2026 Worship Services
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Easter Sunday, April 5, 2026
Resurrection…Now What Do We Do?
Early on the first day of the week, the disciples of Jesus went to the tomb
where he had been buried only to find that the stone had been rolled away and the tomb was empty.
where he had been buried only to find that the stone had been rolled away and the tomb was empty.
SCRIPTURE: Psalm 118: 1-2, 14-24 (NRSVue); Matthew 28: 1-10 (NRSVue)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Kathie Metz, Guest Organist
- Nancy Janson, Liturgist
- Donna Benson, Children’s Message
Palm Sunday, March 29, 2026
The Other Way
Today our worship series theme about journey takes on a very literal journey for Jesus. It likely felt like both the end and the beginning. Such are so many moments of our lives. A pilgrimage may reach its destination but the hope, the wisdom, the lessons learned along the way have offered a new starting point for us.
What have we learned and what transformation–what “other way”–are we called to in the name of right relationship in our lives?
SCRIPTURE: Matthew 21: 1-11; Luke 19: 39-40; Philippians 2: 5-11; Matthew 26: 14-25, 30-39 Matthew 27: 27-37, 45-54
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Rosemary Sutter, Guest Organist
- Jan Petrosh, Liturgist
- Tainya Clarke, Children’s Message
Sunday, March 22, 2026
The Free Way
Our worship series leads us along the path of our faith journey in a way that leads to new life in Jesus Christ, the message of Easter that we move towards. New paths are possible through freedom in Christ. And these ways can be made plain before us if we have eyes to see. Yes, we will strain against adversity–such is life. We don’t reach Easter until we’ve been through the agony of Holy Week that will soon be upon us. But new paths are always possible. New horizons are ours through relationship with God and with each other. There will be both stumbling blocks and stepping stones along the way. But God is our rock and our redeemer–God is with us in our every step.
SCRIPTURE: Isaiah 43: 16-19; Philippians 3: 12-14 (NRSVUE)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Jane Ohlmacher, Guest Organist
- Susan Mascaro, Liturgist
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Children’s Message
- Mary Anne Espenshade, Recorder
- Eric Swartz, Recorder
Sunday, March 15, 2026
The Way Home
We continue our worship series that invites us to contemplate our journeys in life. Yet even in the midst of journeys, we never lose a desire for “home.” No matter what we call “home” in this physical world, we yearn for a spiritual home within that offers serenity, acceptance, and belonging without question. The extravagant acceptance of the father for the son in Jesus’ parable of the wandering son is difficult for us to believe sometimes–that no matter what we have done, who we are, how far we are from what we want to become, we are welcomed home by the Loving Parent.
SCRIPTURE: Psalm 25:4-10; Luke 15: 11b-32 (NRSVUE)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Jane Ohlmacher, Guest Organist
- Mary Anne Espenshade, Liturgist
- Edie Candee, Children’s Message
- Laural Clark, Handbell Director
- Saint James Handbell Choir
Sunday, March 8, 2026
The Way Around
In our series about this journey called life, we focus today on how the journey changes us. This can lead to not always being understood. Jesus found this out as he pushed against the status quo of his day leading to a fair amount of rejection. Close family, friends and neighbors may cling to an idea of who we are and cannot imagine we have grown beyond that identity. And likewise, we may do the same to them. We are called to move ahead and do what we feel called to do, claiming who we know we are, taking the way around what others think we ought to do and be. And we offer the same steadfast love and encouragement to others.
SCRIPTURE: Psalm 32: 1-11; Luke 13: 31-34 (NRSVUE)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Rosemary L. Sutter, Guest Organist
- Jan Petrosh, Liturgist
- Tainya Clarke, Children’s Message
- Saint James Chancel Choir
Sunday, March 1, 2026
The High Way
Today, we continue our worship series called “The Way” that invites us to a spiritual journey during this season. Today we come to the table to be sustained for the road ahead. In our society, we are taught that everything costs. But our ways are not God’s ways, as we will hear in scripture. We are all invited to the table of Jesus without price. This is the abundance of God’s grace. This is the higher way that we are invited to embody for the sake of the world. The “rich food” that we are invited to partake is the richness of life when all have enough–not simply to survive–but to thrive. Hospitality is the way–even though we do not agree on everything, we are still one family at one table.
SCRIPTURE: Psalm 37: 23-34 (NRSVUE), Isaiah 55:1-9 (NRSVUE)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Rosemary L. Sutter, Guest Organist
- Nancy Janson, Liturgist
- Donna Benson, Children’s Message
- Saint James Chancel Choir
Sunday, February 22, 2026
The Wandering Way
Today we begin a new worship series called “The Way.” Making intentional journeys has been a ritual of humankind across time and traditions. Inspired by passages in the scriptures that talk about the journeys, roads and pathways of life, we will make our way together through this time. The popular and poignant movie, The Way, about a father’s pilgrimage in honor of his late son on the famed Camino de Santiago in France and Spain, accompanies us as our modern-day inspiration to live the life we’ve been given to the fullest.
Jesus went on a pilgrimage into the wilderness after his baptism by John in the Jordan River. A common practice among spiritual leaders of his day, this was a time to dig deep into the humanity of his soul. Along the way he encounters what we all encounter along the paths of life–temptations to stray from the path that God has intended for us. But “all who wander are not lost,” as the saying goes, for it is in the wandering often that we find our true selves.
SCRIPTURE: Ps 1; Luke 3: 21; Luke 4: 1-13 (NRSVue)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Erik Matson, Guest Organist
- Jan Petrosh, Liturgist
- Tainya Clarke, Children’s Message
- Saint James Chancel Choir
Sunday, February 15, 2026
Glory Revealed
The Transfiguration is a foretaste of the glory of Resurrection, a revelation of Jesus’ divinity that has been hidden and demonstrates the union of full humanity and full divinity in the person of Jesus.
SCRIPTURE: Exodus 24: 12-18, Matthew 17: 1-9 (NRSVue)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Jane Ohlmacher, Guest Pianist
- Edie Candee, Liturgist
- Donna Benson, Children’s Message
- Laural Clark, Handbell Choir Director
- Saint James Chancel Choir
- Saint James Handbell Choir
Sunday, February 8, 2026
Call to Action
Last week, we explored how Micah helps us discern whether we are aligned with God’s call to live with justice, mercy, and humility. This week, Isaiah calls us to action.
SCRIPTURE: Isaiah 58: 1-12 (NRSVue)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell,
- Pastor Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Clarice Snyder, Organist/Pianist
- Mary Anne Espenshade, Liturgist
- Anaya Alexander, Children’s Message Chancel Choir
Sunday, February 1, 2026
What Is Good
“What does the LORD require of you but to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God?” (Micah 6:8)
SCRIPTURE: Micah 6: 1-8 (NRSVue)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Clarice Snyder, Organist/Pianist
- Nancy Janson, Liturgist
- Jelinda Blum, Children’s Message
Sunday, January 25, 2026
Carrying the Light
SCRIPTURE: Psalm 27: 1, 4-9; Matthew 4: 12-23 (NRSVue)
The light has come. We’ve received the light and the call to bear the light to all the nations. We quickly discover that carrying the light doesn’t get rid of fear. But, as the psalmist demonstrates this week, the light does show us how to not let fear control us but to meet fear with love and finding our refuge in God.
9:30 am – Online Worship in the Sanctuary
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Clarice Snyder, Organist/Pianist
- Susan Mascaro, Liturgist
- Tainya Clarke, Children’s Message
Sunday, January 18, 2026
Give You As a Light
As we move deeper into the season after Epiphany, we continue to explore the glory God reveals among us. While we often emphasize Jesus as the revelation of God’s glory, this week’s Old Testament reading from Isaiah 49 invites us to consider how God reveals glory through us, God’s servants.
SCRIPTURE: Isaiah 49- 1-7; John 1: 29-42 (NRSVue)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
Special Notice: Because of renovation work being done in the sanctuary, the service was held in the Fellowship Hall.
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Clarice Snyder, Organist/Pianist
- Jan Petrosh, Liturgist
- Edie Candee, Children’s Message
- Laural Clark, Handbell Director
- Saint James Handbell Choir
Sunday, January 11, 2026
Signs and Powers
SCRIPTURE: Isaiah 42: 1-9; Matthew 3: 13-17 (NRSVue)
Today we are centering the worship service around the connection between Jesus’ baptism, our baptisms, and our baptismal identity as the Body of Christ. Baptism is about initiation into community with God and one another, and Jesus shows us the way into this community through his baptism.
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Clarice Snyder, Organist/Pianist
- Beth Shipley, Liturgist
- Donna Benson, Children’s Message
Sunday, January 4, 2026
Seeing the Light
SCRIPTURE: Isaiah 60: 1-6; Matthew 2: 1-12 (NRSVue)
9:30 am – Live and Online Worship in the Sanctuary
10:30 am – Friendship Time
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Pastor
- Kelli Young, Director of Music Ministry
- Clarice Snyder, Organist/Pianist
- Edie Candee, Liturgist
- Rev. Patricia Abell, Children’s Message