Good morning! This page is intended to both serve as a continuing worship option for those participating in our worship service from home, and to serve in place of print resources during our in-person worship. Following the worship service on Sunday, one or more video recordings from the service will be placed on this page, including the sermon. This may take several hours, due to the time needed to process the videos. We will email the congregation when the recordings have been posted. If you would like to be added to our congregational email list, please contact pvcob.alive@gmail.com.
- We have begun our new Worship Schedule!
9:30 to 10:15 Sunday School
10:15 to 10:30 Praise Music
10:30 to 11:30 Combined Worship Service
- Baptisms Following Worship Today!
Immediately following worship on Sunday, August 14, we will be headed to the river for baptisms. Please join the celebration at Grand Caverns Park, 5 Grand Caverns Drive, Grottoes. We will gather near the Pavilion 1, then move down to the river together. When you go across the bridge into the park, immediately turn right and find a parking spot.After the baptisms, all are invited to stay and continue the celebrations! The deacons are providing food at Pavilion 1. Please feel free to bring a camp chair along. Then spend as much time as you would like celebrating, enjoying each other and time at the park.
- There will be a Church Board meeting next Sunday, August 21, following worship.
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Transition Team Update: Your Input Needed
The Transition Team continues to move forward with their work and recently met to create a congregational survey. This survey will provide an opportunity for the entire church body to give input into the process and share your ideas, hopes, and concerns with the team. The survey is now available online HERE, on our website, and in the narthex, and needs to be completed by the end of August. If you prefer to submit a printed copy, please place the completed form in the box labeled “Transition Team Survey” in the church narthex. Your responses are confidential and a very important step in the process. Please take the time to prayerfully consider your answers which will help guide our future direction.
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Sign Up to Be in a LIFE Group!
The best way to get connected at Pleasant Valley is by joining one of our Life Groups. Life Groups consist of 6-12 adults who meet weekly or bi-weekly (or as the group determines) throughout the year. Life Groups help us grow in our relationships with each other and in our faith. These groups knit the church together as group members build friendships, pray, and study the Bible together.
The following acrostic further defines the purpose of Life Groups:
Lean on Jesus as we
Ignite faithful discipleship,
Fellowship in love, and
Encourage Christian growth.Groups will begin meeting again in September, and sign-ups will be available at church and online during the month of August. There will be Life Groups for everyone, and we encourage and challenge you to help us form new groups based on interests and preferences.
Sign up now in the Narthex! If you have any questions, please contact one of our Life Group Committee: Sara Houff, Karissa Ruiz, Carol Wilson, and Pastor Rebecca House - Backpack Pals are in need of pudding cups, ramen noodles, and we ask that you continue to donate your plastic grocery bags. Thank you!
- Prayer Request updates: We would like to update everyone on our new prayer list procedures for our bulletins – prayer requests will be removed from the bulletin list after 5 weeks unless otherwise requested. This will assist us with ensuring that there is enough room to continue including new requests as they are brought to our attention each week. We will happily include updates on the circumstances of those on our lists as we learn more from our congregational members. We thank you all for your prayers for those in our congregation and community!
Call to Worship
In this room on this morning, be at peace. Know that the God who tamed the storms, who separated the sky from the sea, and raised Lazarus from the grave is here with us, where two—and more!—are gathered to pray. God it here, in this medium sized room, in this small town, just as God is present this morning and every morning in small towns and big cities all across our nation and our world. Join together in worship.
Invocation
Heavenly Father, be with us today. Fill this room and this service with your presence. Fill each heart with the curiosity of a child, the stability of an adult, and the wisdom of an elder. Amen.
Daniel 6:16-28 NRSV
16 Then the king gave the command, and Daniel was brought and thrown into the den of lions. The king said to Daniel, “May your God, whom you faithfully serve, deliver you!” 17 A stone was brought and laid on the mouth of the den, and the king sealed it with his own signet ring and with the signet ring of his lords, so that nothing might be changed concerning Daniel. 18 Then the king went to his palace and spent the night fasting; no entertainment was brought to him, and sleep fled from him.
Daniel Saved from the Lions
19 Then at dawn, the king got up and at first light hurried to the den of lions. 20 When he came near the den where Daniel was, he cried out anxiously to Daniel, “O Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God whom you faithfully serve been able to deliver you from the lions?” 21 Daniel then said to the king, “O king, live forever! 22 My God sent his angel and shut the lions’ mouths so that they would not hurt me, because I was found blameless before him; also before you, O king, I have done no wrong.” 23 Then the king was exceedingly glad and commanded that Daniel be taken up out of the den. So Daniel was taken up out of the den, and no kind of harm was found on him because he had trusted in his God. 24 The king gave a command, and those who had maliciously accused Daniel were brought and thrown into the den of lions—they, their children, and their wives. Before they reached the bottom of the den, the lions overpowered them and broke all their bones in pieces.
25 Then King Darius wrote to all peoples and nations of every language throughout the whole world: “May you have abundant prosperity! 26 I make a decree, that in all my royal dominion people shall tremble and fear before the God of Daniel:
For he is the living God,
enduring forever.
His kingdom shall never be destroyed,
and his dominion has no end.
27 He delivers and rescues;
he works signs and wonders in heaven and on earth;
he has saved Daniel
from the power of the lions.”
28 So this Daniel prospered during the reign of Darius and the reign of Cyrus the Persian.
Jeremiah 29:11 NRSV
11 For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.
Romans 5:1-5 NRSV
Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we[a] have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we have obtained access[b] to this grace in which we stand, and we[c] boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. 3 And not only that, but we[d] also boast in our afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
Affirmation of Faith
One: You have no equal, oh God. You have stretched out the heavens like a curtain. You have nurtured each kernel of grain to full life.
All: The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.
One: You have no equal, of God. You have weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance. You have measured the waters in the hollow of your hand.
All: The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.
One: The nations are like a drop in the bucket, like dust, like grasshoppers. They shall wither—they shall faint.
All: You, Lord, are everlasting. You are our Creator and Sustainer. We shall not wither. We shall not faint.
In Prayer Together
Let us pray. Dear God, give us the patience to wait upon your plans. We thank you for the blessings and prosperity that you’ve given us and in particular the blessings of health and healing that you’ve give to our sisters and brothers. Lord, we thank you for the hope we get from worshipping with people of like minds and the sure and certain knowledge that we have a future secure in your love. Help us carry that love into your world. Amen.
Patience and fortitude are required. But hope will be ours. Trusting in God’s plan for each of us and our community, go into the world. Amen.