First Congregational Church of Southington First Congregational Church of Southington

They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither. In all that they do, they prosper.  ~Psalm 1:3



Pastor Laura has been reflecting on changing seasons – for some, Memorial Day Weekend marks the start of summer, or others might be counting down to the Summer Solstice on June 20th. This Sunday, we will recognize our high school graduates, students who are marking a different change of seasons. Graduations, birthdays, holidays help us celebrate milestones and recognize the changing seasons of our lives.



The words of the Psalm remind us of the ways that nature can be our spiritual teacher. Maybe you are in a season of bearing fruit and celebrating new adventures? Or maybe it is a season of rest, enjoying the refreshing waters of creation. 

So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; look, new things have

come into being! ~2 Corinthians 5:17



During the seasons of Advent and Lent, times when we are preparing for something (birth during Advent and resurrection during Lent), we will pray a unison prayer of confession. We do not pray those prayers because we are fundamentally bad people. Rather we pray those prayers in order to remember that God has the ability to transform us, even when we are not the best people that God calls us to be. God can turn even our failures around when we are honest enough to recognize and acknowledge them.



After the confession, Pastor Laura or I always offer words of forgiveness, words that recognize the

extraordinary power to transform our lives comes from God, not from us. Often, part of that assurance

comes from the scripture verse above, anyone in Christ is a new creation! On Sunday, we will explore

what that means.

We welcome our own Amy Webb to the FCC pulpit this week.  Amy is a Member in Discernment in the Central Connecticut Association of the UCC as she discerns her call to ordained ministry, and she just completed a Master of Divinity degree at the Boston University School of Theology.  Her sermon will be based on 2 Corinthians 4:16-18, which focuses on what is eternal, not what is temporary.

For the next few weeks, we will explore a few passages from 2 Corinthians, one of the letters in the New

Testament written by the Apostle Paul.



Paul loved the people in the church he started in the Greek city of Corinth, but he couldn’t get them to

love one another. They fought. They were talented, gifted people, but they couldn’t get along. They

argued over which spiritual gift was greatest. They argued about who got to sit at which table when

they served communion. They fought about everything.



So here is their problem: they were majoring in the minor stuff and not paying attention to the major

stuff. This Sunday we will talk about how to figure out the difference between the minor stuff and the

major stuff. I hope you will join me!

Sunday was Pentecost—the birthday of the church. We had a special Pentecost worship service

to conclude the celebration of our 300th anniversary. We welcomed the Executive Conference

Minister of the Southern New England Conference of the UCC, the Rev. Darrell Goodwin, as our guest

preacher.  The Rev. Goodwin is the first Executive Conference Minister of the SNEUCC, a new

Conference formed by the merger of the historic Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island

Conferences in 2020. As the Chief Vision-Keeper, he is responsible for guiding the Conference and its

affiliates to have a positive and lasting impact in our world.



The Rev. Goodwin is a member of the United Church of Christ Board, the UCC Council for Health and

Human Service Ministries, and the Global Ministries Board. He brings to his varying leadership roles

extensive experience in pastoral ministry and higher education.

"But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." - 1 Corinthians 15:57



What a joyful celebration we had in worship on Sunday, May 5! And the celebrations continued for those who joined us at the Aqua Turf on Monday. There was much planning behind the scenes for the 300th Anniversary celebrations and the hard work of the committee paid off. We are looking forward to the culmination of the festive activities on Sunday, May 19 with our town-wide block party!



This Sunday, May 12 we will gather for worship at 8:00 AM in the Chapel and 10:15 AM in the meetinghouse. The Scripture reading is selected verses from 1 Corinthians 15. This section of Paul's letter to the Corinthians includes a strong rhetorical argument for the bodily resurrection.



As I study this passage, I see several connections to my recent trip to Chicago. I was in Chicago with NGLI (Next Generation Leadership Initiative), a program of the Pension Boards. The purpose of our trip was to reflect on Church Vitality. I will share more about the people I met in Chicago and the lessons I took away from my time there in my sermon on Sunday.