Grace and peace be with you all in Jesus Christ our Savior!

I hope and pray that you have been having a great week.  Rose Marie and I attended a Memorial service on Monday at the Eddyville cemetery.   It was a nice service.  Anna Haselhuhn played the echo Taps and did a fine job.  We were able to talk with Jerry VanDerPol, a former member who is Homer Ferguson's son-in-law, who will be deployed to Afghanistan in August.  He told us that he has been in the National Guard for 31 years and when he returns, in one year, he will retire.  We wish Jerry God's blessing.

Sunday will be the 1st Sunday after Trinity.  It is a communion worship service.   I urge you to read through the questions and answers for personal preparation for Holy Communion in our hymnal on page 156.  Our worship theme for Sunday is: The Lord keeps his promises and is worthy of all our trust.  The sermon text is Mt 5:1-10, the Beatitudes, which are the introduction to the Lord's Sermon on the Mount.  The children will sing a hymn, together with the Youth and Adult choirs, which is an edifying piece.  If all works well, we hope to show a WELS Connection video after the service.

A couple of items from our Elders meeting on Wednesday.  We talked about updating our church directory and were interested to know if there is a desire to do another pictorial directory, this being our 65th anniversary year.  If not, we do wish to update our pictures of congregational members.  We will discuss this more at our Voter's meeting prior to the church picnic on July 11.  Also, we have an anonymous donor who is pledging about half the cost for replacement of our sanctuary windows.

This would still leave us about 2,000.00 short of what is needed for the project.  The frames on the widows, especially on the outside are deteriorating rapidly and will need repair in the future.  This, as well, we will talk more about at our Voter's meeting.  If you are interested in donating to this project talk with President Steve Schemm or one of our Trustees.

God's blessing on your weekend.  I look forward to worshipping with you on Sunday.

"When your words came, I ate them; they were my joy and my heart's delight, for I bear your name, O Lord God Almighty."  Jer 15:16

In Christ,

Pastor