Latest UPDATE: 4:53PM | 4.17.2020
Family and friends of Mayfair Bible Church,
The COVID-19 coronavirus crisis is certainly a rapidly evolving situation. Our hearts have been heavy and our minds weary as we’ve weighed every possible scenario, sought the best advice of medical science, and cried out to God for wisdom. We desire to honor our civil leaders for the peace and welfare of our community, as well as care for the safety of the church-flock.
We promised you that we’d make updates as necessary. Please listen carefully to the following:
NOTICE: All worship services will move to LIVE-streaming with only a select group of pastors, leaders, and assistants present at Mayfair.
We joyfully encourage you to participate in watching and engaging with each session in your homes or perhaps with members of your Thrive Group, using wise discretion based on your group leader’s direction.
- The best real-time participation for each LIVE streaming event will be on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Mayfairbible
- Live-streaming is also available on our website: LIVE Stream – Mayfair Bible Church
ENGAGE: We will endeavor to make this as participatory as possible by encouraging all who watch to comment with questions, prayers, verses, and encouragement.
“This is a short-term compromise, not a long-term convenience.” – Dr. Daniel Chin
This decision will remain in-effect through April 30. All regularly scheduled mid-week programs and gatherings at Mayfair are hereby postponed until April 30. We will provide further updates as necessary.
We are not canceling services but rather transitioning to an online format as a short-term compromise to protect and care for our community, not for long-term convenience.
From my heart to your home:*
With the onset of COVID-19 in our state, many people from the Mayfair family will be required to stay at home for an extended period of time. More than ever before, we need each other. Reports of panic attacks, anxiety, spiraling depression, and suicide are on the rise. We, at the highest level, need to give and receive the love of Christ as Mayfair Bible Church.
4 simple action steps WE ALL can take as we move forward together:
(1) CALL six or seven people that you would normally see and check up on them. Be sure to call TWO people that may not be called by others.
(2) Take THREE MINUTES to see if you can give an offering online. There’s a lot of ministry to get done in this time and it would be difficult for churches to try to do more ministry with fewer resources. Click here: https://www.mayfairbible.org/give-online/
(3) Find some worship songs to sing either by yourself or with your small (less than 10) community. And consider stretching outside of your preferred musical comfort zone. I highly recommend searching YouTube for worship music by CityAlight, Sovereign Grace Music, Rend Collective, Andrew Peterson, and Keith and Kristyn Getty. Join together for each live-streaming event at Mayfair Bible Church and engage with comments, questions, verses, and prayers. Let everyone know you are there and that you care. Go here: https://www.facebook.com/Mayfairbible/ or here: https://www.mayfairbible.org/live-stream/ (Sunday 10:45AM and Wednesday 7PM)
(4) Embrace a sense of loss. Believers are meant to meet together. But if wisdom calls us to a season apart, let us mourn our loss, lament for our world, turn to the Lord for a season of prayer and dependence, and look forward to the coming church reunion (including the largest reunion of all— O Come, Lord Jesus.)
*adapted from Pastor Matthew Westerholm
In God’s Vineyard,
Pastor Michael
Friday, 11:53AM | 3.13.2020
As of last night, twelve confirmed cases of COVID-19 (a coronavirus) are reported in Michigan. While these small numbers may seem to pose little threat to us, national and international data points toward a growing, long-term risk of infection.
The elderly and medically fragile are especially among those for whom we must all exercise great caution. After much prayer, research, discussion with medical professionals, and consultation with other area pastors, the following represents our goals and action steps for this coming weekend of mission conference sessions and worship services. Our schedule remains in effect, but all services to live-streaming with only a select team of leaders and pastors. We will provide updates as necessary.
Our Gospel-Centered Goals:
- Act wisely to care for the flock’s safety
- Honor our civil leaders to seek the peace and welfare of our community
- Live by faith not fear; Not fall into panic but remain resolute in hope
- Maintain our religious freedom to freely and safely gather for worship
What We’re Doing
- Live-Streaming all our missions conference sessions: Saturday 7PM, Sunday 9:15AM, Sunday 10:45AM, and Sunday at 6:30PM on Facebook and our site. Go here: https://www.facebook.com/Mayfairbible/ or here: https://www.mayfairbible.org/live-stream/ We will endeavor to make this as participatory as possible by encouraging all who watch to comment with questions, prayers, verses, and encouragement
- Receiving our gift-offerings online or by the other options detailed here: https://www.mayfairbible.org/give-online/
- Sanitizing all door knobs, handles, surfaces, and toys in every room
- Serving of coffee, water, food, or donuts will be offered by volunteers wearing sanitary gloves. Nothing will be self-serve.
- Providing hand-sanitizer in the main foyer and other key areas
- Posting signage to wash hands with warm water and soap in all our bathrooms
- Skipping single cup communion, passing the peace, and the holy kiss. Wait a minute, we don’t do these things anyway.
What We Ask of You*
- Wash your hands often with soap and water or use hand sanitizer, especially after going to the bathroom; before eating; and after blowing your nose, coughing, or sneezing. Say the Lord’s Prayer or sing “Happy Birthday” for 20 seconds while washing. We won’t think you’re crazy.
- Avoid touching your eyes, nose, or mouth with unwashed hands
- Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when coughing or sneezing
- Skip handshakes and hugs
- Avoid contact with sick people
- Stay home if you’re medically fragile, elderly, or sick in any form (fever, chills, sore throat, cough, etc.)
WACSAS.
When someone goes in for the handshake or hug, say “WACSAS.”
When someone forgets to wash their hands, shout, “WACSAS!”
Well, the whole “WACSAS” idea was invented by Pastor Michael. You can take it or leave it.
*Based on information published today by the MDHHS and recommendations from several physicians.
The chart below represents our ongoing action plan. Our community currently remains in the green zone with no confirmed cases reported. But as detailed in the points above, we’ve established preventative measures over-and-above the recommended course of action.
The chart was provided in a recent article (click here) by Dr. Daniel Chin, a physician trained in pulmonary and critical care medicine and epidemiology with 25 years of global public health experience. In 2003, he led much of WHO’s support to China to contain the SARS epidemic.
What We’re Reading
Eight Things the Coronavirus Should Teach Us
This is a really helpful article – written directly from one right in the thick of it (a pastor in Italy). I encourage you to read the entire essay. It’s not long: “Italy currently has the highest reported number of coronavirus cases outside of China: 9,172 cases and 463 deaths. As a result, 60 million people have been told to remain in their homes unless absolutely necessary. How are we, as Christians, to respond to such a crisis? Answer: with faith not fear. We are to look into the eye of the storm and ask, Lord, what are you wanting me to learn through this? How are you seeking to change me? Here are eight things we’d all do well to learn, or relearn, from this coronavirus scare: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/things-coronavirus-teach-us/
I’m an epidemiologist. Here’s what I told my friends about the coronavirus and COVID-19.
Most people (99.8% of the population) are likely not qualified to offer a knowledgeable, medically informed opinion on a wise, proper response to the coronavirus (Covid-19); this unqualified category certainly includes me. But here’s what an epidemiologist wrote today. I find her educated opinion realistic, informed, and well-balanced.
Bottomline? “Wash. Your. Hands. Wash them again.” Here: https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/03/11/epidemiologist-advice-on-how-to-fight-coronavirus-covid-19-column/5012545002/
The FAQs: Coronavirus Explained by an Infectious Disease Expert and Pastor
“Along with being pastor for preaching and vision of the International Baptist Church in Santo Domingo, Dr. Miguel Núñez has practiced medicine in different capacities for more than 35 years. He is board-certified in internal medicine and in infectious diseases. He was also an assistant professor of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine (1989-97) at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center in Englewood, New Jersey. For this reason we contacted him for information related to the current outbreak of coronavirus from the medical point of view and to offer some words of pastoral wisdom.” Here: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/what-we-know-coronavirus/
How DC Churches Responded When the Government Banned Public Gatherings During the Spanish Flu of 1918
“As World War I was coming to a close, still another enemy was making its way toward the nation’s capitol: the Spanish Flu. Between October 1918 and February 1919, an estimated 50,000 cases were reported in the District of Columbia; 3,000 D.C. residents lost their lives.[1] At the peak of the pandemic, the DC government banned all public gatherings, including churches. How Christians responded provides some lessons and principles for responding to similar dilemmas in our own day.” Click here: https://www.9marks.org/article/how-dc-churches-responded-when-the-government-banned-public-gatherings-during-the-spanish-flu-of-1918/
MDHHS Interim Recommendations
Let Us Pray
Above all, let us pray for those already impacted by COVID-19; especially for the physically weak, immunocompromised, and elderly. May we move forward with hearts of compassion and courage. May God give strength and insight to the nurses, doctors, and other medical professionals within our congregation. May God give us wisdom to make informed, faithful decisions in the days ahead regarding this global pandemic.
Soli Deo Gloria.
In God’s Vineyard,
March 13, 2020
Kila response… when I grow up I want to be like you.