February 2021

My Dear Bethany family,

While the church calendar calls this Ordinary Time, it seems

as though times are never ordinary.  This year we can feel a

sense of the newness and promise of 2021 as we have just

celebrated the coming of a new administration in our national

government and the hopes of positive change on the horizon. 

We lift our prayers for unity and equity for members of society,

and the possibility of finally beating this pandemic and finally

getting to enjoy physical contact with our friends and loved

ones, and activities that allow us to be full members of society

again.   This is an important time in the church because we are positioned to bring about some of the positive change ahead of us in the country. 

People of faith have a great opportunity to use our love of God, our lives of faith, our joys and disappointments, our heartaches and hopes to find a place to be part of all that there is to do.  This is a time for us to reflect on who we are in relation to God, as individuals and as a community of faith locally.  Our faith calls us to work for justice in all forms, toward equity, fairness, and unity.  Let us be unsatisfied with only breathing a sigh of relief at what has past and move also with purposeful strides toward a common goal. 

Our Lenten study this season is a chance for us to begin some of that reflection by providing a place and time for us to give thought to some of our thoughts about God.  Who are we and who is God?  What kind of relationship do we share with God?  How does God’s grace and love help us to feel empowered and supported in what we do?

The season of Lent has historically always been a time of preparation in the church.  In early centuries it was a time for preparation for baptism, a time of preparation for church membership, a time of preparation before a commitment.  My hope is that we have a chance to look inward and discover new strengths that have been made visible during these last many months of trial.  We can be assured that this difficult time and the challenges we are still living with are tempering us into more faithful servants of God, with as yet unknown skills and insights.

Faithfully yours, Pastor Deb

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January 2021

My Dear Bethany family,

As the sun cycles the earth, the calendar turns over to another year, and the liturgical cycles continue, we have a lot to be thankful for. 2020 has had its major challenges certainly. COVID-19 has been the biggest challenge by far. Only 10 weeks of worship in the sanctuary in person, left us with 42 weeks of creatively managing to present worship on Facebook and outside twice. Easter and Christmas, adult ed classes and coffee hour are just not the same through a screen. I have dearly missed all of the in person meetings I had hoped to have in your homes or favorite coffee shops that I planned for my first year.

While it is nice to have personalized “pastor deb” notecards, they were never meant to replace seeing you face to face. When the weather is nice, my patio makes a great guest space. A goal for 2021 is for me to reach out more to those of you who are not equipped to join us via technology. I am with you at heart – I would prefer less electronic bytes, and more chocolate bites between us.  None of this however has fazed the life spirit that exists at Bethany. Without all of beloved celebrations that we missed this year, like the tea and the thanksgiving meal, the pride parade, and others, we still found ways to be community. We still collect for the shelter, we have partnered with IPB to help them through their congregational struggles by donating food and other items, and lots and lots of toys and gift cards for their families for Christmas, as well as creating a further partnership with the San Bruno shelter through a Presbytery grant that will help them to grow and fulfill some of their most creative dreams. We have not let the difficulties of 2020 stop the fierce giving that we know how to do! Our little free library, the cleanup of some bushes, and the cleanup of one corner of our parking lot by selling the container and cleaning up some debris, our curb appeal is getting stronger and stronger. By finishing the year with advent packets for families, classes, reading books on line and beautiful luminaries we have ended the year with great vibrancy.

I couldn’t help but feel a very meaningful visual sign of hope for the coming year as I watched the shimmering giant star that our luminaries created.  

Lastly, I cannot thank you enough for the support, joy, love and friendship you have given me this year.  I am humbled and happy to know each of you. Thank you so much for you!

Blessings, Pastor Deb

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March 2021

Our Palm Sunday on March 28th will also be Passion Sunday, in order to be sure to make that very statement. The crowds did celebrate and sing Hallelujah! at Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. And some in that same crowd yelled Crucify him! While we know that we look forward to the celebration of Easter it is important to take this time during Lent to remember what Jesus went through to bring us to the joy of his resurrection. He resisted, persisted, chased after justice and taught a gospel of life for the least of these. He was a threat to the empire that only sought its own desires. Jesus turned the world upside down and startled the status quo to such a degree that the powers that be killed him. Our Lenten study provides us a time to look at the language we use in our faith, the vocabulary of faith, to discover who we think God is, to consider who we see ourselves as being, and look at God in action in our experiences, ultimately as we do in community.

I am writing this just a few days before our annual congregational meeting where we will present the budget for 2021 and the annual report for 2020. Sadly 2020 was not the year we could have ever prepared for. As a result, we have suffered significant social losses that we sorely miss by not being able to see and hug and laugh and cry and sing and worship together. We were not able to have any of the social functions that bring our Bethany community together and provide us with so much. Despite that, I hope you are as pleasantly surprised as I was to read our entire 2020 Annual Report, and realize just how much we have done and how we have been inventive about being together however we can. Seeing all of our activity all at once in one place in this report was so inspiring. Don’t forget to send any comments, (compliments!) suggestions and questions to me at dmcguire@bethanypcusa.org before the 28th so that I can compile them to be read and addressed at our meeting. It can get a little complicated on Zoom, to have spontaneous conversations like we might have in person. Having what we can in advance will help address that. Of course, we hope everyone will join us at that congregational meeting and ask anything then also.

Faithfully yours, Pastor Deb

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April 2021

My Dear Bethany family,

Christ is Risen!  He is Risen indeed!  Easter will be upon us before we know it. 

I wonder what the resurrection has in store for us?  We are promised new life

in Christ and this year we sure could use it.  I feel very hopeful these days. 

With vaccines doing their part we have some hope for getting ahead of the

pandemic.  I pray we all still show some restraint as we give in to the spring

fever and freedom that vaccines represent.  We will need to remain diligent

about masking and hand washing and distancing for some time in order to

prevent the need for another shut down and shelter in place.  We are so close

now.  I look forward to gathering outside for some casual gatherings as the

weather improves even as it is a little too soon to go back to worshipping in

person inside the church.  There are many ways we can see each other for

social activities.  I look forward to hearing your ideas too!

Let’s enjoy the entrance of spring!

Faithfully yours, Pastor Deb

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May 2021

My Dear Bethany family,

Welcome to May – already! As I received my second dose of the vaccine today, I felt a stronger sense of hope than I have felt for a while. A bunch of us took a group photo today on my patio at home and laughed about how sincerely we were all smiling but no one would be able to tell by looking at the photo! It will be nice to see people’s faces from chin to forehead someday.

As the church leadership continues discussions about exactly when we will see each other’s full face in person at services, we have decided to begin with plans for outdoor services first. On May 30th, June 27th, and August 1st we will have our 10am Sunday worship services outdoors. This way we will all be able to see each other in

right in.

Keep the faith! I feel sure that soon we will be saying “Come on in, the water’s fine!”

Blessings, Pastor Deb

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person, and be able to experience the joy of three-dimensional fellowship a few times in a row, so we can offer each of you to choose one date or all three to test out your own feelings about gathering in person. It seems ironic to be welcoming a return to some kind of normalcy and at the same time be even more anxious about re-entering the world. It may be ironic but it is to be expected. Getting out of a rabbit hole is just as difficult as having gotten into the rabbit hole! I can appreciate any struggles each of us experiences to take steps at our own pace. Having three chances to come to church in person gives us a chance to put a toe in the water without pressure to dive

June 2021

To some, summer is baseball!! To some, summer is daisies!!  The beach, a road trip, time away from the every day routine.  Weddings, travel, long warm nights, people making plans!  Here at Bethany we will spend the summer months planning for our opening for in-person worship in September.  Memorial Day weekend coming up will be our first of three in-person outdoor worship services.  I am so excited to see people in person.  We won’t know the vaccination status of everyone there so we will remain masked and distanced.  But we hope more and more people are comfortable coming to worship with us in the safety of outdoors.  We on the broadcast team will be so happy to see more faces and a live group to present worship with.  If you have been worshiping online with us, you can tell how much fun we are having.  The only thing missing is the rest of you.

My hope for the summer is that I will be able to have some face to face visits with people as outdoors becomes an option.  Let’s find some creative ways to be together.  Do you miss church?  Come on up to the building and we can sit in the garden.  Do you have a great outdoor area near home?  Let’s sit out and have a chat.  Do you need to talk about anything of concern, of joy, something on your mind.  How are you?  Let’s talk!

What is the church’s phone number anyway? Here you are: 650-589-3711.

Blessings, Pastor Deb

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July 2021

This month is often filled with celebrations that include picnics, parades, band concerts in the park, barbecues, family, and fireworks! If you play the piccolo, your brain begins to hear the big solo from “Stars & Stripes Forever” starting in June and you’re ready to go.

Then, there’s the next 27 days of July.

If you’re like me, your mind has been filled with pandemic questions, safety, vaccinations yay/nay, protection after vaccination, etc. for way too long. It has been exhausting and it hasn’t gone away even though we are heading in a good direction. We’re on the cusp of coming out. As hopeful as that is, it is still tiring to be concerned about the same subject. Many of us have been blessed enough to not have been affected by the loss of a loved one or the loss of our livelihood to COVID. Even so, we have all been affected permanently.

When I think about what is next for our world, our country, our community, I feel like we are about to open a door. One door feels like a place of welcome to a new comfortable world. Another door feels like it’s opening into something dark and foreboding. Some of us have a choice about what is next, which door to choose, but not everyone. It’s important to remember that we all don’t feel the same at the same time. I want to encourage us to keep realistic expectations of ourselves, and especially for those around us. Those that we know and those that we don’t know. We can do that best by not holding on to old assumptions, not judging others for the way they feel, and being willing to listen to the changed hearts of everyone we meet. All of us have been changed in deeply personal ways.

We can be gentle. We can listen more than we speak. We can offer grace more than condemnation. We have been given as much by Christ who loves us all.

Let’s talk! 650-589-3711

Pastor Deb

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August 2021

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Welcome to August, a week late! My letter this month comes in the second newsletter of the month instead of the first because I was away last week. It turns out it was a good idea to write this letter this week instead of the week before I left because I feel so lovely and reflective right now.

I was away because I went on study leave, on a spiritual retreat at the Mercy Center, in Burlingame. I was disappointed just before I left home by a letter from the Mercy Center welcoming me to the group retreat I signed up for. I thought I had signed up for a private silent retreat, where I would be free from clocks except for meal times, free from words in any form, and from people! But as Craig said to me just before I left, I could consider that the time might just be a different kind of great than anything I had planned.

What helpful words. As it turned out there were 18 people signed up for a silent Ignatian Retreat. We would meet once a day as a group and have one meeting a day with our spiritual director. With not much scheduled after all, and no big group events to speak of, it turned out to be exactly what Craig said – a different kind of great.

I can’t thank you enough for granting me this time for renewal. There is true Joy (just like you folks talked so beautifully about last Sunday) when we are given the chance to be deeply in conversation with God. There’s no telling where God will take us. As silly as I love to be, I also find personal deep conversations with all of you so humbling and beautiful. Let me know what’s on your mind. Anytime.

Let’s talk! 650-589-3711

Pastor Deb

September 2021

moment to mark the presence of God in all of the cycles of our lives. What a powerful reminder of God in all.

For us at Bethany, September this year marks the time when we will make our best faith efforts to return safely to in-person worship in our beautiful sanctuary. The session and the worship committee chose this day in September hoping that it was far enough away from the worst of the pandemic in our area, that we would know more and feel safer. While we do know more, and in many ways we are safer with vaccines, we are completely aware of the new anxiety from the delta variant. We acknowledge that we are not at the end of the pandemic. We do not want to open, only to have to close again later.

With that in mind, the session met in person Monday night and had a heartfelt and thorough discussion about our opening day plans. We have decided to go ahead and open on September 12th with the fullest safety measures in place, knowing that we are small enough to be able to socially distance, we are loving enough to keep each other safe by honoring and respecting the safety needs of others.

We will be requiring proof of vaccination status, the sanctuary is deep cleaned once each week, and all doors will be open for ventilation. We will all wear masks and all eating and milling about will be outdoors. We will still have a camera filming the front of the sanctuary for Facebook Live each week so folks can still see the service on-line, although our focus will be on worshipping together in the room. For confidentiality purposes no congregation members will be on camera unless they are participating in a portion of the service in the front of the room.

Whether it’s the year 5782 on the Jewish calendar, or the year 2021; whether you’re returning to a new adventure in schooling; whether you’re returning to the workplace in person, or special groups or classes in person, or staying put indoors for a while longer, we hope you can find some way to celebrate another “beginning...” in which God is created something brand new.

Don’t forget, let’s talk! 650-589-3711

Blessings,

Pastor Deb

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"In the beginning..."

Scripture tells us that beginnings matter. The book of Genesis, and the Gospel of John, both begin with the words, “In the beginning...”

There are a lot of beginnings going around right now. For example, did you know that the two highest holy days in Judaism are in September? The Jewish New Year begins with Rosh Hashanah on September 5/6. We might say “Shanah tovah,” or “good year” for Rosh Hashanah. These holy days begin a 10-day period of repentance and prayer which ends on Yom Kippur. Faithful will often  

spend the day before Yom Kippur making phone calls offering amends to any they may have pained. Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, is considered the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. It is spent in prayer, meditation and fasting in order to start the new year with a fresh beginning. Unlike our New Year and its boisterous flavor, “Happy Yom Kippur” wouldn’t exactly be the thing to say!

September is the beginning of a new school year. And what a new year

of school this will be for so many. Our hearts are with the teachers and the students and the parents as they take on yet another uncertain new time. September is also the beginning of Fall. New seasons bring another

October 2021

Dear friends,

I write this just after Ellen Kross’s memorial service, a few days before our dear Roberta will attend and participate in her own sister’s memorial, and a week before Freda Lutz’ memorial.  All of this has me thinking about heaven.  I wonder if it really is salted caramel and chocolate?

As a hospice nurse, Tamra must have opportunity to reflect on life and death.  As a hospice chaplain and pastor Ed Kross has had many opportunities to think about life and death.  As a nurse Ellen Kross had probably thought about life and death quite a bit.  All of us have had varying degrees of brushes with death, serious illness, debilitation, and other losses that drastically change one’s life, forever.  Maybe these things happened to us ourselves, or someone we loved or were close to, or to a dear pet.  Maybe once; maybe multiple times.

Death itself is such a paradox.  Time is paradoxical – sometimes even though things seem to happen so fast, each experience seems to move in slow motion.  And vice versa.  Our emotions run in opposite directions simultaneously – we don’t want someone to die but we want their pain to end; death is such an uncomfortable topic and being around people near the end of their lives is not something we do often enough to know what to do or how to feel, and at the same time I know someone who was so excited to see Jesus that she had her daughter bring her balloons to her bedside. 

Memorials are sad events for so many reasons, and yet I felt so much joy mixed in with the sadness today.  Sad for me because I really wish I had known Ellen better.  Joy because the room was simply bursting with the love for Ellen and for Ed and Angela, and for the memories each of you have shared with each other.

I couldn’t even begin to make a list! Joy and thanksgiving for all of the help we had with sound, food, set up, clean up, bringing folks who needed assistance, and the service itself.  As I mentioned today, the relationships at Bethany are long, and deep, and loving.  I have to speak honestly though and say that those relationships were the source of some sadness for me, and maybe a twinge for you too. While this was by no means a long lasting or primary feeling from the day, I want to address it.  When relationships are so deep and have lasted so long, any spoken or unspoken harm can feel like a real betrayal.  While I don’t know specifics or names (and I don’t want to), I do know that in and amongst the beautiful memories you all share, are some painful stories for some of you.  For some the pain is old and forgotten, for some it was triggered today perhaps, and for some there is just confusion.  As we faced each other and recited our beautiful closing benediction, I prayed for hearts to be lifted.  I know they were because I felt it.  I want to address it because I feel as though today was an opportunity for something special. I wonder if you felt that way too? 

In Jesus Christ we know that even though we die, still we live.  It’s true of all parts of our lives.  What love is this that we should all be in one place celebrating the life of a true servant, learning about an even bigger love?

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me.  It is too high, I cannot attain

it.  And yet it is the love that Jesus has for us, poured into our hearts,

that we feel for the other.  If anything in you is broken, let’s figure out

how to repair.  If anything in you is tired, let’s figure out how to rest.  If

anything is joyful in you, let’s talk about that too!  I want to hear how

you feel, about anything, any time.  Whenever you’re ready for a laugh,

a prayer, a loving caring conversation, let’s talk.  The patio is open.

Blessings,

Pastor Deb

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November 2021

Dear friends,

It just does not seem fair that I begin another month’s newsletter with sorrow for another loss of one of our beloved members. You may have heard from your deacon that our lovely Barb Lucas died on Sunday. As of this writing we don’t have a lot of information and we know there is certainly more to say. All of our prayers are with Barb’s family right now, as all of this is very raw.

I’d like to try something a little different in this letter. I am going to invite us to a little bit of inner reflection about those we love. You may be reading this in the body of an email, where you are reading words, followed by more words, followed by more words. I have chosen a graphic for this month’s letter, that I think is lovely. I invite you to gaze on the picture, maybe on a computer, or maybe get a printed copy of this month’s NOV@Bethany. What draws you into the photo? Is there something there that is pleasing? See if you can imagine yourself in the photo. Where would you be? Are you standing or sitting? Maybe you’re lying down on the grass. Are you in the sun? What might you be looking at? It would be great if you could take about five minutes to spend some time in your imagination, inside the photo here, and allow yourself to think of loved ones who are no longer with us on earth. Can you bring that person into the picture with you too? Spend some time together. Take a deep breath.

On the first Sunday in November we will be celebrating All Saints Day. It would be lovely if everyone who wants to, brings in a photo or something that reminds them of one of these saints who live in our hearts. We will collect them all on the communion table where they will be with us as we share the Lord’s Supper together.

On that day, we will have just changed our clocks back. Just two weeks after that we will be enjoying our November 20th Donation Station drive-thru collection day. Followed by Thanksgiving, and then on the 28th we begin Advent already. It’s a whirlwind month, so be gentle with yourselves. We have been through so much. Let each day come in its own time and we will be ready to begin the journey toward the celebration of the birth of our Lord and Savior at just the right time. Together.

As always, let’s talk. 650-589-3711

Pastor Deb

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December 2021

right hand will hold me fast.”

Light is a commodity that often seems in short supply. In those dark times, Psalm 139 reminds us that “even there God’s hand will guide me, God’s right hand will hold me fast.” The darkness that our world, our country, and our communities have been through in times past and in more recent times has been hard, and real, and exhausting.

This time of year is not a time to ignore any of that, or how it makes us feel. But this time of year also grants light to that darkness and is the time when we remember that the love of God and the light of the world was born a babe in a manger. We celebrate the birth of the One who came to bring us the Light that will never dim, will always seek us out, and will always show us the way.

“They looked up and saw a star

Shining in the east beyond them far,

And to the earth it gave great light,

And so it continued both day and night.”

Christmas Blessings,

Pastor Deb

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