11/16/23: Good Things

Last Sunday we welcomed two new members: Glen Scott and Sue Golish! I am sorry to have missed the service, but know that Becky Martin did a great job of welcoming both of these good people to our community. A growing community is a thriving community, and we are truly blessed to be in such a good place. Yahoo!

This Sunday, the church leadership is offering Pies of Gratitude to all assembled after church. There will be plenty of pies to enjoy while we also hear her story from Anya Tatarenko. Hannah Horn has been working with Anya to tell her story. You don’t want to miss either! Yahoo!

While Karen was working with us, she pointed me in the direction of grants offered by the UCC national office. I have never applied for a grant before—but saw several opportunities. One was for a micro-grant of $2,500 towards the operation of our church. Given all we have been thru and given how we were getting so close to our pledging goal, I applied for this to help push us over the goal. In the meantime, we are so close to our pledge goal, that I was able to add money for Search into our budget with these monies. Yesterday I received word that we will receive this grant. Yahoo!

And another Grant we applied for was the NIN (Neighbors in Need). You remember that we took up a collection only a few weeks’ back. You were very generous—we received $835 to send to UCC for next year’s grants. We applied for a grant in support of the work that Jim Stumbo is doing with a group from the city to create a land conservancy in support of lower income housing in Ashland. Becky Martin was instrumental in our getting this grant written. The idea is that whatever Jim’s group comes up with will be shared with UCC so that possibly other churches can do the same. We received the requested $7,250. Yahoo!

That is a lot of good things! Yahoo!