[Insert cliché New Years title here]

Hey everyone!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season! I was able to take some vacation time over the break... Christmas totally crept up on me this year because school let out so late (my life still operates on the high school system! sheesh!) but it was great to squeeze in some last minute baking before the big day. I had a great time celebrating with both sides of my family over Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. New Years was also nice and low-key and relaxing. Overall it was a great break!

I'm back in the office as of today... and I'm so thankful I don't have to worry about Sunday School this week! Everything stars back up next week, starting with youth and iConnect (and all of Bethany's other Friday night programs) on Jan. 11 and Sunday School on Jan. 13.

For youth Sunday school, we will be spending January finishing up our unit on what it means to be made in God's image, focusing specifically on worship and evangelism. In February, we will move into what sin is and after that, Jesus' life, teachings, death and resurrection, and what that means for us. We always start at 10am but hot drinks and cookies are available at 9:45 in the Attic!

For iConnect Sunday school, they will begin with a New Testament overview before moving into a unit on who Jesus is (including his life, teachings, death, etc. - similar to youth!). That will take the group into March when they will begin studying the early church and the model it sets for us as modern Christians. Preteens are welcome to join us for hot drinks and cookies in the Attic before their class starts at 10am in the Upper Room!


For youth on Jan. 11, we're doing "TBA Night." In December we hadn't chosen an event yet so I simply advertised it as TBA and joked that maybe TBA should stand for some sort of event... so now it does! We will be doing a "Totally Bossin' Awesome" night of game show games! We'll plan some games based on popular game shows, so bring your friends cause there will be lots of prizes! Concession will be open too.

For iConnect on Jan. 11, Peter is planning The Amazing Race! It was one of the most popular events last year so we thought it would be fun to brighten up such a dark month with a big event. Bring friends! There will be prizes for the winners!


Well, that's all I have to say about the New Year. No lame jokes from me... for once!