Excerpts from The New Outlook
Early March 2008
Are We Talented or What??
Second Baptist has more “hams” per capita than any church in the world, and
they’ll be in rare form this Saturday night! Singing, comedy, drama, a
band—we’ve got it all. Come and join us for Second Baptist’s annual talent
show—always a great evening of fun and fellowship.
The cost is $3 for adults, $1 for kids over 10, and
free for those 10 and under. Please bring a dessert to share. If you can, bring
an extra one to auction off. All of the proceeds go to the youth for camp.
Dessert is served at 6:30, and the curtain goes up
at 7:00. See you there!
A Great Evening with Kim Massie
What a wonderful evening we had with jazz vocalist Kim Massie on February
17! Her voice was all we had heard it would be, and she is a warm person who
connects with her audience. The sanctuary and choir loft were full—we even had
to put some chairs in the back! African-Americans and whites, old and young—it
was wonderful to have such a diverse group coming together at our church.
From Pastor Steve Jones: “I think the Kim Massie
concert proved that we can set an ambitious and lofty goal and surpass our
expectations. Many in the crowd came because people from Second Baptist invited
them. We drew together an inter-racial crowd to celebrate the inter-racial
nature of the first Baptist congregation in the city of St. Louis. And the
hospitality of our congregation and the acoustics of the Sanctuary of the
Beatitudes and the brilliance of our new Yamaha grand piano came together to
create a night for which our members can long be proud. In an historic evening,
we celebrated the 190th anniversary of the founding of the first Baptist church
in St. Louis with vitality."
Members of the audience contributed
generously—enough to meet all of our expenses and donate $500 to the Martin
Luther King, Jr. National Memorial under development in Washington, D.C.
Lenten Worship Theme: “STONES OF FAITH”
“The Stone, rejected, has become the
Cornerstone.”
I Peter 2:7; Psalm 118:22; Luke 20:17
Stephen Jones, preaching
Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 2: “Stones of
Judgment”
John 8:-1-11 “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.”
Communion Sunday
America for Christ Offering
Fifth Sunday of Lent, March 9: “Stones of Anger”
John 10:22-39 “They took up stones again to stone him. Jesus
answered them, ‘I have shown you
many good
works; for which of these do you stone me?”
Palm Sunday, March 16: “These Stones Shall Cry
Out!”
Luke 19:38-40 “I tell you, if my disciples become silent, the
very stones themselves will cry out!”
Palm Sunday Triumphal Procession in the Sanctuary
Two Lenten Study and Growth
Opportunities Continue
Come whenever you can.
Sunday Evening Lenten Group
Based on Henri Nouwen’s book Out
of Solitude
Soup, Bread and Dialogue, led by Stephen Jones
Every Sunday evening at 5:00 p.m. in the Community Room through
March 16
Thursday Morning Bible Study
“The Life of Peter: Episodes
of Heroism and Humanity”
Every Thursday Morning at 10:30 a.m. in the Community Room through
March 13, led by Stephen
Jones
Quaker
Guest To Speak to Adult Class
The Living Faith Class
has two more sessions in our series “What Can We Learn from the
Quakers?” On March 9 a member of the St. Louis Friends’ Meeting will join us to
talk about her experience as a Quaker in today’s world.
On Palm Sunday, March
16, Mary Shepardson will lead a session called “Both/And.” Jesus tells us that
we are to be “poor in spirit.” A few verses later he tells us that we are the
light of the world. How do we put these seemingly contradictory ways of seeing
ourselves together and live them out? Meets in Fellowship Hall.
The Bible Study Class,
led by Bill Gurley, continues its study of Genesis. Meets in the
Community Room.
The Young Adult Class,
taught by Judy Gurley, continues its study of the questions Jesus asked. To find
this class, go down the left aisle of the sanctuary and through the door at the
front.
Holy Week Schedule
Maundy Thursday Agape Meal and Service of Darkness
March 20, 6:00 p.m.
Finger food potluck, no reservations necessary
Good Friday Noon Services
We are invited to join Faith Des Peres Presbyterian Church for their 30-minute
noon-time Good Friday Service (on Clayton Road west of Lindbergh) followed by a
light lunch.
Good Friday Concert and Service at Second
Baptist
March 21, 8 p.m.
Our choir will perform John Rutter’s Requiem.
Easter Sunday Schedule
7:30 a.m. Easter Sunrise
Service in the Rose Garden (in the building if the weather is poor)
8:30 a.m. Easter Breakfast in Fellowship Hall
9:15 a.m. Adults: Diana Pryer will show slides and tell of her
recent mission trip to Costa Rica
Youth and Children’s classes
will meet in their regular classrooms
Choir Rehearsal
10:30 a.m. Easter Sunday Resurrection Worship
11:45 a.m. Reception and Annual Easter Egg Hunt
Join the Good Friday Requiem Choir
Our church is planning to present John Rutter’s
Requiem at this year's Good Friday service, March 21. We need a
larger-than-usual choir in order to pull this off successfully, so we are
inviting people who do not normally sing with our choir to join us for this
event. Come join us for these special rehearsals:
Saturdays,
March 1, 8 and 15 from 10 am – noon.
Wednesday, March 19, 8-9 p.m.
Friday, March 21, 6:30 – 7:30 p.m.
This will be a
wonderful event for both singers and listeners alike!
St. Louis Jazz and Blues Vespers, Anyone?
A group will meet in the Community Room on
Sunday, March 2, after church to explore the idea of launching a jazz and blues
monthly vespers at SBC next fall. Following the successful concert of Kim
Massie, we have learned a lot about how this might work. If you are interested,
please join us for this meeting.
Getting
Close!
Second’s kids have collected $195.36 of the $250 needed to buy a water buffalo
for an impoverished family overseas. The children have given their own money,
and adults have helped, too. There is a marked jar in the narthex for anyone who
would like to contribute. The money will go to Heifer International, an
organization that gives animals to poor families, who then pass on the firstborn
of their animals to other needy families.
Visit our Baptist
Liberties Hallway. All eight new posters are now hanging in the hallway between
the sanctuary and the office.
18. Box: Jerry Keeney, Second’s former pastor,
will lead the book group in a discussion of John Steinbeck’s East of Eden
at 2:00, March 10, in the Community Room.
Harris-Stowe
University Choir Concert at Second March 30
As a part of our 175th anniversary celebration, the Harris-Stowe
University Choir will present a concert at Second Baptist on Sunday, March 30,
at 5:00 p.m. The Choir will perform Hurrah for Hollywood, a group of show
tunes, the Choral Finale to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and
selected spirituals.
This concert is in memory of and tribute to Dr.
John Whitney, former president of Harris College, and Dr. John Ervin, former
dean of Stowe College, both of whom served as presidents of Second Baptist
Church.
Goodies, Talent, and Trivia
The youth earned $281.37 toward their trip to Green Lake this summer at the bake
sale after church February 17. Proceeds from the talent show will add to the
coffers. And be sure to mark your calendar for their biggest fundraiser, a
Trivia Night and Silent Auction on Saturday, April 26, from 5 - 8 p.m..
America for Christ Offering During March
Envelopes are in the pews for the annual America for Christ Offering, which we
will be collecting in the worship services during the month of March. This
offering supports mission in one of the largest mission fields in the world: the
United States of America. It helps develop new churches, expand the
denomination’s justice ministries, support inner city neighborhood action
centers, support ABC educational ministries and a host of other ministries.
One-third of our gifts remain with the Great Rivers Region to expand outreach
ministries in Illinois and Missouri. Please give generously.
An Invitation from
Third Baptist
Third Baptist has invited us to a Metro
Theater performance of a musical "The Long Road to Freedom" on Sunday, March 9,
in Third’s Johnson Hall Theater. A light dinner will be provided at 5 p.m.,
followed by the musical. The cost for the dinner if $5. There is no admission
charge for the musical, but an offering will be taken to cover Metro Theater's
costs.
“The Long Road to Freedom” tells the story of two girls, one a daughter of
slaves who are escaping their oppression and the other a daughter of a Quaker
family who are a host family for the underground railroad. The presentation is
certainly family friendly and would be appropriate for a general audience
Third Baptist is located at 620 North Grand. Please call (314) 533-7340 if you
plan to attend the dinner.
Area 5 Annual Gathering of American Baptists of
Missouri
First Baptist Church, Kansas City, MO, Saturday, March 8
Adults $10, Children $5 (younger children free)
Get forms in the church office.
There is a special program for youth: “Triple M:
Mission, Meal and MegaFun Day! (The Mission is at Bethel Neighborhood Center;
the Meal at Bethel and there will be a MegaFun Scavenger Hunt at Oak Park
Mall.) There are seven “Lunch and Learn” workshops for adults.
We hope for a delegation of all ages from Second
Baptist Church at this gathering of Missouri American Baptists! Talk with
Stephen Jones for more details.
Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America Annual
Conference
Theme: “The Way that Leads to Peace”
John Abbott College, Saint-Anne-de-Bellevue, Quebec, Canada, July 14-19, 2008
Keynote address: Jim Loney, held hostage in Iraq in 2005-6
Bible study led by Dr. Glen Stassen, focusing on
his new book, Just Peacemaking. Children and youth will spend mornings in
their own programs.
Evening worship includes music, dance, sermons
exploring the life of peace from the inside out.
Housing is in suite-style dorms. U.S. passports
are necessary.
From the Pastor
More Than a Missionary
In the Western Mission Academy in St. Louis which John Mason Peck and James Ely
Welch founded in 1818, Peck taught many academic subjects: reading, writing,
grammar, geography, ancient and modern history, composition, bookkeeping,
philosophy, rhetoric, meteorology, chemistry, logic, botany, astronomy, Latin,
Greek and Hebrew. “On the subject of agriculture he had studied deeply, and was
frequently called on by Agricultural Societies to address the Agricultural
Fairs…and he diffused much intelligence among the people.” (p.18,
Friendship’s Offering: A Sketch of the Life of Dr. John M. Peck by John
Reynolds) How could one person have such a range of educational disciplines? It
wasn’t yet the age of academic specialization, so perhaps this might have been
more commonplace in the early 1800’s. But it represents his broad range of
interests.
In reading Peck’s book, Guide to Immigrants,
I was amazed at his impressive grasp of this region to which he had been called.
He understood the geography, the topography, the natural resources. He taught me
about the land in which I was raised 100 years later.
“(B)eing something considerably more than a scholar
by vocation, being, like so many others in the pragmatically-oriented educated
class in America, a creator of a new culture, Peck was also a builder of
institutions...”
Peck was progressive. He taught women in his day
school. He opened a day school for African Americans. He worked tirelessly
against the spread of slavery. He helped build a foundation for public
education, starting day schools and critiquing the destitute practices of
frontier education. He objected to campground religion and emotional revivalism
and promoted a progressive vision of the church in society. As a social
progressive, he believed that America was destined to become a “city on the
hill.”
A pastor of our church, Jeremiah B. Jeter, said,
“Mr. Peck was a Western man. He moved to the West while young; and his
tastes, manners, habits and modes of thinking and speaking were formed there…
Mr. Peck was not only a pioneer, but a master-spirit among the pioneers. Perhaps
no man of the class did more to guide the thoughts, mould the manners, and form
the institutions of the West. He was the embodiment of Western character…” (From
the introduction to The Memoir of John Mason Peck)
Peck lived in an extraordinary time. Never before
had a nation “purchased” a tract of land as the Louisiana Purchase. Today, we
would have justice concerns about the disregard for Native Americans represented
in this transfer, but undeniably, the American nation doubled in size, from the
Mississippi River to the Rockies, from Mexico to Canada. When John Mason Peck
set foot in the capitol of the former northern Louisiana Territory, St. Louis
was truly the “Gateway to the West.” But, in point of fact, states just to the
east of the Mississippi River were to a slightly lesser extent, untamed and
unsettled. St. Louis was not at the edge but the center of Peck’s missionary
enterprise. What was occurring in Peck’s lifetime was one of the largest human
migrations in history. Europeans from the East Coast and the Continent were to
answer the call of the American frontier, and Peck was there to help shape this
new civilization.
His vision was as big as the events swirling around
him. The Westward Expansion called for visionaries to see in it the capacity to
change the nation. Peck didn’t simply call for implanting coastal culture into
the West. He felt the West had traits that would also shape the nation. He was a
people’s theologian, a people’s sociologist, a builder of a new society. “Peck
knew that he was pressed forward, chosen by God, to do a great work.”
John Mason Peck was “nothing less than a forerunner
of the social gospel in America. . .(P)eople like Peck, with their positive
vision of God’s work in the new ‘Promised Land’ provided the necessary
foundation for social gospel realism.” The Baptist theologian who was to put the
largest imprint upon the social gospel was Walter Rauschenbusch who came to fame
50 years after Peck. Peck and Rauschenbusch left an indelible mark upon
progressive Baptists.
-- Stephen Jones
(Quotations in this article are from The
American Baptist Quarterly, September 1984, article by Paul M. Harrison, and
Mr. Harrison’s introduction to The Memoir of John Mason Peck.)
WEEKLY ACTIVITIES
Sun 8:45 a.m. Adult Choir Rehearsal in Sanctuary
9:15 a.m. Classes
for Children, youth and adults
10:30 a.m. Worship in the
Sanctuary
11:30 a.m. Coffee
Fellowship
Mon 7:00 p.m. Obsessive-Compulsive Group in
Community Room
Tue 1st and 3rd 10:00 am, American Baptist Women's
Ministries
6:30 pm Adult Children of Alcoholics in Community
Room
Wed 7:00 p.m. Choir Rehearsal
SPECIAL ACTIVITIES
Mar 01 Yard work at Second beginning 7:30 a.m.
Talent Show,
6:30 p.m.
Mar 05 Second serves lunch at Friendship International
Mar 08 Area 5 Annual Gathering, KC, MO
Mar 09 Daylight Savings Time begins; Set your clocks
forward
Mar 10 Book group meets, 2 p.m., Community Room
Mar 16 Palm Sunday
Mar 17 Council meeting, 6:15 p.m.
Mar 20 Maundy Thursday Agape Meal and Service of
Darkness, 6:00 p.m.
Mar 21 Good Friday
Requiem
Concert, 8:00 p.m.
Mar 23 Easter: Sunrise Service, 7:30 a.m., Breakfast,
Sunday School, 9:15 a.m., Worship 10:30 a.m., Easter Egg Hunt
Mar 30 Harris-Stowe University Choir Concert, 5 p.m.
