One Service This Sunday
We will worship together at 9:30 am this Sunday. Our Fall Festival starts at 1 pm – we hope to see you there!
Message from Pastor Damon Stalvey
With our recent announcements about one service on Sundays and the conversations that followed, I assume many of you have wondered whether we'll move to a single service. If you have been thinking about that, I want you to know that your assumption is correct. Beginning in January 2027, we will move to a single service at 9:30, with Sunday school options following.
Your Leadership Committee voted at its last meeting to make this move. They feel this decision best positions us for continued grow
and builds momentum for our future. I wholeheartedly agree with the Leadership Committee, and I also know that this will be a challenging move for some of us, if not all of us, here at St. Stephen’s.
Please know this decision was not made lightly, without thought, discussion, or prayer. As with all things, we will have to grow into this new way of doing worship together. Please know that no one, or no particular current service time, will get their way or preference in every part of the worship service moving forward. We will add some new elements, like the children’s moment and children’s church, and incorporate familiar elements from our current worship styles.
Will the worship style be contemporary or traditional? What instruments will be used? How will we use our volunteers moving forward? What about parking? These and several other questions have been and will continue to be addressed. This will take patience, dedication, and a willingness from all of us to adjust.
Some Sundays the worship style may be more traditional and others more contemporary. On special Sundays throughout the year, like All Saints’ Day, Easter, and others, the format will stay basically the same as it is now. We will incorporate elements like a call to worship or creeds into a more common worship rhythm.
Worship is the point of our Sunday morning gatherings, and personal preferences are present but not the point or intention of gathering for worship. So, as we prepare to make this change, we need to pray together for our future. Our priority will not be preferences mine, yours, or ours; instead, the priority, as always, will be that we gather to worship our God and look for ways to better serve and care for our neighbors and the world. As a church family, we have work to do in this area because we are often accustomed to thinking it must go my way. We are all called to adjust and choose to love God, one another, and the work of ministry as our continued priority as a church.
I invite you to email me or call to set up an appointment if you would like to talk further.
– Rev. Damon Stalvey
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