Click on the button below to join us online each Sunday morning at 10:30 a.m. for worship and music.
ONLINE WORSHIP
Hello, all you good people!
I am delighted to be invited to serve as your church's interim pastor for the next few months. This is work that I love to do, and it is always a privilege to be the bridge between your previous pastor and your yet-to-be-discovered pastor. I am confident that we will have a wonderful time together in ministry.
I have been doing interim ministry since 1995 (almost 30 years!). This followed an 11-year pastorate in western New York, where my son grew up. He now lives in Plymouth with his wife and my two grandsons, who will be 10 and 8 this summer. (How did that happen??) I have two older sisters, in upstate New York and Virginia. We are best friends, though we don't see each other as often as we'd like.
I am a native New Yorker and moved to Mass. in 2009 — purchasing my first house after 30+ years of church housing. After 15 years, I'm still discovering the joys (mostly) and challenges of home ownership. But I love my little house in Chicopee and have wonderful neighbors. (Gardening season is soon upon us — an added joy!) I live somewhat by the seasons: Winter is puzzles and needlework, summer is garden and beach, and every season is reading.
I'm really looking forward to working with you all and getting to know you. I hope you will feel that I'm available to you, even though I'm an hour or so away. I've served other churches at that distance and more, so this is not a new adventure in that respect. During Covid, I served a church in Rhode Island, totally on Zoom! (That really was an adventure, but it went surprisingly well.)
My first Sunday with you will be May 12, and I'll set up a schedule of when I plan to be at the church. But I will definitely be reachable by phone and email, and I invite you to reach out whenever you need to.
I leave you, for now, with these beautiful words from the prophet who saw good in the midst of challenging days:
For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future with hope. (Jeremiah 29:11)
Be safe — be well — be blessed!
Rev. Jerrie Shepard Matney
This year's "talent show" was as fun as usual with some real talent and general silliness and good fun. We were able to raise over $800 to benefit the Levin-Chute Scholarship fund.
