Slowly but surely we seem to be making progress in this battle with Covid. Infection rates and deaths are going down. Restrictions are being eased. And as a church, we continue to move forward step-by-step. Through the pandemic, as your leadership team makes decisions regarding our church's response, we have prayerfully sought to address two questions. What is wise? What is loving?
The state of New Hampshire eased its restrictions on masks a few days ago. The governor is still encouraging the use of masks, but it is no longer mandatory. This means that every store, restaurant and gathering place, including the church, must decide for itself how it will respond going forward. For Rock Church, the standard by which we make our decisions remains the same. What is wise? What is loving? I believe many of us are eager to get to the place of not having to wear masks everywhere. Personally, I long for the day when I can see people's smiles again!
I, and the rest of the leadership team, have been in prayerful consideration over our next step. It seems that the wise and loving thing would be a staged transition to a “masks optional” gathering. The first step was really the return to in-person worship. The next step was the discontinuation of preregistration for worship. And now we take another step forward. Beginning this week, when we gather for in-person worship, masks will be optional once seated in the sanctuary in Sandown and Plaistow. We would ask that you still wear your mask as you walk through the lobby. It is wise because a crowded lobby is higher risk setting. And it is the loving thing to do, particularly for our hospitality team (whose service puts them in close exposure to every person who comes in).
Assuming this goes well, and the trends continue in the right direction, my hope is that we can soon make masks optional in all spaces. But this seems like a wise and loving next step. Our North Shore campus is still under a mask mandate through the commonwealth of Massachusetts. So we will continue to offer higher precaution worship at North Shore. If you are not yet comfortable with the more moderate precaution approach of Sandown and Plaistow, the team at the North Shore campus would love to have you worship with them at 10:30 on Sunday.
I recognize that this is a very controversial topic and many of us have strong feelings about it on either side. Particularly in light of our current series “Love One Another”, I would ask us to be kind, gracious, respectful and even loving as we interact with people who think differently than us. As we talked about on Sunday, we are the family of God and we are called to love one another as Christ has loved us
As we take another step, I look forward to us being together in-person or online this Sunday as we continue this important series.
Love you all,
Pastor Steve
Ladies, don’t forget GROW this coming Monday at 6:30 pm. We have a very special guest coming to speak. You can find all the details at this link.