Neighbors helping Neighbors
Our Church’s focus for 2022 is to live more deeply into our vision of being “a sanctuary of Christian hope, love, and encouragement in the heart of Sioux Falls” by seeking out opportunities as a congregation to “Love the 605”. We have been exploring what loving God and loving our neighbors means for us as followers of Christ.
In the past few weeks, we have been given a major opportunity to love our neighbors.
As you may have seen in the local news, St. Michael's Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, a small Christian Orthodox church in downtown Sioux Falls, experienced a significant fire in their church building on Sunday, March 6th. Their building is completely unusable at this stage, and before they will be able to worship there again, they will need major rebuilding.
After the fire and with the blessing/approval of both the Trustees Committee and the Church Council, we began a conversation with representatives from the Ethiopian Church about potentially giving them a temporary home for worship while they re-build. After several meetings, we are excited to announce that the St. Michael’s Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church will begin worshipping in the Church Chapel this coming Sunday, March 27th from
7 am-11:30 am. We have a written lease and building use agreement in place until the end of August. Jennifer Larsen has graciously agreed to serve as our congregational liaison between the two congregations and Jacob Forstein (our Facilities Director) has been intricately involved with creating this partnership. We are currently in the process of assembling a hospitality team to support the Ethiopian Church on Sunday mornings. If you are interested in serving on this team, please let us know.
The St. Michael’s Ethiopian Church is deeply grateful for the invitation to worship in our Church Chapel. They have invited anyone from our congregation to worship with them at any time. Just like any other Christian denomination, some of their traditions differ from our United Methodist traditions. If you are planning to join them for worship, we want to share with you some of their sacred traditions.
For example, their Sunday service begins at 7 am and ends around 11:30 am. Please plan to stay for the entirety of the service. No food, beverages (including water), or gum is permitted in the worship service. No one wears shoes into the worship space. Shoe racks will be provided right outside of the chapel area to store your shoes. Women are required to wear scarves to cover their heads. If you need a scarf, we will have a few available in the church office to borrow for worship. Men and women are seated separately during worship. The majority of the service will be in the language of Amharic.
We recognize that worshipping simultaneously on Sunday mornings may present some unique challenges at times. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Pastor Sara or Jennifer Larsen.
Again, we are excited about this opportunity to help our Christian brothers and sisters in their time of need. Please take time on Sunday mornings to greet and welcome them to our church. What a wonderful way that we can put our faith into action by being good neighbors!
In Ministry Together,
Pastor Sara Nelson and Jennifer Larsen
Below is a link to an article about the St. Michael’s congregation and the fire.