Worship Connection for October 31, 2021

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.

• Upcoming Worship Plans!

  November 7 is National Jr. High Sunday.  Our Middle School Youth will help lead worship around the theme”Build Wisely,” based on Matthew 7:24-27.  Come support the youth and join in worship together!
  We will continue to meet for one service at 11:00AM through November 7, when our Junior High youth will be leading us in Worship. Children’s Sunday School will also resume on November 7, at 9:50AM.
  

  If you are not vaccinated, our Church Board asks that you please wear a mask in the building. Given the current prevalence of Covid-19 infection in our area, I personally request that we all wear masks when we are in groups indoors. Thank you for your cooperation and care.

• Our next Church Board meeting will be held at 12:15 following our worship service on November 7. 
• We will be hosting a CROP Hunger Walk starting at our church on November 13 at 1:00PM. CROP raises funds to help provide food for the hungry both locally and around the world. We will be joined by other churches in our community as we walk together to make a difference! Online registration is available at https://events.crophungerwalk.org/2021/event/weyerscaveva.

  CROP Hunger Walks are community-based walk events held in cities and towns across the United States, raising funds to support the global mission of Church World Service, a faith-based organization transforming communities around the globe through just and sustainable responses to hunger, poverty displacement and disaster. Twenty-five percent of the funds raised will go to support our local food pantries.

• Backpack Pals are accepting donations of Pudding Cups and Ramen Noodles! Please leave any donations in the blue bin located in the Narthex.  Thank you! 

• Our Shenandoah District Conference will be held on November 6 at the Rockingham County Fairgrounds. This will be a very different conference than we had originally hoped for, due to adjustments because of the continuing Covid-19 Pandemic. Please be in prayer for a successful conference and for Pastor Daniel as he serves as Moderator for the conference.

• We are excited to share a fundraising opportunity to support the Church of the Brethren Haiti Medical Project. The Haiti Medical project is a ministry of the Church of the Brethren in Haiti, providing basic health care to their neighbors. The project began with Mobile Medical Clinics, and has now expanded to community development work, including building clean wells and latrines to help with sanitation.

  This year, a matching grant has been given to the Haiti Medical Project to help fund the building of latrines in Haiti. Additionally, we have secured another $5,000 matching grant from Karis, to help with this project. This means that the first $5,000 we raise, will send $20,000 to build latrines in Haiti! Funds beyond our first $5,000 will continue to be matched as available from the Haiti Medical Project grant.

  We hope to share the invitation to contribute beyond our congregation as well. Our music leadership has just completed production of an album of hymns and praise songs, entitled “While I Run This Race.” We will be distributing this album with an invitation to make donations to the Haiti Medical Project.

  Donations can be given to the church office, or placed in the designated donation box on Sunday morning. Checks can be written to “Pleasant Valley COB” with “Haiti” on the memo line.

 They have preached. They have served. They have told stories. They have served meals. They too have dug graves. And they have taught us to turn to God in thanksgiving and hope. In God’s grace, we will all receive our reward!

Matthew 13:31-34 NRSV

He put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in his field; it is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.’

He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.’

Jesus told the crowds all these things in parables; without a parable he told them nothing.

This is My Father’s World

CCLI #1699256

We revel in your creation, O God! For you have placed the grain of the field and the fruit of the forest into our hands. We watch the corn rise from the earth and the apples form on the trees, and know that your blessing is present. So make us fruitful in the same way, warmed by your grace, sustained by your love, and blooming in your calling. In Jesus name, Amen.

Now, as we leave this place
Anticipating what God will put before us next
May what is before us,
Never outshine what God has planted within us.
May it continue to give light and warmth
and lead us in Christ’s love, back together again. Amen.