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What makes a great celebration?

How you answer that likely depends on how you like to celebrate and what you are celebrating, but perhaps there are some common ingredients we can find despite our different personalities. Here are some suggestions. Feel free to e-mail jon@covenantchurch.ca with your own ideas for what ingredients are a part of a great celebration!

  1. People - A great celebration needs people. And not just any people . . . others who are also into the celebration. Have you ever accomplished something you were sooooo excited about and turned to celebrate with someone only to find no one there? Or worse, someone's been there who couldn't care less about your achievement? Nothing sucks the life out of a celebration more. Compare that to a graduation where everyone is engaged and excited. Or a parade after a team wins a championship when everyone who comes out is focused on celebrating the same thing. The excitement is incredible and the celebration is amazing!
  2. Place - The right kind of setting really helps a celebration to come alive. The place also creates the kind of ambiance that fits the specific celebration. A royal wedding at Westminster Abbey has the tone of the occasion set by the magnificence of the building. If everything was the same except the wedding was held in a conference centre, the celebration wouldn't be the same. By contrast, a kid's birthday party at Chuck E Cheese is in a place that helps that celebration come alive . . . perhaps more alive than we parents can handle!
  3. Music - I cannot think of a celebration where there isn't music. (Feel free to correct me!) Pomp and circumstance at a graduation. The wedding march at a wedding. The NCAA basketball tournament concluding with a video montage set to One Shining Moment. Sometimes it is background music. Sometimes it is an entire stadium full of people singing Sweet Caroline. Whatever it is, most celebrations have music.
  4. Food - A wedding without a reception of some kind? A birthday party without cake? A Superbowl party without pizza and wings? An animal activist party without tofu? All good celebrations have food as a part of it. And what kind of food and how it is served plays a role in the celebration being exactly what it was meant to be.

What's the point of this??? To encourage you to come to our Summer Celebration on September 2nd! It will be a celebration!

It will be a gathering of amazing people (especially if you are there) thanking God for his blessings during the summer - even if one of the greatest blessings was the ability to persevere - and looking forward to what is to come for us.

The place will be outside on the side lawn of our building. As an outdoor service - weather permitting - we embrace a relaxed vibe and let our hair down a bit. We'll have some games and after our main gathering, you can enjoy the inflatables!!

The music for this celebration will be music we'll all participate in. This celebration is about us singing, not just listening to people at the front. So we'll have song sheets available and we invite everyone to lend their voice to make the music special.

Finally . . . the food. We can't forget the food! This is something we participate in together, too. Volunteers will prepare burgers and sausages and corn. We invite you to bring a salad and/or dessert to share. These events are always amazing when it comes to the food you make! (Don't forget to bring reusable plates and cutlery to eat it with and save on the disposable dishes.)

Of course, the final thing a celebration needs is a reason for celebration. That one is simple. We are a family brought together by an unimaginably good and loving God. That's really what we are celebrating!

So plan to come and invite your friends to join us on Sunday. Everyone is welcome. Let's make this celebration a really special one!