Purposeful Presentations: The Impact of Isolation Join Angela Wehner of Porter-Starke Services on Sunday, December 8^th during Faith Formation in the Fellowship Hall to discuss isolation & the impact it has on us.  Brought to light by the pandemic, isolation is not a new concept however one that everyone became familiar with. As explored in the Surgeon General’s 2023 report “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation”, isolation & loneliness take a toll on both our mental & physical health; holidays & the winter months have potential to increase this toll.  During this interactive presentation, we will discuss definitions of & barriers associated with isolation & loneliness as well as discuss ways to create, foster, & maintain social connection.

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Calling all CLC members! This Sunday during the Faith Formation hour, our congregation's Co-Op team needs your help! This past May, our congregation was selected to be a part of the ELCA Youth Ministry Network's Formation Co-Op. This process has a mission of rooting young people in a lifelong, transformative faith in Jesus Christ through lifegiving communities. In other words, this process will play a huge role in helping our community reframe our youth ministry programs to be more inclusive of all the youth here within our context! Your perspectives, ideas, and thoughts will play a very important role in helping our team brainstorm new designs for our youth ministry. With such, we would love to have you be a part of our listening sessions this Sunday! There will be listening sessions for general congregation members, our 3rd/4th and 5th/6th graders, as well as anyone with youth ministry experience (chaperoning, working for another church, volunteering with youth, etc!) We hope to see you this Sunday! If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to Kaitlyn, Director of Youth Ministries.

Jesus is the Reason for the Season!

Continuing with our tradition at CLC, we are taking up a collection for Christmas gifts for our CLC Staff.  If you are interested in contributing, please either drop off your contribution to Jen at the church office or place it in the offering plate with the designation “Staff Christmas Gift.”  It is our intention to divide the funds evenly among all of our CLC staff.

Christmas will be here before you know it, please have all contributions in by Sunday, December 22. If you have any questions, please contact any Church Council Officer.

Attention All CLC Youth

I’d like to invite you once again to participate in the CLC Youth Orchestra for the 4:00 pm worship service on Christmas Eve. If you are interested, please speak to me after any of our Sunday worship services, or e-mail me at brian.bartusch@clcvalpo.org. Music will be available to pick up in the Music Room starting November 24^th.  Brass, strings, woodwinds, and percussion are all welcome to participate!

Mr. Bartusch

Stephen Ministry ~ Here to help!              “I will not leave you…”

Typically, starting or adding to a family or bringing two families together, brings great joy.  For some though, it can become a time of great stress and bewilderment.   Pregnancy, child-birth, adoption or other issues can bring challenges. Whether everything goes as expected or complications surface, we may struggle with the situation or where to turn for help and support.  It’s also not unusually for people to feel confused, afraid, hurt or even rejected by God. 

The promise at the heart of scripture is that we are never alone.  Our loving God is with us and offers strength.  Regardless of what we face, there is help, unfailing love and people willing to walk with us and listen. CLC has a group of well-trained, faithful persons with a heart to care, offering support and encouragement.  We can help. 

Specially trained Stephen Ministers are always available to walk with you, listen to you, confidentially and faithfully.  We wear those blue name tags or contact either Pastor; their confidential email is:  pastors@clcvalpo.org or call 219-462-6660.

PJ and Slipper Drive

A big thank you to all who picked an Angel ornament off the tree.  All the Angels were picked up!  These gifts of PJs and Slippers will be a wonderful, warm hug to the kids who will be wearing them. 

Remember:

· Leave the gifts unwrapped (though you might consider including a reusable shopping bag)

· Return pajamas and /or slippers by December 1^st. 

· Look for the table in the Gathering Space where you can leave your gifts.

Thank you again and again for your generosity during this Advent season. 

AMOS TEAM NEEDS US

An AMOS https://www.facebook.com/amissionofservice ministry team, including CLC’s Gail Mannington (Board member and Treasurer), regularly undertakes Medical Mission trips to Esquipulas, Guatemala.  On each trip AMOS provides medical clinics, speech pathology services and education to remote mountain villages surrounding Esquipulas and Copan, Honduras where residents have limited/no access to medical care.

The team will be leaving for Guatemala in February 2025.

They need the following:

This is a list of the medications we need, bold mean high volumes needed, underlined mean we run out quickly.

The following ointments:  Neosporin, Hydrocortisone, Anti-itch cream, triple antibiotic, Diaper Rash, antifungals, muscle rub, Benadryl.

Vitamins:  Adult and Children Chewable (NO GUMMIES PLEASE, they melt), Prenatal Vitamins

Children’s Pain and Fever medications, cough syrups, Flu relief (We always run out). Infant Pain and Fever Medications (We always run out)

Benadryl, Tums/Antacid meds, Anti-diarrhea meds, Daytime and Nighttime multi-symptom meds, any NSAIDS (Ibuprofen, Aleve, Naprosyn, Motrin, Advil, Baby Aspirin 81 mg), Acetaminophen/Tylenol, Pepcid, Omeprazole, Zantac, Aspirin, Urinary Health meds, 

Other the counter (OTC) Medication only, No personal prescription or other medical equipment. 

November Altar Gifts

Holy Communion          Grace Safrin ~ Celebrating the birthday of Kelly Kozloski

Altar Candles                  Dot Ruuska ~ In Memory of Whitey

Eternal Lamp                  Lois & Michael Felten ~ In Memory of Paul Bretscher

LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR CLC Retreat

February 7-9, 2025

More information to come.  Click on link below to register.

https://clcvalpo.churchcenter.com/registrations/events/2616793

Social Ministry Monthly Emphasis

November 2024

Social Ministry Emphasis for November.  Each month the Social Ministry Committee highlights a special giving opportunity.  Nov. 2024’s specific emphasis is providing support for the Lutheran Diaconal Association www.thelda.org.  Below is a message to CLC from LDA:

• “Since 1919, the Lutheran Diaconal Association has formed people for ministries of service.  In the early years we trained women primarily as nurses serving in missions and institutions of the church.  Our ministries have changed throughout the last 104 years.  Today we serve in congregations, in institutions and wherever God’s people are.
•  A deaconess or deacon is someone one who serves. Jesus washed his disciples’ feet and instructed them to do the same for others. Sometimes deaconesses and deacons do actual foot-washing like Jesus did; but more widely, they serve Christ by walking with those the world easily forgets; the marginalized, the poor, the powerless, the sick.
• People who reach out to others in this way—with care and compassion in a hurting world—are practicing diaconal service, as all the baptized are called to do.  Some of them desire to do this as a professional in ministry and enter a more formal training and formation process to become deaconesses and deacons.  Since the earliest days of the church men and women have been set apart to do intentional servant ministry.
• Deaconess/deacon ministry has come to mean many things: it means serving others on bended knee, and from positions of leadership. It means entering the hurt parts of society and carrying the light and love of Christ in service to others. It means telling the story of God’s love and helping others to hear God in their own story. It means welcoming the stranger in our midst. 
• Stories of ministry abound (pick up a copy of a LDA newsletters at CLC throughout the year).  We are nurses, lawyers, engineers, musicians, social workers, chaplains, parish deacons, teachers, campus chaplains, missionaries, professors and so much more. 

We are so grateful for our partnership with Christ Lutheran Church.  Your congregation has made a huge difference in our ministry.  Your prayer support and financial support are invaluable and help the LDA thrive and reach out to God’s people..  Thank you!  For more info www.theLDA.org We would love to talk with you! - see Deaconesses Edie Eickemeyer, Kristen Lewis, Pastor/Deaconess Jane Aicher, Karen Hernes, Diana Iltzsche, Kat Peters.

Help achieve our goal of $2500 in November (over and above giving combined with CLC’s $1200 budgeted amount).  By achieving our goal CLC will help Luth. Diaconal Assoc. continue mutual support and service activities that are crucial to effective ministry.  Use your weekly worship giving mailed in check to CLC and indicate “LDA” or contribute through Subsplash on the CLC website https://clcvalpo.org via the “Give” button and choose Monthly Social Ministry Emphasis.  Thank you to members for supporting monthly social ministry emphases.

CLC now has a NaloxBox located just outside of door #2.  What is a NaloxBox?  A NaloxBox holds individually packaged single doses of Naloxone, a chemical that reverses opioid overdose.  Anyone may use Naloxone on an individual who is suspected to be experiencing an overdose.  If a dose is administered to someone who is not experiencing an overdose, no harm will come from it.  This box allows individuals to take Naloxone with them – no questions asked – and is intended to be a distribution option versus something that is grabbed and used on the spot (CLC has included Naloxone in its AEDs and First Aid Kits should the immediate need arise).  A staff training was conducted at the time of installation; a community training will be held during Faith Formation on January 12^th, 2025.   This box was made possible in partnership with the Porter County Hub Coalition and the Reducing Opioid Overdose Together sub-committee.  

Please let me know if you have any other questions!

Angela Wehner, BSW

Older Adult Grant Project Director

Porter-Starke Services

701 Wall Street , Valparaiso, IN 46383

219.706.1044

Lutheran World Relief (LWR) Projects

The LWR truck came at the end of October and the layettes, personal care kits, and sewing kits that Sandy and Dave Keammerer coordinated were picked up for shipment abroad. And guess what? Now that it is November, they start all over again gathering items for these kits for 2025!

While many items in these kits are donated by CLC members, other items are purchased in-bulk to finish the kits and save costs. That means the Keammerers need funds for this ministry.

To assist in this ministry at CLC, I have applied for and received a Thrivent Action Grant that will provide $250 for these LWR projects. However, I would like to see that $250  grow to $750 (or more), but I need your help! For the month of November, I will match dollar for dollar your donation to the LWR projects up to a maximum of $250. This means we could reach the $750 goal—Thrivent Action Grant of $250, your total donations of $250 (or more), and my match up to a maximum of $250. Can you help with a small donation?  Does anyone want to join me and match the $250 Thrivent Action Grant too for even more funds?

Just put your donation in an envelope marked Thrivent- LWR- Match (or, if you write a check, write Thrivent- LWR- Match on the memo line) and place it the CLC collection plate on any Sunday in November or at the Thanksgiving Service!

If you have any questions, contact Karl Reichardt by email or mobile phone (karl.reichardt@valpo.edu, 219-252-9519).

Tree of Remembrance

Tuesday, December 10 @ 6:00 p.m. 

Christ Lutheran Church

Family and friends are invited to attend this heartwarming event (in person or virtually) to honor the memory of a loved one. This year’s ornament is an etched glass teardrop, symbolizing tears we have shed & tears that have yet to fall, all because we care, we love and we remember!

The program for the evening will include the VNA Hospice Choir and a message from our VNA Chaplain. Families and friends are welcome to gather in the common area following the ceremony for fellowship, coffee, cocoa and cookies.

You may email a picture of your loved one to be included in the ceremony slideshow to mhamline@vnanwi.org or mail to VNA, 501 Marquette St. Valparaiso, IN 46383. (photos will be returned)

All completed forms and photos must be received by Dec 6th to be included in the ceremony slideshow and to receive a pre-printed/prepared ornament at the event.

GIVING ENVELOPES

The 2025 giving envelopes are available.  You will find them in the Gathering Place, in the church hall and by the church office.

Please me Jen Bias know if you have any questions.