That night the Lord appeared to Paul and said, “Be encouraged, Paul. Just as you have been a witness to me here in Jerusalem, you must preach the Good News in Rome as well.” The next morning a group of Jews got together and bound themselves with an oath not to eat or drink until they had killed Paul. There were more than forty of them in the conspiracy. (From Acts, Immerse pg 102)

Do you enjoy a good mystery? What about a story full of intrigue—a heist movie or a Murder Mystery Dinner? Many of us gravitate to this sort of thing, where the truth is deeply buried in layers and must be riddled out and unraveled.

The final chapters of Acts are just such a story. Paul is awaiting trial, and each time a new character or group is introduced, a new perspective is offered—and often, a new deception, a new conspiracy. 

From the perspective of the Jewish and Roman leaders, Paul has spent his life traveling around the world sowing chaos. They want an explanation—but really, they want to be done with him. The plots and machinations grow ever more thrilling and dangerous, and at each step of the way, Paul does not defend himself but preaches the gospel to a VIP list of religious and political leaders. Over and over again Paul uses his time before the world’s most powerful men to decare the name of Jesus. 

The book of Act ends with Paul in prison, in chains, writing letters overflowing with joy. And he couldn’t even see what we know now: his faithfulness resulted in Jesus’ good news passed down for generations, all the way to us today. 

So, what’s the answer to the mystery playing out in these chapters? Turns out, it was God’s hand moving all along. 

Are you able to see God’s hand in the twists and turns in your life?

-Catherine McNiel

Our Ash Wednesday service is March 5 at 6:30 pm. Through worship and the imposition of ashes, this is a service of remembering we are dust and to dust we shall return. This is the start of the Lenten season as we journey with Jesus to the cross. Childcare is available in the nursery. 

Every year the church invites us to mark the 40-day season of Lent until the celebration of the resurrection on Easter Sunday. In Lent, we focus more on confession, repentance from sin, and the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Traditionally, the church invites us to focus on the spiritual practices of fasting, prayer, and almsgiving and to practice these together as a community.

We invite you to journey together through Lent in the following ways.

1. Weekly Communion- Every Sunday in Lent, we will practice confession and observe Holy Communion together.
2. Fasting + Prayer- We are joining with other Covenant churches in our area in a corporate fast on Wednesdays from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm. We will be praying especially for refugees and immigrants in DuPage County, as well as other prayer topics we will send to you each week. 
3. Wednesdays: Praise & Prayer + Soup Supper- light soup supper from 5:30-6:30 pm; service of praise and prayer from 6:30-7:15 pm in the sanctuary.
4. Almsgiving- We encourage you to adopt a charity or missionary to give an extra love offering to during each week in Lent.

Enjoy an evening of fun, fellowship, and good food on Saturday, March 15 at 6:00 pm. The hosts won’t know who’s coming to dinner, the guests won’t know who the other guests will be, and no one will know exactly what’s for dinner!

Read more about how the dinner works.

We are looking for artists who would like to contribute any artwork related to the season of Lent, Holy Week, or Easter. You can submit your artwork proposals by filling out the form below. 

We are looking for volunteers to commit to helping with childcare for some of our special events throughout the year. Please consider helping! We will send out this SignUp Genius several times throughout the year so you have plenty of time to mark your calendars. Contact Pastor Eliza if you have questions.

April 6, 9:15-10:15 am (Congregational Meeting)
April 17, 6:30-7:30 pm (Maundy Thursday Service)
April 18, 6:30-7:30 pm (Good Friday Service)

We are looking for a regular, paid childcare worker for Sunday mornings during worship and could include helping with childcare during ESL classes on Wednesday nights. Maybe you know a neighbor who would be a good fit or have a friend who attends another church with a different worship time! Click on the job description below to learn more. Email questions and inquiries to Pastor Eliza, discipleship@faithecc.org.

Support World Relief as they navigate changes in their funding due to recent executive orders issued by our new administration. These changes impact both the critical services World Relief provides and those helping to provide these services.

Continue to keep their staff and clients in your prayers.

The youth group is raising money to help support World Relief. You can pick up your soup after church on March 9, and we will have extra soup for sale!
Suggested donation of $10/quart.

Beware of emails trying to impersonate our staff. The staff will never email you urgent requests for gifts, money, or our church directory. Our church directory is under secure access through Breeze and should not be shared electronically. Please double-check the email address from which any email is sent and call us directly if you are unsure.

Current Class: CS Lewis 
Teacher: Stephanie Clark

3/2: Voyage of the Dawn Treader
3/9: Till We Have Faces

Next class: Women in Church History with Jessica Johnson

Let us know how we can be praying for you or how God has been answering prayers in your life by clicking on the link below!

Pray requests:

• For my daughter (Sara) and son-in-law to live in GRACE (able to accept disorder) as they moved their family from Minnesota to Arkansas last weekend. For my brother-in-law, Jonathan, who will undergo his 2nd open heart surgery to replace his tissue aortic valve (from 9 years ago) as well as a few more heart "updates," on Tuesday, March 4th. This surgery will take place in Georgia.
• I pray that my brother's birthday goes well and that the Franklins' cat will be okay. - Judah Zboncak
• I pray that our cat is fine. - The Franklin Boys
• Prayers that treatment for my eye condition would work and that I would not lose any more of my vision. In the meantime that I would have peace and courage to trust the Lord's plan. - Carissa King
• Please pray for my 90-year-old mom, Eleanor, as she faces pancreatic cancer. She loves the Lord, and is well cared for. - Marie Allison
• For my knee to be healed. - Abbie Beck
• Recovery and comfort for my Mom. - Jared Buechler
• Joey and I are very excited to announce that we are going to have a baby! We have been so blessed to have such a wonderful community supporting us! Please pray for health and safety for us and the baby and for wisdom as we look ahead to the future and all the exciting changes that this pregnancy will bring! - Tamara Milligan

Continue to Pray for:

• Ben Hayes & the Hayes family (following their journey on Ben's CARING BRIDGE page.)
• Sally & Gary Hutchinson

Pray For Our BLESS people:
BLESS is the Covenant's approach to intentional prayer and evangelism. Listed below are names of people in your lives who you are praying would come to know Jesus this year. We are praying with you.

• Anabel
• Sydney
• Laurie

Pray For Our Church Family:

• Jessica Connors
• Brooke & Jonathan Connors
• Eliza & Ibucwa Djuma; Leya & Malasi
• Betsey & Dan Doebler; Charis
• Josiah Doebler
• Nancy Dunham
• Judy Duvall

Pray For Our Missionaries/Ministries:

Dale & Sara Lusk serve the Evangelical Covenant Church as administrators and coordinators for short term teams to minister around the world. They assist in developing healthy relationships between Covenant Churches and international ministry sites. Dale is the International Director for Global Engagements in the Evangelical Covenant Church.

• Presently, we have three interns in our new Global Internship program with the Evangelical Covenant Church. This program is to give ECC churches an opportunity to disciple young people from their churches to possibly lead toward future Global Personnel. Pray for seven more interns for this first year.
• We have been invited into partnership with the Covenant Church of Colombia and hope to take teams there as soon as possible. There will be four sites available in four different regions of the country.  We also have been invited to partner with an amazing Gospel sharing ministry, connected with ECC in Lyon France, called Cultural Fusion and to an outreach ministry to Muslim gypsies in Lezhe, Albania.
• We have more teams than ever before participating in our domestic short-term trips to locations all over the United States. We have seven teams going to USA sites, four to Alaska, and two going to the Rio Grande Valley of Texas to learn about immigration.
• The big disappointment in 2025 has been international trips. Of the 30 international trips we have organized for 2025 nine have been cancelled for various reasons
• We had organized two trips for Crescendo, the ECC ministry to 60+ adults, one to Mexico and one to Thailand but have had almost no response for these trips.
• A primary personal prayer request is for our two children, ages 16 & 13, to find a youth group in our area. We hope to partner with a local Spanish-speaking Covenant Church to help them restart and develop a youth group. We are praying for this to work out to meet the spiritual and relational needs our children to connect with other believing youth. 

Send Dale & Sara a word of encouragement dale.lusk@covchurch.org.

The Care and Prayer Ministry Team prays for all prayer requests submitted through the digital and paper Connect Cards.  If you have an urgent prayer need, you can email careteam@faithecc.org or call Team Leader Rita Christensen at 630-835-8737.

Week 6
Day 26 pp. 158-164 
Day 27 pp. 165-169 
Day 28 pp. 169-175 
Day 29 pp. 177-185 
Day 30 pp. 185-190 

Week 7
Day 31 pp. 190-196 
Day 32 pp. 196-202 
Day 33 pp. 203-206 
Day 34 pp. 207-214 
Day 35 pp. 215-220 

Looking for the audiobook? Listen to this week's reading here: Immerse website, Spotify, or Apple Podcast.

February 26
Kevin Johnson
Paxton Zboncak
February 27
Katherine Hill
Nancy Hoeft
March 3
Mark Pufundt
Isaac Zimmermann
March 4
Adam Reimers

Wednesday (2/26)
Tiger Breakfast (7:00 am)
Kids Club (6:00 pm)
ESL Class (6:00 pm)
Choir Rehearsal (7:15 pm)

Friday-Sunday (2/28-3/2)
Men's Retreat

Sunday (3/2)
Morning Prayer (8:45 am)
Sunday School (9:15 am)
Worship (10:30 am)
412 Youth (6:00 pm)

Wednesday (3/5)
Tiger Breakfast (7:00 am)
Wednesdays at Windsor (12:00 pm)
Kids Club (6:00 pm)
ESL Class (6:00 pm)
Ash Wednesday Service (6:30 pm)
Choir Rehearsal (7:30 pm)

This week we continue our series Messiah with a sermon on Luke 9:28-36.

Sunday worship begins at 10:30 am. Join us in person or via live stream on Facebook or YouTube.

We have two assisted listening devices available at the sound booth every Sunday morning. Ask one of our sound booth volunteers if you would like to use one during worship!

The Community Board is a space for us to...

Book Give Away: If anyone has been wanting to read "THE REASON FOR GOD" by Tim Keller, I am done and will pass it on. -Susan Aarseth

Selling or Donating a Car: My brother-in-law is currently studying at a seminary. Unfortunately, their family's minivan, which they relied on for daily transportation, has recently broken down beyond repair. They urgently need a vehicle to help manage everyday responsibilities, such as attending classes and running errands, but they have very limited funds. If you know anyone who has a vehicle they might be willing to sell or, even better, donate, please reach out to Pastor Zachs, outreach@faithecc.org or 331.236.0316. Your assistance would mean the world to them! Thank you! 

Ask to borrow items
Give stuff away that’s useful to someone else 
Announce an event 
Have something to contribute? Send it to the church office: office@faithecc.org