Emanuel Lutheran to add Saturday worship service in 2026

Emanuel Lutheran Church in New Philadelphia is adding a service to the calendar in 2026, one that will be unusual among protestant denominations in the area. Named The Vine in honor of former Emmanuel Pastor Stephen Patrick, who began a service of the same name during his tenure at the church, the first service will be Saturday, Jan. 17 at 6 p.m. Yes, it’s a Saturday service. 

“I've been thinking about the kind of worship styles we could do,” said Pastor Robert Eller. “Usually you see a traditional service and a contemporary one and there’s really no other niche kind of service somewhere in the middle there.”

Eller said he considered a folk or acoustic music service but couldn’t quite arrive at how to pull it off. “Then, over the past summer, we had a vacation Bible school and we had several kids enrolled whose families weren’t affiliated with the church at all. They were saying the’d like to attend church, but due to things like Sunday morning sports or work schedules, weren’t able to. I thought, rather then talk about them not making the time to come, what if we offered a service on another day of the week that might work better for them?”

Doing a little research into the idea, Eller discovered something surprising: aside from Catholic congregations, no other church in the area seemed to offer a Saturday option. “I was quite surprised to find that wasn’t an option for families and it seemed like a good opportunity to address that and reach people who are not in church right now” Eller said. Taking the idea to Emmanuel’s governing council, he found an enthusiastic response. “Turned out they’d wanted to do such a thing for a long time but found no willing pastor. I certainly wanted to do it and had the support of my family.” 

The service will be more laid back than the more traditional Sunday morning service, while maintaining key elements. “It won’t be praise band based, or what we might think of as a contemporary service,” said Eller. “It will feature more modern hymns, scripture readings, prayers, communion and things you would expect in a regular Sunday service, just less formal in vernacular and style.” With fewer elements than a Sunday service, The Vine will be kept to an hour in length. 

“It has been a little difficult finding musicians but we have a pianist who is available once a month. We’re going to start with a once monthly schedule until we can get everything worked out, then plan to expand that later,” Eller said.

Digging through Emmanuel records, Eller found a note referencing then Pastor Stephen Patrick’s efforts to add another service to the calendar called The Vine. “I thought it was a good name for it, one within memory of our membership and one that honors a very important pastor in the history of our church.”

Eller said Saturday services used to be quite common in protestant congregations. “We have to remember it was a different time and outlook. On Sundays, you didn’t. do anything other than go to church. Businesses were closed, people didn’t usually work that day. You went to Church and you went home. Larger congregations meant a need for more services offered during the week. In urban centers, you still may find that situation. I was surprised to find that older, more rural, traditional churches were not doing anything like this around here anymore.” 

Regular Sunday services at Emmanuel are at 9:30 a.m. Eller offers quiet personal prayers and healing in a midweek service outside the church Wednesdays from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., weather permitting. Learn more at emmanuelnp.com or follow the congregation’s daily updates on Facebook. 

The church is located at 202 E. High Ave., New Philadelphia.