Saturday, September 6

Littleton 300th Anniversary Parade 10AM Start at St. Anne’s and will then proceed

down King St through the common to IBM.

There are 100 participating floats including our

church – featuring Mosby!

The Parade Grandstand

will be in our parking lot!

We will have tables set up with activities for

all: There'll be free face painting and children's

crafts, and free popcorn and water bottles for

everyone who stops by. In honor of Mosby, our

ministry dog, we will offer a pet stop stocked

with doggie treats and water bowls.

Please gather with us on the lawn as we

celebrate with the town. There are over 200

entries in the parade – so it’s one that you don’t

want to miss!

The celebration will continue: 3:00-10:00

Entertainment and Fireworks at Nashoba

Valley Ski area – Live music with Littleton

Bands together featuring the Bare Hill Band,

Loose Connection and The Concord Band.

Sunday, September 14

RALLY DAY!

You’ve heard of Flat Stanley?

9AM Well this will be the

church year of “Flat” Jesus.

Well…maybe we will need

another name! Join us on Rally

Day as we will make “flat”

Jesus’ as we begin an adventure

with him throughout the year.

Also a Mission Moment: Bring your pennies as we

will count and roll ALL the pennies we have been

gathering for the past two years for the ABC Children

In Poverty initiative.

On Rally Day Sunday September 14 (10AM) we are blessed to have Rev. Dr. Ken Downes

with us in the pulpit celebrating the 300th

Anniversary of the town of Littleton as well as

the past and future ministry of First Baptist

Church. His sermon that morning is “Endings,

Wilderness, Promised Land” (Remembering and

Celebrating the Creativity of the Wilderness

Journey) (More on Ken inside)

Saturday, Sept 27

An Evening of Music and Memories

All members and friends, adults and children of

First Baptist Church Littleton are invited to An

Evening of Music and Memories on

Saturday, September 27th. This is our

opportunity to celebrate the ministry of Pastor

Debbie. As Debbie prepares to complete her 15

year ministry with us at FBC please join us for

dinner and a time of music and sharing of

memories. Dinner will be served at 5:00. The

Program will begin at 6:30. Save the date. More

details to follow

First Baptist Church, Littleton

“Journeying to God’s Sacred Beat”

Fall 2014

Pastoral Daze

“I promise to love

and be with you

as we journey and

minister together in

the years ahead.”

I clearly remember

saying this promise

to you, the church,

after I was voted in

as the full time

pastor in the year 2000. Now, in 2014, as I

prepare to leave at the end of September, I

am full of gratitude for the love and ministry

that we have shared with one another.

My feelings of gratitude extend back to the

year 1998-1999 when I was the part time

Minister of Christian Education and it also

includes 1999-2000 when I was the interim

pastor. What a privilege to have worked in a

church with a group of people who were

always open to the new ways that God might

be at work in our world!

Isaiah 43:19 comes to my mind when I think

of my work at FBC Littleton and I sense that

it is true for the church today, as it enters a

new chapter in its long history: “See, I am

doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do

you not perceive it?” (NIV)

These are just a few of my favorite things:

The Music

This church was a place where I was able to

integrate my musical training and gifts into

ministry. I was able to sing, play my flute,

organize musicals with the children, play my

guitar and lead singing on retreats at

Oceanwood, Grotonwood, and Pilgrim Pines.

It was a great musical joy to have For Higher

with us twice a month during these same

years. They brought great energy to worship

with us AND we made two CDs while I was

here! Do you remember: I Just Want To Be

A Sheep and Songs from Littleton to the

Newborn King with Rossyl Lashley on

piano?

We hosted three benefit concerts with Ronnie

Earl & the Broadcasters; one that also

included For Higher and Geoffrey Hicks.

Those concerts benefited hurricane relief

work and our trip to Louisiana as well as

towards the homeless shelter in Lowell. We

also had a few gospel Sundays that included

a great Dixieland band and friends. Some of

those moments are still on YouTube for

others to enjoy:

https://www.youtube.com/user/pastordeb48/v

ideos

I was blessed to be a part of great music

ministry teams which included everyone in

the choir and the bell choirs as well as

Juanita Tsu, Rossyl Lashley, Sandy Wright,

Carol Hayward, Dell Smart, Ronnie Horvath,

and Anne Lee Ellis. Working for over nine

years with Cindy and Steve Hudson has been

a deep joy as both they and their music

touched my heart and made me smile! Their

musical offerings on Sunday morning seem

to reach right into my soul and touch places

that needed hope and inspiration. I either had

my eyes closed when Cindy played the organ

or I found myself looking out at those of you

being held by the music. Often I made eye

and heart contact with Lois Melillo who

enthusiastically loved and publically

expressed her joy for our music ministry. The

Holy Spirit is strong in the flow of the music

at First Baptist Littleton. I pray that FBC

Littleton will continue to sing and to soar.

The Animals

We love animals at FBC! Remember the

living nativities we had on the side of the

church during the Town Tree lightings? For

a number of years we had sheep and a

donkey joining the costumed children. We

have had had bunnies in worship as well as

the great array of creatures from the Creature

Teacher on Children’s Day a few years ago.

I will always remember the great crowd we

had that day who gave their undivided and

rapt attention to our animal guests. That was

fun and it was my favorite Children’s Day

ever! Well – wait – this past years’ program

was amazing and “happy” as well.

And of course what a blessing it is to have

Mosby MacFisher here as part of our

ministry. He has ministered to all of us at one

time or another and he wouldn’t let me forget

that he was featured on CBS after we

welcomed their crew here to film and follow

him. People love animals and I pray that

FBC Littleton will continue love the animals

in the lives of those who come to worship.

Children and Christmas

I loved and will always cherish working with

children, youth and families of all sizes. I

pray that no one may be turned away. I loved

teaching, singing, playing with sand, using

play dough, crayons, visiting newborns in

the hospital and performing baby

dedications. I was privileged to give many

children Bibles, perform Baptisms and honor

them when they graduated. I enjoyed doing

the Scout program God and Me/God and

Faith with our young scouts. I visited many

of our children and youth at soccer fields,

basketball games, drama and musical

productions, and recitals. I loved Christmas

here at First Baptist Church including the

Teddy Bear Tree, Christmas pageants, the

Christmas open house, Gingerbread House

contests and the sanctuary during Advent

with the Hope, Peace, Joy and Love banner

that softened

our hearts and

slowed us

down

throughout the

season. I

cherish our

Vacation Bible Schools that we shared with

the other town churches, our children’s

musicals and mission projects including trips

to Heifer Project Farm in Rutland MA

(remember Jasmine the Camel?) and making

meals for the Lowell Transitional Center. I

am SO grateful for all of the Children’s

stories that either I or you offered so

creatively over the years. I pray that God

will continue to speak in love through you to

all the little children of the world.

Learning and Growing

We didn’t hesitate to do things differently

and we enhanced our mission in tangible

ways such as giving away the beautiful

scripture soap made by Caroline Poser for

Easter services and other special events. We

journeyed through a season of Lent

artistically which resulted in a beautiful Holy

Week devotional and video. We had Gospel

Sundays with a Dixie Land jazz band and

some great preaching! We had our Teddy

Bear Christmas Tree, creative children’s

stories with puppets, water, Bunsen burners,

telescopes and fire. We have had a plethora

of adult education opportunities over the

many years including a parenting STEP

program, the ALPHA program, Kerygma

Bible Studies, What’s So Amazing Bout

Grace?, Women of the Word by Joyce Reed,

The Gospel According to the Simpsons, Say

Yes to Grace, and Pathways to Science on

Religion and Science. I preached, you

preached, we all preached together. I shared,

you shared, and we all shared together. I

served, you served and we all served

together. I pray that FBC Littleton may

continue to learn, grow and serve.

Pastoral

One of the most public

activities we do is worship

together. I was looking

back on all the sermons I

did over these 15 years

and I am SO grateful that I

could preach creatively.

Here are a few of my favorite sermons:

Y2KYnt2Wrry—from1999 on the

upcoming end of the world.

Yes!—on the power of positive thinking.

Road Trips and Rest Areas—a story

sermon about my drive down and back to

the National Cathedral in DC.

Voice from the Pews—a story sermon

from the voices of people sitting in the

pews.

Scratches, Patches and Scars—a story

sermon on my doctor’s canoe trip.

The Button Box—a story sermon on

grace about my grandmother and

mother’s button box and the always

present small white buttons that are still

in there.

The Melting Pot—a detailed story

sermon on a fondue dinner experience at

the Melting Pot Restaurant.

The Cookie Story—a Christmas story

sermon from the pages of my old Betty

Crocker cookbook.

Interior Decorating —a Christmas

sermon on the preparation we do for our

inner life.

Love Like That—a story sermon on an

imaginary neighbor and her family.

Horton Hears a Who—a sermon

ending with a Zacchaeus in the Sycamore

tree rhyme that my daughter Sarah helped

me compose.

Animal, Vegetable Miracle—on eating

local and peach fuzz.

Home and Homelessness—a sermon I

preached with my mother following the

Ronnie Earl concert for the homeless

shelter in Lowell.

My sermons on Rev. Dr Martin Luther

King’s sermons of which there were ten.

Wow, so many sermons! I had to stop

compiling my list because there were so

many that I loved. They were really a part of

me, which I think, is why I would get a bit

emotional at the end of them.

The mostly private or more personal parts of

ministry work are times of visiting people at

their home, in the hospital, in the middle of

the night, praying before surgeries, and

performing funerals for our beloved friends.

Those intimate types of ministry moments

were gifts that helped me grow in faith and

taught me to keep trusting in the Lord and

live each 24 hour day to the best of my

ability.

You were also pastoral in how you

ministered to Eddie and I in 2009 when he

successfully fought through Stage Four

tongue cancer. You didn’t give up on me

when there were times in my life that were

difficult and for that Eddie and I will always

be grateful. You ministered to us and were

with us in prayer, in service, in love and in

laughter. It is with deepest gratitude and

humility that I give thanks to God for all of

you. I love you and will continue to love

you. I pray that FBC Littleton will continue

to minster in public and personal ways as

Jesus called all of us to do when he taught us

the greatest commandment to “love God with

all of our being and to love our neighbor as

ourselves.” The sanctuary is now graced with

a new banner calling all who come and go to

live that commandment out every day.

With gratitude, and thanksgiving.

Love,

Pastor Debbie

A look back ~

MORE on Ken Downes (continued from front)

Here is a little about Ken for those of you who

don’t know him:

It is difficult to define the professional resume of

the Rev. Dr. Ken Downes because it varies from

hour to hour. Upon completion of his

educational training in 1986, he was in full-time

church leadership (including service at the First

Baptist Church of Littleton from 1991-1999).

From 1999 to the present, Ken dramatically

diversified his portfolio to include stay-at-home

Dad, building contractor, interim minister at 5

congregations, professional vocalist, transition

management consultant, pastoral

psychotherapist, baseball coach, and office

manager for his wife’s elder law practice. When

he is not doing one of these things he is either

planning or pursuing his love of travel. Ask him

about his recent trip to Newfoundland or

upcoming trips to Uruguay and the Dominican

Republic.

On Rally Day For Higher will be with us well. Please

join us at 9AM for Rally day fun and 10AM for

worship!

Prayer retreat October 4

with Rev. Dr. Ken Whitt

Staying with the Anniversary and the Ken theme

on Saturday morning October 4 Rev. Dr. Ken

Whitt will lead a prayer retreat at the home of

Carol and Dick Huebner from 9AM – 12PM and

will preach on Sunday October 5 for worship

at 10AM. Please sign up on the Kiosk for the

prayer retreat entitled “Listening to God.”

Ken shares this about the morning:

"God can and does instruct us by communicating

with us. The experience of humanity throughout

centuries of encounters with God confirms tis in

a multitude of times in a vast richness of ways.

Preeminent among these ways is Jesus, the

logos, the living word and the written word, the

Bible. What we know from the spiritual

experience of the Prophet Elijah, for example, is

that the "still small voice," the inner voice of the

spirit listening to God, is the most common

personal way God speaks to us.

Last year Ken published his book Halfway to

Heaven – which is available in the office for

purchase and on Amazon.com!

Churches of Littleton Open House

October 5 2:00-4:00: Learn about the history

and legacy of the churches in Littleton – First

Church Unitarian, The Congregational Church,

The First Baptist Church, Saint Anne Parish

Catholic Church, The Littleton Ward of the Church

of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Women's Ministry Calendar

2014 - 2015

October 19: Les Miserables, 2:00 PM –

Mt. Wachusett Community College

January 11: Epiphany Party, Yankee Swap

and Secret Pal

March: TBA

May 17: Concord River Cruise and Lunch

Les Miserables October 19

Sign up deadline: September 21! We will be

having a sandwich lunch at church and then

carpooling to Mt. Wachusett Community

College in Gardner, Mass. to see their production

of Les Miserables. The show starts at 2:00 PM

and costs $18.00. Please sign up on the kiosk in

Fellowship Hall by September 21 in order to be

able to purchase tickets. Money is due to Anne

Lee on or before Oct. 12.

Sunday school Halloween Party

October 25: 6:00 PM. Come enjoy pizza and

treats and have fun at the Halloween Party.

Wear your costumes. $2.00 donation to help

cover the cost of the pizza suggested.

Holiday Fair November 22

The church will again hold its annual Fall

Holiday Fair on Sat., Nov. 22, 2014 from 9:00 to

3:00. Volunteers needed! We need help to set

up and clean up, bake, bake, bake, supply

auction items, work the kitchen for breakfast

and/or lunch. If you are able to help out with

this event please speak to Anne Lee.

Looking Ahead/Mark your Calendar

Cookie Decorating Open House Dec. 7: For the past few years we have opened

up our church to the public, after the town tree

lighting ceremony. We offer a place to warm

up with cookie decorating for the kids and hot

chocolate for all. Can you help out with this

evening by helping set up, clean up or providing

cookies, frosting or decorations? Many hands

make light work.

3rd Annual Talent Show

January 10, 2015: This event is so much

fun! Start thinking now about what kind of

wonderful act you are going to do for our

talent show and pot luck supper - We have so

much talent!

3rd Annual Family Retreat

January 30 thru February 1: 3rd Annual

Family Retreat at Pilgrim Pines Camping and

Conference Center in Swanzey, NH. Those

who have attended have enjoyed great fun,

fellowship and food. The 3 F's.

Mission Project On November 2 the children will

be learning about the story of the

Loaves and Fishes. In conjunction with this story

we will be helping out Kylee's Kare Kits for Kids.

In September 2012, at the age of 10, Kylee

McCumber started Kylee's Kare Kits for Kidz in

Leominster to help children who did not have

enough food at home on the weekends. They are

currently providing food to 150 children on a

weekly basis. We will be excepting food donations

and cash to help Kylee out with her mission project.

Suggested food donations: 100% juice boxes,

boxes of mac & cheese, individual fruit cups or

apple sauce, granola bars, cheese or peanut butter

crackers, small cans chef Boyardee pasta, individual

veggies and dip or fruit and dip, anything that is

healthy that children would like. Help our Sunday

school children find out how wonderful it is to

GIVE.

A Message from TABCOM The staff of TABCOM and Grotonwood and

Oceanwood send their most sincere

appreciation for the support our church

provides through its Mission Budget. Along

with that gratitude is an invitation to come to

the camps or TABCOM events any time and

see first-hand how that support is being used.

Rise to the Challenge with International

Ministries

This year the World Mission Offering will be

received throughout October. It takes

prayerful visioning, planning and partnering

to send the right missionary or development

worker for the right task to be effective in

meeting a country's spiritual needs. With our

church’s help through the WMO that’s what

International Ministries does - year after year

- all over the world. International Ministries

partners and projects depend on our gifts to

the WMO! Our gifts directly support the

entire network of IM missionaries, staff,

projects and partners in 70 countries around

the world! Pray for them! Through our gifts,

we are helping to grow and sustain workers

around the world. Rise to the

Challenge. Please give generously to this

important offering.

~~

Search Committee: I will be forming a Search

Committee for our new pastor. The committee will

consist of 9 members of the church family. We

strongly encourage that at least one member of the

committee be from the Senior High Class. .There

will probably be some travel involved, as well as,

meetings. A sincere commitment is necessary to

make as many of the meetings as possible. If you

are interested in being on the search committee

please email me, Charlie Ellis, Moderator at

charlieandannelee@gmail.com.

Boy to the World!

Coffee Talk

By Caroline Poser

Savor (almost) Every Moment

In all your ways acknowledge him, and he

will make straight your paths. ~Proverbs 3:6

"Basket of wild blackberries" by Gandydancer*

Imagine the Air Jordan logo. Now imagine it

rotated 90 degrees to the right. That was me

standing in front of the blackberry bush,

except I wasn’t doing anything with a

basketball. I was reaching to pick berries

from a cluster on an out-of-the-way branch,

bracing myself against the barbs that

threatened to disrupt my almost-precarious

balance, lest I drop the container of already-

picked berries that I held in my other

outstretched hand. The sweet smell of the

leaves and grasses and marshy foliage

reminded me of picking blackberries during

my childhood.

None of my boys wanted to go blackberry

picking with me because “no offense, mom,

but It’s kind of a girl thing,” so after I

dropped my younger two off at camp, I hit

the berry patch. I was alone with my

thoughts. I’d left my phone in the car, so I

wasn’t distracted by any of the beeping,

jingling or pinging notifications that

represented my personal sliver of the 15

petabytes of new information that is created

daily, worldwide, according to the

presentation I’d just watched.

I remembered the first time I picked

blackberries. We had moved from Rhode

Island to a new house in Massachusetts

during the middle of my 7th grade year. At

first, I hated everything about moving and

the new house, but when summer came and

the blackberry bush blossomed, my

appreciation for the new house budded. My

love for baking originated with learning to

make blackberry pie, from scratch, all by

myself (much to my mother’s chagrin, since

it was something she’d hoped to pass on to

me). I’d said “No thanks,” and cracked open

“The Joy of Cooking,” which since that time,

has been my kitchen bible.

Without my phone, things were a lot quieter.

I could mostly enjoy those moments in time,

without my attention being divided by

exponential numbers of noisy bits and bytes.

I tried not to worry about what anyone would

think if I didn’t answer them right away. The

sun shone down on me and the sweet berries

that I popped in my mouth almost as often as

I dropped them in my container.

Savor every moment, I thought, as I enjoyed

another blackberry. This was something

people had told me about parenting. “It goes

by so fast,” meaning childhood. And I

suppose it does. My oldest was at overnight

camp for a week. It wasn’t the first time he’s

been away from home for that long, but it

was the first time he took off with his friends

and didn’t look back.

I wondered how my own mom felt when I

spent the entire summer after 8th grade in

Maine with a friend on her grandmother’s

rural 500 acre property – and I do mean rural:

the closest post office was in the next town,

six miles away; we had no electricity or

running water; I don’t even remember if they

had a landline phone. Back then I don’t think

there was such a thing as answering

machines, never mind the idea of carrying a

phone around in your pocket 24/7.

I thought about how fleeting my boys’

childhoods are. My middle son just became a

teenager. My baby is halfway to 18. Had I

been “savoring” enough?

Pffft, I thought as I put a whole handful of

blackberries into my mouth. You can’t savor

everything. I certainly didn’t appreciate

watching countless episodes of “Bob the

Builder”; I did not cherish cutting up kid

food served on plastic plates, and then eating

the leftovers; and I certainly did not relish

changing diapers for nearly a decade. When

my kids were younger, there were times that

I counted down the hours – then minutes – to

bedtime.

The buzzing insect circling my head

reminded me that there are lot of unsavory

things about blackberry picking, too, such as

thorns, spiders, bees, and mosquitoes (and

according to all the friends I’d invited to

come with me but had declined, poison ivy,

ticks, and bears, however I have yet to

encounter any of those). You just have to

accept the fact that sometimes you’re going

to encounter berries that have bird poop, little

white webs, or bug nibbles on the – and be

sure to avoid the ones on the low branches

because that’s where dogs pee. But overall,

berry picking is an awesome thing.

I was more wistful than insulted that my son

“disappeared” at camp, because I know that

is how it is supposed to be. I’m now at the

stage where I’m counting down the minutes

until I can go pick my older two up at the

movies or a party. They are forging their own

paths, like I did with the pie recipe I chose. It

wasn’t until years later that we discovered

why my crust was the new family favorite – I

had picked a completely different recipe than

my mom used.

I shoved aside thoughts about my looming

meetings and to-dos and the fact that I was

completely out of reach. The ongoing digital

distraction of TMI these days can be

extremely unsavory. The season is so short

and the blackberries won’t be here for very

long. I quit picking when I figured I’d

collected just enough blackberries to make a

pie. I remembered when I was a kid the

anticipation of the finished pie coming out of

the oven, and how hard it was to wait for it to

cool before it was cut. And then all too

quickly, it would be nothing but a memory.

My oldest will be starting high school this

fall, and then it won’t be long before I watch

him drive off for the first time in the family

car, counting down the minutes until he’s

home safe.

I emerged from the berry patch mostly

unscathed (except for a few bug bites and

scratches), which is how I hope to emerge

from child-rearing (except for a few gray

hairs and worry lines).

Author Bio: The mother of three sons,

Caroline Poser lives with her family in

Groton. www.CarolinePoser.com.

~~ Basket of Blackberries: "Basket of wild

blackberries" by Gandydancer Own work.

Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-

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First Baptist Church of Littleton P.O. Box 156 Littleton, MA 01460-0156 Phone: 978-486-4660 Email: office@fbclittleton.org Website: www.fbclittleton.org