| Blood: Water Mission
Ride:Well Bike Tour City Ride
Dallas, Tx
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The Ride:Well Tour is a bicycling expedition from Los Angeles to Washington D.C. to raise funds and awareness for Blood:Water Mission's 1,000 Wells Project. The trip is open to anyone who is up for a challenge and desires to bring clean water to Africa.
For more info click here. |
| UCC & Justice |
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One way UCC helps to "seek justice" is by helping the organization Bread for the World. This is a nonpartisan citizens' movement of 54,000 people of faith.
Bread for the World and its members help hungry people by lobbying our nation's decision makers on legislation that addresses hunger in our communities and around the world.
For more info, please click here. |
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Hospitality Team Greeter: Assures all worshipers are warmly welcomed.
Sacred Space: Develops & implements the installation of worship decor for prayer stations & communion table.
Media Assistant: Assists in the visual worship elements.
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Peace & Justice |
 Peace. Justice.
Social action. Awareness.
These are all hot-button words that we tend to throw around in our world today, but for us at The Search, the words PEACE & JUSTICE should mean something much, much more. One of our values at The Search is to pursue peace and justice. So what does that mean for a gathering of worshippers? As so often is the case, we have to look no further than Jesus. For Jesus preached time and again on the importance of looking for the lost. Sharing with the poor. Feasting with the ones on the outside of the social strata. Bringing the kingdom of God here on earth now. That is a different view of peace (no war) or justice (everyone gets some). It means a partnership among peoples and the world. It means turning our needs inside out to share life with someone else. That's the kind of Peace and Justice I hope our gatherings help us to be mindful of. Sometimes pursuing peace and justice isn't the absence of conflict...but getting down and dirty with those in the world we have been called to be with. In the words of the Gospel of Luke (chapter 6:31-36 from the MESSAGE translation): "Here is a simple rule of thumb for behavior: Ask yourself what you want people to do for you; then grab the initiative and do it for them! If you only love the lovable, do you expect a pat on the back? Run-of-the-mill sinners do that. If you only help those who help you, do you expect a medal? Garden-variety sinners do that. If you only give for what you hope to get out of it, do you think that's charity? The stingiest of pawnbrokers does that. I tell you, love your enemies. Help and give without expecting a return. You'll never-I promise-regret it. Live out this God-created identity the way our Father lives toward us, generously and graciously, even when we're at our worst. Our Father is kind; you be kind."
I'm often out and about with the shattered, the lost, the broken. I go where they are. And I hear the pain in their voices and see the scarcity in their souls. And as is often the case, when they find out I'm a minister they want to know "well, what are YOU doing in a place like THIS?!" And it makes me sad. To be agents of peace and justice starts with being with the people.
May our path lead to peace. May our hands hold justice. Amen.
- Suzanne Castle-Rolen, Minister
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Music Connections |
 I play lots of bars. It's a big part of what I do. I recently played a local bar where this large group of people came out to hear me. They brought this one person with them who had never seen me before. Before the show this person was complaining "aww man, I don't want to hear a bunch of church music". She was obviously aware that playing in church is another big part of what I do.
Of course my set that night was not church music, but
just familiar favorites as well as my own material. Some of the material I played that night was spiritual but for the most part it was not but I guess my presence in there that night just said "church" to her even if my music did not.
I am often surprised at how these two worlds, the sacred and the secular, can be so blind to one another and then here I sit squarely in the middle of the two. I always have. I never really planned for both of them to be such a large part of my life, it just happened. Wherever people gather and require music there I go. I do thank God for this ongoing opportunity to be so deeply immersed in both worlds and hopefully, somehow, my presence in both worlds offers some glimpse of God's great grace.
- Brad Thompson, Music Director for The Search
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| Upcoming Highlights |
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* The "UN" Series
During the month of July we will be exploring a new series: "UN"
It's a series on worship! Come check it out... you won't be disappointed as we figure out how to be the undone, unquenchable, undivided, undiginified, unstoppable, unending worshipper!
* Church Basement Road Show
Authors Tony Jones (The New Christians: Dispatches from the Emergent Frontier), Doug Pagitt (A Christianity Worth Believing: Hope-filled, Open-armed, Alive-and-well Faith for the Left Out, Left Behind, and Let Down in us All), and Mark Scandrette (Soul Graffiti: Making a Life in the Way of Jesus) will preach, sing, and sell healing balm in church basements from San Diego to New York City, bringing the good news of the gospel to anyone who will listen.
Come see them on July 18th form 7 - 9 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church of Fort Worth. Special musical guests include Megan & Ryan Henry of The New Frontiers.
For more info, click here.
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Sunday, July 6, 2008 at 11:35PM 
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