In collaboration with the Champaign Park District, ESC and Children, Youth, and Family Ministry will spread mulch and spruce up Westside Park located in downtown Champaign on June 15, 2013.  This event is being planned to help prepare Westside Park for the Taste of Champaign. For more information check out the poster below.

Have you ever wanted to try ringing handbells?  Now is the time!  Throughout the Summer, ringers of all levels will join together weekly to learn or review the basics and play fun, easy music.  Ringing in a handbell choir is a unique musical experience since it is truly one big instrument played by multiple people.  The fellowship that flows from this cooperation is perhaps the greatest blessing participants receive.  I encourage everyone to come and give it a shot regardless of musical background.  Beginners will learn from patient teachers, while more experienced players provide support and/or try out advanced techniques in a low pressure environment.  Please join us Wednesdays at 6:00-7:00pm in the bell room behind the sanctuary.  Contact Karin Vermillion with questions- karinvermillion@gmail.com

Linda Valentine, the Executive Director, General Assembly Mission Council, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) visited our church and spoke during our International Potluck as part of Mission Celebration Week. In her weekly email she highlighted FPCC:

More fruit of our international mission work

At First Presbyterian Church of Champaign (IL), a congregation deeply engaged in mission, I witnessed another fruit of our international mission work. Not only does First Presbyterian have an active mission partnership with sister congregations in the Presbyterian-Reformed Church in Cuba, it has also welcomed immigrants from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cameroon, and Togo into its membership. Church members have started English as a Second Language (ESL) classes for their new neighbors and members as they prayerfully learn to become a multicultural congregation. 

A key question that has persisted for centuries—and faces church and society in new and challenging ways—is the lawyer's question of Jesus: "Who is my neighbor?" In answering that question in its own context, First Presbyterian is being transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit. Just as the service and witness of Presbyterian mission workers helped to grow Christ’s church in Korea, so have the seeds planted generations ago in Africa by Presbyterian mission workers brought forth marvelous fruits here, continually enriching our lives in Christ.

Photos taken by Jim Berger. To visit our full Photo Gallery please click here.