Brothers and sisters in Christ,

As you must know by now, Sonoma County has issued a shelter in place order for all residents of Sonoma County for the next three weeks. This is being done to slow the spread of the Corona Virus and to help protect those who are most vulnerable to its effects. This is a lawful order by the authorities, and any violation is considered to be a misdemeanor and is punishable by a citation and fine. How are we as Christians to respond? We are to  obey the leaders that God has placed over us and submit to them. Therefore, our church, Christian Family Fellowship, has cancelled all gatherings and meetings until this order is lifted. We are encouraging all of our members to comply with the order out of obedience to Christ and out of love for our neighbors. The current order will last until April 7^th, but it may be extended beyond that date.

We will not be able to assemble together during this time, and we will miss the gathered assembly of the saints! We can still individually spend time in prayer, in God’s Word, in worship and in reaching out to others by phone, text or email. Pastor Steve will be available at the church office during our normal office hours, 9:00 am until noon, for prayer, for counseling, or for access to our food pantry. Please let us know if you have any needs that we can help with?

We also encourage you to set aside time on the Lord’s Day to worship in your home. We are not set up for live streaming, but several of our sister churches are, and you are welcome to watch their services. We also have years of past sermons available to you. Sermons can be found on our web page, Spotify, Sermon Audio or most other podcast player apps. We would encourage you to listen to any sermons you have missed, or to any that you thought were particularly impactful upon you. God’s holy Word does not get old, and we pray that these messages will continue to impact many.

Please take time to pray for our church and for all the true churches that are being impacted by this unprecedented situation.  We also want to encourage you to find a way to continue to financially support our church. Canceling our Sunday worship services doesn’t mean you can’t continue to give your tithes and offerings to support the work of Christ’s church. While the usual activities at the church will be affected, we still need to keep the lights on and the bills paid as we continue to meet the spiritual and material needs of our church family and community.

I want to encourage you to give faithfully, as you have been each week. You can give to CFF electronically by clicking here. You can also mail your offerings or drop them off at the church. A full list of giving options can be found on our giving page. Even with the unsettled financial picture, it remains vital to continue to offer our first and best joyfully to God and trust in his promise, found in Malachi 3:10, to, “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.”

In addition, we know that many of our members may be financially impacted by the shelter in place orders, so we also need to be mindful of our responsibility to help our brothers and sisters who have needs. So, prayerfully consider what you might be able to do in helping others.

Your Pastors, Elders and Deacons will be keeping in touch with all of you to encourage you and assess any needs that you may have. We will also keep you updated as to the prayer need of our church family. We encourage you to use the time that we are apart to press into God and to use the means of grace that we have been given to grow in grace and knowledge, to be further conformed to the image of Christ our Lord. May God bless us as we trust in Him during this time!

Pastor Steve Wadleigh