By Elizabeth Corbett, Programs & Membership Coordinator
I hope everyone had good holidays and you’re ready for the new year. I listened to a podcast last week and in it the host was talking about the futility of New Year’s Resolutions. You know…common resolutions such as “I want to eat more healthy food” or “I want to enjoy the outdoors more” are routinely abandoned pretty quickly. This speaker suggested instead the idea of a theme: generosity, reading, risk-taking, travel, or new starts. A theme gives a person lots of room for exploration and latitude (and even for failure) that a strict resolution doesn’t (for example, with the theme of reading, one could explore all sorts of history books, realize she likes architecture blogs, or write a children’s book). I’ve had both successes and failures with resolutions over the years, but this year I am definitely giving a theme a go. I’ve yet to decide on a theme. An idea for you: what theme would be appropriate for Westside? Send me your ideas (and reasons for choosing the theme) at (see directory for contact info).
And, I suggest you take a look at our president’s blog from the end of December. In it, Barry details so many improvements over the past year at Westside. He mentions the new Justice and Generosity initiative; for the first three months of 2025, our partner is The Bottom, a Black-owned center in Knoxville that offers so much support to the community with poetry readings, sewing classes, a thriving book store, and many more things (see their website here). I hope to attend a meeting with the folks at the Bottom soon to learn about their projects for 2025, and I’ll know more after that about how we can specifically support something they do. And I think someone from the Bottom will visit us one Sunday in February to share more. Stay tuned!
Westside might also have the opportunity to become involved with Family Promise again. For many years before COVID, we served as a host church with families staying at Westside for a week three or four times a year. We planned dinners, provided entertainment or children’s activities in the evening, spent the night, and saw everyone off to work or school in the morning. And we had lots of help from Farragut Presbyterian and Grigsby Chapel Methodist as support churches to complete all the tasks! Now we’ve been asked to serve as a support church to First Farragut United Methodist for 2025–the Board is considering this opportunity, but we’d like to know if you are interested in helping us help First Farragut. If you are, you can sign the interest sheet at the back of the church on Sunday or contact me. This is a great chance for Westside to (once again) live out its values!
Please consider volunteering at Westside in the next few weeks–Westside can always use greeters, coffee hosts, and safety coordinators. And if you have other questions or suggestions, email me at (see directory for contact information). Looking forward to talking with you.
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