Affliction is real, especially right now in ways that are seen and unseen. But it is our God’s work of love and consolation that offers rays of resurrection hope about what tomorrow could look like with God’s help. We may feel that comfort today, but we can never forget we are bound to our neighbor’s affliction. And until such a time when affliction is gone, we are all in this suffering together.
Read MoreRight now, it may feel like the world is upside down. It would be good for us to take some time and consider what is God up to in all of this. The question is not only for our own discernment about what God is doing in the world, but also for us as a community of faith. This is an extraordinary time and an opportunity to prayerfully consider how God is calling us to use our natural gifts and be moved into places that are unconformable and challenging.
Read More[In 1 Corinthians 15] we get a taste of the lawyer side of Paul. His legalistic tendencies come out, as he makes a case for the people of Corinth to believe in not just Jesus’s own death and resurrection, but also their own resurrection. Like so many people before them, and people after them, the Corinthians are unsure about just what happens when perhaps the one common human experience finds us—death… But believing in their own resurrection—that one was harder to hold on to.
Read MoreOur buildings may have been shuttered to combat an invisible enemy, but we must live into the reality that the church is not closed. Our church is not a building, an organization or a worship service. According to the New Testament Greek, the church is the ekklésia, the called-out people of God.
Read MorePaul’s new community and the movement away from more traditional religious practices started to “turn the world upside down.” Paul encouraged them to continue to share the story of God’s love with others. And finally he told his community to be reminded that God chose them. They were the ones entrusted with the greatest treasure on Earth.
Read MoreThe birth of the church is incredibly timely in our readings given our current context and inability to be together in worship. So, our job now and for the next couple of weeks is to consider what the first disciples did and said, and then think about how we may be called to act and live out our calling to build a new expression of church today.
Read MoreTime and space are strange right now. You may mislabel days or forget what day it is altogether. You work, play, socialize, and worship from home. It can be difficult to separate the space and time for God. The disciples show us by example that it can be done, and that God reveals Himself in many and wonderful ways.
Read MoreHow easily we can go through life without truly knowing others or letting ourselves be known by them, even and especially in our faith communities. How genuinely faith might grow if we asked each other the deep questions, made space for hard and authentic stories, and learned to let our legs tremble as we made it a regular practice to share from the heart. Knit together through stories, how powerful we might be as disciples for the sake of the world.
Read MoreMartin Luther once wrote, “You are not only responsible for what you say, but also for what you do not say.” We all have the moral obligation to use words and actions—God’s word and our voices, hands and feet—to serve our neighbors and proclaim the gospel. The world is truly chaotic, and we are only now beginning to realize the extent to which we are connected to one another. Now is the time to speak. Now is the time to be the church that speaks God’s reign into reality.
Read MoreLast night, the Church Council gathered for their monthly meeting. At the meeting we discussed how best to respond to the Coronavirus as individuals and a community of faith. I write to you now to share how the church leadership and I are responding in this time of need. Please know the Church Council is in regular communication with one another and, in the event that local protocols should change, we will keep you updated as soon as possible.
Read MoreThis coming week, Jesus makes his final pitch on the life of discipleship before he heads towards Jerusalem where he opens the door to eternal life for all of us. This is key since we, like the rich man, are unable and unwilling to free ourselves of wealth. But, fortunately for us, Jesus still loves us in our weakness and lack of trust and faith.
Read MoreRemember you are dust, and to dust you shall return. Every year we come here to our sanctuary in the evening hours of a winter night and walk forward to receive black ash pressed into our foreheads in the shape of a cross as we hear these words – you are dust and to dust you shall return. These words are an ominous reminder of the fragility of life and our own mortality.
Read MoreLet’s be honest for a moment. We have all show the true color of our inner heart. We have all shown we are not as angelic and loving as we take ourselves to be. Instead of brushing off these past moments, or continuous, words and gestures as one-off occasions let’s just be clear and say there are elements of our pasts and pains placed upon us that have shaped us in ways we can never fully recover.
Read MoreThe acronym FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) is one that we often hear and perhaps experience. The stories of the women in this Gospel lesson show them missing out, or at risk of missing out. Jairus’ twelve-year-old daughter is, in her culture, at the cusp of adulthood — as in our culture she would be on the cusp of increasing responsibilities and independence. The death of a young person with a full life ahead of them seems somehow harder to bear than other deaths; we reflect on all the things that person will miss out on.
Read MoreIn an attempt to modernize the parables for our current content, the following is a rewriting of the parables from Mark 4. One important note, like Jesus’ parables the images and examples are not sacred in any way. There is nothing particularly special about a sower or a mustard seed.
Read MoreToday is a great opportunity for us to consider where God is opening the circle to people on the fringe or on the edges of our community – or maybe in our hearts. Is God calling you to a moment of forgiveness from over the holiday season? Is God calling you to bring the heavenly kingdom into your world with a gesture of love?
Read MoreFrom the first verse in Mark’s gospel, we will hear story after story about how Jesus comes to radically change how we are oriented to the world. We will read how the message of a battle victory is, in reality, Christ’s defeat over the powers and pains that suppress life in this world. What we are about to hear next changes everything…
Read MoreThis evening the family and I sat down for our annual viewing of A Charlie Brown Christmas. Charlie Brown picks out the weak, skimpy, no-frills tree after being inspired by Linus’ explanation of the Christmas. We are the ones who look for the Charlie Brown Trees in life and respond with love because we see our God in a similar place on the cross. Charlie Brown’s love of the tree is reflective of the love we share to an otherwise rejected and forgotten part of the world.
Read MoreThat’s how I met Jesus. When our guest turned the tables on me, and he essentially became the host, taking care of me and my problems. Jesus is sneaky like that, he turns the tables on you and suddenly he’s there in the most unexpected people and places.
Read MoreThe good news in this is that optimism can be learned. You can train yourself to be a positive person. Using mental exercises such as meditation and the practice of gratefulness, we can actually change the structure of our brains in ways that support a positive mindset.
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