be together outside. So you know, more celebration is planned for
this fall, when we hope to be able to be together without restrictions. I am so
looking forward to more opportunities to worship with you, and for the
post-pandemic freedom that is coming soon!
Peace,
Pastor Chad McKenna
