MARCH-APRIL 2012

HARVESTS

We had two harvest-thanksgiving programs during the period. The first was at Six Roads on March 18 and we had a little over a hundred out for the event. We had a lot of competition as all the churches in the area as well as some of our other churches also had harvests the same evening.

The program featured recitations by the Sunday School children and then we had a number of selections by the combined adult choir. The program finished off with a play by the youth centered around the Parable of the Banquet in Luke. It was entitled “What’s Your Excuse?” It was presented in three scenes. The first featured a home in Barbados and a zealous young man inviting his family to the harvest program but they all came up with some excuse or another for not going. The second scene was a household in Haiti still suffering from the effects of the earthquake and cholera but they are excited when they are invited to go to Church the next morning and they get ready extra early only to arrive and find the church already full. The third scene was the parable from scripture where the master prepared a feast and when the feast was ready all the invited guests came up with one excuse or another – I bought land, 5 yoke of oxen and just got married and we are told the master sent his servant to the poor, lame and crippled and invited them to the banquet. In the end the youth all called out different excuses and one asked the audience “What’s your excuse?” and then they all said “You can’t fool God”.
After the service people bought the produce and prepared items that were donated to help raise funds for the congregation.

The Grazettes harvest came up on April 1. The harvest consisted of presentations by the Sunday School and Women’s Fellowship, mostly in song. Then we had the combined choir and the youth play presented again. We had a great crowd of over 115 out for the occasion. We held it again in what would be the bottom floor parking area in the building because the Sunday School area where we normally hold services now could not hold the crowd. Everyone had an enjoyable time.

EASTER ACTIVITIES…

We had a fairly good Resurrection time at the churches. We had Good Friday Services at Six Roads at 10 a.m. and Grazettes at 11 a.m. The services were fairly well attended. We then had a Youth Group sponsored Easter Fish Fry on Good Friday Evening. We had two major problems. First, we had a problem getting fresh fish. This has been one of the worse years in living memory for fish, especially flying fish. At this time normally flying fish would be selling at 100 for $25-35, but they were selling at 100 for $80-90. The other larger fish which normally sells for $4.50/pound was near $10/pound. We had to settle for using salted cod and we fried Bajan Fish cakes. This is close to what you would call “hush puppies” in the U.S. but we have more fish in them. Then we did not have as big a crowd as we would have liked. However, we did have a good night and those who came enjoyed themselves.

Easter Sunday had moderate attendances at both congregations. For some reason we don’t attract the crowds that you do in the U.S. for the Easter services. Then in the evening we had an “Upper Room” service and this also did not attract to big a crowd.

On Easter Monday which is a public holiday here also we had over 100 for the combined Church Sports. We had four teams (Houses) and we had a keen competition with only around 60 points separating the lowest from the highest team. The team sports like tug-of-war, Water Bottle Relay and the regular relays were keenly contested.