Text: Romans 8:4b-17, Luke 4:18-19 There are a number of personality inventories out there, but one that has captured my imagination lately is the Enneagram. It describes people in one of nine categories, like the reformer, the achiever, the loyalist and the peacemaker (which is me). Every morning, I get a little sentence or two…
Advent
The Redemption of Scrooge: Bah Humbug!
Text: Isaiah 9:6-7, Luke 1:46-47, 52-55 One of my favorite Christmas movies every year is that timeless tale by Charles Dicken’s – a Christmas Carol. For those of you who haven’t seen it or visited the story for a while, it takes place on Christmas Even. Ebenezer Scrooge is a wealthy and stingy businessman who…
The Peaceable Kingdom
Since the end of September, we have had a guest at the Dawson house… a young female cat named Twiggy. Twiggy belongs to my brother and sister-in-law who are just finishing up ten weeks in Germany getting to know the new company they work for. They also have a black lab, Rachel, but she was…
Prepare the Way
As that short film reminded us, there 65 million refugees and forcibly displaced persons in the world today. That is roughly thirty-two times the number of people who live in Iowa. In fact, if you added up the populations of the whole North Central Jurisdiction of the UMC – both Dakotas, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa,…
Eve Meets Mary
Lately, as I’ve made my way home from work here at the church, I can see the stars in the sky. And it’s not because I’m here until 10pm. No, the days are growing shorter… the air colder… This is the time of year when we are preparing ourselves for the longest night, the winter…
Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve
In the beginning… Most years when we get to the season of Advent, we dive deep into the gospel texts. We want to hear about the shepherds and angels, about Mary and Joseph, Elizabeth and Zechariah, the magi and the star. Yet, as Heidi Haverkamp will share with us in this week’s reflections in…
Livin’ on the Edge
This morning, we are hanging out in liminal space… That’s a funny word isn’t it… liminal…. Say it with me… liminal. It comes from Latin and means “threshold.” It is the space in between. It is transitional. Our country is in that liminal space between an election and the swearing in of a new…
Hopes and Fears
Awaiting the Already. As church, we are exploring this book, written by a pastor who served here in Iowa. And he invites us to look at the Christmas story through new lenses. Over four weeks, we pull apart each gospel: Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John, and explore what they have to tell us about how…