When you hear us mention “Dinner Church”, you might think of this as a new term or idea. It’s not really. A basic description of a dinner church simply requires just those two words: it is dinner; it is church. The earliest Christian churches structured their weekly gatherings around those two ideas. They would eat and they would worship. Today across America churches are witnessing a revival of this concept that went out of vogue around the 4th century, but instead of merely being a meal with a worship component (or vice versa) it also has been effective at reaching those disconnected from the church and a variety of economic classes.

As a congregation we are exploring the possibility of starting a dinner church. Here are a few things to know:

• We will host a preview this Thursday, September 19th at 6pm in our Fellowship Hall, specifically for our congregation to get a taste (pun definitely intended!) of what dinner church is all about. It’s free! We will model this type of service, and then have a time of discussion afterwards to process what we experienced and talk about our next steps.
• A dinner church is not a standard “Fellowship Supper”. In fact, we are still having our regular meal on Wednesday, September 18th.
• A dinner church is designed to reach people that are not connected to a church, not to provide another program for our church members. We want as many of our congregants as possible to come on Thursday to experience this approach to ministry, but if we launch an official dinner church, we will only expect those that feel a calling to serve as leaders to participate regularly.

We will unpack much more about this unique approach to worship on Thursday, so be sure to come and experience how God might use us to reach the community around us!

This Message Is for You! – This Sunday’s message is for you. It does not matter who you are or how long you have been here – I promise it is for you. Last week we talked about counting the cost as we begin to follow Jesus, and this week we get to learn about a gift we receive as we learn to “walk in the way” of Jesus.

How Is God Calling Me to Serve? – One of the ways that we live out “walking in the way” of Jesus is by taking up the role of a servant, which Jesus modeled for his disciples. When we commit to join the church, we also commit to support the church through our service (in addition to our prayers, presence, giving and witness). As we put together administrative and ministry teams for next year, we would love your input! In the bulletin this week you can find a survey that will be helpful to us, or if you prefer to fill it out online (click on hyperlink here or in our weekly newsletter email). Anthony

Essentials 360 Bible Reading Plan

Week of September 15th

Sun, 1 Thessalonians 3

Mon, 1 Thessalonians 4

Tue, 1 Thessalonians 5

Wed, 2 Thessalonians 1

Thur, Wed, 2 Thessalonians 2

Fri, Wed, 2 Thessalonians 3

Sat, 1 Timothy 1

One of the ways that we live out “walking in the way” of Jesus is by taking up the role of a servant, which Jesus modeled for his disciples. When we commit to join the church, we also commit to support the church through our service (in addition to our prayers, presence, giving and witness). As we put together administrative and ministry teams for next year, we would love your input! In the bulletin this week you can find a survey that will be helpful to us, or if you prefer to fill it out online you can find a link in our weekly newsletter email.