See You Sunday!

Happy Thursday Church!

I hope this weekly check-in finds you recovering from a fabulous Easter. I am so grateful for everyone who came and participated in our Holy Week worship opportunities. Good Friday Worship was, maybe, the most impactful hour of worship I have ever experienced. I so wish that more of our people would have been with us to hear the amazing “eulogies” of

Lee Laurence, Colleen Clementson, and Tim Seipel. My heart was so moved by their words and all three of them did an incredible job with their presentation. Let’s just say, that Pastor was proud. Rev. Holgie from First Congregational Church in Escondido brought us a first-person, first century account of what this man means to him—it was as if we were in the room with Jesus.

Saturday morning came along and from the amazing work of Vicki Holland, Susan Gurriell, Jeannie Hume, Kristie Perkins, Marlene Rauch (my apologies if I left you out) our sanctuary was transformed into a beautiful homage to the resurrection with lilies and other colorful flowers. The beautiful white scarf will remain on the cross until Pentecost, May 24th. Sunday morning was indeed a celebration. We had 108 dear souls in worship. Thank you, all you CCP’ers for bringing our radical hospitality to a reality. People felt welcomed and seen. Thank you for being the church.

The season of Easter is still upon us as we will now turn our attention to the post-resurrection Jesus. I hope that you will continue your faithfulness in worship. The post-Easter Jesus stories are the best. Easter reminds us that spring is here! Springtime reminds us that new life is springing up everywhere. Easter reminds us that resurrection is not just about one day, but a continual work of God, bringing all of God’s world together, renewed and refreshed for the days ahead.

I hope to see you all Sunday morning as we spend our yearly time with “Believing Thomas.” Hmmmm—see what I did there? Come Sunday morning for my explanation. With a renewed spirit I say to you again … I love being your pastor.

Holding you close and lifting you high!

Pastor Greg

Responding to the Resurrection

In the weeks after Easter we look at the various responses to resurrection. These response range to incredulity, to joy, to confusion, to doubt or surprise. There is a whole range of emotions that come when God does the unexpected and breathes the breath of life into dry bones. All of these emotions belong in our own response and worship of the God of resurrection. With my veterans I try to point out sometimes that the memory of emotion and of events, both good and bad, fades in vitality over time. The same can be true for us as we remember this Jesus story, but how have you seen resurrection, new life and vitality in your life lately? Can you see the divine work in that? How have you responded?

Welcome to our New Members

What a joy to have new folks, who are adopting us as their faith community. On March 22nd, we welcomed several new peeps as members of our congregation. I hope you will find them all and let them know how happy you are that they chose us.

From left to right—Pastor Greg, Lanie Goelz, Amy and Ralph Obrist (and Eliza), Jennifer Closson, Lynn Amabile, vice-moderator and Linda England, moderator.

Join Us!

The Book Club is hosting a special Author Talk—come hear directly from Gregg Brandalise as he shares insights, inspiration, and the story behind The Death of All of Us.

Where:

Fellowship Hall

Community Church of Poway

When: Tuesday, April 14

Time: 10:00 a.m.

Prayer Requests and Donations using your computer or smartphone!

Last fall we encouraged everyone to create an account with Church Connect at ccpucc.churchtrac.com/sign-in. Many of you did, but haven’t used it. Some of us installed the Connect app on our phones, but had trouble with the log-in. Good news, we have fixed that issue. I find the phone app to be an easy way to make recurring tithes and one- time gifts to various restricted offerings straight from my bank account!

What is Church Connect? It is a portal for members and donors to give, view their giving history and submit prayer requests online.

The advantages of signing up with Church Connect are that you will be able to view your giving records anytime, and can set up recurring payments and one-time payments with a credit card or directly from your bank account. In addition to your tithes and offering, it will be simple to designate what other gifts are for, such as mission offering, Guatemala, Jesus Birthday, etc. Plus, if you want to add a note, just click on the plus sign next to the giving category and add your note. You can also make prayer requests through the same link.

Just go to ccpucc.churchtrac.com/sign-in, select Create an account. Enter your email address, click on verify that you are human, then continue. Next you will be asked to enter your first and last name and phone number. Then you will need to set up a password. This assures that only you and the office, can view your giving history. At this point, Vicki or I will need to approve your access.

If you will be initiating donations from your phone, you may want to install the Church Connect app on your smart phone. This app will take you directly to the Community Church of Poway Church Connect page. Here is the QR Code to install the phone app:

Once you have set up your account, if you would like to move your current automatic payments, which are through Stripe for credit cards and Vanco for ACH, please email Vicki for assistance at office1@ccpucc.org. Vicki will be able to stop your old automatic payments so that you can set up the new payment method.

To modify recurring payments in Church Connect, first log into your Online Giving page (ccpucc.churchtrac.com/sign-in, entering your login in and password then select giving), then click on the cogwheel icon to the right of “choose a Payment Source”. A window will appear from the right allowing you to view or cancel an existing recurring donation. Then you can setup a new recurring donation.

Linda England

POINT Connections: Spiritual Soundtrack

The Poway Interfaith Team (POINT) is changing our format to have less business meetings, more friendly interfaith conversations. The first of these “POINT Connections” is themed Spiritual Soundtrack, and it will be here at Community Church of Poway, on Thursday April 9, from 6:30-8:00pm. We will share songs, religious or otherwise, that are meaningful to us. Before then, we invite you to add your favorite song(s) to our “soundtrack”! https://tinyurl.com/POINT-Spiritual-Soundtrack

Contact Autumn to learn more: autumnhankinson4@gmail.com

Community Clean-Up!

Attention fellow nature lovers and stewards of Creation! We will have a clean-up event following service on April 19 in honor of Earth Day.

If you are interested, please let Ryan Kelton know. Though gloves and other supplies are available, feel free to bring your own.

Greetings from the Outreach Ministry

It’s time to put our basket of hope back in service for God’s most vulnerable. This month we will be supporting the Alabaster Jar Project. This nonprofit supports women survivors of human trafficking and sexual exploitation. You might ask, “Does this happen here?” The answer is YES! Human trafficking is San Diego’s second largest underground economy, after drug trafficking, an estimated $810 million in annual revenue.

The mission of the Alabaster Jar Project is to provide long-term housing and comprehensive support for survivors of human trafficking and sexual exploitation, empowering them to move from crisis toward healing, stability and successful return into their communities.

The project is comprised of 3 programs, Grace House, which is a long-term residential program; a Resource Center, which is a drop-in center that provides clothing toiletries and other needs; and Peer Support Groups.

For our basket of hope, we want to provide the items needed to create comfort baskets that are handed out to new residents of Grace House, bringing them comfort and helping them feel settled and cared for. New items requested for these baskets include:

· Small blanket

· Reed diffusers (no candles or plug-ins please)

· Slippers or shower shoes

· Coloring books or activity books

· Small snacks

· Tea

· Reusable water bottle bottles

· Notebooks or journals

· Fuzzy socks

· Basic toiletries (full size, body wash or hair care items for all different hair types)

· Small comfort item such as a stuffed animal or stress ball

Please prayerfully consider how you might be able to help this amazing organization. Thank you again for all your amazing support for all of our Outreach projects!!! You are truly God‘s hands and feet!

Blessings,

The Outreach Ministry

Books & More

On Tuesday, March 10, Books and More will start reading “The Death of Us All” written by Gregg Brandalise. The extraordinary life of Sister Dorothy Stang, a catholic nun who was brutally murdered while she dedicated her life to saving the Amazon Rainforest and ending the atrocities inflicted upon its indigenous peoples. Three women rise above their challenges through friendship, faith, and determination amidst the destruction of the rainforest.

This book is inspired by true events.

Everyone is welcome to join this wonderful group of ladies every Tuesday in the Fireside Room at 10 a.m.

Thank you for checking out our BUZZ! Here is what you were waiting for! If you have a favorite quote or any tips to make the BUZZ even better, please send emails to julie@ccpucc.org :)

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