A Message from Pastor Oldfield and Colleen

We love you all.  Thank you for all the amazing, humbling, encouraging, loving, spiritual words we’ve heard from more wonderful people than we can count or answer personally…we were still getting phone calls today from Washington, Texas, Oregon…emails from so many other places as well.

We are to be at Providence at 10:30 AM.  Surgery is set for 12:30 PM, but I’m number three on Dr. Bernard’s schedule, and he takes as much time as necessary to do the best job he (this Christian man) can do.  Yesterday, we went to the clinic and then hospital for tests, we have heard several more people say how wonderful he is.  The Lord has clearly led us to the right man and place here in AK (where our support system is!).  Heard also from the surgeon who did my back, Dr. Birch at Mayo, who completely agrees with this decision to have it done here.  Then we find out what it actually is, and treat as can best be done. 

Colleen and I are at peace, and we pray that you all are, too.

Again, we love you all.

Jim and Colleen

And Advent flows into Christmas at Faith Lutheran...

As always, there will be a lot of special worship opportunities in the next couple of weeks.  Here's a quick overview, with our warm invitation to join us as often as you can, as we join in celebrating the coming of our Savior and "the good news of great joy" that is meant for all people.

Wednesday, December 17
Final midweek Advent service, with soup supper at 6:00-6:45pm, followed by worship at 7:00.  We'll take a look at God's Word in the Psalm for the third week of Advent, Psalm 71.

Friday, December 19
Faith Lutheran School and Preschool Christmas service:  "Children of the Heavenly Father" will start at 6:30pm in the Recital Hall of the UAA Fine Arts Building.

Sunday, December 21
The children of our Sunday School will add a Christmas flavor to our 11:00 worship on the 4th Sunday of Advent.  They'll lead us in singing two hymns and also join with the adult choir in another special song.

Wednesday, December 24
Christmas Eve Worship  7:00pm
Christmas Eve Candlelight Service  10:00pm  

Thursday, December 25
Christmas Day Worship  11:00am

Sunday, December 28
One service only at 10:00am --- and NO Sunday School or Bible Class

Wednesday, December 31
New Year's Eve Worship (with Communion)  7:00pm 

Don't forget to sign up for Christmas for Kids

Christmas for Kids is one week away! Don't forget to sign up your child at www.faithalaska.com

Your opportunity for input on the WELS Hymnal Project

During 2014, the WELS Hymnal Project has conducted three surveys to solicit input about how the current hymnal is being used and how the new hymnal can best serve our church body.  The first was for pastors, the second for teachers, and the third for musicians. 

This fourth survey, intended for all WELS members, asks for feedback on things like chanting psalms, instruments suited for accompany worship, wording for the songs and prayers of worship, and singing hymns and songs of the liturgy in four-part harmony.  You'll find it at:  http://welshymnal.com/blog/member-survey.

The survey will be available until November 25, 2014.  All of our input will help to shape the worship life of our children and grandchildren. 

The plan is for the new hymnal to be available in 2024, the 500th anniversary of the first Lutheran hymnal and 31 years after the publication of the current WELS hymnal, Christian Worship.

 

Opportunities to Support Faith Lutheran School

Did you know Faith Lutheran School received over $600 last year from the Fred Meyer’s Rewards program?  Do you have a Fred Meyer Rewards card?

Signing up for community rewards can earn our school donations from Fred Meyer when you use your card. Visit www.fredmeyer.com/communityrewards to sign up.  (Faith Lutheran School NPO #91844)  It only takes a few moments. 

Every quarter the school gets a check to be used to purchase items the school needs.

Here are some other opportunities to help our school:

Escrip – Shop Carrs and enter online through E-scrip, and a portion of your purchase is returned to the school.

Boxtops for Education and Campbell’s Labels – Save and turn in for our school to collect and redeem for cash or merchandise.

Office Depot Back-for-School – When shopping Office Depot, give them our school number at checkout (#70000050). We receive credit good for office and school supplies.

Have an old or unused cell phone? Turn it in to the school. We may be able to trade them in for recycling through Pace Butler for extra cash for the school.

Partycraft – Give them our school name at checkout, and we receive a percentage of your purchase back.

Church Work Day and Clean Up

We are having a workday at Church this Saturday (11/8) starting at 9:00am. We have a number of items that need maintenance around the church before the holiday season arrives. Please consider giving a few hours of your time to help out. We plan on working until around 3:00pm, lunch will be provided. It is a wonderful way to serve and is also good fellowship. There are a number of items on the list, most of which do not require any special skills, just a willingness to serve.

  Change out snow tires on church van

  Move storage items out of the mechanical room

  Touchup paint in the narthex

  General cleaning

  Replace burnt out light bulbs in track lighting behind the altar

  Install heat tape on eave near front door

  Install exterior light by the flag

  Troubleshoot power to light bollards and exterior light by school entrance.

  Install asphalt paper on upper section of ADA ramp

  Install new audio cables between organ loft and sacristy

  Install motion sensors in restrooms

  Troubleshoot organ speakers

Christmas for Kids

Christmas for Kids is coming up on Saturday, December 6th from 9am-12pm. It will be like a 1 day VBS where children can come and enjoy Christmas crafts, snacks, games, decorating cookies and learning about the Christmas story while parents get Christmas shopping done.

We're looking for help to acculumate the supplies we'll need, as well as volunteers to help that day.

Items to donate:

• Ziploc bags                                                                  
• Popsicle sticks
• Cardstock                                                           
• Tissue paper
• Ribbons
• Salt dough ingredients (flour, salt, oil)          
• Snow dough ingredients (toilet paper and Ivory soap)
• Christmas cookies (ready to decorate)
• Frosting                                                    
• Other cookie decorations (sprinkles, candies, etc.)
• Cheap prizes for Christmas Bingo
• Trail mix supplies (Bugles, pretzels, goldfish, raisins, M&Ms, sunflower seeds, Hershey’s Kisses)

*A more definitive estimation of amounts needed, as well as a sign-up sheet, will be available closer to December 6^th.

How you can help:

• Lesson leader (tell the Christmas story)
• Craft leaders (salt dough handprints, tissue paper silhouettes, popsicle stick crafts)
• Snack supervisor (set out placemats and trail mix ingredients, supervise making of trail mix)
• Christmas cookie decorators (set out cookies, frosting, decorations; help decorate/crowd control)
• Greeters (greet parents & children, hand out name tags)
• Sensory/outdoor supervisors (watch younger kids playing with playdough, older kids playing outside in snow)
• Song leader
• Clean-up crew

If you are interested in helping in any of these ways, please talk to Cara Ewings or Rachel Wendland for more information!