Weekday Email to Members and Friends – 2020-04-20
Monday April 20th 2020
A Weekday Emailer from
Matt Matthews
To Members and Friends of
First Presbyterian Church
Champaign, Illinois
Dear Friends,
I’m getting a lot of emails from you thanking me for all I’m doing at the church.
I’d so like to take all the credit.
But as you well know, everybody on staff is rising to the occasion in amazing, mainly unseen ways. Eric is our technology guru making difficult things look easy. Ann Petry, our bookkeeper, just filed a billion pages of detailed info in our CARES Act application. Marcia continues to push and pull all necessary levers to make the office work. Ritchie checks our buildings during the week and responds whenever a thunderstorm triggers an after-hours alarm. Jeanette tutoring from home, Mindy (and her friend Jip), Blaise, Lizz, Patty—all willing to go the extra mile, as usual. Fred cut the grass last week before winter showed back up. George checks the church buildings on weekends missing worshippers and the smell of coffee from the Deacon’s Kitchen. Connor sings songs on Facebook. Robert is as faithful and as easy going as ever producing worship. Richard and Leslie have provided music; Joe (and Miranda) has provided song, wisdom, and perspective. I’m moved to tears.
The Session has put in extra hours. Our deacons are making and keeping community connections; Rachel is parsing the intricacies of new community-wide Covid-19 relief initiatives. At least three key lay leaders in our church had ‘retired’ from their duties, taking a well-deserved step back, hoping for a needed rest; each has stepped back up standing in the breach for us because they know the ropes and they know we need them. Our members are praying, reaching, learning new skills, refusing to be shut down, innovating, and loving each other and their neighbors. And God is still God: sovereign, gracious, amazing, with as much power as ten million nuclear suns—in just a sliver of a sliver of a sliver of divine fingernail.
O LORD, our LORD, how majestic is your name in all the earth.
I’m more tired than usual because of the grief we all share. Personally, I miss weekly pickleball games and friends. Rachel and I cancelled our trip to Montevideo. Our son’s study-abroad program was torpedoed. The Ebert Film Festival was cancelled and our theologian in residence stayed put in New York. They necessarily postponed the Boneyard Arts Festival, and we had big plans for unveiling some original, home-grown art. I can’t get dinner at Antica Pizza. Krannert and the Virginia Theatre are mothballed. My schedule is off. (Woe is me.)
I’m also more tired than usual because I often think I’m the captain in charge of steering our church through this, which would be crushing if it were true. Thankfully, however, it is not true. I’m only doing my part. And God is taking my part, rolling it up with everybody else’s part, and transforming imperfect graces into something holy, new, and possibly useful. To God be the glory.
This is as it has always been.
Pandemic certainly didn’t cause this. But pandemic has helped me (us?) to see it more clearly when I had either not noticed before or, worse, had barely cared. Ann Stout led devotions for our recent Session meeting. She asked us, “Where have you seen Jesus lately.” A few people spoke up. (Zoom technology has a way of chilling conversation.) I couldn’t speak up simply because my question was altogether different:
Where have I not seen Jesus lately?
Thank you for thanking me.
I’ll pass it on.
News:
CU-BetterTogether . . . Is a new community group (United Way, Community Foundation, YMCA, and local churches) coming together to fight hunger and give hope to area public school families in need. Ask Rachel Matthews for more info.Want to help? Are you between 18- and 60-years-old? You can, here: https://www.
I need help: Can you tell me where in Mount Hope Cemetery our former minister John S. Frame is buried? He died around 1876. I have found Rev. George. McKinley’s grave. Please help.
Humor: Family lock down boogie (Thanks Beth Hutchens)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
New fun photo challenge! Each week the Nurture Committee is challenging us to read an assigned scripture about Jesus and come up with a representation of the story using whatever you already have around the house and share it in photo form.
CHALLENGE #1 — BIRTH LUKE 2:6-12
This story begins in a different way
The baby Jesus was sleeping on hay
He was the Messiah, God’s only son
But his journey began as a quiet, humble one
With your family, create a scene with baby Jesus in a manger with anything you can find around the house and take a photo.
Think about what it meant that Jesus wasn’t born rich or mighty, but as a humble baby just like us. Talk about why that is important for us as we follow Him.
Post your photo to:
https://www.facebook.com/
live@firstpres.church
For Instagram @fpcchampaign
Here is an example thanks to Gary and Linda Peterson…
Good Word:
Psalm 8 O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
2 Out of the mouths of babes and infants
you have founded a bulwark because of your foes,
to silence the enemy and the avenger.
3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established;
4 what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?
5 Yet you have made them a little lower than God,
and crowned them with glory and honor.
6 You have given them dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under their feet,
7 all sheep and oxen,
and also the beasts of the field,
8 the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.
9 O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Let us pray:
O Lord our God, how magnificent is the works of Your hands. You called creation into being with a single word. You divided the mountains and oceans with a single thought. You ran Your fingers through the dry dust forming river beds and spacious lakes. Trees point their heads to the sky in adoration. Flowers illumine the landscape with colors beyond our imagination. We stand in awe of Your holy craftsmanship. O Lord our God, how magnificent is the works of Your hands.
(Rev. Louie V. Andrews, III)
Much love to you all.
PEACE,
Matt Matthews
Cell: 864.386.9138
Matt@FirstPres.Church
