Announcements
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November 2025 Schedule
Advent Fair 2025
Please join us for a time of crafts and fellowship on Sunday November 23 at 9 AM in the Nolt Auditorium
Crafts for all ages!
Please bring a breakfast item (bagels, baked oatmeal, etc) to share.
We are providing juice, coffee, and tea.
Sign-up in the Solarium
If you would like to volunteer or if you have any questions please contact Angie Rabbe
717-397-2748 or gracechurch517@gmail.com
Communion Assistants
We need your help—we need a few more communion assistants for the 10:30 service . We would love to have at least three more folks sign up on a regular basis. If you have any questions please contact Angie Rabbe or Keith Miller.
Flowers and Candles
A reminder: If you would like to honor/remember your loved one(s) on significant dates, such as birthdays,
anniversaries, or date of passing, please contact: Donna Weidman @ dweidman52@gmail.com or
717-201-6180
A nominal fee of $20 for flowers and/or $5 for candles helps defray the cost of the altar flowers & candles in our budget.
Outreach
Feeding Our Neighbors
Along with sleep, food and water are daily necessities of life. This is a biological fact which even
governments of very poor nations recognize, making efforts to ensure that even their poorest citizens have ways to obtain food and avoid starvation. Sometimes there are events, like Hurricane Melissa this past week, that destroy food and the processes by which food is moved to places where people can buy it. Sometimes those events are not natural disasters but political ones, such as the famines related to war in Gaza or the Sudan. This week, a political disaster is developing, not far away in a poor, war-torn land, but in our own communities. The imminent loss of federal SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits affects up to 3 million people immediately, and over 40 million people over the next month if the politics of our federal government shut-down continue. In Lancaster County, officials tell us that over 50,000 of our neighbors living in or near poverty will find it much more difficult to eat, with average amounts of food assistance lost ranging from close to $200/month for a
single senior citizen, to over $500/month for families with children.
So that we might organize ourselves to help in simple but effective ways, we are prepared to collect financial donations for the FOOD HUB, and to collect and deliver donations of food itself on behalf of the Church World Service Food Pantry that is being set up to help neighbors that are most vulnerable to this crisis.
· If you wish to help financially, please make your check out to “Grace Lutheran Church” with a memo “Food Bank” and our treasurers will forward these donations weekly to support the Food Hub’s ministry to hungry neighbors.
· Grace continues to serve weekly community meals on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays. You could volunteer (call Karen Scheffey at 717-682-1728) or support the meals with a donation to “Grace Lutheran Church” memo: Wednesday Meal.
· For those who would rather donate food directly our English Language Learning team is sponsoring a food drive for Church World Service Lancaster. Items can be drooped off at the gathering area in the Nolt Auditorium or directly at CWS.
If you have any questions please reach out to Pastor Verkouw, Kathryn Verkouw, or Angie Rabbe.
Thank you!
Grocery Cards
Grocery cards are available at both services on Sunday mornings. You may order cards by calling Duane and Kitty Weiss. Remember all purchases of cards realizes 5% in cash back to Grace. These funds are used to support our many ministries. Grocery
CARDS will NOT be AVAILABLE on Sunday, NOVEMBER 23.
Hope For the Holidays
CARDS ARE AVAILABLE IN THE NOLT AUDITORIUM AND THE SOLARIUM
PLEASE RETURN ALL CARDS BY 12/2
DO NOT PUT CARDS IN ENVELOPES
If you have any questions please contact Angie Rabbe 717-397-2748 gracechurch517@gmail.com
Christian Formation
Adult Christian Formation —Fall 2025
November 16: Adults: Contemplative Prayer Led by Tom Santosusso
Highschool Youth’s turn to experience “Finding Your Anchor” Led by Jane Horan, EdD
November 23: Advent Fair!!!!!! Fun and crafts for all ages
November 30: Traveling with the Deaconess Community: Sister Dr. Dottie Almoney, Directing
Deaconess of the Deaconess Community of the ELCA
December 7: Congregational Meeting!!!
December 14: Contemplative Prayer Led by Tom Santasusso
December 21: Please support the children by attending their Christmas Play “Wow!”
December 28: TBD
November 16 & December 14
11/16: Centering Prayer– A long loving look at the Real
Jesus Prayer—Using a mantra
12/14: Lectio Divina—Scripture based contemplation
The Examen—Find God in daily life
All are invited. You need only to bring yourself and an interest in becoming closer to God through these ancient ways of praying.
Hope and the Anchor Within
What grounds you when life feels uncertain? This month’s reflection explores faith, creativity, and the quiet strength of hope.
By Jane Horan, EdD
Our recent workshop began with a question: What Bible story represents resilience and hope? Some spoke of Job, whose faith endured through suffering. I shared the story of Jonah, who, after much resistance and with persistence and prayer, found his way out of the belly of the whale and back toward purpose.
I facilitated an eight-step creative and reflective process to help participants uncover what keeps them grounded in uncertain times. I suggested finding your anchor, that thing you hold onto when life feels turbulent. The word sparked thoughtful discussion: an anchor can steady us, yet it can also weigh us down. Through faith, prayer, and contemplative practice, we explored other anchors, our values, families, and strengths, these are what ground us and guide us as we navigate life’s choppy waters, sometimes finding ourselves, as Emily Dickinson wrote, “on the strangest Sea.”
Midway through, each participant crafted a small boat to represent where they are on their journey, then shared their reflections in pairs. As I listened to the sharing, the words of Emily Dickinson floated through my mind:
“Hope” is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –
As we closed, I mentioned, “We can’t control the weather, right?” One participant smiled and added, “But we can always adjust our sails.” Reminding us that faith, hope, and community keep us afloat, even when the seas grow rough.
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