Messenger | May 7, 2025

 This week's release at a glance:

• Pastor’s Message
• Pray in May
• Deacons’ Spring Fellowship Dinner
• A Night at the Opera
• Songs of Hope Spring Concert
• The Hunchback of Notre Dame Wins Ruby Griffith Award
• Adult Class on the Life of the Apostle Paul
• Pastors’ Bible Study
• Get Ready for VBS
• Mother’s Day Food Drive to Support SPAN
• Ministry of Hope-Malawi Team has a Wonderful Problem!
• Open Dance Classes
• Langton Green Produce Baskets
  

Pastor's Message

This Sunday is Mother’s Day. Doubtless you’ve been inundated with all the ads touting various products as “the perfect gift for Mom,” or special discounts on flower arrangements, and of course the stores are filled with Mother’s Day greeting cards. Many families are planning special celebrations for the mothers in their lives. And it is wonderful and important to take time to celebrate the mothers in our lives who have given so much of their time and energy and love to ensure the health and well-being of their children. We give thanks for their dedication, their love, their strength and tenacity and sacrifice, and their grace in raising us. So if you are able to reach out and express special love and gratitude to your own mother or to mothers of one kind or another in your life, I encourage you to do so this Sunday!

At the same time, precisely because of all that attention and celebration, Mother’s Day is also a complicated and even difficult day for many people. For some, it is a day when grief makes a special and pronounced visit, as they remember their mother or the mother of their children who has died. For others, it is a day of particular pain, because they are children estranged from their mothers, or mothers estranged from their children, or because they have wanted so badly to become a mother and have been unable to do so for various reasons, or because they are the mother of a child who has died. I have talked to many people who actually avoid coming to church on Mother’s Day for some of those very reasons.

As Christians, we are called to “rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15). I want to suggest that verse as the lens through which we view and understand Mother’s Day as Christians. For many, it is and should be a day of rejoicing in good and faithful mothers, and we can and should join in those celebrations as part of our pastoral ministry. At the same time, there are many who are weeping on Mother’s Day, and we have a responsibility to join in that at least as much as in the rejoicing. So this Sunday, in the Prayers of the People, we will hold those who rejoice and those who weep in prayer. And I encourage you, in your own lives, to find ways to be in a ministry of both rejoicing and weeping with those around you as well, so that we may share Christ’s love with those who are in particular need of it, in times of joy and times of sorrow.

Peace and blessings,

—Pastor J.C.

Church News

Pray in May

Prayers were submitted by many of the ministries of Woods Church for our Pray in May initiative. These include the Property Ministry that maintains the facility, the HR Ministry that supports the staff and staffing of the church, the Nominating Ministry that invites members to participate in leadership roles, the Child Development Center that cares for and serves young children, the Mission Ministry that extends the love of God to others, the Youth Ministry that serves middle and high school students who play-pray-serve in the name of Jesus Christ, the Children's Ministry that serves children and their families by offering resources for faith and helping them participate in the life of Woods Church.

Download a copy of the poster or pick one up at the Welcome Desk. Heart stickers are available to help you mark a path of love through the month.

A Night at the Opera

Join us Saturday, May 10, for an enchanting evening of music and fine dining! Over a delicious spaghetti dinner, enjoy performances by talented opera singers: Soprano Kimberly Christie, Bass/Baritone Jason Buckwalter, Bass Shouvik Mondle, Alto Jennifer Cooper, and Tenor David Merrill as they serenade you with popular opera arias and classic musical theater songs.

Dinner Menu: Spaghetti, salad, bread, and dessert

Doors Open: 5:30PM

️Dinner Begins: 6PM

Performance Starts: 6:30PM

️Tickets: $25

To allow us to know how much food to order, registration will close at the end of the day on Wednesday, May 7.

For questions, please email Pam Ward at  pward@woodschurch.org.

You’re Invited to the Deacons’ Spring Fellowship Dinner

All seniors age 70 and older plus guest are invited to join us! Please email madams@woodschurch.org to RSVP or call the church office at 410.647.2550.

Songs of Hope Spring Concert

On Saturday, June 7, 7PM, the Woods Adult Choir with a full orchestra will join forces with the choirs of Ark and Dove Presbyterian Church and Covenant United Methodist Church. We will present two beautiful works. The first is “These Ancient Words” by Heather Sorenson. This work is built on the foundational scripture passages that teach us and guide us in life: Light, Humility, Refuge, Rest, Worship, and Wisdom. The second is “A Journey To Hope” by Joseph Martin. This work is musically inspired by traditional spirituals and tells of the ministry, passion, and resurrection of Jesus.

This concert is free but registration is required. To register, please visit www.woodstix.org. For questions, email David Merrill at dmerrill@woodschurch.org

The Hunchback of Notre Dame Wins Ruby Griffith Award

Congratulations to the cast and crew of The Hunchback of Notre Dame for winning 1st Place - Outstanding Achievement in a Musical at the Ruby Griffith Awards! The Ruby Griffith awards are designed to elevate the quality of local amateur theatre in the Baltimore/Washington area and reward excellence and outstanding achievement. As is the mission of all our ministries, Woods strives to produce art that glorifies God and has a positive impact in our community. Winning this award is a true honor!

And congratulations to all the local theaters for their wins! Some of these theaters use Woods Church throughout the year for rehearsal space: Annapolis Summer Garden Theater, Colonial Players, Children's Theater of Annapolis, The Talent Machine, and 2nd Star Productions.

Children's News

Get Ready for VBS!

Register today for Vacation Bible Study! This year’s program will be held July 14–17, 4–7PM, with dinner at 6:30PM.

Education & Small Groups

Adult Class on the Life of the Apostle Paul

Adult Education will be offering a study on Sundays through June 8, 11AM, featuring The Call: The Life of the Apostle Paul by Adam Hamilton.

Follow the journeys of Paul, beginning with his dramatic conversion, as he spread the Gospel through modern-day Greece and Turkey. Travel to the early church sites and explore Paul’s conversations with the new believers. In this six-week study, you are invited to experience faith through Christ’s greatest teacher and missionary.

Join us in the Office Conference Room and on Zoom. Books are available in the office.

New Adult Education Class: The Reformation & the Republic

Pastor J.C. will be teaching an exciting new class, titled “The Reformation and the Republic,” on Sundays, June 15–29, 11AM.

Presbyterians made up a significant percentage of delegates to the Constitutional Convention of 1787 which laid the foundation for the United States as a republic and Presbyterian values and processes from John Calvin and the Genevan Reformation were many of the key building blocks of that foundation. This class will explore the theology behind those principles and give us a chance to reflect on how they shape and guide us today.

Pastors’ Bible Study

Lead Pastor J.C. Austin and Associate Pastor Nancy Lincoln Reynolds offer a weekly Bible Study on Wednesdays, 12PM, to examine the upcoming Sunday’s scripture readings before they are presented in worship.

Join us on Zoom and gain a new understanding of scripture and enhance your worship experience.

Mission News

Mother’s Day Food Drive to Support SPAN

We need your help! If you haven't had a chance, our Mother's Day SPAN Food Drive has been extended by one week. Today through next Sunday, May 18, feel free to bring those extra grocery items you nabbed while shopping and place them in the SPAN bin out in the foyer. These items are critical for families who depend on supplementation through the school. In the summertime, these families could go without. We are breaching that gap in time enough for those families to have what they need when summer arrives. Thanks for your help!

Please help by donating the following items that SPAN needs most during the summer:

• Canned meat and fish
• Peanut butter and jelly
• Tuna and Hamburger Helper
• Instant and canned white and sweet potatoes
• Pancake mix and syrup
• Oatmeal
• Cereal
• Coffee and tea
• Pasta
• Pasta sauce and other canned tomato products
• Canned vegetables and beans
• Soap and shampoo
• Deodorant
• Toothpaste
• Paper towels
• Laundry detergent
• Dish soap
• All-purpose cleaner
  

Ministry of Hope-Malawi Team has a Wonderful Problem!

We have already had donations totaling eight Medical MAP Packs and more than 100 pairs of shoes for vulnerable children and adults of Ministry of Hope (MOH). A huge THANK YOU to Woods CDC families who donated 88 pairs of shoes!

Now we need suitcases to transport these items. Thanks to Ethiopian Airlines, each mission traveler is allowed three bags, so the team can take 21 suitcases. International bags can total 62 linear inches—length (including wheels) + width + depth. Suitcases as close to the maximum size as allowed are much appreciated.

If you have a large suitcase you no longer use that we could take to transport supplies and then donate to secondary or college students at MOH for their use, we would love to have them. If you prefer that one of your large bags travels to Africa and returns, we will be grateful for a loan. Please contact Pat Johnson at paj10041949@gmail.com or 410.544.3718.

Zikomo Kwambiri (Thank you very much).

Music Notes

Open Dance Classes

Join our Worship Ministry for a series of free dance classes on Sundays through June 1, 2–3:15PM, in Fellowship Hall! Professional teachers will offer a variety of dance styles—including jazz, musical theater, contemporary, tap, yoga, and more! Open to anyone ages 12 and over in and outside the Woods community.

All experience levels are welcome, though classes will be taught at an intermediate level with options for beginners and advanced students.

For more information please email Alyssa Barlis at alyssabarlis@gmail.com.

In Our Community

Langton Green Produce Baskets

Langton Green, one of our mission partners, is an Anne Arundel County–based residential community that supports neurodivergent adults. They are offering produce baskets from June–October. For more information, see the attached flyer.

A Moment of Prayer

Mighty and Life-giving God,

By your grace-filled power and with your wondrous love for us, you raised your Son Jesus from the dead. With his resurrection, you have forever trampled the force of death and you have opened the gate of abundant and everlasting life.

By your grace, Lord God, transform us to be your Easter people. In your Spirit, inspire us to be witnesses to the presence of the Risen Christ among us. Confirm in us, the assurance of his presence with us, here in all of our brokenness, here in this life where we ought to see his face in the tired and the poor and the stranger and the other.

In seeing him, inspire and strengthen us to work in and for his kingdom: a kingdom where the hungry are fed and children are welcomed; where the sick are healed; where sins are forgiven and prisoners are set free; where those who mourn are comforted, and the peacemakers are blessed, and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are forever satisfied; where the nations are healed, and where war is learned no more; where the dead are raised from the grave and gather forever around the throne of your grace.

We offer these prayers, as we would live, in the name of the Risen Christ, whose resurrection unleashes our salvation.