Social Events!!!

Our social committee folks met last Sunday to plan the year's social gatherings.  The purpose of these events is to let us get to know each other in a context outside of worship but still connected to God and the love of our neighbors.  One of the hard things about my job is that I get to see how wonderful and excellent all of you are but you don't always get to see that in each other. Social gatherings allow us that extra vision that turns fellow church members into friends and part of our faith support system.

At the top of our social list are our four Big Events.  These are meant to be church-wide and we hope many, many people will come.  They are:

• A spring tea for women of the church and community in May
• A congregation-wide camping outing in June
• Our fall harvest party
• Caroling, chili, chocolate, and cookies in December

These events will be planned, organized...a big deal.  They are already posted on the big bulletin board in the St. John's Fellowship Hall.  We need people (individually or in pairs) to organize each event.  Organizing includes determining an exact date, place, and time for your event, figuring out what we're doing and how we're doing it, and letting Pastor Dave and the council know so we can get people to help you.  Organizing does NOT mean you have to do everything, just plan and tell us what we can do to make a memorable event.

Once they're planned and announced, we'd like to make these events a big deal.  Please plan on coming and hanging out with your church family!

Besides those four Big Events we also have a variety of other ways to come together.   Unlike the Big Events, these are just come-as-you-are.  Anybody who is interested can participate!

1. We're going to hold periodic game and movie nights where you can just drop in and have fun.  Some will be for all folks together, others for families, others for folks of certain ages. 
2. We're going to hold special fellowship hours, particularly during the summer months.  We'll have ice cream, do a barbecue, have hot lunch...things to make fellowship more varied every once in a while.
3. We're going to have a church-wide ornament-making project during fellowship hour in the late fall.  We'll provide blank ornaments which everybody in church can decorate.  They'll go on our Christmas tree, plus we'll have enough blank ones extra that new members can make one as they join the church.
4. We're also going to encourage drop-by events hosted by people from church.  Basically we're asking people to identify something they'd like to host at their home or church and just go for it!  Invite the church family, see who else thinks it's fun.

The first drop-by event is going to be hosted by the Parkins Family at their house.  It'll be a St. Patrick's Day dinner and party on Saturday, March 17th.  Jennifer will let us know the details.

If you'd like to host a fun evening doing something you love, let me know.  We'll coordinate events so we don't get too stacked up.

I'm sure when the folks interested in Evangelism meet on the evening of March 4th they'll be quick to say that these events--big ones or drop-by's--are great ways to introduce people to our church family and faith life.  Don't be shy about bringing friends!

Thanks to all who helped plan our social direction for the year.  Everybody else can give them help by planning, helping to host/lead, or just showing up when an event comes around!

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)