Returning to Worship Plan
These protocols will be adjusted according to new guidance, new research, local developments and best practices.
Before public services:
Vulnerable persons… If you are in a high-risk category because of underlying health conditions or are 65+years of age, do not feel compelled to attend public worship services unless you are comfortable with the potential health risk. Guard your health.
Please stay home if you are ill or showing symptoms of Covid-19.
If someone in your household is ill, please stay home.
Recorded services will continue to be available on YouTube and sowerandtheseed.org. Pastor is glad to arrange Holy Communion by appointment. If you are in any of the risk categories and still wish to attend services, you are certainly welcome to do so, being aware of the risks.
Wash your hands often. Frequent and thorough hand-washing is great prevention.
Observe “social distancing” and conventional sanitary practices.
Masks are suggested but not mandatory … Masks may be helpful for reducing transmission of viral particles from the person wearing a mask. If you do not want to wear a mask, you will not be turned away or shunned.
Please be considerate of your neighbor’s wishes to wear/not wear a mask. Our respectful and loving care for one another allows freedom in this matter.
Ventilation will be increased as much as possible and as weather permits.
While Rice County is considered a hotspot services will be held outside when weather permits
Arriving for Service:
Avoid direct physical contact with others. If visiting before or after worship services, please do so outside while observing social distancing guidelines.
Hand sanitizers are set at the entrances to the building. (Donations are welcome!)
Doors from the parking lot will be open until service begins, for touch-less entry.
Seating is determined by the usher, who will keep persons / families safely distanced. Pews have been marked with reserved signs to help keep one or more pews between families.
Bulletins will be placed in the pews, but will also be available by the usher.
During the Service:
Singing will be limited indoors. Singing is not listed as a hazard by the CDC, but some are concerned that singing, when forceful, projects more aerosols.
The Offering Plate won’t be passed; place your gift to the Lord in the plate as you enter / exit.
Communion will take place as persons are led forward socially-distanced by individuals and family groups. Please cup your hand, as the elder will drop the wafer into your hand. The wine will be served only by individual cups. (Sharing common cup bears the stigma of being unsanitary, even though the reception by common cup is a totally antiseptic process; so, for the present, we will only provide individual cups for those coming forward.)
Children who come forward with parents will be blessed without touch.
Music may be played during Communion. We welcome soloists or musicians to volunteer.
After the Service:
Pastor will not be greeting or dismissing with the customary shaking of hands.
Likewise, don’t shake hands, hug, or touch people who are outside your household.
Visiting with others should be done outside, observing appropriate social distancing.
In addition to offering public worship services:
1. We will continue to offer recorded services.
2. We will continue to offer family communion services by appointment.
3. You are encouraged to continue to develop and strengthen your personal devotional and prayer life and that of your immediate household using online, TV, and print resources.
4. Please continue to pray for one another, for our congregation, and for your pastor.
5. Please also pray for our leaders, our medical personnel, and for our community.
The Bible calls us to exercise Christian liberty, for ourselves and others. Martin Luther said that “A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none. A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.” In other words, we should recognize our God-given freedoms, but at the same time have great care for the rights and well-being other people. Please refrain from forming opinions about others in terms of whether or not they attend in-person services or whether or not they wear a face mask. The above are precautions that have been provided as best practices at this time.
It is a blessing that we can gather together to receive the forgiveness of sins personally and directly through the Word and Sacrament ministry.
At this time we will continue drive-in services at 8:30am on Sunday mornings, with in-person services at 10:30am on Sunday and 7:00pm on Wednesday.
Our highest desire is for the spiritual care of our members and visitors with a conscientious desire for the physical care of our members and visitors also.
As your pastor, I will gladly visit congregation members in their home and/or bring the Lord’s Supper. Please call me (507-685-2307) with any questions or concerns, or if you’d like a personal visit, for yourself or someone else.
In our Lord’s Prayer, we ask our Heavenly Father to “deliver us from evil.” Sometimes God delivers us not by removing the affliction but rather by giving us the strength to endure it. There is no safe place or safe practice in this world that guarantees we will be free from exposure to viruses, sickness, or death, even if we take the most thorough of precautions.
Our confidence is never in the safety of personal protocols or practices of isolation. Our trust is in our God who is bold enough to make these promises in Scripture: “Though the LORD brings grief, He will show compassion, so great is His unfailing love” (Lamentations 3:32).
We now have the opportunity again to public meet, receive the blessing and forgiveness of
God, encourage one another with the Gospel of Christ, and receive His body and blood to support our faith and grant it divine strength. Public worship services are again being offered our members and the visitors in our community, but they are not compulsory.
“I love the house where You live, O LORD, the place where your glory dwells.” (Psalm 26:6-8)
May God grant us peace and joy in Him!
May our Lord keep us in His mercy. Amen.