Lenten services & soup supper, of course!

Tonight was the fifth week of Wednesday Lenten services and soup suppers.  Our church is small, as are many other Lutheran churches around here, so they all join up to do Lent as a combined event, attending a different Lutheran church every week.  The other churches are from area towns such as Iron River (Our Savior's), Lake Nebagamon (Trinity), Poplar (Peace), and Oulu (Hope)--that was originally where the Finnish people settled back in those pioneer years.

The soup supper started at 6:15pm and I think there was at least a dozen different kinds of soup--potato, 2 kinds of chicken wild rice, 2 kinds of vegetable beef, spicy chicken vegetable, curry pumpkin, tomato basil (that was ours), cheese broccoli, and I can't remember the rest.  But here they are:

And you can't do much around here without some bread bakers bringing in homemade bread.
So good!

All the tables were filled with people and they ran out of both bowls and glasses. Since they try not to use styrofoam or any disposable dishes, the final bit of camaraderie happens around the dishpan and drying area with everyone pitching in to do the dishes when the dinner is over.

Then it was time to go up to the sanctuary for the worship service at 7 with Pastor Neal Milam speaking.  To save on fuel costs during the winter, they close off the sanctuary from January until about now and have Sunday services in the lower level of the church.  Last Sunday after church we moved everything back upstairs, so people seem to feel we were back in "church" again.  

And that must mean it's spring, right?  Right??