Hello travelers, now it's my turn for this step in my journey. On July 1 I will be the pastor of North Bethesda UMC on Old Georgetown Rd. in North Bethesda between the Beltway and Rt. 270.
On the 22nd of June I preached my last sermon at Liberty Grove. It occurs to me and to some others who have suggested it, and it was on my mind as I prepared it, that it might be a good transition sermon, last sermon one church first sermon at the new church. I have some other things I want to say at the new church, but it could certainly be a part of this blog that I am hoping will be helpful to introduce me to my new congregation and church family.
My reference text is Ephesians 4:1-7, & 11-16 for which I will summarize here for your convenience. I suggest when you get a chance to look it up as well. "Accept each other with love, and make an effort to preserve the unity of the Spirit with the peace that ties you together. You are one body and one spirit just as God also called you to one hope. There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father of all who is over all, through all, and in all." Gifts are given.. "some pastors and teachers. His purpose was to equip God's people for the work of serving and building up the body of Christ until we all reach the unity of faith and knowledge of the Son of God. God's goal is for us to become mature adults - to be fully grown, measured by the standard of the fullness of Christ...let us grow in every way into Christ, who is the head." (Common English Bible)
The challenge for us and our mission for our spiritual journey is to recognize the differences in each of us as a part of the body of Christ and to love one another, in spite of the differences. This can be done with Christ's Spirit of love in us, not really possible without it. We remember we have one body, one spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God. Thus we have many reasons to consider the connection and the unity within us. I pray for the church behind me and for the church in front of me, for the unity of the calling in Christ.
I spent a large amount time and will continue to do so on the pastor/teacher role that God has called me to, which includes helping each of us to grow in maturity and to reach the goal of Christ like ness. The goal St. Paul says is to reach maturity. Now there is a loaded challenge.
My role in the life of a congregation is to teach and help you discover God's calling upon your life to grow in faith. I can do that by encouraging you to pray, to worship, to love in the fellowship of others, to serve our neighbors, and to study Jesus so we can become mature in him. All that I do is to try to help you to reach the level of faith and practice, that God has in mind. You will discover that in my sermons, the Bible Studies and Sunday School classes that I teach, the articles I write, the books I recommend, my blog, the website resources and links, and new discoveries along the way.
The teachings of scripture encourage us to know, feel, understand, internalize, etc, that each of us have been given a gift, a task or ability, to help the body of Christ, be a witness to the love of God to our world. Each of us have something we need to do, given and determined by God, to show God's love to others. So I teach and preach and maybe even nag... that you grow in your faith in order to do your part in the work of the body. I believe with all my heart, that each of us are a vital component to a healthy body. Romans 12 and 1 Corinthians 12 describe the body and it's parts and work very clearly.
I can get in trouble, imagine that, by being firm on the idea, that you are an very important piece of the puzzle, we need your efforts to make this work. It is very easy, however, to think that it's my job, rather than to think, my job is to prepare you, teach you, lead you to full maturity in Christ, so you can do your job in the church. This may take some getting used to, and that's okay, I can be patient. Besides I am convinced that the spiritual life is more exciting for you when you are doing what God called you to do, when you discover for yourself that God really wants to use you in the grant plan of showing love to our neighbors. I can help with the teaching and preaching that leads to your maturity. It means everyday can be a blessing, a new adventure, a new discovery of what God has in mind for you. Come join in that adventure, I promise it will be a fulfilling one, plus hard work, but a real uplifting ride toward God.
My next few messages, both in preaching and on this blog, will reflect what I call an "Uncommon Lectionary". I borrow the idea of Tom Bandy who encourages us to hear the 52 most important lessons in the Bible to help shape us as we seek to become more faithful disciples. So our adventure on Sunday morning will be to hear those most important stories and lessons so that it might pour maturity into our hearts and minds.
This is going to be an adventure and journey, and I urge you to join us.
Blessings
Pastor Jeff
Thursday, June 26, 2014
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Another Pentecost
On Sunday June 8 we will celebrate another Pentecost. The feast in ancient Israel that signaled the coming of the Holy Spirit upon the disciples and followers of Jesus, counts as the real birth of the church. It was an awesome day. There where visitors in Jerusalem for this sacred feast from all over the Roman world, and they heard in their native languages the work of God coming alive. The gift of the Holy Spirit is still going on.
One of the gifts is the awareness that the promise of Jesus to send us his Spirit into us to help us be the disciples we are supposed to be has been fulfilled (see John 14:15-). We have the Spirit that was in Jesus available to us. The good news is that the Spirit is really powerful and really gentle. The Spirit can do all things, like creation and sweeping across dark waters, and chaos and bringing life and light. But the Spirit is also gentle and won't do anything until we invite the Spirit to be available for us and to be willing to let the Spirit guide us and bless us. SO, this Pentecost I urge you to be open to inviting the Holy Spirit of Jesus to become fully alive in your life, give the permission to direct you and lead you in the ways you should go. It is an awesome adventure.
The second gift is the personality of Jesus can become more dynamic and visible in your life with the fruits of the Spirit. That description is found in Gal. 5: 22-23, the fruits, the personality qualities that were in Jesus are all available to you. They include Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self-Control. You couldn't ask for a more fantastic blessing and tool box in your life. The secret to all that Love and Joy, start at the other end and develop your self-control. The Holy Spirit is made for such as this. And with self-control being developed, you will become more gentle. your faith grows with the influence into a greater faith, a greater faith will allow you to be able to do more good, doing good will be seen as kindness to all sorts of people in all kinds of circumstances. When your kindness towards others is developing you will learn how to be more patient, which is a really big challenge, especially today. But, that patience, will develop into a sense of peace in the midst of all the worries, anxieties and ordinary stuff, and then you will see that having peace in that chaos, will lighten up you life and you will sense joy. With a joy filled heart, you can love others because you will want them to know all that you have discovered. See, a great adventure!
The third great gift of the Holy Spirit is that God has given each of us a role to play, a gift to share, a piece of the puzzle, a part of the body of Christ (see Romans 12 or I Corinthians 12), for the building up of the church, born at Pentecost and equipped by Spirit filled followers of Jesus. You have been given a special gift and maybe more than one, for the work of being the body of Christ in our world today. You have a very important and necessary part to play and I hope you have given the Holy Spirit permission to make that gift or gifts come alive for you to share with your body of Christ. It's not about you, but God's help in you, to make a difference in our world. It's an awesome feeling to know you are playing a major part in making this a better world, filled with the blessings that God intends to share. (see God's call to Abraham back in Genesis 12, blessed to be a blessing)
Now for me, The Holy Spirit makes it possible for me to be a pastor. What I do, has been a gift from God, not something that I can claim. I'm not perfect and enjoy the glow of appreciation when people see the gifts, but I'm telling you, it's because the Holy Spirit is within me and has directed and encouraged the sharing of those gifts to others. You too can be a part of all of this. I let the Holy Spirit have more room to run my life, way back on Mother's Day in 1970. It's like God gave a new birth to my faith and walk with God and I am so truly grateful for that.
Now before you wonder about that too much, the Pentecostal gift was to be understandable to those gathered in Jerusalem from all over the world, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the way we should all pay attention to, because by God's Grace, he took away the sins of the world. He took down the barrier that separated us and made sure we would be children of God. I try always to be understandable and relevant, just like the gift of the Holy Spirit is to all of us.
Come join the adventure. Welcome the Holy Spirit, let the fruit grow in you. And if you have any questions, especially for the North Bethesda Church folks, let me know.
Blessings
Pastor Jeff
One of the gifts is the awareness that the promise of Jesus to send us his Spirit into us to help us be the disciples we are supposed to be has been fulfilled (see John 14:15-). We have the Spirit that was in Jesus available to us. The good news is that the Spirit is really powerful and really gentle. The Spirit can do all things, like creation and sweeping across dark waters, and chaos and bringing life and light. But the Spirit is also gentle and won't do anything until we invite the Spirit to be available for us and to be willing to let the Spirit guide us and bless us. SO, this Pentecost I urge you to be open to inviting the Holy Spirit of Jesus to become fully alive in your life, give the permission to direct you and lead you in the ways you should go. It is an awesome adventure.
The second gift is the personality of Jesus can become more dynamic and visible in your life with the fruits of the Spirit. That description is found in Gal. 5: 22-23, the fruits, the personality qualities that were in Jesus are all available to you. They include Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self-Control. You couldn't ask for a more fantastic blessing and tool box in your life. The secret to all that Love and Joy, start at the other end and develop your self-control. The Holy Spirit is made for such as this. And with self-control being developed, you will become more gentle. your faith grows with the influence into a greater faith, a greater faith will allow you to be able to do more good, doing good will be seen as kindness to all sorts of people in all kinds of circumstances. When your kindness towards others is developing you will learn how to be more patient, which is a really big challenge, especially today. But, that patience, will develop into a sense of peace in the midst of all the worries, anxieties and ordinary stuff, and then you will see that having peace in that chaos, will lighten up you life and you will sense joy. With a joy filled heart, you can love others because you will want them to know all that you have discovered. See, a great adventure!
The third great gift of the Holy Spirit is that God has given each of us a role to play, a gift to share, a piece of the puzzle, a part of the body of Christ (see Romans 12 or I Corinthians 12), for the building up of the church, born at Pentecost and equipped by Spirit filled followers of Jesus. You have been given a special gift and maybe more than one, for the work of being the body of Christ in our world today. You have a very important and necessary part to play and I hope you have given the Holy Spirit permission to make that gift or gifts come alive for you to share with your body of Christ. It's not about you, but God's help in you, to make a difference in our world. It's an awesome feeling to know you are playing a major part in making this a better world, filled with the blessings that God intends to share. (see God's call to Abraham back in Genesis 12, blessed to be a blessing)
Now for me, The Holy Spirit makes it possible for me to be a pastor. What I do, has been a gift from God, not something that I can claim. I'm not perfect and enjoy the glow of appreciation when people see the gifts, but I'm telling you, it's because the Holy Spirit is within me and has directed and encouraged the sharing of those gifts to others. You too can be a part of all of this. I let the Holy Spirit have more room to run my life, way back on Mother's Day in 1970. It's like God gave a new birth to my faith and walk with God and I am so truly grateful for that.
Now before you wonder about that too much, the Pentecostal gift was to be understandable to those gathered in Jerusalem from all over the world, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the way we should all pay attention to, because by God's Grace, he took away the sins of the world. He took down the barrier that separated us and made sure we would be children of God. I try always to be understandable and relevant, just like the gift of the Holy Spirit is to all of us.
Come join the adventure. Welcome the Holy Spirit, let the fruit grow in you. And if you have any questions, especially for the North Bethesda Church folks, let me know.
Blessings
Pastor Jeff
Saturday, May 24, 2014
The Journey is moving to a new church
Hello Old Friends and New Friends,
Life with God, like Abraham of old, calls for leaving a familiar place and going where God wants us to go. This is happening to me this summer. Not only and I recovering from surgery, but on July 1 of this year, I'll be assigned by the Bishop to North Bethesda United Methodist Church. When I accepted God's call into the ministry in the United Methodist Church, I agreed to go where the Bishop appoints me. Like many of my brothers and sisters in Scripture, we don't always know why, but we say as Jesus does, "Not my will, but thine be done."
So to introduce myself to my new congregation, let me tell you a little about myself.
I was born in Baltimore, and at 5 years of age, my father accepted an invitation to be a missionary in the Belgian Congo. So we moved to Brussels to learn the language and to prepare for the mission field. We served in Kindu in central Congo and returned for a second assignment to Elizabethville n southern Congo. We had to be evacuated because of a war, and returned to the USA in February of 1962 as refugees, with only the clothes we could bring in a suitcase. But God provides, and soon many individuals and churches helped us with housing, and clothes and the household needs. I've learned early on that God takes care of us, especially when we are doing what God wants us to do.
I made the decision to follow Christ at a Young Life retreat when I was 17. That was followed by an invitation given by E. Stanley Jones to enter the full time ministry. He was preaching at Chevy Chase UMC when I accepted that call. I prepared for the ministry at Western Maryland College in Westminster, now known as Mc Daniel, in the area of Sociology. I attended Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta, specializing in worship, including serving as the chair of the worship committee.
I've served three rural churches along the Pennsylvania line, an inner city church in Baltimore, that my grandmother was a member of. I served a suburban church, and then Ashton UMC. I spent a couple of years at the University UMC in College Park, and the last seven years at Liberty Grove in Burtonsville. I am looking forward to coming to North Bethesda, just down the street from where I went to High School.
Elaine and I have been married for 15 years. We met on the internet in a Christian Matchmakers site. We have some interesting stories to tell. We were both divorced and I knew finding the right person was going to be tricky. I have two sons from my first marriage, and the oldest and his wife gave us a grandson, who turns seven this summer. Grandchildren are awesome. Elaine has been a real blessing in my life, and I am truly grateful for her love and support.
I hope this blog can be a way for us to get to know one another. You fill find links to youtube sermons so you can become familiar with my preaching style. I hope this can be an avenue for your questions that might help you get to know me even better. I'll write about once a week to continue to share my story.
May God bless our journey of faith together.
Pastor Jeff
Life with God, like Abraham of old, calls for leaving a familiar place and going where God wants us to go. This is happening to me this summer. Not only and I recovering from surgery, but on July 1 of this year, I'll be assigned by the Bishop to North Bethesda United Methodist Church. When I accepted God's call into the ministry in the United Methodist Church, I agreed to go where the Bishop appoints me. Like many of my brothers and sisters in Scripture, we don't always know why, but we say as Jesus does, "Not my will, but thine be done."
So to introduce myself to my new congregation, let me tell you a little about myself.
I was born in Baltimore, and at 5 years of age, my father accepted an invitation to be a missionary in the Belgian Congo. So we moved to Brussels to learn the language and to prepare for the mission field. We served in Kindu in central Congo and returned for a second assignment to Elizabethville n southern Congo. We had to be evacuated because of a war, and returned to the USA in February of 1962 as refugees, with only the clothes we could bring in a suitcase. But God provides, and soon many individuals and churches helped us with housing, and clothes and the household needs. I've learned early on that God takes care of us, especially when we are doing what God wants us to do.
I made the decision to follow Christ at a Young Life retreat when I was 17. That was followed by an invitation given by E. Stanley Jones to enter the full time ministry. He was preaching at Chevy Chase UMC when I accepted that call. I prepared for the ministry at Western Maryland College in Westminster, now known as Mc Daniel, in the area of Sociology. I attended Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta, specializing in worship, including serving as the chair of the worship committee.
I've served three rural churches along the Pennsylvania line, an inner city church in Baltimore, that my grandmother was a member of. I served a suburban church, and then Ashton UMC. I spent a couple of years at the University UMC in College Park, and the last seven years at Liberty Grove in Burtonsville. I am looking forward to coming to North Bethesda, just down the street from where I went to High School.
Elaine and I have been married for 15 years. We met on the internet in a Christian Matchmakers site. We have some interesting stories to tell. We were both divorced and I knew finding the right person was going to be tricky. I have two sons from my first marriage, and the oldest and his wife gave us a grandson, who turns seven this summer. Grandchildren are awesome. Elaine has been a real blessing in my life, and I am truly grateful for her love and support.
I hope this blog can be a way for us to get to know one another. You fill find links to youtube sermons so you can become familiar with my preaching style. I hope this can be an avenue for your questions that might help you get to know me even better. I'll write about once a week to continue to share my story.
May God bless our journey of faith together.
Pastor Jeff
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
Recovering from Surgery
Hello travelers in faith. Thank you for your prayers for healing and support, keep them going.
Healing after surgery is a unique experience for each person, and I am now experiencing my own recovery. The external wounds created for the robotic surgery are healing up nicely, and the pain and discomfort related to those wounds is minimal, Thank God.
The bodily adjustments to the recovery however, seem to be on their own path all together. I am not a very patient person when it comes to me. I can have patience for others, but wanting me to be complete recovered is going to take longer than I had thought or have the patience for just yet. That's where God comes in asking us to wait upon the Lord to renew our strength. (Isa 40: 30-31) Oh how I wish I were already flying on Eagle's wings.
But God knows I also need a time out from the other parts of life to be healed and to be prepared for the next stage in my spiritual and ministerial life. God knows that will take some doing and now I am beginning to see how God will do that. I am waiting and resting and becoming aware in a big way, how much we take for granted and don't even think about.
Speaking of taking for granted, my wife Elaine has been fantastic through all of this. She is a supreme example of a wonderfully loving wife and a practicer of the art of nursing. She is also juggling a new job and the relationship to that responsibility and at the same time getting her mother adjusted to a new care facility and all the applications that requires. She is a real super trooper, thank God. I know neither of us would want this right now, but God doesn't give us more than we can handle, we just don't think we can handle all that much, and so we get the other half of this equation, that we won't have trouble that God isn't able to help us with. In this case a little of us, a lot of God.
I'm trying not to overdue anything so I'll let this go for now. Thank you all again for such great support, understanding, love and encouragement. Thanks to for your prayers, now you can direct them for Elaine and for me in recovery.
Blessings
Pastor Jeff
Healing after surgery is a unique experience for each person, and I am now experiencing my own recovery. The external wounds created for the robotic surgery are healing up nicely, and the pain and discomfort related to those wounds is minimal, Thank God.
The bodily adjustments to the recovery however, seem to be on their own path all together. I am not a very patient person when it comes to me. I can have patience for others, but wanting me to be complete recovered is going to take longer than I had thought or have the patience for just yet. That's where God comes in asking us to wait upon the Lord to renew our strength. (Isa 40: 30-31) Oh how I wish I were already flying on Eagle's wings.
But God knows I also need a time out from the other parts of life to be healed and to be prepared for the next stage in my spiritual and ministerial life. God knows that will take some doing and now I am beginning to see how God will do that. I am waiting and resting and becoming aware in a big way, how much we take for granted and don't even think about.
Speaking of taking for granted, my wife Elaine has been fantastic through all of this. She is a supreme example of a wonderfully loving wife and a practicer of the art of nursing. She is also juggling a new job and the relationship to that responsibility and at the same time getting her mother adjusted to a new care facility and all the applications that requires. She is a real super trooper, thank God. I know neither of us would want this right now, but God doesn't give us more than we can handle, we just don't think we can handle all that much, and so we get the other half of this equation, that we won't have trouble that God isn't able to help us with. In this case a little of us, a lot of God.
I'm trying not to overdue anything so I'll let this go for now. Thank you all again for such great support, understanding, love and encouragement. Thanks to for your prayers, now you can direct them for Elaine and for me in recovery.
Blessings
Pastor Jeff
Sunday, April 27, 2014
The Night before surgery
I'm sitting in my room watching the sun go down and enduring several rounds of liquids to prepare me for my surgery tomorrow. I have been diagnosed with Prostate Cancer and the doctor who did my kidney surgery five years ago will be operating on me in his actual area of specialty. He has had five more years of experience with the DaVinci robot for surgery. I should be in surgery for 4 to 5 hours and then here for a couple of days before I can go home to recuperate.
I am grateful for all the people who are praying for me. I have been touched by the notes, emails, and texts that have been sent to confirm their prayers. It seems like every church I've been the pastor for, and the church I grew up in, and my Brother Bruce's church are all on alert for praying this week. Thank you all for that. In the letter to the Hebrews we are told that the prayers surround us like a stadium full of people cheering us on in the race we are running right now. I feel the support tremendously.
I won't be able to write tomorrow but maybe Tuesday evening I'll update you on what has been happening.
Blessings on each of you.
Pastor Jeff
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Life is a Journey
Hello Blog followers. Pardon my interruption to the flow of the reading from Luke. Several things have happened in the last two weeks and it has diverted all of my attention. Let me try to catch you up. I hope you don't mind this little side tracking from our regular sharing of the chapters in Luke.
A few days ago, and it will seem like a lot longer very shortly, the Bishop of the Baltimore Washington Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, of which I have been a part of for almost 50 years between youth delegate/member to Annual Conference sessions and forty years under appointment to be a pastor, has re-appointed me to the North Bethesda United Methodist Church beginning on July 1, 2014. That has meant a great deal of prayer, visits to the church, meetings with the personnel committees of both congregations and the announcements in each church on the same day. This has also meant a great deal of reflection and conversation with the people at Liberty Grove who are having a hard time understanding how all of this works.
To try to explain, with apologies to John Wesley and Francis Asbury, how the UMC does this. John Wesley believed that an overall plan or vision for the growth of disciples for Jesus Christ, would take several people to accomplish. The idea of rotating pastors was to provide a congregation with an overall more thorough training for ministry with several pastors than just one for a long time. The belief was each pastor was good at somethings, blessed with certain gifts of the spirit for the ministry, but not all of the gifts. If we switched pastors around, the local church would benefit from a good preacher onetime, a good administrator, at another, a good educationally focused pastor, a good mission minded pastor, a good social service pastor, etc. The local church would then be encouraged by a step in the right direction under the leadership of each pastor.
One way to look at this is to consider a barrel. The barrel has many staves, (the up and down parts of the barrel) and each stave could be at a different height. If the church was a barrel and only had one tall stave, the others would be much lower and wouldn't hold much in the barrel. So if the church only got encouragement and growth in one area, it would be a funny looking barrel. But with rotation of pastors, a good administrator would raise that stave. A building pastor would enlarge the building for ministry, a good fund raiser would help bring in the resources for ministry, a good evangelist, would bring in more members. A good teacher would help develop the spiritual life of the members, and after a while they would be a much taller staved barrel, capable of holding more in the barrel. That's the way it was seen in John Wesley and Francis Asbury's day. And as the country grew, it would take an appointment to move across the mountain and start a new church, because some pastors would like to stay put once they got to know everybody. But then the church would not expand and it would eventually be left alone. So Methodists covered the country and by the Civil War nearly a third of the country had a Methodist connection. We had more churches with our name on the door, than there were post offices.
The country and the culture have changed but our way of doing church has not so much. So the Bishop still makes the changes, and they are supposed to be strategic, helping the churches and the Church grow in faithfulness. It doesn't work as well and since all pastors are not trained the same way and people have learned to be consumers with their own choices for almost everything, the connection to a church is much harder to do. And with so many churches under the responsibility of the Bishop, it is harder to be able to fit every situation and every congregation and every expectation of what their pastor is supposed to be like.
So now you can see why it's a challenge. And it needs much prayer. And I can use your prayers. For a church loses a pastor and lots of people grieve the loss of their spiritual shepherd. The shepherd on the other hand loses a whole congregation which includes many really good relationships and experiences and suddenly the grief and loss can be overwhelming when you think about that. So I am grieving the loss of many of my friends all at once. I am wrestling with the challenges of moving to another church and learning to love them and provide the kind of ministry and leadership they need, not knowing them yet. So keep me in your prayers.
I too am on a journey of faith, called by God to leave the comfort of familiar and travel, like Abraham, to a new place God will show me. Like Jonah, there are times we would rather not, but God will track us down and help us to see clearly that we are going to Nineveh and share the good news. Best of all, God is with us.
Thanks for your prayers
Pastor Jeff
A few days ago, and it will seem like a lot longer very shortly, the Bishop of the Baltimore Washington Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, of which I have been a part of for almost 50 years between youth delegate/member to Annual Conference sessions and forty years under appointment to be a pastor, has re-appointed me to the North Bethesda United Methodist Church beginning on July 1, 2014. That has meant a great deal of prayer, visits to the church, meetings with the personnel committees of both congregations and the announcements in each church on the same day. This has also meant a great deal of reflection and conversation with the people at Liberty Grove who are having a hard time understanding how all of this works.
To try to explain, with apologies to John Wesley and Francis Asbury, how the UMC does this. John Wesley believed that an overall plan or vision for the growth of disciples for Jesus Christ, would take several people to accomplish. The idea of rotating pastors was to provide a congregation with an overall more thorough training for ministry with several pastors than just one for a long time. The belief was each pastor was good at somethings, blessed with certain gifts of the spirit for the ministry, but not all of the gifts. If we switched pastors around, the local church would benefit from a good preacher onetime, a good administrator, at another, a good educationally focused pastor, a good mission minded pastor, a good social service pastor, etc. The local church would then be encouraged by a step in the right direction under the leadership of each pastor.
One way to look at this is to consider a barrel. The barrel has many staves, (the up and down parts of the barrel) and each stave could be at a different height. If the church was a barrel and only had one tall stave, the others would be much lower and wouldn't hold much in the barrel. So if the church only got encouragement and growth in one area, it would be a funny looking barrel. But with rotation of pastors, a good administrator would raise that stave. A building pastor would enlarge the building for ministry, a good fund raiser would help bring in the resources for ministry, a good evangelist, would bring in more members. A good teacher would help develop the spiritual life of the members, and after a while they would be a much taller staved barrel, capable of holding more in the barrel. That's the way it was seen in John Wesley and Francis Asbury's day. And as the country grew, it would take an appointment to move across the mountain and start a new church, because some pastors would like to stay put once they got to know everybody. But then the church would not expand and it would eventually be left alone. So Methodists covered the country and by the Civil War nearly a third of the country had a Methodist connection. We had more churches with our name on the door, than there were post offices.
The country and the culture have changed but our way of doing church has not so much. So the Bishop still makes the changes, and they are supposed to be strategic, helping the churches and the Church grow in faithfulness. It doesn't work as well and since all pastors are not trained the same way and people have learned to be consumers with their own choices for almost everything, the connection to a church is much harder to do. And with so many churches under the responsibility of the Bishop, it is harder to be able to fit every situation and every congregation and every expectation of what their pastor is supposed to be like.
So now you can see why it's a challenge. And it needs much prayer. And I can use your prayers. For a church loses a pastor and lots of people grieve the loss of their spiritual shepherd. The shepherd on the other hand loses a whole congregation which includes many really good relationships and experiences and suddenly the grief and loss can be overwhelming when you think about that. So I am grieving the loss of many of my friends all at once. I am wrestling with the challenges of moving to another church and learning to love them and provide the kind of ministry and leadership they need, not knowing them yet. So keep me in your prayers.
I too am on a journey of faith, called by God to leave the comfort of familiar and travel, like Abraham, to a new place God will show me. Like Jonah, there are times we would rather not, but God will track us down and help us to see clearly that we are going to Nineveh and share the good news. Best of all, God is with us.
Thanks for your prayers
Pastor Jeff
Tuesday, March 4, 2014
Luke ch. 9
Chapter 9 of Luke, which we are reading a chapter at a time, gives us a great view of the turning point in Jesus' ministry. He is preparing his disciples to carry on the work bringing the kingdom of God to our world, when he won't be physically present with them. So to discover if they are ready, and they aren't, but that's another story like ours, he sends them out to tell others the good news.
We are reminded by this event that all of us have a part to play in the work of the church, the church is not a building or a social club with a religious theme, or a social service agency motivated by our faith, but a way for God to change lives to bring people who are separated from God into a relationship with God. He sends his disciples out to get them some experience in sharing the good news, of helping people who are overwhelmed in life to find the help God can give. They cast out demons, heal the sick and tell the good news, which they have been seeing Jesus do all along. That's our mission too, tell people, help people when they are having troubles, that God wants to heal and restore and connect to them for their wholeness.
They come back and apparently a whole group of people are coming with them so that suddenly there are five thousand men and their families sitting on the hill side listening to Jesus and being healed and taught. It get's late and the disciples feel that the people should leave now, or they will be hungry. Jesus suggests that the disciples feed them. Once again, Jesus is asking us to be helping people as a part of their learning and growing in faith. The disciples still haven't developed the faith they need and wonder how on earth we are going to feed all these people. Someone suggests that there isn't enough money in the treasury for all of them to have food. Someone else found a small lunch, consisting of 5 loaves of bread and two fish. The loaves are about the size of a dinner roll or hamburger bun. How will that feed this many people?
Once again Jesus gets to show us that our faith can be a whole lot bigger than it is. Jesus asks the people to sit down in groups of about fifty, and then he lifts the bread toward heaven, and gives thanks for them and then breaks them and passes the bread to the disciples, who pass the bread to the people. He does the same with the fish. And lo and behold, a dramatic expression when we see God at work, there is enough food for everyone and a collection of 12 baskets of left overs! God has a way of doing far more than we can even imagine.
The next part of the story invites us to wrestle with what all of this means. So after the people are gone and they have traveled some more, Jesus starts to ask them, "Who do people say that I am?" This question is still asked today. Who do people think Jesus is? well some say, you are a prophet, or John the Baptist come back to life, or some other great rabbi. It sounds like the same answer by people today. Jesus is a great teacher, a miracle worker, a religious leader from the first century, a person we have heard about from a long time ago. Even today we have many answers to what we and our friends think of Jesus. We will explore that in more detail later. Stay tuned.
Then to make sure that Jesus can move toward his purpose of dying in Jerusalem to accomplish the forgiveness of sins and prove who he really is with his Resurrection, he asks the disciples and he really is asking us. "Who do you say that I am?" The reality comes to us, how do we answer that question. Who is Jesus? Peter blurts out that he is the Son of God, the Christ, the Messiah of God. And Jesus thanks him for the revelation that was not a human concoction, but a divine revelation.
Yes, Jesus is the Son of God, yes, Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah of God. Which is pretty unbelievable sometimes. And when Jesus says that this revelation is right and that as the Son of God we are going to have the same challenges he has, we have a hard time with that. He tells them that the Son of God will be betrayed, arrested, tried, crucified and buried. But on the third day be raised back to life. And as a matter of fact each of us, if we want to be a true disciple, must surrender our own wills and take up the cross of obedience and follow him to that difficult end.
The disciples, and us included, have a hard time with Jesus announcing such a horrible event coming to him and they begin to doubt his divinity and his purpose. He will need to show them something else to help keep them on track, and that's what comes next. He takes Peter, James and John up on a mountain top for a time for prayer.
I pray you will continue to read the gospel of Luke for more details, and continue to struggle with and decide for yourself, who Jesus is and what you will do to stay with him for your whole life and beyond. Come back and we will share what happens next in a future Blog report.
Blessings
Pastor Jeff
We are reminded by this event that all of us have a part to play in the work of the church, the church is not a building or a social club with a religious theme, or a social service agency motivated by our faith, but a way for God to change lives to bring people who are separated from God into a relationship with God. He sends his disciples out to get them some experience in sharing the good news, of helping people who are overwhelmed in life to find the help God can give. They cast out demons, heal the sick and tell the good news, which they have been seeing Jesus do all along. That's our mission too, tell people, help people when they are having troubles, that God wants to heal and restore and connect to them for their wholeness.
They come back and apparently a whole group of people are coming with them so that suddenly there are five thousand men and their families sitting on the hill side listening to Jesus and being healed and taught. It get's late and the disciples feel that the people should leave now, or they will be hungry. Jesus suggests that the disciples feed them. Once again, Jesus is asking us to be helping people as a part of their learning and growing in faith. The disciples still haven't developed the faith they need and wonder how on earth we are going to feed all these people. Someone suggests that there isn't enough money in the treasury for all of them to have food. Someone else found a small lunch, consisting of 5 loaves of bread and two fish. The loaves are about the size of a dinner roll or hamburger bun. How will that feed this many people?
Once again Jesus gets to show us that our faith can be a whole lot bigger than it is. Jesus asks the people to sit down in groups of about fifty, and then he lifts the bread toward heaven, and gives thanks for them and then breaks them and passes the bread to the disciples, who pass the bread to the people. He does the same with the fish. And lo and behold, a dramatic expression when we see God at work, there is enough food for everyone and a collection of 12 baskets of left overs! God has a way of doing far more than we can even imagine.
The next part of the story invites us to wrestle with what all of this means. So after the people are gone and they have traveled some more, Jesus starts to ask them, "Who do people say that I am?" This question is still asked today. Who do people think Jesus is? well some say, you are a prophet, or John the Baptist come back to life, or some other great rabbi. It sounds like the same answer by people today. Jesus is a great teacher, a miracle worker, a religious leader from the first century, a person we have heard about from a long time ago. Even today we have many answers to what we and our friends think of Jesus. We will explore that in more detail later. Stay tuned.
Then to make sure that Jesus can move toward his purpose of dying in Jerusalem to accomplish the forgiveness of sins and prove who he really is with his Resurrection, he asks the disciples and he really is asking us. "Who do you say that I am?" The reality comes to us, how do we answer that question. Who is Jesus? Peter blurts out that he is the Son of God, the Christ, the Messiah of God. And Jesus thanks him for the revelation that was not a human concoction, but a divine revelation.
Yes, Jesus is the Son of God, yes, Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah of God. Which is pretty unbelievable sometimes. And when Jesus says that this revelation is right and that as the Son of God we are going to have the same challenges he has, we have a hard time with that. He tells them that the Son of God will be betrayed, arrested, tried, crucified and buried. But on the third day be raised back to life. And as a matter of fact each of us, if we want to be a true disciple, must surrender our own wills and take up the cross of obedience and follow him to that difficult end.
The disciples, and us included, have a hard time with Jesus announcing such a horrible event coming to him and they begin to doubt his divinity and his purpose. He will need to show them something else to help keep them on track, and that's what comes next. He takes Peter, James and John up on a mountain top for a time for prayer.
I pray you will continue to read the gospel of Luke for more details, and continue to struggle with and decide for yourself, who Jesus is and what you will do to stay with him for your whole life and beyond. Come back and we will share what happens next in a future Blog report.
Blessings
Pastor Jeff
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