Friends,
Our June 6 date for meeting together in person is drawing neigh! It’s hard to believe that after so many months of doing Celebration using a YouTube video play list, we will be meeting back in person. It will be wonderful.
Now I have to say that we’re still figuring out many of the details, but mostly we’ve got a good idea of how things will look. Here are some important things to know.
- We will be worshiping in the MPC courtyard at ten AM on Sunday mornings. The courtyard’s seating capacity will be limited, but we don’t yet know how many people can fit because we don’t know what reopening tier Alameda County will be in on June 6. If we were gathering today, we’d be allowed to have 125 people in the service and if we drop to the lowest tier before June 6 we will be allowed 250. All of this means that space may or may not be a problem, and for that reason we will be asking folks to register ahead of time for a seat in the service. Registration will help us make sure we put out enough seating and will help us refrain from exceeding our legal limits. Keep your eyes peeled for an email with directions for registration.
- Starting June 6 and going forward, all Sunday services will be livestreamed, which means that those unable to attend for whatever reason will be able watch the service live on a computer, tablet, or smartphone. Again, watch your email for information and instructions for making this work. It should be somewhat less complicated than using Zoom or watching services in our current, prerecorded format. Also, please know that we will be able to assist anyone who needs help getting online for church.
- During services we will be observing fairly strict rules about wearing masks, keeping socially distant, and not singing. We will provide plenty of hand sanitizer and we’ll have masks available for those who forget to bring one or who have endured the indignity of a broken ear strap.
- On June 6 we will be celebrating communion, and we have worked out protocols for doing so safely.
- For the time being we will continue having our family hour fellowship time online, but we’ll probably have to reschedule it in order to accommodate in-person worshipers who will need time to get home before we get started on Zoom.
Those are some of the details. We’ll send out more as they come, and I invite you to reach out to me with any questions. I’ll try to answer them promptly and properly.
The most important messages I can communicate as we prepare for June 6 are these: 1) look for more information and instructions as they arrive in your email inbox and 2) know that things could change radically in a fairly short period of time. Everything is in flux right now—for example, the State has promised big changes to mask mandates on June 15, but we cannot plan for those changes because we don’t know what they will be. Also, a rogue variant of the Coronavirus could hit the Bay Area, and we’ll have to scrap all our plans. So I’m grateful for your patience as we figure this all out.
I cannot wait to see you face to face on June 6!
God’s Peace,
Ben