Vacation Bible School is Coming

Vacation Bible School is coming! This year we’re doing something new.  We’re joining three neighborhood churches (St. James Episcopal, College Hill UMC, and Plymouth Congregational) for an evening Bible School the week of July 17.

VBS is Monday – Thursday evenings, with a family celebration on Friday.  The evenings begin with dinner from 5:30-6:00, and then the VBS fun happens from 6:00 until 8:00 pm.

Children 3 – 6th grade are welcome.  (All participants must be potty trained.)  Fifth and 6th graders are doing separate “Mission Possible” activities.

Registration is all online.  Follow the QR codes to register a child or to register as a volunteer.

SEE QR CODES ON THE IMAGE ABOVE

We are not hosting VBS at Grace, but we still need volunteers.  If you are interested in helping, contact Charlene Randle or the church office at 316-684-5215.

 

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Good Neighbor Team Update

Our Good Neighbor Team completed their first project of the year, albeit a month later than planned. This is the property of a woman named Doris, who lives about a mile north of Koch Arena. Doris’ granddaughter came up for the weekend from Dallas to be on hand to assist and field questions for the Good Neighbor Team.

The project was a yard clean-up with many shrubs, saplings, and one good-sized tree that needed to be removed. Luckily, we had the best turnout yet, with 18 people working.  Doris and her granddaughter provided donuts and drinks and prayed with the group when the project was complete. This is the first time that’s happened. It was a really good day.

Contact the church office at 316-684-5215, to learn how to be involved with this team.

Before

Before

After

After

The Crew 5-6-2023

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Pentecost Offering: May 28

Pentecost

Pentecost is Sunday, May 28.  Each year we celebrate the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and as part of our celebration we receive the Pentecost Offering.  The Pentecost Offering supports ministries with children and youth.  Sixty percent of the offering goes to the national PCUSA, and 40% stays in our community.  This year our local portion goes to the East High School YoungLife program.

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Yellow Bags for May: Giving the Basics

Yellow Bag Collection for May

During the month of May, our congregation is helping Giving the Basics Wichita. We have assisted this organization in the past, but did you know that this year Giving the Basics is helping serve 146 schools, 48 community organizations, and two police departments, providing personal hygiene items to those in need?

One of the organizations that Giving the Basics serves is The Salvation Army.  Personal hygiene items such as soap, shampoo, toilet paper, toothpaste, and toothbrushes are provided to its clients each week. These individuals are genuinely grateful for these items. The needs specified by Giving the Basics Wichita are deodorant, shampoo, toothpaste, and toilet paper. If you can provide any of these items, please drop them in one of the barrels placed around the church.  Continued thanks for your ongoing support of our Yellow Bag collections.

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Sunday, April 23, Electricity Update

light bulbWe had major power issues on Sunday morning, April 23. At about 6:20 am, power fluctuations started at Grace that triggered alarms. Kirk Anderson and Martin Burch arrived to discover flickering lights and partial power. Evergy was notified, and we called P1, the company that handles our HVAC maintenance.

A P1 technician arrived to shut down our HVAC system to try and prevent damage to units due to our partial power situation. Evergy arrived at about 8:30 and discovered issues with the incoming power transformer. Power was shut down, repairs made, and power restored by 9:40. The P1 technician then restarted the equipment.

Ideally, that would have been the end of everything. …But we don’t live in an ideal world. In our world, additional issues have been discovered since power was restored. And these additional issues will cost us.

  • Our IT specialist came out on Sunday afternoon to restore connectivity between the server and our internal network and restore wireless service, none of which was functioning after the power was back on.
  • We had to have backup batteries in our fire alarm notifier system replaced.
  • We have discovered some HVAC systems are not working correctly, so P1 will return.
  • The organ lost power to it, so our electrical contractor came out Tuesday, and we have power again.
  • The hot water booster that our commercial dishwasher needs to sanitize dishes is not functioning, so someone will come out and find the issue and correct it.
  • The power dock that hooks Martin’s computer up to all its peripherals is not functioning, so a workaround has been created until the offending piece of hardware can be replaced.

That is what we know about currently. We may discover other issues as we move through the next few days.  Thank you for your flexibility!

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