Busy Month

by Jeff Bills

November is always a busy month around HOPE. The good news is that what makes it so busy is all great ministry stuff. Here’s just a taste of what is coming up.

We will be entering into a new series for the four Sundays of November called “Homecoming.” We will be doing an in-depth study of the Prodigal Son. We have some really creative and meaningful worship experiences planned that you won’t want to miss.

For each of the past 17 years, the people of HOPE have donated Thanksgiving baskets to families in need in the city of Camden. We collect the food here and organize it so that a box will contain enough food to feed a family of four for about a week. The boxes are then delivered to the Neighborhood Center, where the baskets are distributed to those in need. We typically provide food baskets for 70 to 90 families. In the past, we have also collected Christmas boxes for children in refugee camps: This year we will do a similar thing for the children in the Humble Way orphanage in Uganda.

We have just launched the H7 class for those who want to learn more about HOPE and what membership is all about here. (Brochures about this are available in the lobby.) In addition, I am going to be leading a Wild at Heart group for men on Wednesday evenings throughout the month. Two other men’s groups are also getting started this month; on Sunday mornings at 9 a.m., a group of guys will be learning about tools to help you them in faith, and another group will be meeting every other Wednesday evening looking at the book No More Christian Nice Guy.

On Sunday evening November 18th, a garage band made up of HOPE musicians will be rockin’ the house with some classic rock and roll favorites. The band is called M-Street and besides the fact that they enjoy making music together, their desire is to have HOPE people invite their non-believing friends to the concert to introduce them to HOPE in a way they would be comfortable. For some spiritual seekers, the biggest hurdle is getting in the door of the church. A concert like this one makes that step a whole lot easier. The suggested donation for a ticket is $10 and all the proceeds will be donated to the church to be used as seed money for launching our new pre-school in 2008. (You will be getting an update from Heather Mandala on the status of the pre-school soon.)

These new ministries fall into three general categories: outreach, spiritual growth, and missions. These are great things with which to busy ourselves, don’t you think?

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