Lent, Holy Week and Easter Sunday
Go deep for Lent!
Pick up complimentary Lent Devotional “Into the Deep” at worship or in the JPW Library. Mirroring the 2025 General Synod theme, “Into the Deep,” our 2025 Lent Devotional invites reflection on God’s mysterious depths.
As Mary Luti writes in the introduction, “God inhabits the depths of life, love, loss, ecstasy, and pain, God dwells in the profundities of prayer, in sighs too deep for words. God loves the deep.”
What courage, what faith, what reckoning, what wonder might find us as we go deep into God’s depths this Lent?
Easter Donations for Easter Lily and Organ & Carillon:
This is a wonderful opportunity to make a donation in honor of, or in memory of, a loved one! Easter Lily and Organ & Carillon donations can be made online HERE. Click HERE for a printable form and return it to the church office with your payment. If you wish to have your donation listed in the Sunday Bulletin, please make your donation by Sunday, April 15. If you have any questions, please contact Bethany at office.manager@whfirstchurch.org or 860-233-9605.
Join us for a Pancake Lunch on Sunday March 2
Lent begins next week and we will kick off the season with pancakes on Sunday, March 2 at 11:15. This pancake lunch will start right after worship and is for everyone and will include gluten free options. Traditionally, this is a Shrove Tuesday (March 4 this year), aka Fat Tuesday “feast” the day before Ash Wednesday, but we are making it more accessible to all by having it on Sunday.
Following worship on Sunday, join the Inreach Team and Faith Formation in the auditorium for pancakes, sausage, fruit and beverages.
We will have a Mardi Gras theme, so plan on wearing colorful outfits, put on your beaded necklaces, eat pancakes and goof off with us as we get ready for the beginning of Lent. Mardi Gras is French for “Fat Tuesday,” reflecting the practice of the last night of consuming rich, fatty foods in preparation for the Christian fasting season of Lent, during which the consumption of such foods is avoided.
Ash Wednesday Service
Wednesday March 5
The Lenten journey begins this week. We’ll take our first steps toward the old rugged cross on Ash Wednesday — March 5th — at 6:00 p.m. in the chapel. This 30-minute contemplative service includes sacred music, a brief pastoral reflection, candle lighting, and imposition of ashes.
Yours in Christ,
Rev. Fredd
First Sunday in Lent
Sunday, March 9 – 10 a.m. Worship Service
Open Chapel
The Spirit Team is pleased to once again offer Open Chapel during Lent. This is an opportunity to rest and quietly reflect in the sacred space of the First Church Chapel. You are welcome to drop by for any part of the hour. We hope that you will find peace.
Wednesday, March 12, 12-1 pm
Wednesday, March 19, 5-6 pm
Wednesday, March 26, 12-1 pm
Sunday, April 6, 5-6 pm
Friday, April 18, 12-1 pm
Lenten Wednesdays Together
Wednesdays at 6 p.m. beginning March 12th through April 16th | Come to one or All
Fellowship Room (Rm. 303)
With Rev. Laurie Andersen, curator and facilitator
During the sacred season of Lent, we’ll gather midweek to create a safe space to welcome feelings of worry and prayers of any kind and let the liturgical rhythms guide us in the Way of the Cross. Rev. Laurie Andersen invites you into a quiet prayerful space where you can share or just listen and receive (light refreshments served). Come and see where the Spirit takes us.
Lenten Book Study
Thursday afternoons at 1 p.m. (hybrid)
March 13, 20, 27
April 3, 10, 17
Join JPW Library Director Jennifer deSimas Thursday afternoons in March and April for a Lenten book study. Using short videos and readings from Dr. Amy-Jill Levine’s 2021 book, Witness at the Cross: A Beginner’s Guide to Holy Friday, we will explore the events of Holy Friday.
“Levine takes us by the hand and walks with us through the story of Jesus’s last day, pausing alongside each of the characters to see and hear and feel how they individually experienced it, how each was affected by it. This is not just a fresh retelling of the Crucifixion narrative; it is a remarkably personal immersion and participation in the narrative. Levine breaks open new dimensions and possibilities of the story’s meaning for all of us” (review).
Free program; please REGISTER HERE.
Second Sunday in Lent
Sunday, March 16– 10 a.m. Worship Service
Third Sunday in Lent
Sunday, March 23 – 10 a.m. Worship Service
Fourth Sunday in Lent
Sunday, March 30 – 10 a.m. Worship Service, “Soup & Sharing” at 11:15 a.m.
Fifth Sunday in Lent
Sunday, April 6 – 10 a.m. Worship Service
Palm Sunday
Sunday, April 13 – 10 a.m. Worship Service with music and palm fronds
Good Friday
Friday April 18 – Info to come for “Do Good Friday”
Easter Sunday
Sunday, April 20 – 10 a.m. Worship Service featuring a brass quintet