Fall 2020
Volume 11, Issue 2
View more photos from church events via our website: upcbgm.org/programs-and-events/photo-gallery
Our worship services premiere live on our YouTube channel: upcbgm.org/youtube
Sunday, November 1: All Saints Day and the Bouquet of Remembrance
One of our cherished traditions at United Pres is our Bouquet of Remembrance, which we build as a congregation during the worship service closest to All Saints Day. This year the service will be on November 1, and we will be building the bouquet in a different way than we have done in the past.
First, we will create a short slide show with photos and short video clips remembering those who have died since last year’s bouquet was created, and you are welcome to send photos and videos of your loved ones for the 2019–2020 memorial. Pastors Becky and Kimberly will place a flower in the bowl for each of those folks.
If there is someone you would like to remember from years past, please send us the name(s), and if possible, send a photo of yourself holding a flower for each person you wish to remember. We will create a second slide show showing those pictures and place a flower for each of those who are now part of the great cloud of witnesses that surround us.
For example, this year I (Pastor Kimberly) want to place a flower for my mother on the 10th anniversary of her death and one for Marie Hepworth, who died in 2018. So I will take a photo of myself holding two flowers, and naming them. Because my mother loved yellow roses and Marie loved pink, I will take a photo of myself holding a yellow rose and a pink rose, representing them.
Here’s the tricky part: if you want us to place a particular flower, you need to bring it to the church by Monday, October 26, so we have it when we are creating the bouquet. If it doesn’t matter, we will do as we have in the past and buy a variety of flowers to create the bouquet.
We will also celebrate communion as “Comfort Food” on that Sunday. The Bouquet of Remembrance will be the centerpiece of the table on which the elements are consecrated.
Our Money Story
We all have stories that shape us. Stories of family, of faith, of adventures and successes and catastrophes and losses. Some stories we tell over and over again, and know by heart. Some stories we don’t pay much attention to, but they have shaped our lives and our ways of thinking and our habits, and so they are worth remembering and understanding, so that we can either continue the story as we learned it, or craft it into a new story.
Stories of money are especially tricky, because we all have them, and we all feel awkward talking about our money stories and even thinking about them. But as Christians, we say that every part of our life is given in service to God, so it is worthwhile to examine our money stories in the light of Christ.
Several Presbyterian congregations in Binghamton will be using a curriculum called “Our Money Story” to have conversations around this topic, and three of us who are pastors have recorded a conversation that we hope will help to set the tone.
During October, I will be sending an email out each week with exercises and reflection pieces that you can use to think about your personal story and your family’s story. Then during our worship, we will be hearing stories about God’s amazing love and generosity, about God’s grace and providence as we know it through the Bible, and reflecting on our story as a congregation.
We will reflect using four “steps” or themes: Remember, in which we call to mind our stories; Release, in which we let go of things that have hurt us or kept us from living in God’s abundance; Reimagine, in which we remember God’s vision for us and dream of ways we can come closer to that vision; and Restore, in which we will think about steps we can take to participate actively in building a world where God’s reign is over all of creation.
The reflection pieces are also gathered into a journal and a workbook, and if you would prefer to use them in that format, we can send them to you in hard copy.
While preparing for this series, I have been noticing the other stories that I carry with me, that have shaped me in various ways — stories of family, of community, of faith, of politics — and I notice that some of the stories that we carry most closely are the ones that we talk about the least in church. So I hope that this first conversation will help us to have some other conversations about the stories that shape us, and we can learn more about what we carry in our hearts and what we stand for in the world.
Grace and Peace,
Pastor Kimberly
Our mission is to follow Jesus Christ by doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God.
