Scripture: Luke 1:39-56

“The Way of Hope”

 Rev. Erin Wyma

Click here to sign up for Sunday service volunteer opportunities (reader, greeter, acolyte, or usher)

We need announcement readers for January.

Advent Schedule

December 18th: Celebrate with cake after church during our annual Birthday Party for Jesus with the Sunday School children.

Christmas Eve: 6pm Family-friendly service and 10pm Candlelight service. 

The nursery will be open for both Christmas Eve services. 

Christmas Day: 9:30am Caroling, Lessons, and Cocoa in your pj's.

The nursery will NOT be open on Christmas morning or New Year's Day.

For our full Advent schedule, click https://stmatthewucc.org/advent/

We wil not have Sunday School on Christmas Day or New Year's Day.

Starting January 8th, Sunday School will dismiss at 10:45am.

If you requested giving envelopes for 2023, they are on the table in the narthex and ready to be picked up. 

Way to go crazies…we made $337 at our cocoa sale last Sunday! Thanks to all who helped, as well as our VERY generous St. Matthew family!

A reminder that if you need to submit a report for the Annual Report, they are due to the office the first week of January. 

The Annual Meeting will be on Sunday, January 29th, after church. 

Women's Fellowship will resume meeting in January. We are looking for a volunteer who will host the meeting at their house. Please contact the office if you would like to host in January. Thank you!

St. Matthew will once again be packing meals with Feed My Starving Children on Monday, January 16th, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. We will meet at FMSC at 1:45pm to pack food for starving children in countries all over the world. We will pack from 2 - 3:45pm and then leave from there, after taking a brief group photo outside. (PLEASE NOTE THE TIME CHANGE! This is different from the times we have packed before!)

If you haven't packed before, it is a great experience and we always love to have new people join us. There are only 40 spots reserved. You can reserve a spot by emailing Alex Johnson, messaging him on Facebook, or texting him (630.890.7244). You can also sign up in the narthex. If you email or message Alex to reserve spots, please let him know the number of people coming and the first/last names of all volunteers. General reminder that anyone going will need to wear closed-toe shoes when we are at the building. We hope to see you there!

In addition to collecting bread tags for SCARCE, we ARE continuing our collection of ink and printer cartridges, used gift cards (that are used to make guitar picks), and corks.

Empty pill bottles are still ON HOLD for now.

The gray plastic bin for collection of these items is now in Dobstaff Hall. Please direct any questions to Dawn Schubert at 630.542.0160.

Our Sunday coffee hour will resume in Dobstaff. Please consider bringing a treat on the following weeks:

First Sunday- last names A-C

Second Sunday- last names D-H

Third Sunday - last names I-O

Fourth Sunday - last names P-Z

Fifth Sunday- Anyone

Please contact Wendy Fanning if you are able to set up or clean up coffee hour. Thanks for your help.

The St. Matthew worship service will be streamed every Sunday at 9:30am. The service will be available on our website after the service.

Access the service through the St. Matthew YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/user/StMatthewUCC

**Once you are on YouTube, you have the option to turn on closed captioning and resize the font. Once the video is playing, click on the setting wheel in lower-right of your screen, choose Subtitles/CC, then choose English.**

You can also go to the St. Matthew homepage (stmatthewucc.org) to access the online service. 

Go to our website for instructions on how to donate to St. Matthew. Thank you!