Our daughter and son in law brought our new granddaughter Hannah Marie Thormes to visit us over the weekend, Above is one of the pictures we took.





Twenty two Presbyteries have sent the same overture to the General Assembly to eliminate the following paragraph from our Book Of Order.

b. Those who are called to office in the church are to lead a life in obedience to Scripture and in conformity to the historic confessional standards of the church. Among these standards is the requirement to live either in fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman (W-4.9001), or chastity in singleness. Persons refusing to repent of any self-acknowledged practice which the confessions call sin shall not be ordained and/or installed as deacons, elders, or ministers of the Word and Sacrament.

Each Presbytery has appointed an Overture Advocate to represent their Presbytery. All 22 of us have been collaborating to make the most convincing presentation to the committee considering our overture. In the process of this collaboration we have sent the group collectively over 500 email messages. We have had three conference calls, each around 2 hours in length. The last of these calls was this morning.

The committee is allowing three minutes per person, as of this morning three of the 22 of us will take their three minutes personally, one is uncertain, and the rest of us will make a joint presentation not to exceed 54 minutes. At this point I have been tentatively selected to be one of a half a dozen speakers who will present out joint presentation to the committee. One of the things I will be doing will be to share a little about Keith and the incredible contribution he has made to our congregation. I raise the question whether he is not a person called and gifted by God for ministry as a deacon, and if so should the session have refrained from ordaining him because he is gay.