Join us Each week in person or online
Sundays at 9:30am.
THIS WEEK AT A GLANCE
Sunday Sermon
Psalm 119:63; 1 Peter 2:4-10
“Come People of the Risen King” “O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing” “All Creatures of Our God and King” “Great Are you Lord” “What A Fellowship”
FEATURED UPDATES
Annual congregational Meeting
The Annual Congregational Meeting will be this Sunday, January 28th at 5:45pm in the Family Life Center. We celebrate and give thanks to God’s faithfulness in the last year and prayerfully look ahead at 2024. We hope you join us!
ADULT SUNDAY SCHOOL Winter 2024
Join us in the gym for coffee and Adult Sunday School!
“Cultivating Patience in an Age of Acceleration ”Taught by Dr. David Lauber in the Family Life Center.
January 28: GOD’S PATIENCE
February 4: JESUS’ PATIENCE
February 11: HUMAN PATIENCE AS A GIFT OF THE SPIRIT
makerspace
Don Holt will lead a writing workshop in the Family Life Center. Makerspace on Sunday, February 4th, from 4-6pm.
RSVP at 2013themakersspace@gmail.com
Young Adult Supper and Fellowship at the Laubers!
SMALL GROUPS
Pastor Dawn would like to connect with existing small groups and also form new ones for anyone who is looking to join.
As part of this re-engagement with small groups, she will provide six weeks of curriculum using spiritual practices around scripture and prayer.
Please see Dawn if you are in need of a small group or if your group would like to use these resources (which will be available mid-February).
Email at dawn.lauber@gecovenant.org or sign up in Higher Grounds
SPRING SEMESTER COLLEGE DINNERS
Please sign up to bring a side dish or consider hosting our college students at your home.
Dates and sign ups can be found here: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0C45A9AD2BA1FB6-college2
Student Ministry Updates
Important Updates;
Jr League is tonight 6:30-8pm, and Hi League tomorrow night Thursday from 7-8:30p.
The calendar on the Student Ministries page is updated with Sunday School and Confirmation dates. You can see that by clicking Student Ministries.
The Winter Retreat is this Friday through Sunday! We will meet at the church at 4:15 to leave for Lake Geneva! Dinner will not be provided for by the camp on Friday. If you could send your student with cash or a sack dinner, that would be great. The Weekend Schedule, as well as the Packing List, is displayed on the Student Ministries newsletter.
Sr. High Ministries will be attending the Unite Conference this summer (formerly known as CHIC)! Please contact Joseph Sawyer know if your student is interested. Unite is from July 15th to the 19th. Click here for more Unite 2024 details.
The GEECC Babysitting Fundraiser is Valentine’s Day Wednesday, February 14th 5:00-8:30 pm, in support of the Glen Ellyn Covenant Church Hi-League Students.
For Kids: Games, Movies, & Lots of Fun ~with some wonderful High School Students.
For Parents: 3 and a half hours to enjoy... Ash Wednesday Service, dinner, shopping, or whatever!!
To register, e-mail Joseph Sawyer, Director of Student Ministries, at joseph.sawyer@gecovenant.org
Walk-in's are welcome!
Winter retreat 2024
The Hi and Jr. League winter retreat is this weekend, January 26th-28th at Covenant Harbor! Join us for a time of fun, and fellowship!
Book Club resumes
The racial justice book club is currently on Zoom with the new book by Wheaton College Professor Esau McCaulley. How Far to the Promised Land.
For much of his life, Esau McCaulley was taught to see himself as an exception: someone who, through hard work, faith, and determination, overcame childhood poverty, anti-Black racism, and an absent father to earn a job as a university professor and a life in the middle class.
But that narrative was called into question one night, when McCaulley answered the phone and learned that his father—whose absence defined his upbringing—died in a car crash. McCaulley was being asked to deliver his father’s eulogy, to make sense of his complicated legacy in a country that only accepts Black men on the condition that they are exceptional, hardworking, perfect.
The resulting effort sent McCaulley back through his family history, seeking to understand the community that shaped him.
In these pages, we meet his great-grandmother Sophia, a tenant farmer born with the gift of prophecy who scraped together a life in Jim Crow Alabama; his mother, Laurie, who raised four kids alone in an era when single Black mothers were demonized as “welfare queens”; and a cast of family, friends, and neighbors who won small victories in a world built to swallow Black lives.
With profound honesty and compassion, he raises questions that implicate us all: What does each person’s struggle to build a life teach us about what we owe each other? About what it means to be human?
How Far to the Promised Land is a thrilling and tender epic about being Black in America. It’s a book that questions our too-simple narratives about poverty and upward mobility; a book in which the people normally written out of the American Dream are given voice.
If you want to know more about the book, watch this interview with Professor McCaulley at the Wheaton Library. Author Visit: Esau McCaulley
Book club welcomes everyone who wants to discuss the book even if you are not able to join every week.
adult bible studies
BIBLE STUDIES RESTART IN THE NEW YEAR
Pastor Dawn leads our women’s evening bible study, every other Wednesday 6:30-8 pm. We meet in the family life center. We are currently in Acts chapter 9. The Midweek children’s program occurs the same night. Upcoming dates: February 7, 21.
Pastor Jeff leads our men’s evening bible study, every other Wednesday 6:30-8 pm (opposite weeks from women). We meet in the family life center. We are currently in 1st Timothy chapter 4. Upcoming dates: January 31.
CHURCH PRAYER MEETING!
“Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.” -Colossians 4:2
ATTENTION: The Church prayer meetings are on Zoom every Monday night at 7pm!
Zoom ID: 859 848 614
Password: geecc
All are welcome to this sweet hour of prayer! See you there!
MISSIONS FOCUS
Partner Visit This Sunday
We will have a chance to visit with and hear from Carl and Karen this coming Sunday evening, January 28, at our annual congregational business meeting. This will be a special time with them as they share highlights of their remarkable 35-year journey of service in Thailand. They are global personnel affiliated with The Evangelical Covenant Church.
Food Pantry Name Change
The Glen Ellyn Food Pantry, one of our local service agency partners, is now the Glen House Food Pantry. The name change reflects the Pantry’s roots in Glen Ellyn and relocation to the renovated house at 55 N. Park Boulevard. The Pantry continues serving those who live, work, or attend school in DuPage County. The Pantry’s mission is to provide essential groceries and support to neighbors at risk of hunger through a collaboration of local churches and the broader community. Check out the new website at http://www.glenhousefoodpantry.org/.
