It is our utter delight to announce that THIS SUNDAY Vineyard Anaheim will be livestreaming online and re-gathering for in-person services. We now have permission from the governor to gather in person at 25% capacity. The number of COVID infections is trending downwards, and we sense that this is the right time to explore regathering safely.
Your safety is a high priority and so in order to continue to keep our community as safe as we can, and to honor our medical professionals and our city without becoming a burden to them, we will be maintaining social distancing guidelines. We can all play our part…please read to the end to see how.
• Please register online before you attend. This way, you will be assigned specific parking, a designated entrance into the building, and seating in the sanctuary. After the service, you’ll head back to your car the same way you entered the building.
• You’ll have your temperature taken at the door before you’re allowed to come inside, at which point social distancing will be observed. That means, just for now, no hugging. But you can chat with people outside of your household if you stand at least 6 feet apart.
• Masks must be worn at all times inside the building - even when seated. If you don’t have a face mask, free disposable face masks will be made available to you.
As we are all aware, it’s much more difficult for kids to operate within these guidelines than responsible adults. With that in mind, we will not be allowing children in the sanctuary (unless they are nursing infants), and our childrens’ ministry (preschool and elementary school environments) won’t be available this month as we need a little more time to gather volunteers who feel safe in larger settings. We are so sorry for the extra wait for families, but we hope to be up and running again in March, and will keep you up to date as soon as we know exactly when that will be.
Our middle school and high school environments will start this Sunday with the same protocols in place as the main sanctuary. You can register below.
We understand some of you may wish to gather with us but maybe don’t yet feel safe meeting indoors, you have the option to sign up for an outdoor cluster. We will have socially distanced tables where you can meet with others and watch the service on a large screen together. There will also be time at the end of the service for prayer. And of course, we will continue to livestream our services, so that if you don’t quite feel ready to jump back into in-person services, you can continue to connect and feel very much part of our church family.
There’s no doubt regathering in person is going to look and feel different. We are still operating with restrictions in place. At the moment, singing out loud during the service is not yet permitted - but we sense an opportunity to learn some new ways of offering our hearts to Jesus while this guideline is in place. We expect the Lord to come in deeper ways than we’ve ever experienced. We might never get the opportunity again in our lifetime to bring an offering to the Lord that costs us quite like this. There is gold in this moment because of these restrictions that we get to turn into the offering that we set on the altar before the Lord. Which is exactly why the posture of honor matters so very much as we regather. And all of Heaven is watching.
Let’s make it count...
We can hardly wait to see you again. We love you Vineyard Anaheim!!!
Alan and Kathryn