Birthday Party

We had a really busy weekend last week.  First was the 4th of July party (see separate blog).  Then on Saturday Ken Sande was here to do a Peacemaker Seminar for leaders of our church and others in the denomination.  It was very interesting.  Our pastor was part of the panel that looked at an Asian case study and thought about peacemaking in an Asian context.  As a church we are going to begin going through some of the materials in our cell groups.

On Sunday was the church's 8th anniversary.  They had a combined worship service which was very special and included a cake cutting.  

Then everyone adjourned downstairs to the parking lot.  There they set up activities for the children like face painting, arcade games, balloon animals, and jewelry making.

The worship team set up and played lots of great music

And then there was lots of food!  Tents were set up and a catering company provided rice, noodles, curry, veggies, fruit, roast lamb and....

lots of beef and chicken satay.

What was different about this lunch was that they sent out flyers to the entire neighborhood.  The community surrounding the church is filled with college students from the three colleges in the area.  Plus there are families who live around there and lots of businesses as well.  The church is in an office building and so to accomodate a large crowd for the party, they used the parking lot downstairs with the blessing of the building owners.  Lots of people from the community came which was very exciting.  Many didn't even know that a church met in that building.  Some thought it was only for Chinese, but we assured them that all were welcome.  We met some new students who were just starting the semester at one of the local colleges.  It was the first time the church had been so visible in the area and I think it was a great success.