May 6, 2020
Grand Family,
As you are likely aware, Governor Hutchinson issued guidance on Monday for reopening houses of worship in Arkansas. Some of the highlights of the guidance include:
- Advise attendees not to enter the building if they have had fever, symptoms, or recent exposure to Covid-19.
- Advise at-risk attendees to refrain from entering the building.
- No one will be admitted into the building without a face covering, except for children under 10 years old.
- Maintain physical distancing of 6 feet between family groups.
- No childcare to be offered.
Although churches are not required to meet these guidelines, we feel it is important to do all that we can to provide a safe environment. As such, we will be adhering to these guidelines. What this means is that church will look and feel different for some time. To meet these guidelines, we will need to use only every third pew in the sanctuary. This will limit us to about one quarter of our sanctuary capacity. Attendees will need to sit only in family groups and maintain 6 feet between family groups.
A high number of our survey responses (79%) indicated they want to return to church at either “the first opportunity we have” or at the “first opportunity but with some concerns and precautions.” We believe that by adhering to the detailed list of guidelines that are linked below, we can provide a safe environment for those that are ready to return to worship. For those that are not quite ready to return, we understand that completely. There will be no condemnation for those who choose to refrain for now. We will continue to offer online options for worship for the foreseeable future, but we look forward to seeing all of our church family return when ready.
With these things in mind, we will plan to have our next in-person worship service on May 17 at 11:00 AM. Please allow extra time when arriving as the entry process may be slowed due to distancing requirements. Also, please review the attached detailed guidelines that we will be following.
If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to reach out to me or any of our deacons.
Chris Brown
Chairman of Deacons
