Text: Deuteronomy 15:1-2, 7-11; Matthew 19: 16-22 Over the last week or two, my husband and I have watched the first season of Netflix’s immensely popular Korean drama, Squid Game. It isn’t a show I would recommend you run home and watch… it is incredibly and senselessly violent… but as I thought about our texts…
Bible and Newspaper
current event discussion
Weaving a new thread…
Every three years, I have to go to sexual misconduct/boundaries training. It is required for all clergy in my conference of the United Methodist Church. We hold a lot of power in our role over the lives of parishioners and breaking that sacred trust by misusing that power to exploit someone else is absolutely unacceptable.…
Sing! Play! Summer! – The Old Rugged Cross
Text: 1 Corinthians 1:18-29 A young rabbi found a serious problem in his new congregation. During the Friday service, half the congregation stood for the prayers and half remained seated, and each side insisted that theirs was the true tradition. Nothing the rabbi said or did moved toward solving the impasse. Finally, in desperation, the…
YES! We Are Able!
Text: Deuteronomy 8:11-18 and Mark 10:23-31 Last week, Pastor Lee from Women at the Well shared with us part of the story of the rich, young, ruler in Mark’s gospel. This morning, we hear the second half of that story… the response of the disciples… our response… to the invitation Jesus offers this faithful follower.…
Do What Is Good
I think in many ways it is a cruel irony that as we begin our Lenten series on heroes that our first pop culture example is the Dark Knight, Batman. As a young boy, Bruce Wayne was a victim of gun violence. In a dark alley, his parents were gunned down by a thief in…
Ashes and Prayers
A colleague, Elizabeth Dilley, shared the story of imposing ashes on the foreheads of children. As she made the sign of the cross on one little boy’s forehead, “From dust you came and to dust you shall return,” his mom bent over and whispered in his ear, “But not for a really long time, okay…
The Wealth in our Wallets instead of the Well-being of the World
This afternoon I watched the United States join two nations… Syria and Nicaragua… in being the only three nations in the entire world that are no longer signers of the Paris Climate Accord. As I listened to the justifications, what I heard over and over again was the mention of a few economic sectors that…
The Hope of the World is Us
The President of the United States is currently weighing whether or not to withdraw our nation from the Paris climate accord. Political leaders within our country are skeptical about the science behind climate change and its causes. One congressman said this past week: “As a Christian, I believe that there is a creator in God who is…