2-20-22 Bulletin

When asked to summarize the desire of God for our lives, Jesus said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart mind, should and strength. And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Recently, I was reading up on the great commandment and came across and idea I had not heard before. According to the writer (whose name I cannot currently remember), the implication of the command is not only that loving our neighbors summarizes the law, but also that the primary way we show our love for God is by loving our neighbors. The two hang together. You cannot love God without also loving your neighbor.

Earlier this year, our staff met to think about God’s call on our church, our vision to empower believers to live as missionaries in the community, and what God might be calling us to specifically focus on as a congregation this year. Last year, you likely remember we urged everyone to read through the New Testament together. We focused on growing in our knowledge of and connection to God through reading scripture. I know both my family and the discipleship group I am in all benefited from this intentional focus on reading the New Testament together. I hope you did as well.

This year, we want to help each of focus more outwardly on how we can show the love and mercy of God to our community. To that end, we have set a goal of collecting 1,000 RBIs this year as a congregation. You might be asking, “What is in an RBI?” In baseball, and RBI is a run batted in and it is a key measure of a teams success. The more runs you score the more likely you are to win. For us, an RBI is a Relationship built with a nonbeliever or an unchurched person (someone who is no longer connected to church, but has some sort of faith), a Blessing given, or an Invitation made to church, to study the Bible, or follow Jesus.

Every week, you will be able to turn in an RBI through a special card in the bulletin or online on our website. If you have a picture you took of the experience you can turn in a physical picture or upload it to the website. We will post all the stories on a wall in the lobby along with a scoreboard to track our progress to 1,000 RBIs by the end of the year.

You may be wondering what counts as an RBI so let me share two examples.
1. Pattie Grooters works in food service at Grandville schools. While serving breakfast, she made a connection with a student at Grandville who plays on the girls basketball team. She and Bern started going to all many of their games to cheer the girls on. The relationship is so important to this teenager that she invited Pattie to an honors dinner. Pattie took the time to notice and care for this girl and she experiences God’s love in Pattie.
2. Someone stopped by church on Tuesday this week with a special needs friend. They spend one day a week together every week doing odds and ends, volunteering with Threads and just enjoying one another’s company. This gives the parents of the friend a little break and this friend overtime has become a part of the family of the Zion member. (For some context, this relationship started over 10 years ago and has steadily grown over time.)

Both of these relationships have developed over time, but they started by simply taking an interest in someone else and caring about their life. Maybe for you it could be making a point to meet a new neighbor, shoveling the driveway of an elderly neighbor or offering to watch the kids of a young parent (someone did that for us years ago and it was a lifesaver one summer for our family) or something else entirely.

You may be wondering who gets to decide what counts as an RBI. You do! If you think you have started or developed a relationship with someone who doesn’t know Jesus, it counts. If you think you have blessed someone else in some way, it counts. If you feel like you have invited someone to take a step toward God in some way, it counts. Tell us your story and we will put it up on the wall and celebrate your courage in living as an ambassador of God’s kingdom.

You should also know, Haley Stone created the wall we will be using to share stories and keep track of our RBIs, so if you see her this weekend, make sure to tell her what a great job she did. 🙂

– Greg

Connect to God
This week we will gather for worship at 9:30 am. This weeks service will be at zionreformed.online.church and streaming on our YouTube channel. We will also rebroadcast a version of the service on WCET at noon on Friday and 4pm next Sunday. The service will continue to be available on YouTube to watch at your convenience.

This morning, we continue a sermon series entitled Upside Down Kingdom. This series draws from the gospel lectionary readings, predominantly in Luke, to help us see the counter-cultural values and ways of God’s kingdom. Our text today begins Jesus greatest sermon in this gospel: the Sermon on the Plain. Having just chosen his 12 disciples, he lays out for them the unique values of his kingdom. A kingdom not centered on prosperity, pleasure, power, or popularity, but standing firmly with those the world ignores, rejects, and oppresses.

Grow in Community
Congratulations to Tom and Megan MacGraw on the birth of their daughter Ryleigh Mae. Ryleigh was born Monday at 12:51AM. She weighs 6lbs 5oz and both mom and baby are doing well. Please join the McGraw’s in a prayer of praise and thanks to God for this precious gift. 

This paragraph is about child abuse so skip it if it might be triggering for you. I saw a news story about a baby dying from child abuse this weekend in the Grand Rapids area. It brought me back to a night a little over 20 years ago when I sat in the hospital holding a baby’s hand all night after they had been shaken by the mom’s boyfriend. There are so many kids growing up in homes that are not safe. Would you join me in prayer for those kids and for foster parents to be ready to care for them?

Beginning February 22, we will be hosting a book discussion on Be the Bridge by Latasha Morrison. The book focuses our attention on how we can build bridges across racial divides to model the restoring and unifying work of Christ among all people. You can sign up for the discussion through the Connection card on Sunday. Sunday is the last day to sign up.

Serve the World
Threads will be having a semi-annual sale, which will be open to the public, on Saturday, March 12 from 9am – 1pm. Each and every item in the boutique will be priced at $1. The money raised from this sale is used to self-fund our ministry and purchase needed items. All are invited to come in and shop!

Currently, Threads is in need of new underwear and new socks for all ages/sizes, and also in need of plastic white shirt hangers and pants hangers. Any donations of these items is greatly appreciated.

If you need help, either with food, personal care items, help grocery shopping, or with financial needs, please contact Jerrod Holzgen, our chair of deacons, and he can help connect you with the appropriate resources at Zion. His e-mail is Jholzgen@yahoo.com and his phone number is 616-520-1771.

Administration
Willing To Serve response forms are due Sunday, Feb. 20. A cover letter and response form were placed in the mailbox of every eligible member. A copy of the letter and response form can be found here, Completed response forms can be placed in the box marked “CONSISTORY NOMINATIONS” on the table in the narthex or you can email your response to cstegeman@zionreformed.org.

The remodel of our bathrooms began earlier this month. Fixtures are being removed. Walls knocked down. It is a little noisy at times in the offices! You can check out the progress in some pictures below. The first shows the bathroom from the former entrance to the women’s bathroom and the second shows the same space from the former entrance to the men’s restroom.

As a reminder, during the remodel, the only restrooms available on the main floor of church can be accessed through the doors at the front of the sanctuary. They are single stall uni-sex restrooms.

The Reformed Church in America announced the people appointed to serve on the denominational restructuring team last week. If you are interested in learning more, you can check out the article here.

We continue to thank God for his provision of all of our needs and for the generous support of our congregation with their time, talent, and treasures. 

Fiscal Year 2021/22 Budget:  $403,569.72
Fiscal Year 2021/22 Contributions: $347,075.75
Giving Last Week: $8,903.50

The last few years have been interesting at Zion. Four summers ago, we were scrambling to put together a new Children and Worship room (which brought us to five kids rooms running during church for kids birth through 3rd grade) and within a few weeks volunteers were asking if we could add another new room. We were adding rows of chairs in the sanctuary to make sure we would not feel “full” to a visitor. We had a lot of new kids and adults who were coming to church. By that winter, we were starting to think about a potential building remodel. I think many of us felt the energy and excitement in our church.

Like many, if not most, churches, Covid and all the accompanying changes, tensions, and turmoil of the past two years have affected our community. We have seen dear friends choose to worship elsewhere. Others have simply drifted away from any active church involvement. When you love your community, these changes can be painful. I told Rachel recently that my I can feel my heart physical hurt when I think of the loss of those who are no longer worshipping with us.

I know I am not the only one carrying these feelings because just this week I was a part of or overheard two conversations with people wrestling with just these sorts of thoughts. If you share these feelings, it is OK to grieve. It is sad. It can feel hard. So, take the time to grieve these losses. I have been intentional to do so for the last year or more.

I also want to share another perspective on our community. We continue to see anywhere from 50-60 people joining us for worship online. These members actively tithe, pray for, and serve in ministries at our church. Some of these online attendees come physically to Zion about once a month when they serve in children’s ministries, in the band, or on a welcome team. Others due to ongoing health concerns are choosing to minimize their risk of exposure to Covid and the flu this winter. But they are a vital part of our community that is not easily noticed on a Sunday morning.

We also have seen some new families, teens, and adults join our community over the past year. Some gather most weeks in person, but others are choosing to worship online so you may not have noticed them become a part of our church family.

On Tuesday this week, I met with Beth Morey and Mary Veldink, Parent Liaisons from Jenison Public Schools, to talk about Kids Hope, Threads, and their work to help families find accessible housing in our community. In conversations over the past year, both have spoken of how amazed they are at the generosity and heart for our neighbors shown by the people of Zion. To quote one of them, “This is the coolest church.” You really are.

Our goal at Zion has never been to be the biggest church in town (I remember directing tour busses to Mars Hill back when it was the biggest church in town), but to reach our neighbors with the gospel. We continue to do just that through relationships built at Threads, Kids Hope, and Camp Zion, through support given through Hand2Hand and the Personal Care Pantry, and through each of you as you love your neighbors, live humbly and show mercy in your homes and workplaces.

In the midst of these changes, I also want to remind each of us, God is still in control. God was in control when we were struggling to keep up with the growth in our church. God was in control the first Sunday everything shutdown due to Covid. God is in control today, tomorrow, and every tomorrow to come. This season at Zion is a part of God’s plan, too. It is part of how God is shaping and forming me and you and all of us that make up the community of Zion to believe, think, and act more like Jesus.

As I reflect on the last several years, I have no idea what may happen next. But, I know God will carry us through as God has carried and led Zion for the last 67 years. May all we do be for God’s glory and point people to the beauty of God’s kingdom.

– Greg

Connect to God
This week we will gather for worship at 9:30 am. This weeks service will be at zionreformed.online.church and streaming on our YouTube channel. We will also rebroadcast a version of the service on WCET at noon on Friday and 4pm next Sunday. This week, we made some upgrades to our live stream technology. Beginning this week, we will not be replaying the service at 11 am. The service will continue to be available on Facebook and YouTube to watch at your convenience.

Have the past couple years been hard? Have you struggled emotionally or spiritually? Wondered where God was? Got out of some important spiritual habits like: worship, prayer, and scripture reading? Then join us for the the conclusion of this once a month series to reboot your faith. This week we talk about rebooting generosity in our lives by reflecting on the generosity of God.

We will also celebrate with Danny and Ashley Copron the baptism of their daughter Aria.  As they celebrate his life, we give thanks to God for the gift of new life he has made available to all who believe. We thank God as well for the covenant he has established all the way back with Abraham to include children in his family. We honor this faithful God as we welcome  these children into the covenant community at Zion.

Grow in Community
Gwen Wallace’s knee surgery was postponed until sometime next week.

Beginning February 22, we will be hosting a book discussion on Be the Bridge by Latasha Morrison. The book focuses our attention on how we can build bridges across racial divides to model the restoring and unifying work of Christ among all people. You can sign up for the discussion through the Connection card on Sunday.

Serve the World
I just have to share a really cool small thing from this week. The owners of Striders in Grandville have heard about Threads and toured Threads and just this week donated two huge boxes of mens and women’s athletic shoes. They are very excited to partner with us in caring for our community.

Threads will be having a semi-annual sale, which will be open to the public, on Saturday, March 12 from 9am – 1pm. Each and every item in the boutique will be priced at $1. The money raised from this sale is used to self-fund our ministry and purchase needed items. All are invited to come in and shop!

Currently, Threads is in need of new underwear and new socks for all ages/sizes, and also in need of plastic white shirt hangers and pants hangers. Any donations of these items is greatly appreciated.

If you need help, either with food, personal care items, help grocery shopping, or with financial needs, please contact Jerrod Holzgen, our chair of deacons, and he can help connect you with the appropriate resources at Zion. His e-mail is Jholzgen@yahoo.com and his phone number is 616-520-1771.

Administration
The remodel of our bathrooms began earlier this month. Fixtures are being removed. Walls knocked down. It is a little noisy at times in the offices! As a reminder, during the remodel, the only restrooms available on the main floor of church can be accessed through the doors at the front of the sanctuary. They are single stall uni-sex restrooms.

The Reformed Church in America announced the people appointed to serve on the denominational restructuring team last night. If you are interested in learning more, you can check out the article here.

We continue to thank God for his provision of all of our needs and for the generous support of our congregation with their time, talent, and treasures. 

Fiscal Year 2021/22 Budget:  $392,359.45
Fiscal Year 2021/22 Contributions: $338,172.25
Giving Last Week: $6,809.50