Bulletin March 15, 2026

Deacons

I’ll have much more to say about this over the next few weeks, but at our last meeting, the Session approved a plan to begin the process of electing, training, and ordaining deacons. According to the proposed plan (which requires congregational approval), we would have three deacons serving three-year terms. Once we’ve selected our first three, they will be on a rotating system so that, each year (starting in 2027), we will elect one elder and one deacon.

For some time, our church has functioned without deacons, but as time goes on and the congregation grows, it is becoming more and more difficult for the elders to manage both the spiritual and temporal matters of the church. But in God’s wisdom, that is exactly why he gave us the office of deacon. In Acts 6, as the church was growing, the apostles found that they were unable to focus on their primary duties of spiritual leadership because the physical needs of the church were growing as well. In response, seven men were appointed to care for those needs. This was the beginning of the diaconal office, and the effect was that the church was able to better fulfill her call to evangelism and discipleship. That is our goal as well.

Again, I’ll talk more about this in the coming weeks, but this is what we would like you to do. In 1 Timothy 3:8-13, Paul gives the qualifications for deacons. Consider that passage, and pray about who you think could meet those qualifications to serve in the office of deacon. Then, pass those names along to the elders so that we can make official nominations at a congregational meeting. (As always, there will be the opportunity to make nominations from the floor at the congregational meeting as well.) And finally, pray for your elders and for our church as we move into this next stage of ministry.

One additional note: if you have been attending church with us for a while, but you haven’t formally joined in membership, now is a great time to consider it. Membership benefits you by giving you a variety of privileges in the courts of the church, but it also opens up opportunities to you for service in Christ’s kingdom, like church office. If that’s something you’re interested in, I’d love to talk about it with you.

If you have any questions about this process, feel free to ask me or another elder, and we’d be happy to discuss it further.

Your friend in Christ,
Reid

Bulletin for March 8, 2026

Updates

1. Don’t forget that the clock jumps forward this weekend!
2. The schedule for Easter weekend is in the bulletin. We will have a special service on Good Friday at 6 PM, a sunrise service at 6:30 AM on Sunday, and our regular Lord’s Day service at 11. Be sure to grab some cards from the vestibule to invite your friends and neighbors!
3. Our Wednesday night studies are continuing to meet at 5:30. If you haven’t been with us, there’s never a bad time to jump in!

Your friend in Christ,
Reid

Bulletin for March 1, 2026

Non-Essentials in the EPC

For the next several Wednesdays, we’ll be going through the Essentials of Our Faith one by one. This week was an orientation to the various doctrinal statements we use and how they relate to one another. One topic that came up was charismatic expression, or the use of gifts like tongues and prophecy. This is not a part of the life of our local congregation, but the EPC leaves room for those who are convicted that these practices are biblical. That’s something that often surprises people new to the EPC, so I wanted to go ahead and give you this link to the EPC’s Position Paper on the Holy Spirit. This is a helpful document that sets very careful guardrails on which views we allow and which we don’t.

We also discussed the issue of women’s ordination, and of course, we have a position paper on that as well. You can find it here.

Updates

1. The Lord’s Supper will be served this Lord’s Day. Be sure to prepare your hearts.
2. The Easter schedule is on the bulletin. If you remember from last year, we made some cards to help you invites your friends and neighbors. Those cards will be available again, so be sure to pick some up and spread the word!

Your friend in Christ,
Reid

Bulletin for February 22, 2026

Ash Wednesday 2026

Our Ash Wednesday service is tonight at 6 PM. While we do not impose ashes in our service (click here for an explanation), it is still a somber service. You’ll notice that I refer to it in the bulletin as “A Service of Commination and Repentance.” A commination is a threat of punishment and denunciation of sin. Though we confess our sins and seek God’s forgiveness together every Lord’s Day, repentance is the main theme of this service. So as you come tonight, take the opportunity to consider the ways in which you may need to repent. What sins have you been hiding or ignoring? What temptations beset you? Tonight is a special opportunity to bring those sins and temptation to the Lord, seeking his help.

Your friend in Christ,
Reid

Bulletin for February 15, 2026

Bulletin for February 8, 2026

Updates

1. We will have our Souperbowl Fellowship Meal immediately following this Sunday’s worship service.
2. We will have an Ash Wednesday service on February 18th at 6 PM.

Bulletin for February 1, 2026

Matthew 3 and the Mode of Baptism

In this week’s sermon, we’re looking at the baptism of Jesus in Matthew 3:13-17, and I wanted to briefly address a question that often comes up in discussions of this passage. On a popular level, it’s very common to hear an argument for baptism by immersion from this passage. The reason is that when you get to verse 16, Matthew describes Jesus as coming up out of the water. And on a popular level, that’s often understood as Jesus coming up out of the water after he had been immersed The thinking is that he had perhaps been dunked down into the water and is rising back up out of the water. In fact, if you see artistic depictions of this scene, they will have Jesus standing in the river while the dove descends on his head. But if we take a closer look at this passage, it is pretty clear that Matthew is not describing the mode of Jesus’ baptism.

Verse 16 begins by saying, “When Jesus was baptized, immediately we went up from the water,” implying that the baptism had already occurred, and his coming out of the water is a separate action. Most likely, this refers to Jesus walking up onto the bank of the river. The vast majority of commentators (even Baptist commentators!) agree with this interpretation.

We see more evidence of this if we look at Acts 8, where Luke is using the same language Matthew uses to describe the baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch. There Luke says that both the eunuch and Philip went down into the water, and both came back up. It’s the same language being used to describe entering into a body of water and exiting a body of water. And of course, in Acts 8 we know that Philip did not dunk himself alongside the eunuch. In other words, neither passage describes the baptism itself, only what happened before and after.

Part of the reason for this is that baptism was something that would have been very familiar to a first-century audience. The ritual comes from the Mosaic Law, where we have various forms of baptism, and also later Jewish tradition, which developed something called proselyte baptism, an initiatory rite used when Gentiles converted to Judaism. Therefore, Matthew’s readers (and Luke’s) know what baptism is, so the New Testament authors don’t feel the need to describe what’s happening. In fact, there is no description of the mode of baptism in any narrative part of the New Testament, that is, the Gospels and Acts. Based on those various examples, there is no clear evidence for one mode or another, whether immersion or sprinkling/pouring.

The reason that Presbyterians believe that the proper mode of baptism is pouring or sprinkling is that when we look at other texts, we do see a pattern that perhaps is a model for us. For example, we know that the word “baptism” does not always mean immersion, because in Mark 7, the Pharisees are described as baptizing their dining couches before they eat. It’s perhaps possible, but highly unlikely that the Pharisees took their whole dining couches down to the river and dunked them in the water before each meal. Most likely it’s describing a sprinkling or pouring.

There are also two key examples where the New Testament writers refer to Old Testament types of baptism.

In 1 Corinthians 10, Paul says that all of Israel was baptized in the Red Sea, in the cloud. If you look back at that story, the Israelites were not immersed in that baptism. Instead, if anything, they were sprinkled. They were walking through on dry ground, and it was Pharaoh and the Egyptians who were immersed. In 1 Peter 3, Peter talks about Noah’s flood as a type of baptism. Of course, in Noah’s flood, Noah and his family were not immersed. The water rained on them, it sprinkled them, but they were afloat on top of the waters while the wicked were immersed.

And so throughout the New Testament we have this pattern: in the narrative portions, there is no description of the baptism, but in the didactic, doctrinal portions of Scripture, all of the descriptions of baptism are described as sprinkling or pouring.

In the Presbyterian tradition, there have been people who have preferred immersion, and of course, we will do immersions for those people who have strong convictions about mode. But the Reformed tradition, in accord with the historic church throughout ages, has long held that immersion is not necessary. And in fact, the preferred mode is pouring or sprinkling.

So when you come to Matthew 3, don’t be fooled by the images you’ve seen or the stories you’ve heard. Pay attention to what the text says. And then we can come to a clearer conclusion about what John’s meaning is and what Matthew’s meaning is also.

Updates

1. The Lord’s Supper will be served this Lord’s Day. Please prepare your hearts.
2. Next week after worship, we will have our annual Souperbowl Fellowship Lunch. Bring enough of your favorite soup for your family.
3. Wednesday evening activities have started for both youth & children and adults. Be sure to join us at 5:30!

Your friend in Christ,
Reid

Bulletin for January 25, 2026

Bulletin for January 18, 2026

Updates

1. Backpack Buddies has started back. There are lots of weeks open still, so be sure to sign up!
2. Wednesday night activities for youth and children will start on January 28th.
3. Souperbowl Sunday is February 8th. Immediately following the worship, we’ll have a fellowship meal. Bring enough soup for your family, plus a little extra to share.

Your friend in Christ,
Reid

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