Central Baptist Church of Westerly, 16 Elm Street, Westerly, RI 02891 THE GOOD WORD Carrying news of God’s work into the Community and World January 2011 Volume 4 Issue 1 Worship With Us At Central Baptist Sunday School 9:00 Worship Service 10:30 Fellowship Hour 11:30 HOW TO CONTACT US Church Office : e-mail [email protected] White Gift Service - Dec. 12 Lighting of the Advent Candle Telephone : (401) 596-4929 Newsletter: e-mail Celebration of Christmas at Central Baptist [email protected] Pastor : e-mail [email protected] Phone: (401) 315-0868 Christmas Eve Website : Candlelight Service http://www.cbcwesterly.org Church Meetings January 5 Family Advent Night 5:30 PM Pot Luck Supper 6:45 PM Prayer Gathering December 4 - Christmas Luncheon and Sale 7:00PM Boards of Deacons January 9 11:30AM Congregational vote on new pastor January 12 Waitresses 7:00 PM Board of Trustees January 19 6:45 PM Prayer Gathering 7:00 PM Missions meeting January 23 Business Meeting January 25 7 :00PM Church Council Entertainers - Nancy Balentine and Judy Hall-Gray Page 2 Central Baptist Church of Westerly CHURCH STAFF NEWSLETTER TEAM Tiffani Kaminski—Editor Rev. Thomas Hiltsley, Pastor Nancy Balentine Lynn Dowding, Music Director Linda Engler Laurie Miller, Office Manager Marcia Erskine Walter Dugas & Paul Arnold, Custodians Janet Gerbutavitch Church Office Hours Todd Higgins Mon—Thurs 9:00AM—1:00PM Dot Marra Laurie Miller Friendship Circle All Church Pot Luck Supper January 17 Bring a dish to share Fellowship Hall at 7:00PM Needleworkers Circle 2 Wednesdays Meetings are held monthly January 5 and 19 On the third Tuesday 9:30 AM at of the month at 9:30 AM Wednesday, January 5 - 5:30 PM Nancy Balentine’s Home In the Church Parlor. Food will be provided for this supper. 35 Spruce Street This will be your first opportunity to meet our pastoral candidate. Everyone January 15 is the deadline is welcome to attend. For the February Issue of the For the February Issue of the Newsletter Wednesday, February 2 - 5:30 PM Submissions can be Last Name A - F Main Dish emailed to: G - L Dessert Men’s breakfast [email protected] M - S Vegetable Saturday, January 8 or brought to the church T - Z Starch (not bread) 8:00 AM office. Fellowship Hall Chief cooks: Skip Terwilliger OPPORTUNITIES TO MEET OUR Alan Caval All men ages 5 to 105 PROSPECTIVE NEW PASTOR welcome January 5 - 5:30 PM, Wednesday evening Pot Luck supper in Fellowship Hall. No need to bring a dish. Food will be provided this month. 6:45 - Prayer Gathering, Chapel January 6 - 7:00 PM, Thursday Choir Practice January 7 - 7:00 PM, Friday dessert social in Fellowship Hall January 8 - 8:00AM, Saturday Men’s Breakfast January 9 - 10:30AM, Worship service Our search committee has worked long and hard to find the right pastor to lead us in the future. Please take advantage of one or more of these opportunities to meet him and his family and also in- troduce ourselves to them. Central Baptist Church of Westerly Page 3 Pastor Tom’s Corner Brennan Manning has written: “To be Christian, faith has to be new —that is, alive and growing. It cannot be static, finished, settled. When Scripture, prayer, worship, ministry become routine, they are dead.” Manning includes the following meditation as his invitation to a series of devotional meditations on the love of God. It is an invitation to a new discovery of God’s love and I offer it to you as an invitation to a New Year. COME Be here, now. And here, at the beginning, we should begin again, don’t you think? All things are new, even this by-now- familiar story. Imagine… You are being pursued by a ferocious tiger. You run as fast as you can but come to the edge of the cliff. Glancing back, you see the tiger about to spring. Fortunately, you also notice a rope hanging over the edge of the cliff. You grab it and scramble down, out of reach of the tiger. A close escape! But now you look down. Five hundred feet below you see jagged rocks. So you look up. You see the tiger, crouched and waiting…and also two hungry mice, already gnawing on the rope. What to do? Nearby, on the face of the cliff, you notice a strawberry. Carefully, you reach out, pluck it, and eat it whole. “Yum!” you exclaim. “That’s the most delicious strawberry I ever tasted in my whole life!” What does this story tell us? Seize the gift of this moment! If you are preoccupied with the rocks below or the tiger above—with your past or your future—you will miss the strawberry that God wants to give you in the present moment. In the readings ahead I ask you to make a serious effort to remain rooted in the moment. Discipline your time, your thoughts, your emotions. Don’t allow anxieties or distractions to crowd out the work of the Spirit in your life. Be here now. Then the God who comes will find you in the present—waiting, listening, and ready to receive His gifts. Reading: Psalm 139 Calm thyself, O my soul, so that the divine can act in thee! Calm thyself, O my soul, so that God is able to repose In thee so that His peace may cover thee! SOREN K IERKEGAARD from The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning BLESSED N EW Y EAR PASTOR T OM Congratulations Pastor Tom and Deirdre are Grandparents. Their first grandchild, Eliana Howell, was born on December 10. Blessings on this new little one and her family. Page 4 Central Baptist Church of Westerly Across The Boards The Board of Deacons 1 Corinthians 3:11-15 (New International Version) 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, 13 their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. 14 If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. 15 If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames. As we come into the New Year, many people make resolutions to change something about themselves or their circumstance, but those changes are often only in the mind or on paper. Few people make any real lasting change. Paul is showing us, I believe, in the above scripture that everything we do, all the time, all year, everyday, has an impact on our relationship with God. Our actions build on our founda- tional relationship with Jesus Christ. Since we are human we will have some mislaid stones, probably a lot of misplaced straw that won't stand up to the fire test, But overall do we strive to live like Christ, loving the unlovable, being kind to one another - yes, even when someone has hurt our feelings. Do we put our critical thoughts and actions aside in order to show the love of Christ, who told us to share it with the world. A new year usually means a new beginning. Put aside the past and look forward to a wonderful future by letting God nurture you and show you how to share the love of His son with all. Yup, even the ones who aren't your favorites. Happy New Year and may God bless you richly with his gifts. For the Board of Deacons, Kathy Caval The Board of Missions As I write this article- we have just celebrated a Wonderful White Gift Service. The outpouring of gifts for our church family and com- munity friends was tremendous! The Christian Ed Board played a huge part in the service. They arranged the manger setting, got the cos- tumes ready and assembled our youth to take part in the service. A Big Thank You to all who participated - by being in the service and by bringing forth the gifts. After the service the Mission Board sorted out the gifts and then delivered them. What a Wonderful Blessing we all experienced. We also want to thank our church family for your contributions to the Retired Ministers/Missionaries Offering. Many of our older ABC pastors and missionaries really depend on this offering. Looking ahead to January and the New Year the Mission Board will continue in our endeavor to make the missions our church supports more meaningful to our church family. In January we are looking forward to having Pastor Joshua McClure from Pleasant Street Baptist Church speak during one of our worship services about Eziekiel Ministries. He will explain what this special mission ministry is about. We Wish Each One A Blessed New Year. Kay Perrone Chairperson of Missions The Board of Trustees Happy New Year from your Board of Trustees! The old year has passed, and the new year appears bright with promise. As of this writing, our Stewardship Campaign has netted more than $135,000. This amount coupled with additional anticipated pledges allows for the Trustees to work on decreasing the budget deficit. We will have our Business Meeting on Sunday, Janu- ary 23 and at this time will unveil our 2011 spending plan along with a proposal for repairing our sanctuary windows. The results of our anticipated fire upgrades to our church home mandated by recent fire inspections will also be explained.