Custer Road UMC

Dear Church Family,

I hope you’ve settled back into a post-holiday routine and are having a great start to the new year. Like many of our college students, Monday was my first day back in school. This semester marks the midway point of my three year doctoral program in preaching.

This semester I’m studying the semiotics of preaching and continuing my research and writing on church revitalization. Thanks to all who continue to encourage me in this endeavor and thanks to my wife, Jennifer, who is graciously picking up so much of the slack at home during this busy season of life.

We’re also quite busy at the church as we march toward the construction phase of our strategic campus redesign. The architectural plans are now about 90% complete and many of our lay leaders and staff are making preparations in anticipation that construction will begin sometime this spring.

This is an exciting time to be a part of Custer Road. If you know people who are looking for a new church home, I hope you’ll invite them to come and worship with us.

This Sunday, I’ll continue our sermon series “All Things New” talking about how Christ invites his

Dear Church Family,

It’s been a crazy week at our house. Last week we got a call from school informing us that our daughter, Taylor, suffered a fall from the monkey bars. I was the closest to the school so I hurried out of my meeting with the Bishop and other clergy from our district to race her to the hospital. X-rays revealed a broken humerus bone just below the ball joint on her right shoulder. Fortunately, the doctor said a sling will suffice but it’s going to take 4 to 6 weeks to heal. Needless to say, her piano lessons and flute practice are limited to one hand for now!

Meanwhile, our third grader Zak had one of his art projects selected by the AP high school art students for the Book Mark Award. Every couple of months, students submit their artwork to be printed on bookmarks for use in the library. It’s a pretty big deal at the school to have your creativity featured in this way. When we told Zak the school had selected his drawing he was so excited.

I hope you’ll join me and our other clergy for our “Ask the Pastor’s” event coming up October 17th at

Dear Church Family,

I want to take an opportunity to specifically address an issue with our building plans that has some of you deeply concerned. This will be a little long, but I want to make sure the work of our building committee is understood. I also want to share with you my great sense of hope for the future of Custer Road!

Let me begin by saying that we have a wonderful church. God is fully present here, and we have a remarkable team of lay leaders, church members, clergy, and staff who have been working tirelessly for the past two years so that we might be prepared to take our next steps toward the vision that God has placed before us. Indeed, God is calling us to share the love of Jesus in such a way that it will impact our community for generations to come!

During the past two weeks, our building committee has received approvals from our Board of Trustees, Finance Committee, and Church Council to present a final set of building plans for our campus re-design to the congregation for approval. The initial set of plans that were presented to the congregation last year were beautiful and ambitious,

Dear Church Family,

Over the course of the past three months, our Building Committee has been working with our architects to reimagine the strategic redesign for our campus. While the plans vary from what we originally presented to you last spring (as a result of budget constraints) the heart of the redesign continues to be driven by the Five Pillars we identified as critical to the future growth of our church.

Last week the Building Committee was able to present those plans to the staff, Trustees and Finance committees. I’m thrilled to say that both committees unanimously approved the plans and are presenting them to the Church Council tomorrow night. Please note the meeting tomorrow night is an open meeting to anyone who would like to attend. We will be meeting in room 204 at 6:30 PM. If our Church Council approves the new design, then we’ll schedule another Called Church Conference for sometime in late October. In order for the congregation to have ample time to gain a full understanding of the scope of the project, we will begin sharing the new floor plans and designs with you this week. Also, please be sure to check out our Frequently