The kitchen’s warming up for the Community Holy Week Breakfasts at First Presbyterian Church of Kilgore, part of a series of activities building up to Easter.
The planned events begin with the congregation’s Palm Sunday Service, with Sunday School at 9:30 a.m. and the worship set for 10:30 a.m. March 29, featuring the young performers of ‘Grace Notes Sing!’ amid the regular service. Then, from Monday to Wednesday, each 7 a.m. breakfast will feature a different speaker.
“It’s a longstanding tradition of the First Presbyterian Church of Kilgore,” co-organizer (and co-cook) Tom Sartor said. He’s been involved for almost four decades. “It’s been in existence over 70 years. We do not know exactly when it started.”
In the beginning and for years to follow, it was the ‘Men’s Holy Week Breakfast.’
“It has since been extended to anyone, male or female, who would like to come and enjoy our fellowship breakfast and hear a good word.”
First Presbyterian’s interim minister, Rev. Dr. Jerry Carpenter, will bring the message March 30, followed by Rev. Shannon Pickard of Revive Church (Longview) on Tuesday, March 31.
“He’s a child of the church,” Sartor noted, along with wife Amanda (Moore) Pickard, who was a member of the youth group years back.
Rev. Kelly Inman of Kilgore’s St. Luke’s Methodist Church will bring the final devotional Wednesday, April 1.
Each of the morning events will finish by 8 a.m. to give attendees time to get to work, Sartor added.
It’s a longer morning for the cook team, he quipped.
Along with Jerry Camp, “We get there about 5 a.m. I like to have the coffee going when the other men show up. John Dickerson, he’ll cook up some sausage or something for the cooks to snack on while we’re cooking,” Sartor added, drawing as many as eight helpers to prepare for their guests at 7 a.m. “We have a lot of fun back there. It’s very jovial. We like to cut up and have a good time.”
And to carry on the tradition.
“This started back at the old church that was downtown,” Sartor said. That building was famously cut in half during the boom to make way for oil derricks. It was the oil money contributions from founding families that kick-started construction of the current building at 815 E. Main St. “We’ve been in this church since 1939.”
In addition to the Community Holy Week Breakfasts, First Presbyterian will host an Easter Egg Hunt and Snack Supper the evening of April 1, 6 p.m. that Wednesday night, before the congregation’s Maundy Thursday Communion Service at 7 p.m. April 2.
Cheyenne Kirkpatrick, Director of Christian Education, and her young charges in the church’s Youth Group will once again produce the Tenebrae Service of Shadows for the Good Friday gathering at 7:30 p.m. April 3.
On April 5, Easter Sunday, Sunday School will begin at 9:30 a.m. before the Worship Service at 10:30.
“There is no theme other than ‘Come and join us. Celebrate the Risen Christ,'” says First Presbyterian Communications Director Amy Bates. “We are so excited to have visitors next week at all of our events.”
