SASS Weekly Newsletter
July 8 2020
Here are the answers to last week’s “Canada Day Quiz”, otherwise known as “how good a Canadian ‘ex-pat who has gone through Canadian citizenship’ are you?”
- What famous DC Comics superhero was co-created by Canadian Joe Shuster? - Superman
- Daylight Savings Time was introduced in Canada by the federal government as a measure for increasing what type of production? – efforts to support the War effort
- The town of York, which was sacked by Americans in 1813, is now known as: - Toronto
- What great hotel, built by the Canadian Pacific Railway, was constructed largely to attract international visitors? – Banff Springs
- Canada has the world's longest coastline. In Km is it a) 100k-150k, b) 150k-200k, c)200k-250k, d) >250k - 243k therefore C
- Why was November 11 chosen as Remembrance Day? – you all know this !!!!!
- Can you name the connection that Canadians have with Congo, Cyprus and Cambodia? – Peacekeeping
- The Hudson's Bay Company is the world's oldest chartered trading company. What product gave this company its start? - Fur
- What is the name of the Canadian equivalent of the Grammy Awards? - Junos
- Who is Canada's head of state? – Queen Elizabeth II
- Canada added provinces over time. In 1949, Newfoundland and Labrador became the 9th – True or False? – FALSE N&L were the 10th
- Canada is a big country. How does it rank in the world in terms of size? – 2nd to Russia
- At 1,661m above sea level, name the highest altitude settlement in Canada – Lake Louise
- Canada has many national parks. Name the largest. – Wood Buffalo, Alberta
- Apart from the maple leaf name one other official national symbol of Canada? – the Beaver
I received a number of entries but was really really REALLY surprised that only ONE person / family got all of the correct answers, and she / they are not even Canadians by birth. I wonder if anyone can guess who I am referring to?
But being such a nice pastor I have decided to name SANDI ROMAIN as last week’s winner, just because she is due to win one of these weeks. Bless you Sandi.
July 5 2020 :– Sunday Worship
From July 5 to Sept 6, 2020, we are going through a series entitled “Questions Jesus asked.”
On July 5th we started with “which is lawful on a Sabbath, to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy it?”
It is a rhetorical question, because all of us, whether we know anything about the Sabbath should be able to answer the question. It is always “proper” to do good, to save life, rather than to do evil, and/or destroy life.
Perhaps the aspect of “doing good” that we all too easily misunderstand is that the goodness is not focused on ourselves, on our self-righteousness, but on others; doing good to and for others. The Sabbath perhaps more than any other day of the week is set aside to help us cease working for our own good / benefit, in order to do something on one day of the week for the benefit / good of others.
I wonder if we can come up with ways of accomplishing that in these strange times and sharing our ideas with each other. Email me and I will happily add them to the newsletter, anonymously if you prefer.
Take note – I am not intending to do a weekly newsletter through July and August, but will drop one now and again into our e-mailboxes just to keep us as connected as possible through this summer season.
If you did not get a chance to join in the worship time on Sunday please watch the recording of the service on our YouTube channel, which you can access through our homepage, www.sasspc.bc.ca, or by simple searching for “SASS Presbyterian” on YouTube.
Competition Time
Without using a Bible, or reference material, or any online search engine, do you know who said the following in the Bible?
- "Please test us for ten days on a diet of vegetables and water."
- "perhaps you were made queen for such a time as this?"
- "For everything there is a season"
- "If pleasing people were my goal, I would not be Christ's servant."
- "With the Lord's help, I have produced a man!"
- "I'm too much of a sinner to be around you."
- "Lord, please! Send anyone else."
- "Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you live I will live."
- "give me a son, then I will give him back to you."
- "A prophet is honored everywhere except in his own hometown"
- "The Lord who rescued me from the claws of the lion and the bear will rescue me"
- "You intended me harm, but God intended it all for good."
Email your answers to pastormbaxter@gmail.com
WELCOME TO
CAMP DOUGLAS’ VIRTUAL CAMP
2020
Since Camp cannot meet in person, they thought they would bring Camp to you! Each week Camp will upload videos, activities, and tutorials. To access the materials, go to …
https://campdouglas.virtual-camp.org
Scroll & click on the week you would like to access. Then select the activity and follow the prompt to login, using the following info …
username - CampDouglas2020
password - Camp Douglas 2020
SASS Congregational Survey
“What might the Fall 2020 look like for us?”
On May 22nd 2020 the BC Provincial Health Officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry, extended the restrictions on mass gatherings indefinitely. As such no gathering can be more than 50 people, until further notice. That of course includes our in-person worship services.
In conjunction with that directive, recently the Session of SASS extended our closure of the church building until August 31st 2020. We also have delayed formalising any rental agreements for 2020-2021 with outside groups. However we have developed and circulated a “SASS COVID-19 Safety Plan” in order to work towards using the facility beyond that date for SASS congregants, in a manner that will hopefully minimise any risk of exposure and/or transmission of COVID-19. Part of that plan will be to work with the Board and the Staff to ensure protocols are in place to potentially open the building to SASS group use in the Fall 2020.
However, that does not directly help us to determine if we are going to have small in-person worship gatherings, prior to the provincial directive on mass gatherings being cancelled. So we would like to hear from you.
We believe the following factors must be considered if and when we begin to have in-person worship services again:
- Currently gatherings must be less than 50 people in total
- Must be able to physical distance. As such the hall is perhaps a “better” space than the sanctuary to allow more flexibility.
- Singing in a group setting is high risk so either no singing will occur or singing by attendees will occur only if everyone is wearing a mask. We do not expect choir to resume (due to the proximity of its members to each other) in the foreseeable future and the worship band set-up may need reconfiguration.
- If families come to worship what if anything can we offer with regards to Children / Sunday School.
- Tea & Coffee “fellowship” times are possible only with major changes to how we run these times in order to keep everyone socially distanced
- Regardless of any in-person worship service times, SASS will continue to “Zoom” its worship to anyone who is uncomfortable attending in-person. We will not exclude those who cannot or are uncomfortable attending in-person meetings.
With these factors in mind we would like you to answer the following questions:-
- Are you currently participating in the Sunday ZOOM services?
(Occasionally, 1-2, 3-4 / month, watching the recordings on YouTube, never)
How could we improve the Zoom services?
- If we could possibly provide an in-person worship service on Sundays, in the church hall, would you come, if
- you were required to wear a mask?
- you had to sign up on-line at least two days beforehand in order to ensure we managed the number of people planning to attend?
- we did NOT include community singing for the time being? (In other words, would you come if we could not sing together?)
- If you have children who normally participate in Sunday School would you be willing to allow your children to attend a Sunday School class with other children if current school safety protocols were in place?
- Would you be willing to meet / participate in the following in-person gatherings, in groups of less than 15 people properly socially distanced in the lounge …
- Bible Studies
- Prayer meetings
- Youth group events
- Please provide any further comments / questions / concerns below:-
- Help us understand your responses better for planning purposes:
- Are you designated as a vulnerable person (over 70; compromised immune system; etc.)
- My age is: [throw in usual age brackets]
- Male / female
- there are in my household who attend SASS {1,2,3,4 more than 4}
- Student / work part time / work full time / retired
Thank you for completing this survey. May God continue to bless you and your loved ones during these everchanging times.
Please forward your survey to Pastor Martin, pastormbaxter@gmail.com, no later than Friday July 17th 2020.
SASS Church Finances
There are a number of ways to continue supporting SASS during this pandemic.
Send a cheque to the church office, or you can drop your offering in to the secure letterbox attached to the Chesterfield Ave entrance door. This letterbox is checked and emptied every week day.
If you have a PAYPAL account - Go to our church homepage and scroll down and click on “DONATE NOW”.
Using a credit card, or paypal you can donate to SASS through CanadaHelps. Click on the following link to our donation form.
Sandi Romain can setup up for PAR (Pre-Authorised Remittance). This is a monthly direct debit from your bank account. Go to sasspc.bc.ca for more details. You need to download & complete the PAR authorisation and mail it directly to Sandi with a VOID CHEQUE. Sandi’s contact details are as follows :-
SANDI ROMAIN, 2208 Sorrento Drive, Coquitlam, BC V3K 6H5
604-931-6695, romainsandi@hotmail.com
Thank you for continuing to support the life and ministry at SASS.
SASS Worship Service information
We continue to hold our Sunday worship services online, via ZOOM. The link to all SASS meetings and worship services is easily accessible. Just go to our homepage – sasspc.bc.ca and scroll down and click on the following graphic. The password to access our ZOOM meetings will be “sass” – lowercase, no quotes.
The ZOOM Meeting ID for our SASS worship services is – 795 930 7120
If you DO NOT have access to a computer / internet then you can phone in and listen to any SASS meeting / service using the above meeting ID.
- Dial 778 907 2071
- When prompted enter the Meeting ID: 795 930 7120, followed by #.
- You will be asked for a participant ID - just hit the # key.
- When prompted enter the password: 676824
PLEASE REMEMBER on Sundays to check that your MIC is muted and that your video is disabled / turned off, to limit bandwidth usage and potential on-screen distractions.
If you dial in using your phone please MUTE your phone, if that option is available.
Pastor Martin’s Musings
“80 is a great number”
I have played golf my entire life. I have always enjoyed it, but I have never really been very good at it. I have dreamt of “breaking 80” many times.
Recently I have been going to the driving range a lot, because a good friend blessed me with some golf lessons. (Not sure if he was simply taking pity on me!)
On Monday I played a round on a course I have played many times, and I scored 80, perhaps one of the best rounds I have ever played. The game felt easy on Monday. Most drives went straight down the middle. Most irons went the distance I wanted them to. My short game was reasonable, and I even held a few putts. I could have broke 80 quite easily, and hope to do so sometime this summer with some more practice.
Did you grow up with your parents teaching you proverbial phrases like … “practice makes perfect”?
I doubt whether I’ll ever be perfect, on or off the golf course, but I think this summer I really can see that the more I practice the better I am at golf. Perhaps I need to clarify that a little. I am not really hitting the ball any better than I could in the past. But I am hitting it far more consistently now.
Perhaps, for me, there’s a more accurate proverbial phrase to describe my current golf game …
practice leads to consistency
The sermon I will be preaching on July 12 is taken form the latter half of Luke 6, which contains a much shorter version of the Sermon on the Mount, recorded for us in Matthew 5-7.
I remember always having a love-hate relationship with the Sermon on the Mount. ‘Love’ because it just paints a picture of a life that I so desire. At the same time ‘hate’ because it just seems far too hard to achieve.
How can my righteousness ever surpass that of the Pharisees and the Teachers of the Law?
How can I be perfect as my Father in Heaven is perfect?
How can I not worry about life? I spend my life worrying about so many things.
Do not judge, or you too will be judged. I am so bad at that as well.
And the list goes on and on and on.
Then Jesus says this …
everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. [1]
Did we hear that right? Did Jesus say, anyone who perfects my words? NO! Did he say, anyone who achieves an A-grade passes the test? No!
Simply, EVERYONE who puts them into PRACTICE.
Because Jesus knows …
practice leads to consistency
That’s all He is looking for, consistency. A life that resembles His more and more in a consistent manner. Jesus does not want Sunday Christians, thanks be to God. He wants everyday, ordinary people who are so committed to practicing what He has taught them that their lives are being transformed more and more and more.
Golf is a strange game. No matter how much you practice, no matter how much raw talent you have, you will never perfect the game. It is a simple game that no one can perfect.
Life is simple. God is not asking us to live perfectly. But He expects us to put His words into practice.
All of us can do that!
Let’s keep on practising !!!!!
God bless,
Pastor Martin
pastormbaxter@gmail.com
Direct Line in Church Office – 604 770 1025
www.sasspc.bc.ca
