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Brothers and sisters,

This coming Sunday, we will celebrate All Saints Sunday. If you’ve been coming to Hope Valley for a while now, you know what things typically look like on All Saints Sunday. You know what this Sunday means to folks and for folks. But for those that may not know about All Saints Sunday or for those of you who may be thinking, “I remember we always do something that day, but I can’t remember what,” let me tell you a little bit about it.

All Saints Day has been celebrated by the Catholic church for centuries. Basically, it is a holiday on which Catholics remember and celebrate the saints of the Catholic church, i.e. Saint Peter, Saint Christopher, etc. They will also celebrate anyone who died for their faith. (By the way, we get our word, Halloween, from All Saints Day. “All Saints” can be written as “All Hallows” and since “All Hallows” is on November 1st, that makes October 31st “All Hallows Eve,” aka “Halloween.”)

However, as time has gone on, Christians—particularly us Protestants—have begun to refer to all believers as “saints,” since that is one of the words used by Paul to describe us. And so, we Protestants have begun to celebrate All Saints Sunday on the first Sunday of November. All Saints Sunday, then, is a time to remember those Christians that have come before us and celebrate their lives and their faith journeys. It is a time to contemplate the ways in which we have been shaped by “so great a cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1; NRSVUE).

It is also a Sunday on which we honor specific church members and/or the immediate family members of church members who have passed away within the last year. It’s a time when we can come alongside their family and remind them that we love them, that we are with them. It is a time to remind them that we loved their family member, too. It’s a time to catch up, tell stories about the person, and be grateful for all they meant to each of us.

This coming All Saints Sunday, we’ll be remembering five people who have gone on to glory: Dixie Ferrell, Alan Mangum, Phyllis Edwards, Moria Packer, and Shirley Lewter. During the service, we will read their names and have any family present stand. Then, we will light a candle for them and ring a bell. We will also have a candle for anyone in attendance who lost someone this year. It’s a touching moment as we remember them.

So, plan to be here on Sunday, November 1st during morning worship as we remember those saints who have gone before us. Come to honor their legacy. Come to spend time with their family. Come to worship a God who promises us that death does not have the last word.

Grace and peace,
Pastor Ben

Brothers and sisters,
Our church’s annual Fall Festival is coming up quickly! Well, for today’s article, I wanted to run through the details with you and encourage you to volunteer or contribute! The most effective way to catch you up is just to describe the festival we’ve planned.

First of all, the festival itself will take place from 2:30 – 4:30 PM on Saturday, October 31st. Most everything will be happening in the Family Life Center or right in front of the Family Life Center, so visitors should be able to park in the side parking lot next to the sanctuary. As they come into the festival, we’ll have a Welcome Table set up where the kids can get glow sticks, a coloring book, a bag for candy, and a token to vote for the Best Trunk they see. From there, they will find a face-painting station and a photo-op area.

Our trunks for Trunk-or-Treat will be in front of the Family Life Center this year. Volunteers from the church are transforming their trunks into all kinds of fun things! They’ll pass out candy and the kids can vote on which of the trunks they like the best.

Then, in the Fellowship Hall, they’ll see lots of fall-themed crafts they can do. Things like real pumpkins they can paint/color, masks they can make, and a special craft from our Ceramics ministry! Plus, we’ll be passing out bags of popcorn for kids and parents to snack on while they’re here. There will also (potentially) be a guessing game where families can win a prize if they correctly guess the number of candy corns in a jar.

Finally, in the gym, the kids will see all kinds of games they play. At each game, they’ll have the chance to win tickets which they can bring over to the Prize Table and trade in for
fun prizes (or more candy)! In addition, we’re hoping to have the Cake Walk again this year, where families can win delicious desserts to take home with them. We are also planning to have a “costume parade” for the kids at around 3:15!

We’ve got a wonderful event planned for our community! These are all things we’ve done in the past and I’m sure we can do them again. But we need your help!

First of all, if you can volunteer on that day, be sure to sign up on the volunteer sign-up sheets in the vestibule! We need people in every area I just mentioned: trunks, face-painting, crafts, popcorn, games, cake walk, and prize table. If you can’t come the day of, but you’re free on October 30th, Frances is planning to get a lot of things set up that night and could use help! Let her know if you can help that night!

If you’re not sure you can be there either of those days, you can still help! Trunks typically
bring their own candy to pass out, but we always like to have candy on hand to replenish them if we need to—so you can donate candy anytime! We are also in need of new prizes for the prize table this year—so you can donate prizes (in the past, kids have loved things like rings with fake gemstones, small sports balls, small stuffed animals, etc.). We also need desserts for the Cake Walk—so you can donate a dessert. We ask two things related to that: list any major allergens your dessert may have (nuts, dairy, etc.) and, if you can, pre-package it into more manageable portions (i.e. if you made a couple dozen cookies, put them in Ziploc bags, and give 3-4 cookies per bag).

I’m looking forward to the festival this year! I think it is a wonderful way for us to bring
joy to our community. Be sure to sign up on the sheets in the vestibule!

Grace and peace,
Pastor Ben

Brothers and sisters,

First of all, don’t worry. I’m not working while I’m on vacation; I wrote this article ahead of time! It would be silly to preach a whole sermon series on taking time to rest and then refusing to rest, wouldn’t it?

More importantly, however, this coming Sunday is World Communion Sunday. This tradition was originally started by Shadyside Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh, PA all the way back in 1933 by Dr. Hugh Thomson Kerr. The Presbyterian Church (USA) adopted it as an annual celebration in 1936 and in 1940 the Federal Council of Churches (now the National Council of Churches) endorsed it and began to promote it to other denominations all over the world. Thus, on the first Sunday of October every year, churches all over the world, across denominational lines gather to celebrate Communion. It serves as this wonderful moment of unity among a church that can sometimes get so caught up in our differences, we forget that we are all brothers and sisters in Christ and are united by our belief in his grace and his gospel.

And while here at Hope Valley Baptist Church, we will celebrate with grape juice and bread, I remember a professor of mine once telling my class at Duke Divinity a story about a unique style of communion she took years ago. She was in Southeast Asia (I don’t remember where exactly, but I believe it was either Indonesia or the Philippines) on a mission trip. She and her group were there to provide services to local communities and connect with some of their Christian brothers and sisters living on the other side of the world. They were there one Sunday and so they went to church with the Christians in the area, singing, praying, and worshiping together.

Toward the end of the service, they took communion—though the communion in that
Southeast Asian community looked a little different than ours. When my professor went
forward, she was presented with a saltine cracker and a glass of milk to dip it in. She gratefully took the cracker, dipped it in the milk, and ate it, but after the service she talked with one of the locals who they’d been staying with. She explained to them that in America, we typically use bread and either grape juice or wine for communion and asked why it was saltines and milk here. The local told her, “The reason we use the saltines and milk
is because those things are precious here. They are not easy to find! So, since we want to offer our best to Jesus, we use the saltines and milk.”

On this Sunday, all over the world, our brothers and sisters in Christ will be taking
communion. Some will use bread and grape juice. Some will use a wafer and a chalice of wine. Some will use saltine crackers and milk. But all of us will be united in our common belief that this table was set by none other than Jesus Christ himself and that anyone who would like to lay down their burdens and take up his goodness may come to it. Eat the bread. Drink the cup. Rejoice with your church family all over the world.

Grace and peace,
Pastor Ben