I walked to the church this morning in my usual daze (I’m not exactly a morning person, except when I’m out fishing). It is a beautiful, sunny morning, and everything looks bright and new. For some reason, the church looked especially bright and new….

It took me a couple of minutes to realize exactly why the church looks so bright and new. The last of the landscaping got finished over this past weekend while I was away in New Bedford. This is just about the last of the capital campaign project that restored the exterior of this historic church. And Susan Conant’s landscaping looks fantastic.

As an interim minister, I especially like the new sign. It is much easier to read than the old one — and much more attractive. Passers-by get a much better sense of what this church is — which makes it more likely that they will stop in for a worship service.

Good things happened inside the church while I was away, too. The preschool class made huge paper “mosaic,” the Religious Education bulletin board got updated, and there’s a nice picture and biography of next year’s interim associate minister, Rev. Jennifer Innis.

This is what interim ministers hope for — that our congregations do great things while we’re away.