ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 23, 2024It happens on a pretty regular basis. I receive an email from someone in the world who wants to school me on the Bible, often in regard to what they believe the Bible says about homosexuality. I received another one of those emails just yesterday. For a number of years, I responded to every single one of them, which often was the spark for many
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 22, 2024Prayer for the Week: Show us your mercy, O Lord, when we are tired. Show us your mercy when we are tired of being tired. Show us your mercy when our exhaustion turns to frustration and complacency. Show us your mercy when our faith has fallen flat and we are left with doubt, confusion, and feelings of failure. Show us your mercy, O Lord, yet
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 21, 2024Like many of you, I can remember when we only received three channels at home (for some reason, we were not able to get ABC early in my childhood). Friends started getting cable, and I can remember my first evening of watching MTV at Chris’ house. For the longest time, except when renting a movie from Blockbuster or watching PBS, everything had commercials. Today, I
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 20, 2024I have been allowing the words from Proverbs 19:2 to be a conversation partner the last few days. It says: Desire without knowledge is not good,and one who moves too hurriedly misses the way. For a number of things in my life right now, there is a need for discernment, and rarely is discernment done in a vacuum of ignorance or with rapid movement toward
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 19, 2024In the book, On Purpose: Finding God’s Voice in Your Passion, there are a couple of sentences that caught my attention. It says, “Listening requires surrendering. It means courage, asking that we put aside our preconceived expectations and abandon our present stations.” In the last 48 hours, I have heard a lot of people use the word courage, but it has most often been in
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 18, 2024This Sunday, I will finally begin the new Worship Series entitled: Jesus & His Ancestors. I delayed the start as last Sunday sort of felt like it needed to go in a slightly different direction. My intention with this series is to look at some of the characters found in the Old Testament (Hebrew Scriptures) that offer us some insight into who Jesus was and
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 17, 2024The last two weeks have known general craziness for most everyone, yet amidst the craziness of the hurricane and the power outage, we had both VBS and a Youth Mission Trip planned. Without power at the church, VBS could not happen. We were so disappointed, but we have all the material for next year’s VBS ready to go. The Youth Mission Trip had a few
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 16, 2024In part of my sermon on Sunday, I referenced some words from Psalm 30:10, “LORD, be my helper.” I pointed to the word “helper” as I was speaking of how God, through the Prophet Isaiah, announced how the nature of God includes helping us. But what I missed was how the Psalmist referenced God. Notice we translate it as LORD, but in all caps. This
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 15, 2024Our Regional Minister, Rev. Andy Mangum, wrote the following post. I requested his permission to repost it, as I found it helpful but also deeply profound. Days like this tempt us to feed an insatiable appetite for information as we convince ourselves that having information is the same as having knowledge and that having knowledge is the same as cultivating wisdom and and that cultivating
ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGSJuly 14, 2024A lot of people scoff at prayer, especially in a time of crisis. This is understandable in situations where people send their “thoughts and prayers” as a sort of smokescreen to conceal a lack of actual action. With that said, I find prayer—including a community gathered in prayer—to be extraordinarily helpful when there is not a lot that can be done. Waiting can leave us