Weekly E-Pistle: Second Sunday in Lent

2/26/2021

In This Week's E-Pistle, You Will Find:

This Sunday's Service Notes - "Second Sunday in Lent: The Fullness of Life"
Last Week's Service Video --"First Sunday in Lent: Into the Wilderness"
Pastor Sal on 'Saugatuck on Sunday,' FM 92.7
National Day of Unplugging
Cream of the Crop Walk, 2020!
Lenten Devotionals Available at Retreat House and Online
Unity Church's Devotional
Centering Prayer Group during Lent, Wednesday Evenings at 5:30pm, Feb 17 to March 31
Community Read with Interfaith Action: The Beauty of Your Face
Order by Feb 28 To Receive DUCC Discount on QuartzAir UnitsMichigan's
Contact Tracing App
Sign up for your vaccine! Here's How!
Friendship Hall News
Birthdays & Anniversaries, Prayer Requests, and Financial Stewardship

This Sunday: "Lent Week 2: The Fullness of Life"

In John 10:10, Jesus said, "I have come so that you may have life, and have it to the full." As Joan Chittister reminds us in the quote above, the season of Lent is about becoming, doing, and changing whatever it is that is blocking the fullness of life in us right now. At this Sunday's "Video Worship Service," Pastor Sal will be giving an inspiring Progressive Christian message on what it truly means to experience "The Fullness of Life." Plus, there will be uplifting music from Peter Black and The Huggetts. We hope you will tune-in and join us online.

Tune in on Sunday at 10 AM via our Facebook page, YouTube channel, or here on our website.

Last Week's Service

Last Sunday was the 1st Sunday in Lent. The 40 days of Lent are a time of spiritual preparation for us. Before Jesus began his ministry of teaching and healing, he spent 40 days and nights in the wilderness. The 40 days of Lent invite us to venture into the wilderness alone, to face our fears and to wrestle with the things that are keeping us from experiencing our greatest good and living life to the full. Please watch last Sunday's "Video Worship Service," when we prepared ourselves spiritually for the sacred season of Lent.
Message: Pastor Sal. Music: Peter Black and Jim Bailey.
Click here to read the text, listen to the podcast, and share last week's homily!

Pastor Sal on 'Saugatuck on Sunday,' FM 92.7

Saugatuck on Sunday is a community radio program that airs on 92.7 The Van. This past Sunday, Ingrid Scone served as guest co-host with Gregory Muncie as they interviewed our own Author, Speaker, and Pastor Sal. You can click here to listen to the interview.

National Day of Unplugging, March 5-6

Church Member Chris Clark invites you to observe this year's 'National Day of Unplugging' on March 5-6. To “unplug” is to refrain from using all digital devices and electronic media - phone, tablet, laptop, desktop computer, television, camera, radio, and so on.

Unplugging gives you a break from the daily overload of stressful email, disturbing news, toxic commentary, misleading ads, inane videos, and spiteful social media. It’s a chance to explore healthier alternatives to tech. Where safe, it’s a day to interact with live human beings face-to-face.

Since 2009, there has been an “official” National Day of Unplugging, and in 2021 the time frame is March 5-6. You can pick an entire day, go from noon to noon, or slice it some other way. If you want, sign up at the NDU website. Otherwise, just unplug on your own. Download the NDU's ideas page, below for ideas of how you might spend all the extra time that day.

national_day_of_unplugging_ideas.pdf
File Size:	97 kb
File Type:	pdf

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Cream of the Crop Walk, 2020!

This past week Church World Service released its annual "Cream of the CROP" list, featuring the top 100 CROP Walk teams in the United States. The DUCC team came in at #27! Congratulations to all of the participants and thank you to the donors, and KUDOS to Chris Clark for leading our team!

Lenten Devotionals Available at Retreat House and Online

The Season of Lent began on Wednesday, and a great way to journey through the Lenten season is by praying each day with the UCC's 2021 Lenten Devotional.

The devotional features daily Bible quotes, reflections, and prayers for all 40 Days of Lent, from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday.

The devotionals are $5 each, and you can pick one up in the foyer of the Retreat House, or you can order online at The Pilgrim Press.

Unity's Lenten Devotional

And here is another Lent devotional, organized around our friend and neighbor Mark Antony Lord's book, The Seven Living Words. Lord serves at Unity Church in Naples, Florida, and has a summer home in Douglas. The Unity Church has organized their 2021 Lenten Devotional around daily excerpts from Lord's book, presenting Jesus' final words from the cross as a guide to developing our own Christ attributes and to living from a higher spiritual awareness. Order the this devotional here. You can download an excerpt from the devotional below.

2021-lent-bklt_eng_spreads-excerpt.pdf
File Size:	540 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

Centering Prayer Group during Lent, Wednesday Evenings at 5:30 pm

During the season of Lent,
Pastor Sal will be leading
a "Centering Prayer" meditation
via Zoom each Wednesday
evening from 5:30 PM to 6 PM.
If you are interested in
taking part in these sessions,
please email Julie for the
Zoom link.

Community Read with Interfaith Action:
The Beauty of Your Face

The DUCC Social Justice Team, in partnership with West Michigan's Interfaith Action, invites you to read and discuss The Beauty of Your Face. Our friend Beth Kenagy writes, "The novel was named one of the New York Times's 100 Notable Books of 2020. It's rich with details of the Islamic faith and Arab culture and the prejudice that confronts American-Muslim immigrants. The generational conflict that sometimes arises within immigrant families is also a central theme."

The author will join the ZOOM discussion on Thursday, March 18 at 6:00.

Nevine Khalil, a journalist from Saint Joseph, and Tatiana Reinoza, a Notre Dame professor, will moderate the discussion.

Click here to register for the online book discussion.

Order by Feb 28 To Receive DUCC Discount on QuartzAir Units

Surgically Clean Air February 2021 discount pricing information for DUCC

QUARTZ:
retail price: $1,795
DUCC Feb 2021 price: $1,495
Cubic Ft./min cleaned, 194 cfm on Medium setting
Total sq ft cleaned per unit: 2,100 sq ft

JADE:
retailprice: $2,495
DUCC Feb 2021 price: $1,995
Cubic Ft/min cleaned, 229 cfm on Medium setting
Total sq ft cleaned per unit: 2,730 sq ft

After our last congregational meeting, during which we shared plans for air cleaning when the church returns to in-person services, several DUCC members showed interest in Surgicall Clean Air (SCA) units for their homes. SCA has offered church members a discount for orders placed in the month of February, 2021. Full list and discount prices are shown above along with the home square footage covered per unit. Shipping is approximately $50 with a two-week lead time.
If you would like one of these units at this special price, contact our sales representative, below. Only orders placed with him by phone qualify for the DUCC discount. Also, he is happy to answer any questions regarding home layouts, size of units, etc.

Mr. Dave Lerg, Surgically Clean Air, Inc., 248 761 9923 www.quartzair.com

Michigan's Contact Tracing App

We can protect one another as we work to stay safe by downloading and using the MI COVID ALERT app for our apple or android smart phones. The app a free and is managed by the state health department to help with contact tracing and notification, which will slow the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19) in Michigan. Using the MI COVID Alert app along with following and observing existing public health recommendations will help us all stay safe when we meet up, socialize, work or travel. Click here to find and download the app to your phone!

Sign up for your vaccine! Here's How!

Local public health departments are working to distribute vaccines in West Michigan. Click here to visit Vaccinate West Michigan for news of distribution in our region. If you are an Allegan County resident and wish to have a vaccine and/or volunteer to help out , follow this link to register with the Allegan County Health Department website. You may wish to register with your local Meijer, whose clinics will be set up to distribute Covid 19 vaccines. Here is the link to register at your closest Meijer pharmacy. Hope is on the horizon!

Please note that healthcare advisors in our own church and across the nation are advising people who have received the vaccine to continue to wear masks and practice social distancing for a while longer. Patience is the gift we give to each other. Here's a good explanation of why masking and distancing will still be necessary.

If you have the time and the skills to help people sign up and receive their vaccines, Allegan County has a volunteer application form you can use to let them know of your skills and availability.

You need to sign up online, and here is the link for Allegan County:
http://cms.allegancounty.org/sites/Office/Health/PHEP/SitePages/Volunteers.aspx

And here is the link for other locations in Michigan:
http://mivolunteerregistry.org/

Friendship Hall News

At Online Friendship Hall last week, we learned that the Valentine Visitations Continue! We heard that church member Aase Munk welcomed a very large puffy cow at her door, delivering a message of love. Same cow, different door, visited Paul Burdick and Mike Valdez. (For more on that loving business, see last week's E-pistle!) We were so happy to celebrate Craig Drager and Dan Pierce's 25th anniversary! We caught up with new members William Briggs and Jeff Chinski, who asked us to pray for teachers and their students, who are working so hard to teach and learn under difficult conditions. We checked in with Beverly Hawkes, whose nephew Darren starts an aggressive course of chemo this week. And we learned that two of Bev and Orie's neighbors from Detroit, Mike and Gwen Elbert, who died of Covid just 8 days apart, were featured on PBS Newshour. Bev and Julie Ridl shared some of their farm-to-yarn processing adventures. And we learned from Serena Spina that Tom Spina is returning to Miami with his parents. We offered prayers for them for entering this new phase in their life. It was wonderful to see some of Serena's art. See above! We checked in with Becca Waaso on her family's big move to Oregon It was good to see Sidney Matheis was back on line (with the help of Dan Mack!).

Birthdays & Anniversaries

February 28- Betsy York, (29)- Craig Drager, March 1- Elinor White, 2- Carol Watson Ortman,
3- Nancy Gervais, Mary Westenbroek & Marcel terVeen, 5- Michael White,
6- Ted Sommer, David Turner

Birthday and Anniversary cards are a great way we can continue to reach out to one another during this time. If you wish to mail a card to one of our church members, addresses can be found in our Church Directory. If you don't have a directory, please let us know, and we will email one to you.

Prayer Requests

Becky Hoeppner (Demetrhea Terrien's niece); Dale Lower; Sherri Kanten (Ruth VandenBosch's friend); Diane Carr (Debra Carr's sister); Michael (a friend of Dan Mack's); Mike Boston and Kathy Austin; Myron (Wendy Hamlin's grandson, Fred Hamilin's great-grandson); Chris Stuart (Virginia Stuart's sister-in-law); Kurt McDonald (John McDonald's son); Matt Brazys (Friend of Pete Wehle's); Darren Dixon (Beverly and Orie Hawkes' nephew); Mary Elizabeth Loudin (friend of Laurie VandenBeldt); Richard Graham; Char Clausing (Nancy Plantinga's cousin); Chris Robinson (Peter and Kathleen Mueller's nephew); Jim Shewell; Gregg Kirchen (Sheryll and Greg VanPortfleet's friend); Daniel Ver Meulen (Susan Fleming's son); Marcia Sullivan (Jo Cooley's friend); Len Lynch (Kathleen Mueller's brother); Curtis Coffin (Marty Coffin's brother).

Financial Stewardship

February 21, 2021

Viewers for February 21 Online Service Videos: 815
Online Giving: $6,734.40

Total: $6,734.40

Thank you!!

Your generous giving allows us to sustain our church community and our mission of service in the world. Please consider giving online, which is easily done by texting your donation amount to
844-931-2849, or sharing through the donate buttons on
Facebook or Instagram, or at our website.