The Memorial service is June 2, 10 a.m. at Little River United Church of Christ, 8410 Little River Turnpike in Annandale.

The obituary that was published in the Connection:

“Diana Janice Richards of Centreville, Va. passed away peacefully from cancer on May 9, 2012. She was born in 1939 in upstate New York, daughter of John R. Schmidburg and Rose Hornick. She grew up in New York and married her husband, William Bruce Richards, in Switzerland while he was stationed in Germany with the American Red Cross. Upon returning to the States, they adopted three boys while living in Washington, D.C. and Prince Georges County, Md. In 1972, they moved to Burke, where she remained for over 35 years. Diana was very active in the community.

She and Bruce both served as presidents of the Lake Braddock Community Association. She started the mulch site and worked very closely with Sharon Bulova in reducing the tipping fees for local communities at the sanitary landfill, and was at the forefront of the recycling movement in the late ’80s for Fairfax County. She was very involved in the start of the Fairfax Fair when it was held at George Mason University, was nominated as Lady Fairfax, served as the Awards Chairperson for the Fairfax County Fair, was an active member of both the Citizens Task Force for Annandale (now Braddock) District and the Fairfax County Policy Review Board and served as the Campaign Precinct Chairperson of the Lake Braddock Community.

“^1-2 So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

³I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him.

^4-6In this way we are like the various parts of a human body. Each part gets its meaning from the body as a whole, not the other way around. The body we’re talking about is Christ’s body of chosen people. Each of us finds our meaning and function as a part of his body. But as a chopped-off finger or cut-off toe we wouldn’t amount to much, would we? So since we find ourselves fashioned into all these excellently formed and marvelously functioning parts in Christ’s body, let’s just go ahead and be what we were made to be, without enviously or pridefully comparing ourselves with each other, or trying to be something we aren’t.

^6-8If you preach, just preach God’s Message, nothing else; if you help, just help, don’t take over; if you teach, stick to your teaching; if you give encouraging guidance, be careful that you don’t get bossy; if you’re put in charge, don’t manipulate; if you’re called to give aid to people in distress, keep your eyes open and be quick to respond; if you work with the disadvantaged, don’t let yourself get irritated with them or depressed by them. Keep a smile on your face.

^9-10Love from the center of who you are; don’t fake it. Run for dear life from evil; hold on for dear life to good. Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle.

^11-13Don’t burn out; keep yourselves fueled and aflame. Be alert servants of the Master, cheerfully expectant. Don’t quit in hard times; pray all the harder. Help needy Christians; be inventive in hospitality.

^14-16Bless your enemies; no cursing under your breath. Laugh with your happy friends when they’re happy; share tears when they’re down. Get along with each other; don’t be stuck-up. Make friends with nobodies; don’t be the great somebody.

^17-19Don’t hit back; discover beauty in everyone. If you’ve got it in you, get along with everybody. Don’t insist on getting even; that’s not for you to do. “I’ll do the judging,” says God. “I’ll take care of it.”

^20-21Our Scriptures tell us that if you see your enemy hungry, go buy that person lunch, or if he’s thirsty, get him a drink. Your generosity will surprise him with goodness. Don’t let evil get the best of you; get the best of evil by doing good.”

Romans 12: 1-21 (MSG) BibleGateway.com

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=acts%205&version=MSG

17-20 Provoked mightily by all this, the Chief Priest and those on his side, mainly the sect of Sadducees, went into action, arrested the apostles and put them in the town jail. But during the night an angel of God opened the jailhouse door and led them out. He said, “Go to the Temple and take your stand. Tell the people everything there is to say about this Life.”

   Promptly obedient, they entered the Temple at daybreak and went on with their teaching.

21-23 Meanwhile, the Chief Priest and his cronies convened the High Council, Israel’s senate, and sent to the jail to have the prisoners brought in. When the police got there, they couldn’t find them anywhere in the jail. They went back and reported, “We found the jail locked tight as a drum and the guards posted at the doors, but when we went inside we didn’t find a soul.”

24 The chief of the Temple police and the high priests were puzzled. “What’s going on here anyway?”

25-26 Just then someone showed up and said, “Did you know that the men you put in jail are back in the Temple teaching the people?” The chief and his police went and got them, but they handled them gently, fearful that the people would riot and turn on them.

27-28 Bringing them back, they stood them before the High Council. The Chief Priest said, “Didn’t we give you strict orders not to teach in Jesus’ name? And here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and are trying your best to blame us for the death of this man.”

29-32 Peter and the apostles answered, “It’s necessary to obey God rather than men. The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, the One you killed by hanging him on a cross. God set him on high at his side, Prince and Savior, to give Israel the gift of a changed life and sins forgiven. And we are witnesses to these things. The Holy Spirit, whom God gives to those who obey him, corroborates every detail.”

33-37 When they heard that, they were furious and wanted to kill them on the spot. But one of the council members stood up, a Pharisee by the name of Gamaliel, a teacher of God’s Law who was honored by everyone. He ordered the men taken out of the room for a short time, then said, “Fellow Israelites, be careful what you do to these men. Not long ago Theudas made something of a splash, claiming to be somebody, and got about four hundred men to join him. He was killed, his followers dispersed, and nothing came of it. A little later, at the time of the census, Judas the Galilean appeared and acquired a following. He also fizzled out and the people following him were scattered to the four winds.

38-39 “So I am telling you: Hands off these men! Let them alone. If this program or this work is merely human, it will fall apart, but if it is of God, there is nothing you can do about it—and you better not be found fighting against God!”

40-42 That convinced them. They called the apostles back in. After giving them a thorough whipping, they warned them not to speak in Jesus’ name and sent them off. The apostles went out of the High Council overjoyed because they had been given the honor of being dishonored on account of the Name. Every day they were in the Temple and homes, teaching and preaching Christ Jesus, not letting up for a minute.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=acts%205&version=MSG

The Message (BibleGateway.com)

But as I was reading Matthew, it came to me that one of the most common traditions in the church is to say the Lord’s Prayer in worship. But if you read Matthew 6:5-15, Jesus uses the Lord’s Prayer as a suggestion for praying simply and away from the spectacle of public prayer. As the scripture reads in the message translation:” Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense his grace.”

Jesus ends this part of the prayer passage with a lasting thought in 14-15 – “In prayer there is a connection between what God does and what you do. You can’t get forgiveness from God, for instance, without also forgiving others. If you refuse to do your part, you cut yourself off from God’s part.”

When we are hurt or mad, it’s very hard to not have it affect all of our relationships. It’s the same with prayer. Simply, we cut ourselves off from communication with God if we cannot let go of past hurts and wrong doings.

So let’s try our best to move spiritually to a new place where we so that we stop cutting ourselves off from God and take a moment to “sense his grace”, reminding ourselves of the larger spiritual community we call Christ’s church.

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Matthew 6:5-15 The Message (MSG) – BibleGateway.com

“And when you come before God, don’t turn that into a theatrical production either. All these people making a regular show out of their prayers, hoping for stardom! Do you think God sits in a box seat? Here’s what I want you to do: Find a quiet, secluded place so you won’t be tempted to role-play before God. Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense his grace.

“The world is full of so-called prayer warriors who are prayer-ignorant. They’re full of formulas and programs and advice, peddling techniques for getting what you want from God. Don’t fall for that nonsense. This is your Father you are dealing with, and he knows better than you what you need. With a God like this loving you, you can pray very simply. Like this:

Our Father in heaven,
Reveal who you are.
Set the world right;
Do what’s best— as above, so below.
Keep us alive with three square meals.
Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others.
Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.
You’re in charge!
You can do anything you want!
You’re ablaze in beauty!
Yes. Yes. Yes.

In prayer there is a connection between what God does and what you do. You can’t get forgiveness from God, for instance, without also forgiving others. If you refuse to do your part, you cut yourself off from God’s part.

[Click here for those with need of a traditional translation]
Matthew 6:5-15 The Message (MSG) – BibleGateway.com
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Karen thought to simplify it to make it more iconic and focus only on the cross.

Rob developed the concepts into a draft logo.

Feedback to extend the road further into the background.

“grungi-fying” the logo with color concepts

Clean up the lettering and change the colors.

Your Thoughts?

The Road Christian Church planning team is hosting a Christmas party, and you’re invited.  We want to celebrate together – we will provide the food, and hope you’ll bring the fellowship and fun!

We are also collecting toys and canned goods to donate to those less fortunate.  We will send another note with more specifics on what we need once we get the details in order.

We plan to start our service by sharing our common goals, vision, etc, that has drawn us together as a community.

Next, we will have a time of community prayer – where we can each share joys, concerns, and prayer requests with one another both verbally and anonymously.  We will have a basket (or several baskets) for people to write their requests on – be it a person’s name, a word, a picture, or even just an “X” to indicate that there’s something that needs to be prayed for, but they aren’t yet ready to share.  These prayer requests will either be read aloud, or we may just pray over the entire basket.  After each prayer request, the group will recite some common response such as “Lord, hear our prayer.”

After we finish with the community prayer time, we will have communion.  The four of us felt like we don’t want to wait for communion, but want to have it be an intentional, important part of our worship gathering.

Once we finish communion, we will have a blessing to be led by the Regional Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) minister, Lari Grubbs.  During this time, we, as a community, will ask God for blessings of the location, the communion cups/plates, and the people.  We envision this as a time for those in the community to share our hopes and dreams for our new church, as the Spirit moves them to do so.

Following the blessing, we will have a brainstorming session, to help identify key ideas, theological questions, and interests that our community would like to explore further.  We will use the ideas gathered to determine, by consensus, what our next topic of discussion/meditation/study will be.  We intend to discuss this topic until we’re done talking about it, at which point we will, as a community, determine what to study next.  During this first service we only intend to brainstorm ideas – the next time we gather, we will come to consensus on what will be our first topic of study.

We will close our first gathering with a prayer.

We do intend to have music be a part of this first gathering, but we have not yet determined what/when/who will share that (we only had an hour, after all!).

One thing don’t foresee doing is having a weekly time of offering.  If there’s a special project that requires a donation outside of pledged monies, then we will have a time to request financial support for that project.  We may do a monthly offertory time.  We (or at least I) like the idea of having a piggy bank somewhere in the room so that there’s a clear space for people to leave money as they wish, but we are going under the assumption that those who pledge, have already thought about how they are giving, and those who do not already have a plan to give or not – we just need to provide a place for them to give it, should they want to.

Finally, an important thing we discussed was that we do not need to justify our reasoning behind any particular decision we make for a particular worship service.  If we are led by the Spirit to try something new and different, we will try it.  If it works, we may do it again.  If it fails, we won’t do it again – at least not in the exact same way.

I’m so excited to be involved in a Positive, Progressive, and Open-minded church.  I can’t wait to see what the future brings!

I am lucky enough to be on the planning team for the first worship service.  One morning a couple of weeks ago, at 8:00 am, we held a conference call to discuss the plans for this gathering.  At least two of us were driving, one had been taking care of a sick child, and I may be mistaken, but it sounded like the fourth was still in bed.  Talk about multi-tasking!  And, we had an incredible, spirit-filled, exciting conversation.  There are so many possibilities!  And yet, we seemed to all come to consensus on most ideas that were presented pretty quickly.

Our general plan is to not be tied to structure.  We want to have an open format.  We do not intend to have the same order of worship every week.  Some weeks may be a guided discussion; some weeks we may have a guest speaker – either a minister, lay person, or a person of a different faith who can share some of their traditions with us; some weeks we may have silent meditation for the entire service – we are open to just about anything.  Personally, I’d love to spend an hour doing yoga one Sunday morning.  Possibilities abound!

Join me for my next post detailing what decisions we made about the specifics of our first gathering!

So we are at the moment where the idea of a new church has materialized into people with a mission and a place to worship, learn and build community. The NOVA West Church project is winding up with our first worship tentatively scheduled for November 27, 2011 at 10 AM in Chantilly, VA.

4229 Lafayette Center Dr #1350
Chantilly, VA 20151

The location: The Condo Mentality

Being a condo dweller in Ashburn, my mantra about condo living is: “you live in a condo so you can spend more time in your community and less time maintaining your home”. Your condo is still your home, a place where you can find respite and comfort, but it doesn’t define who you are. The location of any church is just a building where people gather, but it is these people that define its use and purpose. The condo church mentality allows for the inward church community to be outwardly focused through Christ’s church, where the work on the church building does not get in the way of the work of the church community. The new space is an office condo space with a large multipurpose space for worship and friendship gatherings, a classroom space for children and a meeting room for small groups.

What’s in the plans?

For the immediate, we plan to meet for community lead worship, start education programs for both kids and adults, participate in community service programs, giving to homeless and poor in the Fairfax and Loudoun County area. The future of the church holds wide open possibilities and plans. If you want to participate in the big plans for this church, please come and participate.

We need your help

To continue the journey of building this new church community, we need your help.  There are a few ways that you can help us immediately.

Join Us

Become a part of this community and join us for our inaugural worship service on the 27th.  At that time we follow the service with some friendship gathering and community building.  Though this requires no material giving, your part of this community provides us with the intangibles that are required to serve our community, inside and outside of the building.

Donate Money

Your decision on this type of gift ultimately needs to come from your belief in this church and the good that it plans to do in the world.  The money will immediately support the church’s startup cost and emerging community service programs. If you decide to donate money, your check donations can be made out to Christian Church Capital Area with a note in the memo field for Chantilly Church and mailed to (Robert Winter | 20385 Belmont Park Terrace # 105 | Ashburn, VA 20147).

Donate Services or Goods

The gift of time and service is the vitality of the church. If you have a service or goods that will meet the needs of the new community, please let us know.  We appreciate any help you can lend.

Pray for Us

In all cases, we ask for you to pray.  We need the spiritual strength to continue this journey and with your prayer we will be successful in God’s new church.

With Christ’s Love, Your friend,

–Robert