Our final Family Promise visit of 2017 will begin in a couple of weeks. Two small, sweet families still need our support toward being independent. They will be with us from 5:30 p.m. Sunday, October 15, until 7:00 a.m. Sunday, October 22. Please consider lending a few hours of your time, or your cooking talents. These are our remaining needs:

Food: We need a few more people to donate breakfast items, lunch food, and snacks. We also need supper for eight on Sunday the 15th or Saturday the 21st, delivered to the little kitchen between 5:15 and 5:30 p.m. The meal can be takeout or homemade.

Dinner hosts: We need people to eat with the families on Monday the 16th, Tuesday the 17th, and Thursday the 19th. Choose your evening and come to the church parlor by 5:30 p.m. to share the dinner you will find waiting for you (unless you also volunteer to bring it with you!). You'll eat with our guests, help them clean the little kitchen, and stay until the overnight hosts arrive at 8:30.

Overnight hosts: We are looking for volunteers to stay overnight on Tuesday the 17th or Thursday the 19th. You would arrive at the church at 8:30 p.m., spend the night, and see our guests off at 7:00 the following morning. Our visitors retire to their rooms after they've tidied up from dinner, so bring a book, work some crosswords, or watch a DVD. We have comfy rollaway beds and snacks for you, but you will need to bring your own linens or sleeping bag.

Please feel free to invite a friend to volunteer with you, especially if you choose to stay overnight. Both Family Promise's on-call phone number and Dottie Havlik's phone number will be posted at the church, so someone will always be available to help or give advice.

If you can help our friends continue their journey toward healing and independence, please email Dottieat [email protected] or call or text her at 423-956-6747. Thank you!

Jim White at the Pantry in an undated photo.

The cupboard is rather bare at a local hunger ministry. Contributions to the Bristol Emergency Food Pantry fell over the summer, and its shelves need restocking. The Pantry is also low on money, so those planning to contribute to it at year's end are being asked not to wait but to make their donation now.

The Bristol Ministerial Association organized the Pantry to provide three days of food for hungry people, and clients from either side of Bristol may use it once a month. This ministry has become the city's hub for integrated food poverty assistance; its mission is to end hunger in Bristol by organizing food, information, and support for community survival and dignity.

Each year the Pantry serves approximately 14,000 individuals, the majority of whom are children, seniors, women, the working poor, and people with disabilities. It depends on donations of food and funds from FPC and other local churches, businesses, individuals, and two local food drives, the Boy Scout drive in the fall and the Postal Workers drive in the spring. FPC contributes a percentage of our Five-Cents-a-Meal Hunger Offering, a gift of about $1,200 per quarter.

We have a grocery cart in the Fellowship Hallway for receiving donations of nonperishable food for the Pantry. You may also take food items directly to the Pantry at 21 Washington Street (behind the train station) in Bristol, Virginia. Please coordinate your delivery time with our own Jim White (423-571-4449) before you do. To make a monetary donation through PayPal, follow this link.

Be sure to join us next Wednesday, October 4, when Dave Welch will lead a Bible study during the Adult Learning segment of our evening program. Before the evening programs, we will share a fellowship dinner of chicken divan, rice, salad, and dessert at 5:30 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall. The Adult Learning segment will follow at 6:20, and the Middle School Gathering and Wednesday Night Kids will meet separately at 6:00. High School Small Groups will meet at 7:00.

Beginning October 4 and continuing through December 13, Lorri Looney's Wednesday morning Heart to Heart Bible Study will tackle Beth Moore's newest release, The Quest. Workbooks will be available at the first meeting. All women of the church, and their friends, are welcome to join this group at 9:30 in the Coffee Klatch room.

Last week the Student Ministries took to the trails for Sunday night fellowship. With a group of 33 students, we hiked to the top of a bald on Roan Mountain to worship as the sun set behind us. Nate Higgins, a guest leader from the Atlanta area, led us in worship. Nate led worship for students on the Fall Retreat as well. The experience was breathtaking, as we worshipped and fellowshipped as a church family while surrounded by God's incredible beauty. Several hikers who were passing through stopped to join our group and sing praises to the one who created the beauty we were taking in. God is so good! / Katie Arnold, Director of Student Ministries

Dear friends and church family,

Thank you for honoring me Sunday with such a beautiful reception. Thank you so much to all who gave time, cookies, punch fixings, grapes, work, and everything else for such a beautiful table of food around which we might fellowship. I was so blessed by all of those who came to share a hug and a kind word with me yesterday. Thank you also for the gift for my family and me. My hope is to use this to begin a new journey of publishing some of the songs I have written over the past few months.

Our family will continue to pray for First Presbyterian Church in Bristol, for the Session, the Pastor Nominating Committee, the committees, staff, and members to discern God's leading in his sovereign wisdom.

"Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, 'The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him'" (Lamentations 3:21-24).

The LORD is our portion; therefore, we have hope, because his compassions never fail.

In Christ's love,

Shannan Miller

Fall has put a toe in. Leaves are yellowing and browning, surfing the wind and falling. Pots of chrysanthemums vie for our eye at the nursery. Halloween decorations pop out at us when we're not prepared for them. Into this whirl of activity ride the mowers of October, led by Jim White. He will shake out the church lawn for World Communion Sunday and give it a good airing. After him will come Roger Sikorski, continuing the eternal work of discouraging a lawn from becoming a hayfield, even if it would make a neat autumnal meme.

If you'd like to rid the world of cliché or just help care for our grounds, join our mowing team! You can sign up at any time of year. We welcome men and women, adults and teens. You can make a family outing of it: younger children can move debris to the curb, and a parent or an elder sibling can mow. If you're unfamiliar with Scag mowers, Team Captain Randy Cook will be happy to give you a lesson on our Tiger Cat. If you can mow even once during the growing season, please email Randy at [email protected] or call his cell at 423-956-1541. Thank you! 

Sunday's music participants: Sanctuary Choir; Lauren Castor, flute soloist.

Sunday's music: The anthem is a text by Horatius Bonar (1808-1889), a prodigious Scottish hymn writer. Bonar entered the ministry of the Church of Scotland and was put

	Horatius Bonar

in charge of mission work at St. John's parish in Leith. He joined the Free Church at the time of the Disruption of 1843, and in 1867 was moved to Edinburgh to take over the Chalmers Memorial Church. In 1883, he was elected Moderator of the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland. Bonar wrote a number of hymns, many of which, for example, "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say" and "Blessing and Honour and Glory and Power," became known all over the English-speaking world.

The music was composed by William M. Schoenfeld (b. 1949). He holds a BA in Music from Cal State, Hayward, California; C.T.S. in Worship from the Pacific School of Religion, Berkeley, California; and Master of Church Music from Southwest Baptist Theological Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas. In addition to compositions published by Choristers Guild, he also has children's and adult anthems published by GIA, Coronet Press, the Lorenz Corporation, Shawnee Press, and Sacred Music Press.

Organist's footnotes: The Augsburg Organ Library is a multivolume collection of repertoire for the church organist. Each volume is geared toward specific seasons of the church year, including Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, and Easter, and the long green time after Pentecost is covered by Summer, Autumn, and November (the end times). There are also thematic volumes for Baptism and Holy Communion, Funeral, and Marriage. Because many churches are marking the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, their latest volume, Reformation, has just been published. I own all of these volumes, so I purchased this latest addition to keep my collection up to date. As I read through Reformation, a plan emerged to learn and play enough of these pieces to cover all five Sundays of the month of October, the month which ends with Reformation Sunday.

"Allein Gott in der Höh" (Prelude) ["All Glory Be to God on High"] takes its tune from a Latin plainsong, adapted by Nikolaus Decius (1485-1550). This particular setting was composed in 1962 by the American organist, Paul O. Manz (1919-2009). Manz was Cantor at Mount Olive Lutheran Church in Minneapolis; Cantor at the Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. Luke, Chicago; and Professor and Artist-in-Residence at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago.

For the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, I have chosen two shorter pieces, both of which are based on the hymn tune VATER UNSER: the first two words of the Lord's Prayer in German. The first setting is by Barbara Harbach (b. 1946), Professor of Music at the University of Missouri, St. Louis. The second setting is by Max Reger (1873-1916), who was Professor of Composition at the Conservatory, University of Music and Theatre Leipzig; and Music Director at the Paulinerkirche, University of Leipzig (Germany).

"Nyt ylös, sieluni" (Postlude) ["Arise, My Soul, Arise!"] is based on a Finnish folk tune. It is here set by the American composer, Dale Wood (1934-2003), who was Organist and Choirmaster at the Episcopal Church of St. Mary the Virgin in San Francisco. He was also Director of the Grace Cathedral Boys' Chorus, and Executive Editor of Sacred Music Press.

Sunday, October 1

8:30 a.m.       Worship, Fellowship Hall

9:40 a.m.       Ethiopia Mission Trip Information Session,

                        Room 117

9:45 a.m.       Sunday School

11:00 a.m.     Worship, Sanctuary

5:00 p.m.       Middle School Student Fellowship

6:30 p.m.       High School Student Fellowship

Monday, October 2

5:30 p.m.       Adult Handbells

7:00 p.m.       Board of Deacons, Room 123

Tuesday, October 3

9:00 a.m.       Staff Meeting, Room 117

10:00 a.m.     Morning Prayer Group, Conference Room

7:00 p.m.       Boy Scout Troop 3, Scout Wing

Wednesday, October 4

9:30 a.m.       Women's DVD Bible Study, Coffee Klatch Room

4:45 p.m.       Savior's Singers Children's Choir

5:15 p.m.       Baby & Toddler Care, Rooms 34-36

5:30 p.m.       Fellowship Dinner, Fellowship Hall

6:00 p.m.       Pastor Nominating Committee, Room 117

6:00 p.m.       Wednesday Night Kids

6:00 p.m.       Middle School Gathering

6:20 p.m.       Adult Learning Program, Fellowship Hall

7:00 p.m.       High School Small Groups

7:15 p.m.       Sanctuary Choir

7:30 p.m.       8:30 Worship Team, Fellowship Hall

Thursday, October 5

7:00 a.m.       Men's Bible Study, Parlor

12:00 p.m.     Noon Bible Study, Room 117