Friends,
We have some more information to share about reopening.
As we’ve said in the past, we are following the guidelines from the Springfield-Greene County Health Department. Last week the Health Department amended the “Road to Recovery” to allow for gatherings of 25 people.
Here’s what this means for Schweitzer:
- As of Sunday, May 17, we are giving the “green light” for adult groups to meet on campus within certain parameters. Children and youth ministry will not have any meetings. Worship will continue to be offered only online.
- Any adult group meeting on campus will need to be less than 25 people.
- All groups will need to practice social distancing, by maintaining a distance of six feet from one another.
- There will be no food or drink served.
- The room and times will be limited, so any group wanting a room will need to be flexible on when and where they meet.
- We also encourage groups to continue to meet online, or explore offsite options.
- If your adult group would like a room, contact David Freeman.
As you can tell, this is going to be a very slow reopening. We will take this in stages.
Our reopen also gives us a chance to think outside the box on how we can use our ministries to reach even more people. One great example of this is Vacation Bible School (VBS). Normally we would have several hundred volunteers and kids gather for a week in the summer for VBS. It’s high energy with very little social-distancing. We don’t want to lose the opportunity with our kids, so VBS this year is going to look very different. Instead of one large group meeting one week out of the summer, we will be putting together kits so we can host VBS in lots of neighborhoods around the area with much smaller gatherings. I love when ministry moves from the church building more deeply into our community. We’ll be sharing more information about VBS in the next couple of weeks.
Our ministry together is changing. The church is changing… and yet, God is faithful.
Spencer