Our next service is Sunday, June 1st. @ 10:30 a.m. @ St. Paul’s United Church, 178 Church St, Bowmanville. On this Sunday, we will be celebrating the 191th. anniversary of St. Andrew’s congregation with Communion. All are welcome!
If you are joining us in person, the sanctuary is wheelchair accessible. A Sunday Morning Program is available during service in the lower Sunday School hall for children, Grades JK to High School. Youth leaders follow Theme Time for activities that encourage exploration of today’s scripture.
The 150th General Assembly will be held from Sunday June 1 to Thursday June 5. The Assembly will begin Sunday evening with worship at Central Presbyterian Church in Hamilton at 7:30 pm. Opening Worship and the first sederunt will also be livestreamed on The Presbyterian Church in Canada’s YouTube Live Stream . The meeting sessions and all other events of the Assembly will be at McMaster University.
This year’s General Assembly marks the 150th anniversary of our denomination. We give thanks to God for God’s faithfulness to The Presbyterian Church in Canada and look forward with hope and possibility for the future. The theme of the 150th General Assembly is from the book of the prophet Jeremiah, “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11) Those words, “A Future with Hope”, anchor this General Assembly in the promises of our faithful God and invite us to live with hope as The Presbyterian Church in Canada. For more information, go to https://presbyterian.ca/gao/ga2025/
Looking back over 150 years, we see that God has been faithful through the generations and is faithfully working on some new things among us now, even if they are hard to discern.
We are called to make peace with our times and circumstances and to move ahead, preparing for the next new thing. The road ahead is long and will not always be easy. There will be clouds along the way, but there will also be the hopeful breaking of dawn. We call this journey hope and the future resurrection, remembering that Israel suffered the destruction of everything familiar and reliable when Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians in 587 BC. People grieved the loss of their identity and their homes and institutions, wondering how they could be people of faith and sing the Lord’s song in a strange new context.
Jeremiah Chapter 29 spoke of future hope into the pain and chaos, offering no false hope or quick fixes. While the way ahead was unclear for the people of God, what was clear was the need for the people to settle into their new reality, maintain their faith, and show endurance, fortitude and trust in the God of the unexpected. Rather than deny or rebel against the reality of their situation, people were called to see their current situation clearly and look beyond it. The prophet encouraged the people to embrace what was possible while trusting in God’s plans to give them a future and hope. (For more information go to https://presbyterian.ca/150-years-of-the-presbyterian-church-in-canada/#recollections_reflections)
The Rev. Ian Ross-McDonald, General Secretary, Life and Mission Agency
