the 25th Anniversary Celebration

On Sunday we celebrated 25 years of ministry as Pastor and people at the church. It was a great day filled with special music, testimonies and special people. Nearly two hundred members and friends were on hand for the two hour and five minute celebration. Yes, it went that long but it didn't really feel that long. Things moved right along.

The Lord girls, all grown up, sang a beautiful rendition of "His eye is on the sparrow." It was a song that Lori used to sing quite often and was one of Pastor Cal's favorites. Lori and Cal came here a week and a half before Rebecca was born and this has been the only church the girls have known. It was a very special presentation.



The only time they let Pastor Cal speak was when he came up to join Lori for a duet of a song they sang on the Sunday they candidated back in April 1985, the same day that Cal was ordained and officially called to serve as the pastor of the church. The song is titled, "I want hat crown" and features Lori playing guitar. She hasn't done that in 10 years but she did pretty well.




Steve Contois, Cheryl Dutrumble and Paul Johnson also added a special song to the mix when they sang "There's More to the Story." It reminded us that even as we look back to celebrate the past, there is still more to come.

George Strouse and Curt Brockway, two of the young men in the church when Pastor Cal arrived, served as worship assistants for the morning. We read the responsive reading from his very first Sunday and Pastor Greg Hamby read the scripture reading from Isaiah that was used at his ordination. Fran Rogers had the children congratulate the Pastor on his anniversary as part of the Children's Moment. The choir rounded out the special music by singing "Make a joyful noise."



Kevin Mariano also helped out by adding a trumpet voluntary to the prelude and the hymns. It was just the right touch to make it extra special.

Pastor Greg Hamby was welcomed to the pulpit just before noon. He is a good friend of Pastor Cal and he was able to leave his service at the Quaker Hill Baptist Church and get here in time to share the message. He was great. He talked about Isaiah's sense of call and the promise God had given to be with him and bless his ministry. Title of the message was "Rev. Dr. Crackpot." That got a laugh out of the congregation and was a perfect ending of the celebration.

After the service we went downstairs for the reception and the ladies put on a beautiful spread. Cal also received a gift of an autographed ball by players of this year's Connecticut Tiger team and several other special gifts.

The Anniversary Committee was made up of the following people; Nancy Allen, Karen Barber, Oliver Bray, Curt and Mary Brockway, Adele DiBiagio, Judy Dupont, Sue Ferguson, Mark Kane and Cynthia Strouse.

It is sermon time

I've been working on my sermon for tomorrow. It's titled "Just Make Sure You Stretch." It is based on Paul's epistle to the church in Philippi. The particular passage I'm quoting has Paul saying that he is going to forget the past and press on to the future.

I read somewhere that some Pastors do not like to preach. They feel it is an arduous task. They prefer the administration or visitation or pastoral care. The pulpit presents their greatest challenge. Not me. I enjoy looking at God's word and trying to apply it to our every day lives. I try to find out what God is saying to us. I think the secret to my preaching is that I try to discern what God is saying to me and then I turn it around and pass it on. I've often said that most weeks I am preaching to myself.

I know some preachers like to delve into history and their preaching is more like a seminary lecture. I enjoy that. I love to learn and feel empowered by anything new that I can take away from a sermon. Some preachers are linguists and they enjoy looking at the texts in their original language. They try to help us see what the authors intended when they wrote their texts. I agree that this is important to know. I get fired up by it. But my preaching takes a little bit of this and a little bit of that and combines it to come up with a word that speaks to what's happening in life.

That makes preaching fun. So I'm going to get back to my sermon. Hope to see you tomorrow.

Cal

We've got tickets for the Tigers

I picked up the tickets for the Connecticut Tigers game on June 27th. We will be selling them as a fundraiser for the New York City mission team. For every $8.00 ticket we sell we get to keep $4.00 for the mission team. We will also have lots of fun. Last year we did this and had a great time. It is one of those events where you get to hang out with people from church that you don't normally get to spend time with.

As an added bonus, I will be throwing out the first pitch. You'll need to get there early that day to see it. The management team of the CT Tigers heard I was a big fan and decided to give me the opportunity. They also heard that there was a facebook page promoting the idea and how could they ignore that!

If you want tickets you can get them from me at church, Doreen Mainville at Central Baptist Church or any of the Mission team members.

Cal

Mercy Barnes will visit FBC

Mercy Gonzales Barnes is coming to Connecticut this month. Mercy is our missionary partner from Mexicali, Mexico. Mercy and her husband, Rick, have hosted our mission team for the last four years. They are teachers and church consultants to the Mexican Baptist Convention. They were commissioned in 2000 and have been very active ever since.

Mercy will be making her rounds through southern New England for two weeks at the end of June. On Wednesday, June 16th she will be here at First Baptist. At 5:30 p.m. there will be an appreciation dinner with Mercy for those who have contributed to their ministry. At 6:30 p.m. the coffee pot will be on and everyone else will be able to meet and greet Mercy. At 7:00 p.m. we will host the worship service and Mercy will preach. at 7:45 p.m. we will head downstairs and enjoy ice cream for dessert.

Come join us if you are free.

Cal

Softball blowout has us looking for fresh start next week

Our softball team played one of its worst games in our twenty four year history tonight. We only got 5 hits and one run. We also gave up about 14 unearned runs with terrible play all around. Thank goodness that it is only one game and we get to try again next week.

The one highlight for us tonight was Chip Chaffee's fifth home run of the season. Our record is now 2 -3 and we are looking to turn things around next week. We heard that Paul Pont had a broken ankle and will be out for a while. We added Corey Poore, Fred Stone and one of Sean Wilding's friends to the roster tonight. Hopefully a couple of them will be joining us next week. We only had ten players tonight.

Cal

A seven day a week church

This morning I had breakfast with a few of my colleagues at Olde Tymes. One of them presented us with a challenge. He asked if we had any ideas on how to reach out to the folks in or community who now live in a 24/7 world. Sunday mornings are being encroached upon by everything from work, to sports, to shopping. Some activities are certainly entered by choice but so many of them are dictated by a culture that no longer leaves the sabbath as a time for worship and renewal. He noted that most of us are in small churches that have neither the staff or the personnel to have worship at various times on multiple days across the week. Then he suggested that maybe we could do something together.

It was an exciting moment. The thought of offering a worship experience every day of the week in a neutral location that was supported and managed by several of our congregations was intoxicating. A few sights were mentioned and obvious benefits lifted up. If this was to happen it would fly in the face of the ongoing concern about "us" and "them" and worries about losing members to other churches that is often at the center of our non-cooperation within the body of Christ. It would truly be a gift that the body of Christ was offering to a changing world.

Of course there is a long road from the idea stage to the actual birth of such a movement. It would involve money, time and the investment of leadership to make it come to pass. For now we can all begin to pray that God would unite us in such a way that God's will come arise out of any further discussions on things like this.