Snow in Scripture!

This snow fall we've had is unbelievable! I'm quite a fan of the song "Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow," but frankly--I've got places to go!

Actually, it's been fun seeing McMinnville covered in a way we may never see it again. I have to laugh at the big lumps of white parked on the streets with only the side view mirrors poking out. And yesterday Kelly and I ventured out to finally buy some chains for the van, so we had to dig out our driveway. But where was our shovel? Oops--the kids had taken it out to play with it the day before and left it somewhere in the front or back yard. We foraged around for a while, but we may not see that thing for days!

Has anyone else thought about snow in the Bible this last week? Psalm 51:7, of course, pops to my mind first, where David pleads for forgiveness: Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. It turns out that even though the Bible was written for the most part in desert regions, "snow" gets mentioned 23 times in Scripture! I won't bother enumerating them here, because my friend, Pastor Scott Reavely, did all the work on his blog. So click here if you'd like a thorough treatment of snow in the Bible and some lessons we can learn from it!

Church Services Canceled Today

Well, it's still chunky and slippery out there, so we've decided to pull the plug on all services and activities today (including tonight's caroling). So stay safe in your ice-encrusted homes, and we hope to see you Wednesday night at our Christmas Eve Service!

Church service???

We're carefully watching the ice out there, and we'll make a decision about church service in the morning. If we cancel our service, we'll be sure to announce it here and on the website's home page. Stay tuned!

Snow!

Let it snow! I took a little drive into town this afternoon and was just amazed at all the white here in McMinnville!

It's been snowing here since I got up this morning and eight hours later it hasn't stopped yet. The forecast insists that it will turn to rain at about midnight tonight, so hopefully everyone will be able to join us for some Christmas worship, but right now it looks like we live in a ski resort town!

Here are some pictures I took at my house and about town...

Here's historic downtown 3rd Street.

From the front door of Safeway, looking toward Big 5.

Here's Hwy 99W approaching Linfield College.

Molly here is making a snow angel on our deck. To her left you can see the snowman I made, now more of a snowlump!

Snow Sculptures

Gee, just when I was feeling good about the snowman I built on our deck...


Amazing Snow Sculptures - The most amazing videos are a click away

Family Christmas Concert!

Well, the weather threatened to doom our Family Christmas Concert on Sunday night, but about 100 folks braved the elements and joined us for an awesome celebration! I think everybody there had a great time, and I was really happy with the way everything turned out!

The program included four tunes by our Christmas Choir, an ad hoc Children's Choir performance, and the youth group playing It Came Upon a Midnight Clear with spoons and waterglasses. Dustin Blumenstein, Anne Muehleck and I all sang some solos; Cassie Carver and Anne sang a duet, with Haley Keller and McKenna Rogness adding sign language; Kim George played a beautiful rendition of O Holy Night on the clarinet; and 8-year-old Molly Janssen brought the house down with her Do You Hear What I Hear solo...It was all just great!

The evening was capped off with some Christmas cookies and presentation of some wonderful gift cards to those of us on the New Hope staff. All in all it was great night, and I'm sorry for those who planned to come but couldn't travel in the snow.

Steve Myers recorded the evening, and some of the tracks turned out really nice! I'll post them soon on our web site's Sermons, Etc. page. And Repko sent me dozens of pictures--here are some of my favorites:

Christmas Concert Sunday Night!

Well, the weather outside is frightful, but our Family Christmas Concert will be delightful!

Okay, that's definitely a lame announcement...but I'm telling you, the program this Sunday evening is going to be fabulous! This casual, fun concert will be about an hour long and will feature many of our talented singers and instrumentalists. On the list:
- Four great songs by our Christmas Choir
- A Waterglass Choir made up of our youth group
- Instrumental music
- An Ad Hoc Children's Choir
- Traditional and contemporary solos
- And more!

The concert starts at 6:00 p.m., and we'll have cookies afterwards. Don't let a little snow on your lawn keep you from this wonderful evening of celebration--you'll be really glad you came!

Our New Sign!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything because I’m waist deep in Christmas planning, but I just had to share this!

I’ve been itching to put up a new sign on our building for months, and came up with some designs last summer. When I saw that the Holiday Craft Fair was going to be in the building across the parking lot, I was anxious to get the project going again. Enter Leela Zeeb and Repko Bruinsma, who took the proverbial ball and ran with it! Their skills and initiative really made it happen, and I appreciate them a ton.

I think it turned out great!