Sermons & News

But Timothy has just now come to us from you, and has brought us the good news of your faith and love. (1 Thessalonians 3: 6)

4/3/20

Beloved in Christ,

It has been four weeks since we suspended services in our church building. We’ve had to quickly reorient ourselves on how to be the Church in such strange times. It has been a challenge, but a blessing to know how many of you are supporting each other in love, as Christ loves us. As we move into Holy Week, it is important that we focus on what we can do rather than what we can’t. We can always make time to pray, to open ourselves up to God’s presence and know God’s love. If anything will see us through these difficult times, it is our faith and trust in God.

Through the wonders of technology, we are offering much of the same services that we would "normally" have during Holy Week, although at different times (see the April Good News for all the service times). The good news is that if you cannot watch them at the time we are offering them, you can watch the videos of them at any time on our YouTube Channel or Facebook page. We will have one service on Palm Sunday and Easter so that our entire community can gather and worship together, hopefully offering solace and support to each other.

I received a letter from a parishioner this week asking that I encourage the congregation to learn and pray Psalm 91, which her community offered in prayer in the late 1960s when her husband was serving in Viet Nam. Psalm 91 is one of my favorite Psalms as well, and apropos in our current context. While I do not promote the idea that praying this Psalm will prevent anyone from getting sick, I do believe that God watches over us and cares for us, giving us strength to face any challenge.

We chose not to order palms this year, so I encourage you to find some other leafy item to use for our Sunday service and then put it up on your door or in your window as a sign of Jesus’s continued love and presence in the world (along with teddy bears and rainbows I hear people are putting in windows for kids to count on walks through their neighborhoods).

I feel like we will be walking with Jesus through his Passion in a new way this year, either by having more time to focus on it, due to staying at home, or less, because of the demands of working at home! I do hope you will take some time to pause and consider how Jesus is working in and through your life right now. And also offer a prayer for strength and support for all those working in the medical field, first responders, those working in grocery stores and other essential services, for putting themselves at risk so others can be as safe as possible.

You are all in my prayers and I look forward to sharing the awesome stories of our faith throughout this next week. As the old hymn says, "I love to tell the story; Twill be my theme in glory. To tell the old, old story Of Jesus and His love."

In Christ,

Rev. Valerie+

Go to the calendar on our home page: Upcoming Events