Dear family,
A very blessed Lunar New Year to you and your loved ones! We are in the season of celebration, feasting and reunions but this year, Lunar New Year doesn’t really feel like Lunar New Year. Annual rituals of gathering with family and friends are replaced with zoom meetings and much smaller gatherings, and even tossing the lohei doesn’t feel the same. The festive atmosphere is muted.
For some of us, this feeling is amplified. Some have lost loved ones over the past year, some have had their lives changed by the economic situation, and some have not been able to see their family and loved ones face to face for close to a year.
Most of us will still be celebrating Lunar New Year with our immediate family, but for some of our church siblings – especially those whose family are not here in Singapore – festive seasons can be a lonely time.
As a church family, we can’t have our usual reunion lunch as we have had in previous years, but we felt it is important to do something for our siblings who are not able to celebrate the new year with their families. After all, we are family – Jesus said, “whoever does the will of God is my brother, my sister, my mother.” (Mark 3:35)
While many of you cannot participate in hosting the lunch, we would like to invite you to consider contributing a love gift this Sunday to help pay for the lunch. After all, it would be quite odd to have our siblings pay for the lunch we invited them to. It would be a way of expressing our love for them.
It may be that things are different this Lunar New Year – but some things can and should remain the same. The spirit of celebration, hospitality, generosity and love can still be present even as we find different ways to express them.
We will still be worshipping together this Sunday at our usual service time. Come join us this Lunar New Year Sunday as we revisit Jesus’ radical definition of what it means to be family.
Wishing you all a happy Lunar New Year!
With love,
Miak and Pauline