Highlights Live

The Los Ranchos Presbytery meets 6 times a year. St. Andrew’s had the privilege of hosting the Los Ranchos Presbytery yesterday. About 400 Pastors and Elders from throughout our Presbytery were in attendance. The Los Ranchos Presbytery includes all the Presbyterian Churches from Long Beach to the North, Yorba Linda to the East and San Clemente to the south. The last time we hosted Presbytery was about 12 years ago. Yesterday’s meeting is a very important one as our Presbytery will vote on Amendment 08-B regarding the Ordination of Officers. For more detailed information you may visit the Los Ranchos Presbytery website.

The meeting began in the Sanctuary for a time of worship and meeting. A break-out session and discussion time was held in our wonderful new Youth Center. Dinner was held in the new Dierenfield Hall, and the meeting concluded in the Sanctuary. It was exciting to share our new facilities with our sister churches in the Los Ranchos Presbytery.

Our team of college students who traveled to Kenya this Summer also shared some reflections of their trip, and played a short video of their experiences. The video will be played in all three services this weekend.

Presbytery of Los Ranchos

Worship in the Sanctuary

After a few weeks of having Newport Harbor and Ensign students over for lunch, we wanted to share with you what an amazing blessing it has been, for both our church and the students.

On Mondays and Thursdays, nearly 300 high school students have been joining us for lunch in “The House” We’re starting to get a regular crowd, but still see countless new faces each time. It is so great to see “The House” being used for its envisioned purpose: being filled with students and laughter.

On Wednesdays, after school (early dismissal day) our Jr. High students have been coming over from Ensign to enjoy lunch and the amenities that “The House” offers. Since they aren’t trying to race back to class, we have many of them hanging out downstairs for hours.

A big thanks to Rachel Stone and her volunteers for keeping all of this so organized and successful. If you would like to help out, or just want to come see the excitement, contact rachel@standrewspres.org

Students walking over to our campus from school

Lunch is served!

Full of life!

Tuesday night, St. Andrew’s honored our staff who have reached milestone years in their careers here.

David and Jessica Ludwig celebrated 5 years at St. Andrew’s.
Leah Stout, Heidi Giem and Ion Galev each celebrated 15 years.
John Huffman was recognized for his 30 years of service here.

This video celebrates John Huffman by looking at the past thirty years at St. Andrew’s and in our culture.

Huffman speaking to the members of the staff and session

Dave Ludwig

Jess Ludwig

Ion Galev

Leah Stout

John Huffman, his mother, and his wife Anne

Below is a video from Jim’s sermon this past weekend. It is a powerful video, so take a look…

“A Thousand Questions”

This past weekend, our team of 70 had an incredible time in Tecate building a home for a needy family, ministering to orphans and impoverished communities and accomplishing many needed projects with our ministry partners.

It was amazing to see children, teenagers and adults of all ages build a home from scratch on two days!

Another group did crafts, bible stories and played games with orphans and needy children. We handed out clothes to neighborhood families in desperate need. The gospel was shared in word and in deed!

The morning devotions and evening worship set the tone for the weekend as we focused on God’s goodness and how each of us is privileged to share His goodness to a needy world.

How do I sum up the weekend? Generations connected, we served the poor, our lives and the lives of our Mexican friends were changed. All of this happened through our Lord Jesus Christ. Come join us Spring 2009 for the next Tecate trip as Jesus leads us to serve the poor in Mexico.

-Tim Yee

Check out the videos and photos below!

The team building a house together

A tour of the final product

Construction

Painting

Construction

Father-Daughter Team

Celebration

The Family in front of their new home

The 2008 Tecate Team in front of the house they built

It’s that time of year again! Advent is coming and Christmas is close at hand and our “Star Tree” will be up in the church Plaza beginning the weekend of November 22/23. Pick a star off of our Christmas tree in the plaza and buy a gift for a child! The gifts will go to the CHRISTMAS STORE run by MIKA Community Development Corporation of Orange County (a partner organization supported by our St. Andrew’s missions).

Parents have the opportunity to choose special new gifts for their children at the MIKA Christmas Store – gifts provided by St. Andrew’s congregation. The Christmas Store affirms the dignity of our low income neighbors by giving them the joy of “shopping” for the families.

We received an update from Tim Yee and the Tecate Mission team yesterday evening…

We’ve arrived safely in Tecate and the 70 of us will begin working early in the morning on building the house and ministering to orphans. If you’d like to see where we are staying and find out more about the
ministry here, go to www.rancholapaloma.org. Adios!

- Tim Yee

You may notice some new faces leading worship in service this weekend.

Saturday Night Service Guest Worship Leader, November 15
Brandon Muchow,

If there is one word to describe Brandon Muchow, it’s passion. And his music is nothing less than passionate. He is an active worship leader, songwriter, and teacher. With only 22 years of life experience, Brandon’s music and ministry has already spread around the world, including The Purpose Driven Worship Conference in Brazil and the Philippines, as well as the Fringe Festival in Scotland in 2004. Brandon’s original worship music is now used in churches on a regular basis worldwide. He has been featured on ABC’s 20/20, worship magazines and in Simply Youth small group curriculum, “Life Hurts, God Heals.” Brandon’s CD ‘s as “Cornerstone,” “Where I’m Supposed To Be,” and other resources are available at Encouragingmusic.com.

Sunday Morning Guest Choir, November 16
Vanguard University Concert Choir

The University Concert Choir, the larger ensemble at Vanguard with over 90 student members has presented classical, sacred, secular, and contemporary concerts in major concert halls, schools, churches, conferences and conventions throughout the United States. Past concert tours outside of the U.S. have included China, Mexico, Europe, the South Pacific, South Korea, Japan, and Canada. The Vanguard University music ensembles have long been noted for their inspiring and excellent presentation of sacred vocal and instrumental music, including classical, sacred, secular hits from theatre and film, praise and worship, and contemporary Christian arrangements. Under the baton of Dr. James Melton, the Concert Choir will again be featured in solo performance at Carnegie Hall, New York City, in May of 2009, their 4th concert in 8 years there.

After several months of research, prayer and collaboration, the Community Outreach Visioning Team has produced a set of recommendations for our church to implement. Three sub-teams (Outreach, Equipping and Hospitality) worked separately to produce the one report. View the documents and video (below) to find out more of how you can be a part of reaching our neighbors for Christ. And, of course, please contact us if you have any questions about how to get more involved in community outreach.

Tim Yee, Minister of Missions and Outreach (co-chair)
John Frei, elder (co-chair)

Click Here to download the Community Outreach Executive Summary

Click Here to download the Community Outreach Full Report

Dear St. Andrew’s family:

This weekend we will be taking the Servant Ministries Offering which supports our seminarians, missionaries and short-term mission trips for students and young adults. That means your special gifts impact thousands of people both locally and globally. Check out the video below to find out more about the Servant Ministry Offering and how you can be a part of seeing lives changed through Christ.

Click Here to make a donation.