NORTHMINSTER NEWS - FEBRUARY 2022

Calendar of Events

Sundays 10am - Worship in person or on ZOOM

Monday 7:30am - Prayer Team

Tuesday 6pm - Unity Group

Thursday 7:30am - Prayer Team

February 18 at 1pm Memorial service for Winnie Hawkins

Fabulous February is here!

At the congregational meeting, elders Linda Dieckmann and Brett Qua, deacons Nancy Riggs and Marni Vigil were installed. All will be serving a 3-year term of office.

Daily Bible Study is ongoing, and everyone is encouraged to participate! Work on the sound system and other sanctuary improvements is continuing. Progress has been impacted by COVID.

Preschool is open and operating under COVID guidelines We are welcoming new faces in church each Sunday
Our Sunday school class is growing!

Marvelous March Ideas

  • Ash Wednesday church service

  • Wednesday nights during Lent– soup and salad Would you like to help?

  • Daily morning Lenten devotions leading up to Easter

  • Family Sunday with food and activities for children

Our year in review by Johanna Smith, clerk of session

The elders on the Northminster Board of Session worked very hard in 2021. In March, the elders along with Music Director Joel Marple met for an evening retreat and discussed where the church’s primary mission focus should be. It was decided that we should have an all-church focus on being attractive, welcoming, and receptive to families with preschool-age children, specifically, our Northminster Preschool families. The current Covid pandemic has made that challenging, but with the help of the deacons, much was achieved. In October, the deacons hosted a successful trick or treat time for the preschool. Over sixty-five children participated. Parents and preschool staff expressed their appreciation, and the children had a blast! A Parents Morning Out event was held in December and 22 children mostly from the preschool, spent the morning under the care of seven Northminster volunteers, allowing parents time off to Christmas shop, relax, etc. Just before Christmas, the tech team filmed YouTube videos of each preschool classroom singing Christmas carols, and these were presented to their parents.

Other highlights included:

  • Completion of the financial audit for 2019 and 2020 in December. No discrepancies were found.

  • Thanks to a $50,000 gift, session was able to authorize significant audio-visual upgrades to the sanctuary, including placement of two TVs in front of the sanctuary. $42,600 plus up to 10% for cost overrun was budgeted for the project. The work is close to being done. The next project will be to improve the library in the narthex, to allow it to be used by meeting groups, and to provide a quiet room for parents with infants. The youth room will also be modified to make it more friendly for young children.

  • Session continually reevaluates our Covid 19 protection policy. On December 15, a recommended statewide indoor mask mandate for businesses was imposed. Session elders made the decision to have one side of the sanctuary be designated “masks required” and the other side be “masks optional.” We will continue to have every other row roped off and will keep the pews in front of the band blocked off. On Christmas Eve, masks were required because several preschool families attended.