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June 2010 Pastoral Letter

 
Dear Members and Friends of First Church,

This is my first email communication to you for the summer of 2010; you can expect to hear from me at the beginning of each month through October, as a way for me and your Florida church home to reach out and touch you wherever you are.

The Memorial Day holiday is just completed and the month of June begun, marking what is for most the unofficial beginning of summer (and for us in Florida, the official start of the “rainy season”). I hope that, wherever it was spent, you enjoyed your holiday weekend. I spent this past Friday through Sunday on a short trip to southern California, where my father celebrated his 80th birthday. I normally visit him in August each year, but Jeanne and I made the trip at this time with several other family members (from Ohio and Pennsylvania) to share in his special event.

Here is a quick update on things happening at and around First Presbyterian of Bonita Springs as summer begins:

• The McClure Hall clean-up and restoration is almost finished. The last step is installation of completely new carpet in the whole facility. The insurance company had hoped to be able to save the original (since it was brand-new when the fire and smoke damage occurred in February), but efforts to clean the carpet actually degraded the glue underneath … so replacement carpet has been ordered and should be here within a couple weeks. Then the old carpet (still reeking of smoke) will be removed and the new installed. By the end of June we expect to once again hold our “First Stop” coffee hours and other events in McClure Hall.
• I will be leading a group of 43 church members and friends to the “Passion Play” in Oberammergau, Germany in early June. We’ll also be doing some touring in Austria and Bavaria, but the highlight will be the spiritual experience of the play. Later in June, on my return, Pastor Paul Fahnestock will be leading a mission trip to Brazil. We’ll be sharing with you in July something of what these trips have meant to the participants.
• An update on our church’s finances: Pledges for the current year’s operating budget have slightly exceeded what is needed. We are, however, somewhat behind in the amount we had hoped to receive for the Building Fund. So if you find yourself in a position to give an additional gift to First Church in 2010, it would be most helpful to designate it either for the payoff of our mortgage balance (which we expect to be at or below $600,000 by the end of the year) or for some smaller-scale renovations we need to make to the Learning Center and Great Room, targeting a new outreach to young families we hope to begin this fall.
• If you are looking for some good reading for the summer months, I encourage you to pick up the short but powerful book The Prodigal God by Tim Keller. You will never again hear the parable of the prodigal son in the same way once you are enlightened by Tim!
• Dan Oedy and his family are purchasing a house in our area in mid-June and are relocating from Charlotte, where he finished his seminary training towards his Master of Divinity degree. Dan is returning full-time to our staff. The love gift provided by the congregation for the Oedys will be presented at a worship service in late June. The process is also moving forward for extending a call to Dan to become an ordained Associate Pastor of our church (this involves the concurrence of Peace River Presbytery, and we hope it will be completed by late fall of 2010).

The mood in Southwest Florida now could best be summed up as cautious watching … watching our beaches (and the related news reports of the oil slick in the northern Gulf) to see if we will have to deal with any of it in our waters; and watching the national economic and political scene, in hopes of a turnaround in some of the very difficult trends and problems we have all witnessed in the past couple years. Many of our local businesses, retailers, contractors, country clubs, realtors and even churches have seen difficult times. We’re all waiting, hoping and praying that prosperity and growth will soon return to our area, as well as to other areas hard-hit across our country.

I pray that your summer will be a blessed time of renewal, recreation, and reunion with family and friends. If you have any personal or prayer concerns you would like to share with me and the other pastors at First Church, please call or email us anytime.

Yours in Christ,

Pastor Doug Pratt