Bethlen Naptár, 1988 (Ligonier)
Kálvin Egyházkerület
New Covenant United Church of Christ McKEESPORT, PA Pastor: Dr. Eva M. Fabian President: Mr. Harvey J. Barnum Until 1987 we have never associated 2 Corinthians 4:16 with anything else but the personal life of Christians. „Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed every day.” In 1987 we learned something new. The referred Scripture can point to the life of a whole congregation also. We experienced this counter-movement between the physical and the spiritual in two ways. First, the New Covenant UCC is a part of that aging and „wasting away” process which is common with every congregation in the Calvin Synod Conference and with every church which has an ethnic background. Though we buried only two of our members in 1987, many „old timers” are struggling with serious health problems and getting less and less active. In the meantime God has given us a spiritually healthy younger generation with lovely children. Through them He is renewing our church day by day. Second, our other outer nature, the building of our church is „wasting away” in a dramatic way. The structure is more than a hundred years old. Since we have been fighting city hall for more than a decade, and so far without any success, our congregation does not want to put money into a building which is condemned anyway. Yet, in spite of the substandard condition of our church building, the Lord blessed us with a small but spiritually alert and fully alive membership through the living presence of His Word and Holy Spirit among our crumbling walls. Glory, hallelujah! Besides our worship services, monthly Holy Communion celebrations, Sunday-school, youth and adult Bible study classes, vacation Bible school, we have a cherished gathering every month, the Family Fellowship meeting. It is a five program with sing-along, various activities for the different age groups, occasional Christian movies, pot luck dinner and evening devotions. In 1987 four of our children, Jerremy and Joshua Booth, Shelley Ernst, and Ericka Gergely were confirmed in their Christian faith after three years of faithful preparation. Our church sent eight members of our youth fellowship to the Calvin Synod youth camp. The Ligonier Bethlen Home has been the chosen mission field of our church for many years. We visited our fifteen 125
