Advent 2: Sunday, December 8, 2014 Overflowing in Hope! O, the mystery of God's dwelling in our relationships

On the second Sunday of Advent we continue focusing upon God's coming to dwell amongst us.

In God’s mysterious ways, death blossoms into new and abundant life, the dissonance of violence resolves into the harmony of God’s created order, and the presence of enemies becomes an opportunity to restore relationship rather than to take up arms. So let us seek harmony that we may abide in the house of the Lord—there is peace!

In God's presence we are filled to capacity, no filled to overflowing with hope.  May we express the hope of Christ Jesus in all our relationships.

Message link:  Overflowing in Hope! O, the mystery of God's dwelling in our relationships

Advent 1: Sunday, December 1, 2013 Open House! O, the mystery of God's dwelling in our present

During this Advent season our focus is God's coming to be with us.

In God’s mysterious ways, the weapons that diminish us are turned into the tools that sustain us, the assurance of God’s continuing presence is both sudden and expected, and ordinary living resounds with extraordinary implications. Let us wake to the establishment of the house of the Lord—there is hope!

What we discover on this first Sunday of Advent is that God's House is an Open House - open to all whom God invites.  And since God has invited all who are invited, may we welcome those whom God is calling.

Messsage link:  Open House! O, the mystery of God's dwelling in our present.

November 24, 2013 “I myself will gather my people”: “Christ is before all things and in him all things hold together”

This is our last Sunday in the series of Hearing from the Prophets.  And on this last Sunday the warning is directed at the "shepherds of God's people."

Often as pastors, we think ministry hinges on our leadership, our competency - and because we do believe this, this warning is appropriate for us.

Actually, the One who leads is the Lord for God is the One who gathers God's people.  And we are gathered together as the body of Christ - being held together by Christ.

Christ being before us and being held together by him is how we are called to live in this world - to be led by the Spirit, rather than being led by we who are pastors who think more highly of ourselves than we ought.

Link to message:  "I myself will gather my people"

November 17, 2013 Promise of Healing - Promise of Life: Revering God's Name

Many of us reading the prophets hear words of judgment, words of the destruction of the wicked.  But who are the wicked?  Maybe not as many as we think.  In the midst of the prophet Malachi talking about the destruction of the wicked we hear God promising life to all who revere his name.

What does that mean in light of the meaning of God's name?  If God's name bears striking resemblance to the Hebrew verb for "being," for "life" could God be saying - all who revere who I am and what I am are filled with life?

Something to consider . . .

Link to message:  Promise of Healing - Promise of Life: Revering God's Name

October 20, 2013 Living Within Culture: The Word of God Written on our Hearts

There are so many different things written on our hearts - in fact the cultures in which we live often shape what is written on our hearts.  But we are a people who are called to live within culture, live within the world exhibiting a life-giving reality among the many life-inhibiting realities all around us.

As God's people we come living in the presence of the Spirit because we have a different reality written on our hearts - the Word of God in its many manifestations - God's Word, the embodied Word of Jesus, the written word of Scripture and the declared word of proclamation in the power of the Spirit.  We participate with God in God's transforming mission in the world as we live in light of the Word of God written on our hearts and minds.

Link to message:  Living Within Culture: The Word of God Written on our Hearts

October 13, 2013 The God Who Comes - Living in God's Presence

We often think about our mission as God's people as "Going" into all the world.  However, when we think of God, we always think of God coming to us.  Often in our going, we are perceived as being ones with an agenda - we come in and leave and go on about doing our thing.

How might we be seen as a community which "comes" to the ones to whom we are sent?  By coming as God comes.

Jeremiah offers us some insights as we explore Jeremiah 29: 1, 4-7.  Settling down in a place puts us in a posture where we focus more on coming than "going."

Link to Message:  The God Who Comes: Living in God's Presence

September 1, 2013 The Sin We Commit: Drinking from Cisterns and Not the Living Spring

Our relationship with God is a mutual relationship – God not only interacts with us, God desires for us to interact with God in deeply personal ways.  And yet, though God is faithful to us, we often are not faithful to God.  We like to have God around (as a consultant), but God wants to be more than a consultant – God wants to be a confidante, one who walks with us and we with God.  The sins we commit are not so much behavioral “sins” but the sin of not needing God.  We think that we are self-sufficient – but life is to be found in being centered in God. 

Jeremiah reveals the waywardness of the priests and people in which they sought to find living water elsewhere than from the life of God.  From where do we draw our life?

Link to Message: The Sin We Commit: Drinking from Cisterns and Not the Living Spring

August 25, 2013 - Hearing God's Voice

Today’s scripture (Jeremiah 1: 4-10) invites us to hear God’s voice.  God speaks to us.  Do we hear, do we respond to God calling us?  To hear God speaking to us we are invited to have a mind that is open to hear from God. To see, to hear we need an open mind.  To adapt a statement by Robertson Davies, a Canadian author, “the eye sees [and the ear hears] only what the mind is prepared to [encounter and] comprehend.”

Jeremiah gives us some insights in developing the courage to hear and respond to God's voice.

Link to Hearing God's Voice

July 14, 2013 Plumb Lines in an Out-of-Kilter World

How do we measure up to the righteousness, the justice of God and God's ways.  When we measure our place in the world by our comfort or by what benefits us, we see nothing wrong with the way we engage or do not engage those who touch the heart of God.

But when God holds a plumb line to our lives, we begin to see how far our ways are removed from God's.  Amos challenges us to realign ourselves with God and God's justice in the world.

Link to message: Plumb Lines in an Out-of-Kilter World.

July 7, 2013 Engaging the Prophets - Hope: Peace Like a River

As we begin our series on the Prophets we are exploring what concerned the hearts of the prophets- in what ways were the people aligned or not aligned with God and the purposes of God.  We explore the prophets to check on our alliances.

Link to message: Hope: Peace Like a River (Introduction to Prophets)

June 30, 2013 - Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord

Road construction just does not happen in our cities in the summer, in preparing the way of the Lord, we are involved in road projects so that God has free access into our lives.

Link here to: Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord

Easter Sunday - Ashamed No More: Surprised by Resurrection

On this Easter Sunday, we complete our exploration into the theme of salvation from the perspective of honor and shame, in which we have sought to develop a different perspective from a more western perspective of judgment and guilt.  Ashamed No More throughout Lent examined how we might understand God's grace and mercy differently, how we might understand salvation differently as we examine these through the lens of honor and shame.  Now on Easter Sunday we are Surprised by Resurrection.

 

Connect to Ashamed No More: Surprised by Resurrection.  Not only are we surprised by resurrection, just as the early disciples were, in being surprised by resurrection, and in being open to the new creation it creates, we discover that we become, through Christ Jesus, the surprises of God in the world.  

Fourth Sunday of Lent - Ashamed No More: Grace that is Wasted

On this Fourth Sunday of Lent we continue our exploration into the theme of salvation from the perspective of honor and shame, rather than from a more western perspective of judgment and guilt.  Ashamed No More throughout Lent examines how we might understand God's grace and mercy differently, how we might understand salvation differently as we examine these through the lens of honor and shame.  

 

Connect to Ashamed No More: Grace that is Wasted.  This week's message focuses upon how God "wastes" grace on us.  Not in the perspective that we are undeserving - we are.  But rather, God does not stop pouring grace out upon us - God keeps bestowing grace upon us so that it overflows our lives - i.e., God wastes grace on us in order for us to have an abundant experience of grace in our lives.  

First Sunday of Lent - Ashamed No More: God Will Show Us Salvation

On this First Sunday of Lent we begin an exploration into the theme of salvation from the perspective of honor and shame, rather than from a more western perspective of judgment and guilt.  Ashamed No More throughout Lent examines how we might understand God's grace and mercy differently, how we might understand salvation differently as we examine these through the lens of honor and shame.  

 

Connect to Ashamed No More: God Will Show Us Salvation.  This week's message focuses upon how living our lives in Christ is to be open to God's work in us, to be open to the honor God bestows upon us and God through Christ Jesus takes upon himself our shame.  And instead of living lives of shame we are set free in Christ to live lives of shalom.  

On this Fourth Sunday after Epiphany we continue our series on Encountering God.  The season of Epiphany focuses on Jesus Christ being revealed to the world - particularly through the Magi - and now today, through us.  Throughout Epiphany we are exploring how, in our encountering God, we manifest the life and ministry of Jesus, how we go about demonstrating the presence of God in the places we work and live among the persons we engage in our day to day lives.  

 

Connect to Encountered by God's Embrace: God Birthed in Us - Fulfillers of God's Word.  This week's message focuses upon how like Christ we live fulfilling the word of God in our lives.  As we reflect upon how God's Word - God's Story and Vision forms and shapes us, how it transforms us, we realize that in embodying God's Word in our lives - we live as ones who fulfill the purposes of God's word in our human contexts.  

Second Sunday After Epiphany: Encountered by God's Embrace - Sharing Gifts Which Reveal God

On this Second Sunday after Epiphany we continue our series on Encountering God.  The season of Epiphany focuses on Jesus Christ being revealed to the world - particularly through the Magi - and now today, through us.  Throughout Epiphany we are exploring how, in our encountering God, we manifest the life and ministry of Jesus, how we go about demonstrating the presence of God in the places we work and live among the persons we engage in our day to day lives.  

 

Connect to Encountered by God's Embrace: Sharing Gifts Which Reveal God.  This week's message focuses upon the outpouring of Spirit given gifts which manifest the presence and love of God in the world.  Too often we think of engaging in ministry for the left-over hours of our weeks - the hours we give to volunteering.  But we are called to be about sharing God's love and presence and making disciples not in the left-over hours of our week, but rather in the 100+ hours in our week in which we are working, being with family, doing what we do with the main hours of our lives.  It is in these times we minister in the power of the Spirit with Spirit-given gifts through which we reveal God's love for the world.  

First Sunday after Epiphany: Encountering God in Our Baptism - Being at Home with God and Revealing God's Presence

On this First Sunday after Epiphany we begin our new series on Encountering God.  The season of Epiphany focuses on Jesus Christ being revealed to the world - particularly through the Magi - and now today, through us.  Throughout Epiphany we are exploring how, in our encountering God, we manifest the life and ministry of Jesus, how we go about demonstrating the presence of God in the places we work and live among the persons we engage in our day to day lives.  

 

Connect to Being at Home with God: Revealing God's Presence.  This week's message focuses upon God's love for us is revealed in God creating us, naming us and being with us.  As the people of God we do not merely grasp hold of God's love for ourselves, but we reveal and demonstrate God's love for the world by living in ways which make God's presence known in our worlds.