April 27, 2022
Hello everyone
First, a warm thank you to all for our holiday last week. I am enjoying working at St. Andrews very much but it is good to get away for rest and relaxation. We spent some time in the Florida sun reading (and sleeping) and it was wonderful
The only downside was that Barb tested positive for COVID despite our wearing masks and taking precautions. Unfortunately, she continues to test positive although almost all of her symptoms have disappeared. Out of an abundance of caution I am working from home this week and after talking to Margie Warren, Clerk of Session I will not be leading worship this Sunday. Rev. Wendy Paterson has graciously agreed to do so and I am very thankful to her,
Here are some of the things I am working on this week:
Weddings and funerals - Christina Weylie passed away this week while visiting her daughter in England. I had a long conversation with her son Donald and the funeral will be at St. Andrews on June 22 at 1pm with lots of details to be worked out yet. Please keep Christina’s family in your prayers. On a happier note, I will be officiating at a small wedding ceremony next Tuesday afternoon in the church garden area for one of Jean and Larry Rechsteiner’s nephews. I have had some delightful conversations with them
Worship planning for the Pentecost season - service themes, scriptures and songs are all thought out beforehand in order to give our wonderful music team the time they need for preparation. I am hard at that this week
And we had our first meeting of the Goverance review team with Cathy Umphrey who is a consultant with Creedence Consulting from Cambridge. It was a wide ranging conversation helping to identify the needs of the congregation as we consider the future and how to effectively make decisions and follow through with those decisions
That brings you up to date with what I am doing. I look forward to the Mother’s Day service on May 8 and at the staff meeting yesterday we chosen May 15 to ne the Sunday here we celebrate and install both Ann-Marie MacDairmid into her role as Director of Music and Gord Burnett as Choir Director and Hand Bell Choir Director. Here at St. Andrews we have a great musical team. A big shout out to the two of them and to our talented choral scholars including Darielle, Keiko, Matthew, Morgan and Megan
One final note - in my reading this past week I came across a quote that said God’s primary job is to wrestle resurrection of out every death. I like that. To me it is powerful and it will show up in a worship service in the near future
Take good care everyone and again thank you for the holiday
Marty