Retreat Wrap-Up

Wow! What a retreat! I have wanted to post about the retreat for the past three days, but haven't been able to find a good time to do so until now. To sum up my opinion of this past weekend: I've been on lots of retreats in my life (and get to go to a men's retreat from my church this weekend), many of them very good, but this one might be the best one I've ever been on. I'm not prone to exaggeration or hyperbole, so I say that with all seriousness and joy.

A huge thank you to everyone who went. You were GREAT participants and engaged in the wide variety of worship styles and activities with wonderful attitudes which allowed me to also worship freely despite being focused on teaching.

A few other thank you's...
Thanks to Steve and Rod for so ably leading us in worship through song. Thanks to Amber & Matt for buying all the food and overseeing the cooking. Thanks to Christina for the great games. Thanks to John for leading us all weekend and keeping us on schedule. Thanks to the Boy Scouts for letting us use the Allsop Center despite having a busy weekend hosting a Boy Scout conference. And thanks to God for the sunny day on Saturday and the great weekend.

If anyone has pictures from the weekend, email them to me at erin.bird@newcovenantbible.org, please!

Watershed website down

Yes, we know - the main Watershed website is currently down. We are working on correcting the problem.

For those of you wanting directions to the Allsop Center for tonight's retreat, Joe has bailed you out with this post. Thanks, Joe!

Maps to Retreat

I believe an email will be sent out about this later today, but for those like me who've been wondering how to get to the Boy Scout Camp/Allsop Center in Waubeek for the retreat, here are the directions.

For you Google fans, here's a Google map of the same general area.

See you in Waubeek. :-)

John Stackhouse is blogging

Some of you may remember our Nov. 2, 2006 worship gathering at Coe College to hear John Stackhouse speak about "Jesus, Buddha, and Muhammad: What's the difference?"

Well Prof. Stackhouse is now blogging! I just happened to stumble upon it this evening and thought some of you might be interested in his thoughts.

Free Bible Software

Just heard about Bible Explorer, a free full-featured Bible software program. Thought some of you might be interested.

Thursday Serving Opportunities

We could use some happy-hearted servants in the following areas:

1) Childcare: A huge thank you to those of you who stepped up last month to help with childcare. We are still in need of 2 to 4 more childcare workers. We currently have a team of workers, and would like to keep a full team so that people serve once every 6 weeks. If you would enjoy playing with infants to 7 year olds, then please talk Erin Harlan. It's a great way to help the single moms and married-with-children couples in our midst!

2) Greetings Central: If you enjoy meeting people and making others feel comfortable, then we would love to have your help. We are hoping to put together a small team that will rotate serving at Greetings Central. It’s super easy and super fun, plus you get to meet lots of new people at our Thursday Gatherings. Talk with Amber Schouten if interested.

3) Worship Team: If you like to sing or play an instrument and have a desire to lead people in worshipping God through song, talk with Steve Adolphs.

Women's Summer Retreat

With the annual Watershed Retreat coming up, some of you females might be interested to know that Nichole DeKlotz is working on putting together a Watershed Women’s Retreat to The Boston Mountains in Arkansas this summer. If you are female, enjoy hiking, and discussing life as a God-fearing woman, then come to an informational meeting Thursday, January 25th, immediately following the Worship Gathering and learn how you can get involved in the preparations.

Retreat!

We will be having our 4th annual Watershed Retreat starting 7:00p Friday night (registration begins at 6:00p), Jan 26, and ending the next day at 5:00p on Jan 27 (but could use clean-up help until 6:00p).

This year's topic will be Spiritual Pathways and promises to be deeply spiritual, wonderfully refreshing, and highly practical!

Cost is $25 for the whole retreat, which includes lodging, meals, and a copy of Sacred Pathways by Gary Thomas. Registations can be downloaded here (and the pretty cover for the brochure can be downloaded here if you so desire). Registrations and payment can either be turned in at a Thursday Gathering or mailed to:

Erin Bird
New Covenant Bible Church
1800 46th St. NE
Cedar Rapids, IA 52402

Checks must be made payable to New Covenant Bible Church. If you have any questions, direct them to Erin at 395-0021.

Podcasters Wanted!

For quite a while, we've been recording the message from Watershed's Thursday night gatherings and posting the MP3s to the "Listen" page. We've even started podcasting. But we've done all that kind of on the side, with various people (mostly Erin) chipping in some time to edit MP3s, update the listen page, get the podcast feed set up, and so on.

We want to make sure that if someone can't make it to a Thursday night gathering, they can still hear the message. It's not a huge time commitment, but it's something that needs to be done regularly. Ideally, we'll have a team of at least two podcasters, so one person won't have to do all the work.

Do you want to serve the Watershed community as a podcaster? Do you want to know more? Talk to Matt, Erin, or Steve, or leave a comment here. (Updated to allow comments - sorry about that!)