Palm Sunday 2020: Ways to Worship From Home

Happy Sunday, everyone.

It's Palm Sunday, Holy Sunday, one week before Easter Sunday, which seems like an ironic and beautiful thing in the midst of a worldwide crises. Churches across the country are streaming services live today, some are even handing out palm leaves via drive-thru pick-up. Hopefully you were able to find a Palm Sunday service that was streaming live this morning. If you struggled to find one, here are the links to three local churches that I love and respect (and have been a part of in one capacity or another during my adult life). If you missed the Live Stream the recordings will be available online all week):

1.) theWELL, Buffalo, where we currently attend streams their service live at 10 am currently during the Coronavirus church shut downs. Here is the link to the live stream: theWELL Buffalo Live Stream

2.) Eastern Hills Wesleyan Church (in Clarence)- where Scott and I were married, Ava and Aubrey attended pre-school, and I spent many years in the youth group, will also be streaming live at 10: Eastern Hills Live Stream.  

3.) The Chapel at Crosspoint, where we spent a number of years when we first moved back to Buffalo in 2009, and where we have many friends: The Chapel Live Stream (at 9 & 11 am). 

(Note: there are many other wonderful churches in Buffalo also doing live streams right now. These are just the three that I am most familiar with and wanted to share in case you weren't sure where to start). 

As I mentioned in my post yesterday, I wanted to offer a few resources to help parents celebrate this holy week of Easter with joy, despite how strange it seems to not be gathering in person in churches across the country, or with friends and family during this holiday time. 

I'm doing this easy palm leaf collage with the girls this morning. You can print out the template from DLTK Bible.com (which is a great resource for faith and school aged kids crafts): http://www.dltk-bible.com/crafts/mpalmcollage.htm

I printed the palm leaf on heavier paper stock for the girls (regular printer paper works just fine). We are planning on using green water color on the palm leaf first, and then will add scraps of different colored green paper to cover the rest. 

I've printed a couple of extra copies that we will deliver to neighbors (and maybe Grandma and Grandma, who live a couple of miles away) later. 

I promise to take pictures after we're finished and post them here later. 

I also printed out a couple of these coloring pages for the girls (found at http://tomiannie.blogspot.com/2016/03/hosanna-coloring-page-8.html?m=1) to either keep them busy during the online church service, or just as something to do later: 

TODAY'S SCRIPTURE We'll be writing out the daily verse and posting on our fridge each day (see below- it doesn't have to be Pinterest fancy friends! Mine never are!). You could also do this on a chalk board, or just post on a piece of paper on your fridge. 

The next day the great crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him shouting, 

"Hosanna!"

"Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!"

"Blessed is the king of Israel." 

John 12: 12-13

The last thing I wanted to share with you today is a podcast episode from Proverbs 31 Ministries (one of my favorite women's ministry websites) titled, "How Do We Pray in the Midst Of Fear". If you're struggling to know how to even pray right now, take a few minutes to listen to this today: 

https://www.proverbs31.org/listen/podcast/full-podcast/2020/03/10/how-do-we-pray-in-the-midst-of-fear


I'll be back tomorrow to tell you about the Resurrection Eggs we'll be making and using later this week, as well as the neighborhood Easter card project the girls and I are working on.