It must be getting close to Labor Day. School has started, football season is kicking off, and we have multiple hurricanes coming across the Atlantic. Please be in prayer for those in the path of Earl, which looks like a major storm, if there ever was one.

I hope you are planning a restful holiday weekend with some recreation included. But I also want to encourage you to include worship and Sunday School at St. Andrew's in your weekend plans. On this first Sunday of September we will be celebrating Holy Communion at all three worship services. And we will be preparing for a church-wide study on prayer that will begin the following Sunday, September 12. You will have the opportunity to sign up for a small group and purchase the book, Talking in the Dark, by Steve Harper. We are looking forward to taking an in depth look at our practice of prayer, to addressing some of the questions we have on prayer and its effectiveness, and to learning to be more consistent pray-ers.

Also, on September 12 we will be celebrating "Back to Church" Sunday. We are encouraging our members to invite someone who does not have a church home, or has been away from church for awhile, to come with them to St. Andrew's. This Sunday there will be materials and information about all the events of Back to Church Sunday for you to take with you and share with a neighbor or friend during the week. We want to make this a very special day as we welcome new friends to our congregation and fellowship.

We are beginning a new phase in our Natural Church Development process that some of you will be involved in. Small Focus Groups will meet in the next few weeks to talk about personal worship experiences. We are working to make our worship at St. Andrew's as inspiring and passionate as possible. Realizing that inspiration is a very personal and sometimes intimate experience, there will be different things that are inspiring to different people. So, we would like for as many people as possible to be part of the conversation. Between 150 and 200 of you will be randomly selected and asked to participate in one focus group session. This will be a purely random selection, with no particular agenda concerning who is picked. We are looking to find what is effective and inspirational about our worship services, so that we can build on those things.

For those who will be able to participate, thank you very much.