Sunday May 3 virtual service only

The church council for Emmanuel has decided that Sunday May 3, will be a virtual only service through Facebook and the website. Please look for the service to be posted at 9:30 a.m.

Worship resumes with proper Restrictions

Based on the Declaration of Governor Reynolds from Monday, April 27th, religious communities are able to resume corporate worship while still adhering to certain restrictions. Here are the guidelines we ask everyone to follow for the sake of our entire community: 

1. Please enter and move through our church building without touching any surface that is not needed for your safety. Example: do not touch railings if you are physically able to maneuver stairs without the help of a railing. Don’t move too close to others – six feet between you!

2. Please use the hand sanitizer in the upper narthex before you enter the sanctuary.

3. Please do not touch, hug or shake hands with anyone who is not in your circle of social contact. We will share the “Peace” only verbally between the Pastor and the congregation. The offering will be taken at the door as you enter or leave. Thank you for your generosity!

4. If at all possible, please wear a face mask.

5. Please be aware that you may not be able to sit where you normally would sit! We will seat people from the front to the back with two pews in between families and the seating staggered. Example: if your family sits in the first pew on the north side of the pew, the next household will sit in the fourth pew on the south side of their pew. Depending on how many people per pew, such will allow for a distance of 5 to 7 feet. Please do not lean over pews. There will be sheets of paper to help you navigate. If a family is in social contact with a single person (grandparent?), please sit together so we can ‘save a pew’. Thank you for strictly adhering to this plan!!! 

6. We will serve Holy Communion by Intinction with each household being ushered up at one time and the next household (individual, couple or family) waiting in the pew until the previous one has left the chancel area. Not coming up to the Communion rail allows us to dispense with the cleaning of the rail between ‘tables’. I will sanitize my hands between each group. (Since we mailed this out in the newsletter, I believe I have been able to find an even more safe and suitable way to share the Sacrament that will eliminate even more unnecessary contact with a person or the element. We will offer instructions accordingly on Sunday morning)

7. At least until a new declaration lifts additional restrictions, there will be NO Coffee hour as ‘socializing’ per se is still limited to 10 people.

8. There will be NO Sunday School for the month of May. Parents, please use the lessons we sent to you in our previous UPDATES.

9. For now our worship service will be recorded and be available on Facebook and our website on Sunday evening for those who should remain highly cautions due to health issues that may cause complications if exposed to communicable diseases. If you have any sign of illness in your household, please remain safely at home. If you are healthy, we hope to see you on Sunday.

OF COURSE, WE WILL CLEAN AND SANITIZE OUR FACITYY PRIOR TO AND FOLLOWING WORSHIP IN THE MOST APPROPRIATE WAY POSSIBLE.

Intercessory Prayer from the Lutheran World Federation

O God our Healer, show your compassion for the whole human family that is in turmoil and burdened with illness and with fear. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Come to our aid as the coronavirus spreads globally, heal those who are sick, support and protect their families and friends from being infected. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Grant us your spirit of love and self-discipline so that we may come together, working to control and eliminate the coronavirus. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Make us vigilant, attentive, and proactive in the eradication of all diseases that create suffering and often result in death for many people. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer. 

Heal our self-centeredness and indifference that makes us worry only when the virus threatens us, open ways beyond timidity and fear that too easily ignore our neighbor. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Strengthen and encourage those in public health services and in the medical profession: care-givers, nurses, attendants, doctors, all who commit themselves to caring for the sick and their families. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Inspire, give insight and hope to all researchers focused on developing a vaccine. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Sustain all workers and business owners who suffer loss of livelihood due to shut-downs, quarantines, closed borders, and other restrictions… protect and guard all those who must travel. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Guide the leaders of the nations that they speak the truth, halt the spread of misinformation and act with justice so that all your family may know healing. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Heal our world, heal our bodies, strengthen our hearts and our minds, and in the midst of turmoil, give us hope and peace. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Hold in your gentle embrace all who have died and who will die this day. Comfort their loved ones in their despair. Hear our cry, O God,  Listen to our prayer.

Remember all your family, the entire human race, and all your creation, in your love.   Amen!

Monday Message 4/6/20

Here is a devotion from the pen of Henry Nowen; Roman Catholic priest, theologian, writer, lover and servant of those who are treated most harshly in life, and who yet throughout his own life struggled with who he was. “I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations.” Isaiah 42:6

When all is said and done, what we must learn above all is to offer ourselves – imperfections and all – to God. If we keep waiting until we are ‘worthy’ of God, we will move farther rather than closer to him. It is through our broken, vulnerable, mortal ways of being that the healing power of the eternal God becomes visible to us. We are called each day to present to the Lord the whole of our lives – our joys as well as our sorrows, our successes as well as failures, our hopes as well as our fears. We are called to do so with limited means, our stuttering words and halting expressions. In this way we will come to know in mind and heart the unceasing prayer of God’s Spirit in us. Our many prayers are in fact confessions of our inability to pray. But they are confessions that enable us to perceive the merciful presence of God.

I pray that today will be a day on which you are ready and able to present yourself to the Lord in all that you are. Bring your fears, your hopes together with your thanks and praise and step into the presence of God who promises to make this day a day of His blessing.