Love Is in the Air

It's Mardi Gras and Valentine's season! There's a lot to love about all the purple, green, gold, and pink celebrations. I'm eating king cake at Cup's while I write this, I recently found out that some of our students share my controversial love of conversation hearts candy, and I still rejoice every year that I live in a region where grocery store bakeries put out more than just pink goodies this time of year.

Our youth have plenty of chances to grow in love for God and each other this month. We have two opportunities to serve our community: making goodie bags for East Flora teachers this Wednesday (February 8), and working on beds for those in need on February 15. Our Sunday nights are full of lessons answering practical questoins from our youth about how to live out their faith like devotional Bible reading and prayer. I'll be teaching some of these lessons, but we also have some great guest speakers lined up this month and the rest of the semester. On Sunday mornings during the spring both middle school and high school Sunday school classes are working through Paul's letter to the Romans. I encourage youth to set that alarm a little earlier than they might otherwise and join us in gaining helpful experience by working through a whole book of the Bible, and a critically important one at that.

Whether or not you're a youth, we've all been encouraged to pray about how to express our love for God and neighbor by completing a Next Faithful Step discipleship card. I've asked the youth to not tune this out or assume it's only about money; we hope all of Parkway Hills will spend some time contemplating how God would have us step up in the new year and new era in front of us. To look back at the history of our congregation or let us know where you're hearing God move, head to parkwayhillsumc.org/nextfaithfulstep. One way or the other, I hope you'll help us spread the love this month!

-Geoff

Spring Spiritual Formation

Often our students ask for recommendations for further reading to grow their faith and augment topics covered in Bible study, and that's a wonderful thing! After reading a book together outside of Bible study last spring, we're going to try it again this semester with NT Wright's Surprised by Hope. With fall marching band and football behind us, we're looking at making a book read an added spiritual formation option for our students every spring.

If your student wants to join us, they grab a copy for $10 by bringing cash to church or paying via online giving. We'll meet a couple times over the course of the semester as we can to chat about what we've found.

Surprised by Hope is a great option for the spring as we move closer to Easter. In this book that arguably serves as the central hub of his entire writing and theological career, Wright encourages us to look to the resurrection and see how it affects both beliefs about the future, the Gospel, life after death, etc, and care for the concerns of our physical today like relief work, justice, and the arts. This has been a critically transformative book in Geoff's life, and we're looking forward to seeing how God uses it in our ministry!

Upcoming Events

Weekly Schedule
Sunday
9:30am: Sunday School
10:30am: Church-wide fellowship time in the Worship Center
10:45am: Church-wide worship
5:30-7:30pm: Engage

Wednesday
5:45pm: Dinner (please RSVP)
6:15pm: Activities

Dates to Know
Adults, you make what we do possible! To provide dinner for or volunteer with our Engage Sunday nights, sign up here to help. For all other events, sign up here. This signup will have some more entries added as the semester goes on, so check back in future PHUMC and Youth newsletters!

February 8: Valentines & Games, after Wednesday dinner. With Valentine’s Day coming up, we'll be making goodie bags for East Flora teachers and playing games in the Youth Suite.

February 12: Super Bowl Party, 5:30pm. Brink a snack to share for the big game!

February 15: Serving with Beds for Kids, after Wednesday dinner. Please wear closed toed shoes and clothes that can get dirty as we head to the basement.

March 1: Homework night, after Wednesday dinner. Monthly homework night, mid semester edition.

March 8: Ceiling tile night after Wednesday dinner. Leave your mark on our youth space!

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PO Box 1721
Madison, MS | 39130 US

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