Send us a text We Are The Shepherds God Is Raising “I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall no longer fear or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the LORD.” -Jeremiah 23:4 One of the most poignant moments in all the gospels is when the risen Jesus appears to Peter and asks him three times if he loves him. At first Peter is disturbed that Jesus questions his love and commitment so many times. But each time Jesus says since you love me, care ...

Send us a text Serve With Hope And Without Fear “that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear,” - Luke 1:74 Elie Wiesel said that the opposite of love is indifference. Paul Tillich, Anne Lamott and Brené Brown.said that opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty" And I’ve become convinced that the opposite of hope is fear. It turns out that Jon Meacham said it first: The opposite of fear is hope, defined as the expectation of good fortune not onl...

Send us a text The Joy Of God’s Immanence Shout aloud and sing for joy, O royal Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel."- Isaiah 12:6 Immanence is the state of dwelling within something or being inherent to it. In religious or theological terms it is the idea that God is immediately and intimately present within and among us. Immanence is often contrasted with the concept of transcendence. Transcendence means beyond the ordinary, beyond normal limitations. I...

Send us a text Justice, Wellbeing And Healing Flow From Reverence “But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise, with healing in its wings.” -Malachi 4:2 Reverence at its core is a deep respect for something or someone greater than oneself, To live with reverence is to live with a sense of awe, wonder, and appreciation. Everyone and everything, the whole cosmos, lives and moves and has its being God. (Acts 17:28) God is our source. God is our gro...

Send us a text Never Get Too Tired To Do The Right Thing “Brothers and sisters, do not be weary in doing what is right.” - 2 Thessalonians 3:13 It’s easy for us to do the right things when it feels like we are winning, when we are making progress, when things are going right. But it’s much harder for us to keep going when we get bogged down, when we have been denied, delayed, or defeated. We start to wonder‘what’s the point?’ As are efforts appear to yield less and less outcome, a...

Send us a text Let Our Tests Become Our Testimonies “This (hardship) will give you an opportunity to testify.” - Luke 21:13 I dislike calling hardships and adversities blessings in disguise. Such a framing tends to minimize the very real agony, and pain that we are experiencing. To be transformed and overcome, these pains must be acknowledged not denied. I do believe that every struggle contains within it powerful seeds. These seeds when planted, nurtured, and cultivat...

Send us a text We Don’t Need To Be Defensive “So make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance;” - Luke 21:14 Many of us spend a lot of time and energy worrying about what’s going to happen. We worry about defending our name, our honor, our reputation, our pride. We worry about being disappointed by the people around us. We worry about being betrayed by the people we most care about. We spend so much effort and energy protecting and defending ourselves th...

Send us a text God Answers The Prayers We Don’t Know To Pray “Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear.” - Isaiah 65:24 Sometimes life has us all twisted. I could use another phrase, but I’m not going to drop any expletives today. Sometimes we know something is wrong but we have no idea how to make it right. If we have an idea of how to make it right, we don’t know where to begin. If we have an idea of how to begin, we don’t know how ...

Send us a text These Troubles Will Soon Be Forgotten “For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.” -Isaiah 65:17 Some of us are so tired, so discouraged, so overwhelmed that we feel like giving up. What’s going on within us, what’s going on in the world around us, it seems like too much sometimes. The prophetic words of Isaiah 65:17 are written for such times. They encourage us to take heart. The power of God is ...

Send us a text Do We Trust That Our Redeemer Lives? “For I know that my redeemer lives and that in the end he will stand upon the earth;” - Job 19:25 Job endured. He endured pain and suffering, loss and grief, ridicule and derision. He endured his own disorientation and internal dissonance. He had no answers for life’s questions. What made it possible for him to endure? I believe he was able to endure because of his decision to trust that his redeemer lives. Whether he trusted fro...

Send us a text Strength Comes From The Heart “Comfort your hearts and strengthen them in every good work and word.” -2 Thessalonians 2:17 Where do we find our strength? From where do we draw our power? These questions emerge from this week’s lectionary readings. Psalm 17 emphasizes how we don’t try to become stronger through violence, manipulation, or exploitation in declaring, “As for what others do, by the word of your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent.” Our po...

Send us a text The Secret Of Happiness “I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live.” -Ecclesiastes 3:12 What makes for a good life? This was the question the writer of Ecclesiastes pondered. Was it having money and power? Was it to be revered and respected? No. They had the wealth and status to do as they wished, and they were widely respected. True happiness wasn’t found in these. Was it hedonist pleasure? No...

Send us a text Don’t Let It Shake You “We beg you, brothers and sisters, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as though from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord is already here.” - from 2 Thessalonians 2:1-2 The words of 2 Thessalonians were written in very troubled times. The times were so troubled that many wondered if the world was coming to an end. There were many who cheered for the day of The Lord to come, for that day...

Send us a text If Our Hearts Were Put On Trial… “If you try my heart, if you visit me by night, if you test me, you will find no wickedness in me; my mouth does not transgress.” - Psalm 17:3 If our hearts were put on trial today, would they be found to be full of love? Or would we find hidden pockets of bitterness and hate, envy and resentment? And if all of our secrets were to be revealed today, would the world come to know about all the ways and times we’ve helped an...

Send us a text Take Courage And Do The Work “How does it look to you now? Is it not in your sight as nothing? Yet now take courage… says the LORD… take courage, all you people of the land, says the LORD; work, for I am with you, says the LORD of hosts…” - From Haggai 2:3-4 By the time this passage was written, there was almost no one left still who could even remember the good days. Things hadn’t just gotten bad, they had been bad. And there was no sign that they were about to get b...

Send us a text May We See The Deeds Of The Lord In Our Lifetime “Lord, I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, Lord. Repeat them in our day, in our time make them known.” - from Habakkuk 3:2 Habakkuk wasn’t praying for the end of the world. Rather Habakkuk prayed for its rebirth and renewal. Habakkuk did not pray for God’s wrath to be spilled out onto the world but rather for God’s mercy. Too many of us in our disappointment and in our discouragement, in our...

Send us a text Write Down Your Vision “Then the LORD answered me and said: Write the vision; make it plain on tablets… For there is still a vision for the appointed time.” -from Habakkuk 2:2-3 When things are hard, when things have been hard, when there’s no sign of things getting easier, the most important thing we can hold onto is a vision for ourselves and our futures. A vision is more than a fleeting passing thought. A vision is more than a day dream. A vision is more th...

Send us a text True Worship Happens Outside Of Church The writer of Isaiah 1 gave the readers the ancient world equivalent of ‘get out of here with that noise’. “When you come to appear before me, who asked this from your hand? Trample my courts no more! Bringing offerings is futile; incense is an abomination to me. New moon and Sabbath and calling of convocation-- I cannot endure solemn assemblies with iniquity. Your new moons and your appointed festivals my soul hates; t...

Send us a text When Salvation Comes “Then Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house…” - from Luke 19:9 When salvation comes, it can look different for all of us but it feels just as good. The Greek word translated as salvation (Sōtēria) also means, rescued, healed, made whole, kept safe, preserved, delivered, and liberated. Zacchaeus’s salvation looks different from the paralytic’s, which looks different for an enslaved person or a hungry person, which looks which...

Send us a text God Always Welcomes And Invites “All who saw it began to grumble and said, "He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner."- Luke 19:7 I do not know the first century slang equivalent for the phrase Uncle Tom. But in the eyes of the crowd, Zacchaeus was the worst kind of scum. He lived fat and happy collecting taxes for their Roman oppressors while so many of them struggled to pay the bill. Most of us have certain sins, certain behaviors that we dis...