The Grove Charlotte - Podcast: Recent Episodes
The Grove Charlotte - Podcast
the weekly sermon podcast of The Grove Church - a diverse Presbyterian community in the heart of the Hickory Grove neighborhood in Charlotte, North Carolina
Scripture: Luke 7:36-50
Dear Church,
This Sunday we wrap up our six-week session of ‘Sin School,’ and I’m sure that some of you are wondering what the point of it all was. Given all the harm that has been done in the name of condemning sin, shouldn’t we be retiring this dangerous and arcane theological concept? Don’t we need to focus more on grace and justice? Shouldn’t we be learning about generosity and healing?
The gospels are clear, Jesus came to save sinners. So if we don’t know sin, we don’t really know Jesus.
And once we know sin, we’ll know that we all are sinners. Each one of us is a person separated from God by our individual choices and by the broken and destructive powers and principalities (read: systems) of our culture. if we are too squeamish or precious to wrestle with the hard truth that each one of us is a sinner, then we cannot accept, rejoice and participate in the new life that Jesus is offering us.
The gospel of Luke shows us it’s almost impossible to love Jesus until you know yourself as a sinner.
Without a mature, sober understanding of sin, we might be like Simon, confident in our own ability to live a righteous life in an unrighteous world, carefully, and critically considering Jesus, unaware that we need forgiveness, healing and new life.
But once we know ourselves as people who have been forgiven an insurmountable debt, we are transformed like the saint at the center of the story. We mirror Jesus’ extravagant love. We worship exuberantly. We become witnesses, sent to break in to inhospitable dinner parties, sent out to live joyfully in peace.
It is one of the strange and holy paradoxes of the gospel life: only a church full of sincere self-acknowledged sinners can become a source of Christ’s forgiveness and grace-fueled new life.
I hope you will join me in seeking God’s truth and grace so that together we can be a living sign and source of the glory of God.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: John 8:1-11
Saints,
Sin is offensive.
Jesus is a disruptor of sin.
When we put those two together, we’re left with a conundrum. How could Jesus, deemed Lord of Lords, Holy Magistrate, Counselor, and Friend, be of statute and judge people who aren’t caught actively sinning? And yet, be gracious, merciful, and kind to what seems like a crime against humanity for the woman caught in adultery?
What does my contribution to the cycle of sin have to do with Jesus?
Here’s a hint: We have more in common with the woman caught in adultery than we do with the teachers of the law and the Pharisees.
I hope you can join me, this Sunday, as we wrestle with the text (John 8 : 1-11) — all while sitting in the truth that: just like the woman caught in adultery, we (the world) need a savior.
See you soon,
Shardae’
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Scripture: Romans 5:12-21
Dear Church,
This week at Sin School we turn to the passage in Paul’s letter to the Roman church that we call chapter 5. For millennia, scholars and theologians have been studying these words and then arguing about a concept called Original Sin. I bet you’ve heard of it.
I bet you have questions like what the heck is it? Where did it come from? Is it in me? Can I get rid of it? Why am I responsible for it if it’s something I was born with?
As we said earlier in this worship series, if we turn to the Bible with bad questions, we’ll get bad answers. Paul wasn’t trying to explain the concept of original sin to the believers in Rome, mainly because such a concept didn’t exist!
He was writing this small, struggling community mired in conflict to help them live in peace and unity with one another. And he definitely thought they needed a better understanding of the power and nature of sin in order to flourish.
But he was even more interested in opening their eyes to the power of grace.
This Sunday, I’ll tell you why I don’t think we need to worry about original sin and what Paul’s words help us to see about the power of sin–and the power of grace–instead.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Luke 11:1-13
Dear Church,
Last week, when Octavia led our time of corporate confession and pardon, she shared how a weekly practice of confessing sins was unfamiliar to her when she first came to the Grove. At first, she wondered what kinds of things people were doing that they needed to confess their sins every week.
She went on to beautifully share how regularly wrestling with her own sinfulness has borne fruit in her life. A practice of confessing sins has deepened her awareness of God’s love for her and the power of grace and also broadened her compassion for and connection with other people in their struggles.
Mature Christians regularly face the reality that we are sinners.
But what happens when we grow too comfortable?
What happens when we decide that our sins–the things that separate us from God–are reasonable and tolerable? What happens when we keep confessing our sins, but stop repenting of them? How can we walk in the peace Christ has given us, confident of his grace and our belovedness and still, at the very same time, long for greater redemption and transformation? In other words, how do we live as sinners being saved by grace?
I hope you’ll join me as we consider the prayer Jesus gave his disciples in Luke and see that Jesus anticipated our weakness and provided a way for us not just to know, but experience the power of resurrection in our on-going struggle with sin.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Genesis 11:1-9
Dear Church,
Does God just not like tall buildings?
That was my question the first time I heard about the Tower of Babel and no Sunday School teacher ever answered it to my satisfaction.
Why was God so bent out of shape about the people coming together to work cooperatively to build a big tower? Just a few verses previously God was pretty pleased with Noah for building a big boat–what gives?
The Bible is a holy book. It’s best read, not front to back, beginning to end, but in cycles. On a first read, this story is pure mystery. But we can begin to understand the danger God saw on the plain of Shinar once we know about Pharoah’s pyramids, Nebuchadnezzar’s statue and Solomon’s temple.
The size of a vision doesn’t make it righteous. Every common cause isn’t in service of the common good. Everything that seems glorious, isn’t. This ancient story reveals that sin isn’t limited to the actions of individuals, we can also be collectively swept up into sin-filled destructive systems of oppression and harm.
Sin is corporate, too. That’s a terrible, almost incomprehensible truth for those of us raised to take personal responsibility for our own righteousness. How can we be faithful in a world that sometimes gives us no good choices?
The good news is, we have a God who intervenes. A God who makes a way when there is no way. A God who loves us enough to thwart our plans and scatter us, even when that is our greatest fear. We have a God who loves us enough to be good to us, even when that goodness seems like a curse. Come and see how the very worst things that happen to us can sometimes, but not always, be our deliverance.
Things are not always what they seem. Sometimes, impressively great things have the capacity to destroy us. And sometimes, the end of everything and death of our dreams is the door to the wild, free and abundant life we’ve been praying for.
Come and see.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Genesis 3:1-24
Dear Church,
This Sunday, we’re going to sin school. Because let’s be so for real, as the kids say. We have some un-learning to do.
Some of us were taught that sin was what other people did. Some of us were taught that almost everything we did was sin. Some of us were taught that since Jesus ‘paid our debt’ on the cross, we were incapable of sinning anymore. Or…we could sin but it didn’t matter anymore. Or that sin really meant ‘missing the mark,’ which doesn’t really sound like anything to worry about.
Healthy disciples of Christ need mature and sober wisdom about sin. We need to understand what sin is’ and what it isn’t, so that we can discover healing, wholeness and freedom in Christ. So for the next six weeks, we’re going back to class to recover the truth about sin. And here’s my promise to you:
No guilt, no shame, no condemnation.
But also–no delusion or flattery or cheap grace faux-theology that our sin is somehow acceptable or benign.
Because Jesus really did come to save us from sin and death. And we need to face our sin in order to see our salvation.
This Sunday, we’ll be learning about sin–because we have nothing to fear. Sin is real and destructive and against us. But the love of God in Christ Jesus is the most powerful force in all of realty; and it is good; and it is for us.
Come and hear the good news about sin!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Joshua 24:1-15
Hello Grove!
I am so looking forward to sharing the message with you this Sunday. There are so many changes taking place as we wind down the summer. We are beginning to pack up our summer toys and prepare to make lunches and get bookbags ready for homework. Many of us have enjoyed this blazing hot summer while others are looking forward to jackets and cool breezes. As we look ahead to these changes, I want us to remember that seasons change but God does not. No matter what season we find ourselves in or what changes or challenges we may face God remains our consistent provider and protector and redeemer.
Last week, Pastor Kate wrapped up the sermon series, A Season of Astonishment: Reviling in the Ordinary Goodness of God, and this week we will build on that foundation. We will look at the goodness of God and ask ourselves what are we doing with it? I pray that we may be able to challenge action out of ourselves and each other as a community- in love, to recognize the gift of goodness and rest in its benefits.
I look forward to seeing you Sunday,
Nicole
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Scripture: Psalm 8, Psalm 13
Dear Church,
We’ve just wrapped up an astonishingly good week of Camp Wonder (VBS, if you’re old school!) with children and youth at the Grove. Each morning we played and sang and worshipped, told stories, made art, created friendships and feasted at the breakfast and lunch tables. We pounded flowers (you had to be there) and even learned to play disc golf!
And in the midst of all the holy chaos, we focused on wonder. The incredible truth that each one of us is made in the image of a wonderful wonder-making God. And we leaned into the blessed freedom we have to ask questions, express our doubts, get curious and wonder. Every single one of us is wonderful and made to wonder. Wonderful and wonder-full.
On Sunday, we’ll gather around two of King David’s prayers. Psalm 8, extolling the wonders of creation and our place in it. And Psalm 13, where David vulnerably wonders where God is in his life.
I’ll leave you with a few lines from the original songs our children learned and will be sharing with you in worship. Our friend Elizabeth Bridges placed this line in the chorus of the song she wrote for them about the prodigal son: “You can never get away from how much God loves you.” And these lines from the bridge of our theme song: “I am full of wonder and wonderful” and “I’ll wonder as I wander this great big world.”
God is better than we imagine.
The truth about God’s love is astonishingly beautiful. It is a holy gift to plant seeds of the goodness of God in the hearts of our little ones. How wonderful it will be Sunday to allow them to sing that truth back into our hearts. I hope you’ll come and be blessed.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Exodus 25:1-9, Exodus 31:1-11
Dear Church,
We come to the Grove from a lot of different places and backgrounds. We like different foods and root for different teams and celebrate with different foods and traditions. Other than Jesus, we have very little in common.
But over the years, I have discovered one other place of passionate agreement. Something that unites us across generations, genders and cultures:
Everybody hates group work.
Almost every person has a story to tell about a school assignment or work project that went left because other people were bossy or lazy or incompetent. Most of us would prefer to do important work on our own, without depending on–or being sabotaged–by anyone else.
But that is not God’s will for us. God calls us to life, to ministry, to work…together. I hope you’ll join me as we look at the story of what is perhaps the very first group project–the time God asked the people to build a tabernacle-sanctuary in the middle of camp–together.
Because Jesus is our friend, but he does not want to be our only friend. God calls us to life with Jesus, together. Come and see!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: 1 Kings 19:1-13
Dear Church,
For a long time I was part of a church that used a standardized liturgy each time we celebrated communion. The pastor would come to the table and say, ‘The Lord be with you,’ and we all knew to answer back, ‘And also with you.’
That part always bothered me. Because it seemed as though the pastor was saying, ‘May the Lord be with you’ like the characters said, ‘may the odds be ever in your favor’ at the start of the Hunger Games. Like we were praying that God would be with us in the future (maybe even in the immediate future once we took the bread and the cup) but for now, we were all acknowledging that God wasn’t with us. Our prayers were like a holy dinner bell, calling God in for supper. The Lord may be with you…or maybe not.
And for most of human history, people have thought this way. We’ve believed that God’s sacred nature meant that God had to stay far away from ordinary sin-filled humans People climbed mountains to get closer to God, or sought the holy in the depths of caves, acting like God was a prize that could only be won by the strongest and bravest and most exceptional. People thought God might come closer to those who devoted their whole lives to achieving spiritual perfection, but could not stand the stink of ordinary imperfect human lives. Or maybe we just hoped it was that way.
The consistent revelation of scripture is that God is with us. Already. From the beginning of Genesis to the glorious triumph of love in Revelation, God is with us. God is close, right now. Theologian Sam Wells speculates that the biggest problem of humans isn’t our morality–it’s our isolation. We weren’t made to do things ‘for’ God, but to be with God. As our friend Lisa Koons puts it, ‘God made us to hang out with us.’
So we start not with a hope–‘may the Lord be with you!’ but a stunned declaration, ‘God IS with us!’ God is WITH us. GOD is with us…close to…us. It’s a glorious truth to savor in this season of astonishment.
I hope you can join us as we watch the prophet Elijah discover the nearness of God for the first time. It happens, not when he’s at the top of his game, but when he’s burned out and teetering on the edge of despair. Maybe you’re there too? Come and discover how tender and close God is to your beautiful weary heart.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Luke 15:11-32
Dear Church,
When my girls were little, we had to teach them how to say sorry. And we had to practice–a lot. Like all young children, they had trouble controlling their impulses, using their words instead of their hands (or feet!) and asking instead of taking. Things could escalate quickly.
So we taught them how to talk instead of punch back when there was a problem. They’d run to me and I’d send them back to one another and coach them through a conversation. Tell your sister what she did that hurt you. Listen to what she’s saying to you. Can you tell her that you are sorry?
They were little and learning, so I didn’t expect perfect. I ignored rolled eyes and huffy breaths and barely audible apologies. But there was one thing they instinctively did that I always made a point to interrupt and correct. One would say, ‘I’m sorry’ and the other would answer back ‘It’s okay.’ And I’d swoop in:
Don’t say it’s okay, because it’s not okay. Say, ‘I forgive you’. Because that’s how we can start again and make it better.
Forgiveness isn’t an implicit acknowledgment that what happened wasn’t important or harmful. Forgiving someone doesn’t mean that what they did was okay. Forgiveness opens a path to healing and change.
We are a forgiven people. We need to spend more time being astonished at that truth. What does it mean that we are forgiven? How does it change us? How does it connect us to God? How can it be?
This Sunday we return again to Jesus’ story of the Prodigal Son and the astonishing forgiveness and love he received from his Father when he least expected and deserved it. But this time, we meet the older brother and learn what it feels like, not to be forgiven, but to watch someone else not get what’s coming to them.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Luke 15:1-24
Dear Church,
So far in our Season of Astonishment, we’ve marveled at two glory-filled truths:
We are Chosen & We are Changed.
But on their own, these might be astonishing and terrifying truths.
Recently, I was watching a sci-fi show where the evil supervillain could pick and switch any unsuspecting person, without warning, from a resister or bystander into a violent destructive ally. It’s only good news if we know the nature of the God choosing and changing us.
In the gospel of Luke, Jesus tells three stories about the character of God: a shepherd recklessly rescues a wandering sheep, a woman relentlessly searches for a lost coin and a Father who lets his youngest son go and then watches and waits for the moment he exuberantly welcomes him back home.
God has chosen us and God is changing us because God. Loves. Us. Right now. As we are. God is not waiting to love us until we become who we ‘ought’ to be. We rush past the truth of God’s love too quickly in our quest for power, purpose and understanding. God IS Love. That’s an astonishing revelation. God is not vengeful. God is not destruction. God is not MAD at you. God is LOVE. God loves us. AND Jesus’ parables and presence show us, God’s love is so extraordinary–extra-ordinary–so far beyond what we name and claim as love–that we barely recognize it.
God’s love seeks what is lost because sheep, coins and children have intrinsic non-negotiable worth. God’s love is limitless and non-transactional. It is not a resource to be hoarded or a reward to be earned; it is necessity. And, most improbably and offensive to us, God’s love refuses to conquer or compel us ‘for our own good.’ God’s love is not a prison. The younger son is free to walk away, but he does not have the power to stop the Father’s longing for his return. The Father waits as the shepherd searches and the woman seeks, expectantly.
Perhaps the most astonishing thing of all is not how hard it is for us to trust God’s love, but how recklessly easy it seems to be for God’s love to trust us to come home.
I hope you will join me as we practice astonishment and wonder at God’s love for us.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: John 3:1-21. 1 Peter 1:3
Dear Church,
He was a Pharisee, a member of the ruling council and a spiritual leader of his people. He was respectful and curious and sensitive to the moving of the Spirit. He knew the Bible inside and out. You could sum up Nicodemus in one word: Faithful.
And with all of that extraordinary faith and impressive pedigree, Nicodemus hears what every one of us hears when we seek the Lord: You must be born again.
For centuries, Christians have wondered and argued and threatened one another over the meaning of these words. At times, the church has twisted this revelation into a weapon of exclusion or accusation.
But Jesus isn’t threatening us here, he’s promising us something – something astonishing and wonder-filled:
Wherever we are on our spiritual journey, the goodness of God is making us new. Life with Jesus is not a self-improvement plan. We are not limited by our own will power and wisdom. We can have faith, not in our own efforts, but in the power of the love of God to heal and grow us.
So we can breathe deep and unclench our souls. We can relax and rejoice. As we hear each Sunday after we confess our sins, we can be at peace because God is making us new.
We are not in competition with anyone. We are not in danger. Since that very first Easter Sunday, we have held by the love of Jesus who endured the cross for us, the love of God who raised Jesus from the dead and the love of the Spirit who lives in us, filling and connecting us to that great holy love.
On our best days, on our worst days, in what appears ordinary and in what appears extraordinary (spoiler alert: it’s all extraordinary), we can be astonished and comforted by the great mercy of God that has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Let’s come together to revel and rejoice in the goodness of God! God’s own Spirit is making us new. In Christ, we are born again.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Exodus 3:1-12, John 15:16
Dear Church,
For the last five years, I’ve been making a weekly podcast with my friend and fellow pastor Eulando Henton. It’s cleverly titled “2 Pastors take a walk and make a podcast.” We talk about pastor-life, racial justice, transformation and growing healthy & holy multi-ethnic, multi-cultural churches. And we begin each episode by sharing what’s astonishing us.
Because if you make a practice of looking for it, something always is. And if you don’t focus your attention on all the good and beautiful things in life that astonish you, you will quickly become overwhelmed and paralyzed by all the terrible things that astonish you.
To be astonished is to be filled with awe and wonder and amazement. The goodness of God is astonishing, but sometimes sin and familiarity robs us of our attention and blinds us to the incredible goodness of God. One of the marks of the early church was that it was filled with awe.
At the Grove, we’re declaring this summer the season of astonishment. Together, we are going to direct our attention on the active goodness of God. We are going to practice noticing the presence and power of the goodness of God. We are going to let it astonish us. We are going to seek the Spirit to recover our sight & astonishment.
The goodness of God is powerfully, palpably, perceptibly with us every moment of our lives, whether we notice it or not. But life is better–and we are more joyful and loving–when we notice it. Let’s practice astonishment together.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
P. S. Speaking of astonishment, yesterday, our friend Wes Vander-Lugt released his book “Beauty is Oxygen: Finding a Faith that Breathes.” If you want to dive deeper into astonishment, this book beautifully resonant with all the themes of our summer worship series. We’ll be praying over and celebrating it a little later in the summer!
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Scripture: 2 John 1-13
Dear Church,
My favorite saint is a woman called Julian who lived a long time ago in a place called Norwich. She had visions, the most famous of which is the one of some thing ‘that appeared to be hazelnut.’ At that time, she knew the Lord was showing her that the tiny object was everything that ever was and ever would be, and it was held by God and so ‘it is well, it is well, and all manner of things will be well.’
It was years later in her life, a life marked by deprivation and wars and plagues and loss, that she asked God For the meaning of the vision. And this is what the Lord told her:
Wouldst thou learn thy Lord’s meaning in this thing? Learn it well: Love was His meaning. Who shewed it thee? Love. What shewed He thee? Love. Wherefore shewed it He? For Love. Hold thee therein and thou shalt learn and know more in the same. But thou shalt never know nor learn therein other thing without end. Thus was I learned that Love was our Lord’s meaning.
The meaning of life is love.
It always has been and always will be, but since the fall, we humans have never been satisfied with that.
But life came as a gift from God, who is love. Our creator who made us from love for love. And anytime our theology becomes anything other or easier than love, we’ve made ourselves an idol.
I hope you’ll join me as we read the last of St. John’s ancient love letters and remember again that the way is love and love is our way.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: 1 John 4:7-21
Dear Church,
I love the book of 1 John because the message is profoundly simple: God is love, and if you are God’s children, you will be people of love.
This is what Christianity is all about! In his marvelous little book The Love That Is God, Frederick Christian Bauerschmidt summarizes the basics of Christianity this way:
God is love.
The love that is God is crucified love.
We are called to friendship with the risen Jesus.
We cannot love God if we do not love each other.
We live our love out from the community created by the Spirit.
That fourth line is often the hardest.
We get tripped up by our busyness, by our tendency to narrow the scope of people we are called to love, by our fear, and by misunderstanding what it means to love.
But the message of 1 John is liberating: God has given us everything we need be people of love. The Spirit is with us, dissolving our fears and empowering us for a life of sacrificial love.
I hope you will participate in worship this Sunday at 10am in the sanctuary or on the livestream as we continue our series First, Love and remember who we are as people of love.
Grace and peace,
Wes Vander Lugt
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Scripture: 1 John 3:11-24 (NIV)
In the beginning, we understood that our only goal on the way of Jesus is to love. Not to fix or change or judge or punish or even to save, not to be the holiest, or the most important or the most powerful or the best. God is all of those things, and the way of Jesus won’t make you God, which is what we’ve all desired from the beginning. The way of Jesus will heal us and show us how good and wonder-filled and enough it is to be people fully loved by our Creator. The way of Jesus will make us content and grateful to be human. It is the grace of God that delivers us from evil and into love, which is the opposite of death.
Love will set us free in the wild center of God’s liberating redemption of all creation. Love will lead us on the path back to shalom. Love, and only love, will take us everywhere we need to go. Love will make all things new.
Including our life in Christ.
I hope you will join me as we share the feast of communion and I hope you’ll come and taste and see that God is good and God is for you and God is with you and God is within you.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: 1 John 2:7-17
In the year 125 AD, a Greek philosopher named Aristedes attempted to explain the popularity of Christianity to the Roman Emperor Caesar Hadrian’s. Here’s how he described these early Christians:
“They love one another. They never fail to help widows. They save orphans from those who would hurt them. If they have something, they give freely to one who has nothing. If they see an immigrant, they take him into their homes and rejoice over him as a brother…and if there is among them any that is poor and needy, and if they have no spare food, they fast two or three days in order to supply to the needy their lack of food.”
Who would describe Christians that way today?
This Sunday, we begin a new worship series based on the letters of John, the last living apostle to the early church. He was the one Jesus called ‘beloved,’ and he wrote to believers in the time before the faith was a religion, before it was institutionalized, before it was domesticated, when it was still a way of living. When it was still a way of love.
These letters were written before we replaced Jesus’ invitation to ‘follow me’, with the authoritative command to worship Jesus, before we replaced ‘pick up your cross and follow’, with ‘believe these doctrines or be damned.’ John wrote in a time when the church understood that Jesus did not leave us with a call to belief or worship, but with one command: ‘love one another as I have loved you.’ Keeping that command was the way the early church lived with Christ.
In those early days, keeping the faith was figuring out what does it look like to love my brother and sister the way that Christ has loved me?
You can see in Aristedes’ words that people answered that question in some astonishingly beautiful ways. Now most Christians talk about Jesus as the only way to get to heaven after you die. Then Christians talked about Jesus as the only way to live on earth as citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven.
At first, Christianity was a way of living with love. Let’s go back to the beginning.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Acts 2:1-21
When Jesus gathered his disciples together after his resurrection, before he returned to the Father, he gave specific instructions. ‘Stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.’
So they stayed together in Jerusalem. They gathered in an upper room, they did a little administrative work, they prayed, and they waited. They did not get what they were waiting for. They did not get the kind of power they expected or desired. Because who in the world could have anticipated this?
Instead, they got the power Jesus asked the Father to give them. They got Jesus’ own Holy Spirit. And in the moment they received the Spirit, they became the answer to Jesus’ prayer.
This Sunday is Pentecost. We will remember the story of that day and the wisest and most mature among us will celebrate it. Because the story of that day is still the story of our life together. Those first disciples didn’t get what they prayed for, they became what Jesus prayed for–they were filled with the Holy Spirit, what was in them was not of them, and they became the church. May it be so with us.
The church without the Spirit of God is just a religious institution, a collective, interactive man-made idol. Such a church might do things for God, but it cannot do things with God. It is limited by its own wisdom, its own desires, its own culture, its conflict and its limited vision and resources. It can easily be seduced by the enemy. It has and does tremendous damage.
But a community of believers who wait, pray and surrender to the Holy Spirit, they are empowered by God through the Holy Spirit and become the living body of Christ. They are limited only by the will of God. Such a church has everything it needs to flourish in faithfulness to God in all seasons.
I hope you will join me for worship on Sunday at 10am, in the sanctuary or on the livestream. Like our ancestors, we will surrender our agenda and wait and pray for the power of God which is the Holy Spirit. Apart from the Spirit we can do nothing. With the Spirit, we have everything we need to become the answer to the prayers Jesus is still praying for the world.
Come and see!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Colossians 1:9-22
Dear Church,
As is our custom here at the Grove, in January I prayed and asked the Holy Spirit for wisdom to discern a word to guide us in faith and focus this year. For 2024, that word is reconciliation.
And so, on the last Sunday of our worship series ‘Life After Grace,’ we turn again to that word–reconciliation. Most of us know little more than the definition. We know what the word means, but very few of us have any lived experience of deep, transformative relational repair. Even worse, we don’t want it.
Our culture, secular and sacred, celebrates enmity and judgment. Perhaps especially in the church, our deepest animating passions surround what we’re against and who we reject. Our moral vision rarely exceeds the righteousness of exclusion. We believe that our enemies are no more than the worst things they’ve ever done. We seek God’s grace to protect us, not reconcile us. Which means, at our deepest level, we believe the power of sin supersedes the power of grace.
But reconciliation is the core of the revelation of Jesus. It is the ultimate and inevitable expression of grace. Anything less than reconciliation isn’t grace at all. When the thought of reconciliation fills our own hearts with resentment and suspicion, it is not our enemies that we are rejecting, but the way of Jesus and our own salvation. If grace doesn’t heal and save our enemies, it doesn’t save us either.
I hope you’ll join me as we let the Spirit and the scriptures shape our vision and increase our desire for reconciliation. We cannot believe what we cannot imagine. So first we’ll let scripture and Spirit help us imagine a life after grace where we, along with all the rest of creation, are healed and reconciled back to Christ.
Once our hardened hearts are softened and filled with the beauty of the goodness of reconciliation, then we’ll believe it and begin to long for and seek the power of grace to be part of it.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Psalm 139:1-12
Grove Family,
I know we talk about God a lot.
About how we are loved and cared for. We share stories with one another about how God keeps us or shows us the path we should follow. Surrounding ourselves with these stories is encouraging and of course it builds and strengthens our faith.
This Sunday we will examine how we can stay the course when we find ourselves in those moments when we aren’t strong, when doubt creeps in and questions abound.
We will walk with our brother David and reflect on moments of his life when he walked with God but he also wondered and questioned. We will explore how God knows us and is not surprised by our feelings as we walk this journey called life.
As we journey through the various seasons we find ourselves in, what is most valuable for us to remember is that God is with us.
Smooches!
Elder, Pastor, Seminarian Nicole Thompson
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Scripture: 2 Corinthians 12:1-10
If grace were only the assurance that we will find eternal life with God after we die, it would be more than enough reason to praise God forever. If grace were only the character of God’s heart that chooses to pour out merciful forgiveness on sinners, it would be enough reason to give thanks for all of eternity.
Most of us think that’s what grace is–eternal life and an assurance of God’s mercy. And it is more than enough for us. Who could want or need anything more?
We do.
People who want to pick up their crosses and follow Jesus, we need more.
And the incredible good news is that there IS more. Grace is even more than mercy and salvation.
Grace is power.
Grace is the force that resurrected Jesus from the grave.
Grace is the power inherent in the new life we receive from God.
Grace is the ability that is in us, but not of us, to be faith-filled followers of Jesus.
But most of us, as familiar and dependent on grace as we understand ourselves to be, don’t feel very powerful. In our suffering and struggles, we are weak and despairing. Or worse, in denial. Many of us have been taught to completely deny our suffering and struggles.
If power is part of grace, then why are we so powerless?
Because, friends, the power of grace can only be found in one place. It’s the place Jesus walked toward unflinchingly his whole life. And it’s the place most of us run as fast and far from as we possibly can.
I hope you will join me as we discover the exact place we can find the power of grace in our lives, should we choose to seek it.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Exodus 16:1-16
Dear Church,
The Hebrew people were liberated by the power of God’s love for them. They no longer had to fear Pharaoh’s wrath or the brutality of slavery or the infanticide of their children. They were rescued out of oppression and set on a journey towards the promised land and their common destiny–to dwell in a land flowing with milk and honey and become a source of blessing for every nation on earth. It was happy-ever-after on all fronts.
Except that it wasn’t.
Because they didn’t know how to live blessed and free. They didn’t know how to survive, how to care for themselves and, most basically, how to feed themselves in this new life. So this glorious freedom began to feel like doom and they cried out to God (read complained) and demanded to go back to their familiar life of slavery. At least we had good food back then, we’d rather die there than die out here in the desert.
Sometimes, freedom from your fears feels like a different kind of death. What is unknown can feel like threat, even when it’s actually a blessing.
As Christians, we have life after grace. We have been freed from the powers of sin and death and evil. We are redeemed people and on our way to the promised land, and even on the way, we have abundant life.
And all this blessing is strange and unfamiliar. Sometimes, wild new life can feel like death. Sometimes, the urge to return to what we know is all-consuming. We too cry out to God. Sometimes we unconsciously choose to return to our old pre-grace–and don’t even notice.
The good news is, our God is a determined liberator. God meets our needs with extraordinary generosity and gentleness. God knows we need space and grace to grow into our new life in Christ and gives us both, abundantly.
I hope you’ll join me, as we look back at the story of the chosen people in the wilderness learning how to live in the freedom of God’s love and celebrate the way Christ, which ushers us into our own new life after grace.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Ephesians 2:11-16, 1:9-10, 3:6, 3:14-17
Dear Church,
When Jesus said ‘it is finished’ on the cross, he was announcing his eternal victory over the powers and principalities of sin and death. That’s not what it looked like, but that’s what it was. The resurrection was God’s vindication and validation of Jesus’ triumph over the forces of evil. Ever since that first Easter, we have been living in grace.
Now that grace has come and the Kingdom of God is in our midst, the Holy Spirit has been unleashed to work in the world making all things new. And it may surprise you, but here’s the first item of business:
Destruction
The Risen Christ has some demolition work to do.
Specifically, he’s tearing down the wall of hostility that divides enemies and strangers from one another.
Perhaps your first response is incredulity. You might look around and point out all the places that division and hostility still rule the day. But before we question the efficacy of grace in geopolitics and national culture, I wonder if we could pause and look inward. Are you willing to surrender to grace and allow the Lord to tear down the walls of fear and hostility you’ve erected in your own heart as a barricade against enemy love and redemption.
Our job is not to critique how well or poorly God is overcoming sin in other people’s hearts, but to soberly wonder if we are allowing the Lord to conquer and reclaim our own hearts that have been twisted by sin and fear. Life after grace includes rejoicing in the salvation God gives to our sworn enemies.
Do you long for reconciliation with your enemies, or are you still building a wall to stop the flow of unmerited grace?
I hope you’ll join us as our friend Cedric Lundy preaches the good news of God’s astonishing grace-fueled demolition!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 8:23-27
Dear Church,
It has not been quiet at the Grove this week and we are so grateful! We’ve gathered with more than 50 children and youth for our Treasure Hunters Spring Break Vacation Bible school and the mornings have been full of the sounds of young voices singing, playing, making art and seeking treasure.
All week we’ve soaked in joy of learning that Jesus is alive and making all things new–to heal, to reconcile, to provide abundantly and to bring peace to us even when we are in the midst of a storm.
On Easter morning we discovered the resurrection of Jesus–and with it the glorious news that the last word in life isn’t sin or death or suffering. Because of Jesus, the last and final word in life is grace. And we who follow the risen Lord are entering into life after grace. Together with the Spirit we are learning how to live now that we know grace, now that we see that in Christ there is always enough and nothing to fear.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 28:1-10
Dear Church,
These holy days are not for pretending. We watch and pray as those who know the incredible end of the story. On the cross we are seeing the triumph of the goodness of God. We are seeing the Prince of Peace overthrow the powers of violence, sin and death.
The most radical thing that Christians believe is not the virgin birth or resurrection. It’s not that one time the sun stood still or that Jesus walked on water. It isn’t the liberating ten plagues or the manna in the wilderness. We believe a lot of incredible things; but the most astonishing faith claim we make is this:
Goodness has already won.
Grace has already won.
Mercy has already won.
Love has already won.
Christ is risen.
Believing this, and seeking the grace of God that makes it true, is how we have the courage and power to welcome the stranger, embrace the prisoner, forgive our enemies and live each day in hope washing one another’s feet.
I hope you will also join me as we delight in the goodness of God that rose Jesus from the grave. Together we will seek God for the grace to live by the goodness of God, and by the power of the Holy Spirit–we will find it!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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It is Good Friday. This is the holiest day. This is the hardest day. We cannot look away. I hope you will join us as we worship and pray and keep watch together. Jesus tells us this is the hour for which he came. He promises that if we will allow the Spirit to open our eyes, we will see the glory of God. Then we will understand how it is possible that this day can be good.
The First Word “Father Forgive Them”
Luke 23:33-34 – Pastor Barbara Smith
The Second Word – “Today, With Me, Paradise”
Luke 23:39-43 – Rev. James Thomas
The Third Word – “Woman, Behold Your Son”
John 19:25-27– Josue Figueroa
The Fourth Word – “My God, My God, Why”
Matthew 27:39-46 – Nicole Thompson
The Fifth Word – “I Thirst”
John 19:28-29 – Pastor Kate Murphy
The Sixth Word – “It Is Finished”
John 19:30 – Ciara Osbey
The Seventh Word – “Into Your Hands”
Luke 23:43-49 – Dr. Wes Vander Lugt
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Scripture: Matthew 21:1-11 & Matthew 27:27-32
Dear Church,
We are standing together on the cusp of Holy Week.
Throughout this sacred season of Lent, we’ve been walking towards the glorious revelation of the cross and empty tomb which forms the heart of our faith and hope in Jesus. Now we are only a few steps away.
But first, two parades. One is strange, but joyous. The other horrifying and brutal. One embodies the way of Christ. The other exposes the true nature of all that stands opposed to God’s love–stripping away the facade of righteousness and respectability that so often deceives us.
We need to see both and seek God for wisdom, healing and growth in them.
I hope you will worship with me throughout this holiest of weeks. There is much the Spirit wants to show us in the final triumphant moments of the life of Jesus. Some of what we will see is astonishingly beautiful. And much of what we will behold is almost unbearable horror.
All of it is true. The beauty and the horror. And in Christ, God provides beautiful transcendent life for us in all of it.
Sooner or later, we will all experience the reality of these days in our own lives. We need to see how Jesus is with us in it all, is faithful to us in it all.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 27:11-26
Dear Church,
‘I am innocent of this man’s blood. It is your responsibility!’
So says Pontius Pilate, governor of Judea, as he washes his hands and knowingly condemns an innocent man to death.
It’s a terrible irony we are all too familiar with–Pilate, who has absolute power to condemn or pardon Jesus, pretends to be powerless and performs innocence.
But saying, even believing, you are innocent doesn’t make it so.
Why was Pilate unwilling to use the power he was given to do the right thing? Though he was ‘amazed’ by Jesus, found evidence of no crime, recognized the self-interested duplicity of the accusers and was warned by his wife ‘not to have anything to do with that innocent man,’ Pilate decided to have Jesus crucified. And he found a way to rationalize that decision.
Just as we all do when we knowingly participate in evil.
For centuries, Christians have abhorred Judas for betraying Jesus. But there is a long and rich tradition of believers venerating Pilate as a ‘secret Christian,’ even a saint. Why do we condemn Judas but excuse Pilate?
Maybe because, in our heart of hearts we know that like Pilate, we have more power than we acknowledge and more culpability for the unopposed brutality of our world than we care to admit.
I hope you’ll join me as we soberly consider the life of our brother Pilate, what he did, what he should have done, and how we can seek Jesus for the grace and power to live faithfully in critical times.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 26:26-35 & Matthew 26:47-75
Dear Church,
We choose to follow Jesus because we want to know God more fully and intimately. And so it is a gift, but not a surprise, that as our faith in Jesus grows, our knowledge of God grows as well. We learn some things about God that amaze us, other things that astonish us, and more than we’d like that confuses and unsettles us. Still, learning more about God is what we expect when we put our faith in Jesus.
What we don’t expect, however, is to learn so much about ourselves.
We sign on for God-knowledge. We also get self-knowledge, whether we like it or not.
Peter didn’t sign on for self-discovery. Like most of us, he thought he already knew everything there was to know about his own soul. Being Peter, he reasonably assumed that he was the expert on Peter.
He wasn’t.
Very few of us would dare to argue with Jesus about who God is. But most of us should be able to identify with Peter when he argued with Jesus about who he was.
We come to Jesus wanting to see and know God. Part of that revelation is Jesus showing us our own sacred souls.
For good and for ill, we are not who we believe we are.
We do not know ourselves best.
Jesus does.
Part of deciding to follow Jesus requires believing what he shows us about ourselves.
It’s not always comfortable to let go of our self-illusions and believe Jesus when he shows us who we are. But accepting that Jesus knows us best is what allows him to lead us.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 26:1-14 -&- Matthew 27:1-10
Dear Church,
In response to the Jesus Super Bowl ad, a pastor named Mark Driscoll tweeted, ‘yes, Jesus washed Judas’ feet and then he sent him to hell’ #hegetsus
Well, then.
This Lent, we are focusing on the people who encountered Jesus in the last week of his life and decided for or against him. And on Sunday, we’re considering Judas’ decision to betray Jesus (with a kiss!) for 30 pieces of sliver. For generations, Christians have told his story and wondered…
Can someone make a choice so terrible that it utterly destroys their humanity? Can someone commit an act so heinous that it makes them beyond all hope?
Can Judas be saved?
Should he be?
What happened to Judas?
I’ll tell you this, the way we tell Judas’ story reveals a lot about our own understanding of the power and will of God.
I hope you’ll join me as we consider the one Christians have condemned for centuries and then allow Jesus to feed us at his table.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: John 11:45-57
Dear Church,
In the gospel of John, Jesus’ fate was sealed after he raised his friend Lazarus from the dead. There were plenty of people who saw it happen: their neighbor, who died four days ago, stumbled out of the tomb after Jesus came and cried and called out, Lazarus, come!
It was bringing Lazarus back to life that led to Jesus’ death.
Some of those first-hand witnesses saw the miracle and believed in him. Others saw and told on him.
They ran to the leaders of their temples and synagogues and reported what they’d seen. And those religious leaders called an emergency meeting of the Presbytery Sanhedrin to figure out what to do about Jesus. Because whoever he was, he was clearly going to change everything. And they were going to have to decide whether they were for that or against it. They decided that whatever Jesus was doing, even though it included raising the dead, they were against it.
And like all people of faith ever since, we too must decide if we are for or against the way Jesus is changing everything. Will we yield to the power of the glory of God Jesus unleashes in our lives? Or will we decide that some things are more sacred to us and must be protected from Jesus?
I hope you’ll join me for worship this Sunday at 10am–in the sanctuary or on the live-stream. Because Lent is a time set apart for us to reconsider and recommit to the way of Jesus. And as much as we prefer the stories of those who decided for Jesus, it is good for our souls to contemplate how very similar we are to those who encountered Jesus and decided against him.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Hebrews 11:1-16 (Faith in Action) Dear Church, Faith is a verb. Faith is not what we believe or know, it’s not how much we love or are loved by God, though it grows out of those things. Faith is the choices we make, the actions we take on the basis of how we know … Continue reading "How to Faith-Week 2 // Faith in Action // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Luke 9:18-27
Dear Church,
Perhaps you are also going through a season where the world seems extra heavy. Perhaps, like me, someone has tried to lift you up by encouraging you to ‘have faith.’
But what if we’ve been thinking about faith all wrong? What if faith isn’t a noun? What if faith isn’t something we have, isn’t a thing we carry around in our hearts, or think in our brains, or feel in our feelings?
What if faith is a verb? What if faith is the choices we make, the course of actions we commit to, a way of life we repeat over and over again? What if faith is not what we have, but what we do?
That’s how Jesus seemed to think about it. When Peter boldly declared that Jesus was the Messiah, the son of God, Jesus’ response wasn’t, ‘Welp, my work here is finished. Good job, everybody! Time to wrap it up!’
He said (and this is, admittedly, a loose translation), ‘Great, now you need to know that I’m going to head to Jerusalem and defeat evil, sin and death on the cross. If you want to follow me, you’ll need to deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow me.’
In Jesus’ opinion, a declaration of faith isn’t the culmination of our life with him, but the very beginning of it. Once we know who Jesus is, then we get to decide if we’re going to follow him. The call isn’t to have faith, it’s to do faith, to walk it out, to live it out, to follow the one we believe is our Lord and savior.
That’s why the new worship series we’re launching this week isn’t called ‘how to have faith’ but ‘how to faith.’ The Spirit is inviting us into a freer, fuller life with Jesus, one that isn’t limited by our feelings or our thinking. It’s a life of grace–a way of living Jesus both calls us to and completes in us.
I hope you’ll join us as we learn together how to faith Jesus.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: 2 Corinthians 5:1-21 Dear Church, For we walk by faith and not by sight… These are the apostle Paul’s words to the church he founded that had begun to doubt him. Of course, if the people had begun to doubt Paul’s leadership, he wouldn’t really have cared. But they had begun to doubt the vision of … Continue reading "We Walk by Faith // Salvation // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Luke 19:1-10 (NRSV) This week we are thrilled to welcome the Rev. Daniel Heath to the pulpit! Daniel serves as associate Chaplain at Davidson College and is a long-time friend to the Grove. Daniel will be sharing a message about Jesus’ encounter with Zacchaeus, a tree-climbing tax collector despised by his neighbors. Zacchaeus wasn’t … Continue reading "Jesus and Zacchaeus // Welcoming Uninvited Guests // Rev. Daniel Heath"
Scripture: Genesis 50:15-21 Dear Church, There’s a song we sing sometimes at the Grove called “Blessings Everywhere.” In these days, I am finding solace and rest in the words of the chorus: Blessings in the highs, blessings in the lows, blessings everywhere I go. Blessings in the yes, blessings in the no, blessings everywhere I … Continue reading "The Life of Joseph-Part 2 // Blessings // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Genesis 37:1-28 Dear Church, One of the things I find so comforting about scripture is how much familiarity is there. Of course, you find the unbelievable miracles–instant healings, never-ending feasts, walking on water. You find the sublime poetry of the psalms and the prophets. You find declarations of God’s limitless love and unending mercy. … Continue reading "The Life of Joseph-Part 1 // Genesis 37 // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Micah 4:1-5 Dear Church, The prophet Micah famously told us what the Lord requires of us–to do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with God. But before he told us what to do, he told us what God was going to do for us and through us. King Hezekiah called the prophet to the … Continue reading "Holy Troublemakers -Week 4 // Micah 4 // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Jonah 4:1-4 Dear Church, Do you believe in repentance? This week we turn to the book of Jonah–and that’s the question. We like to pretend Jonah’s story is about obedience or the ‘problem of evil.’ But it isn’t. The book of Jonah is about the problem of Goodness. Ultimately, the book of Jonah asks … Continue reading "Holy Troublemakers -Week 3 // Jonah 4 // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Isaiah 58:1-63:14 Dear Church, In the 58th chapter of the book of Isaiah, God tells the prophet to start shouting as loud as he can, raise his voice like a trumpet alarm and call out the people for their many sins and total rebellion against God. So–that sounds terrible and terrifying, doesn’t it? What … Continue reading "Holy Troublemakers -Week 2 // Isaiah 58 // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Ezekiel 10:9-22 Dear Church, In his sermon on the mount, Jesus says, ‘blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.’ In the very next breath, he says people should be encouraged and rejoice when they are persecuted and insulted and lied about, because this is what has always happened and … Continue reading "Holy Troublemakers -Week 1 // Ezekiel // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 13:44-46, Luke 8:21 & 11:28 Dear Church, Jesus liked to tell stories about seeking and finding. He told one parable about a man seeking treasure who found some buried in a field. He hid it again; went away and sold everything he had and then bought the field. We are all seeking treasure … Continue reading "#RealTalk-Week 4 // Handling Conflict // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: 2 Corinthians 12:7b-10 Dear Church, #realtalk: My greatest fear is rejection. Because I’m afraid of rejection, I really dread conflict. For years, I avoided it like the plague. I’d do anything to avoid having a painful conversation with anyone–much less someone I loved. Maybe this is part of your story too. But what I’m … Continue reading "#RealTalk-Week 3 // Embracing Conflict // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It’s wedding season, so you may have heard these words recently on someone’s special day. The trouble is, we tend to reserve Paul’s wisdom for ceremonial occasions, when we need them most on … Continue reading "#RealTalk-Week 2 // It Must Be Love // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Genesis 1:1-5, John 1:1-5, Matthew 12:33-37 (NIV)
In Matthew 12, our Lord says that the words we use reveal who we are:
“Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit. You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him. But I tell you that everyone will have to give account on the day of judgment for every empty word they have spoken. For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned.”
He’s not saying as long as we say one prayer one time, whatever else we say for the rest of our lives doesn’t matter. He’s saying our words show us who we really are. Our words shape us.
How we talk matters–there is nothing more powerful, more spiritual or more important than how we talk to one another.
Words make worlds.
I hope you’ll join me as we start our new #realtalk worship series. Because the way we talk matters, because even more than our actions, our talking forms our community.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: John 14:15-31
Dear Church,
This Sunday is the most important day in the Christian year–and most of us have never heard of it. We love to celebrate Christmas and the joy of the birth of our savior. We love to celebrate Easter and the astonishing triumph of Resurrection. The goodness and glory of God is certainly on display and worth celebrating on those holy days!
But this Sunday we celebrate Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit into the hearts of all believers! And Jesus himself says that Pentecost is the reason that he was born and the reason his death is not a loss for the world. When he sat with his friends the night he was betrayed, he told them that he was ‘going away for a little while.’ That’s an extraordinary way to describe his impending betrayal, condemnation, crucifixion and death! And then he told them something even more astonishing. He reassured them that it was good for them that he was going.
How could it be good for the people who loved Jesus that he was going to die?
Because–Jesus promises his frightened and confused friends who feel like he’s abandoning them–when he returns to the Father, he will ask God to send them the Holy Spirit. And then, he will be even closer to them. Once they are filled with the Holy Spirit, they’ll be even closer to Jesus than when they sit at the same table and share a meal with him. Once they are filled with the Spirit, Jesus will be living within them.
This Sunday, we celebrate the day Jesus kept his promise and poured his Spirit out upon the earth. Because of Pentecost, we can never be separated from our Savior!
Come and rejoice, friends! God still pours the Spirit out–
and there is more than enough for everyone!
Come and worship, church!
This Sunday is literally the day we were made for!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Luke 24:13-35
“We had hoped that he was the one…” (Luke 24:21)
These are some of the most poignant words in all of scripture. They were spoken by two ex-disciples. It was Easter afternoon, and they were heading back to their former lives. They’d heard from the women about angels, they’d heard from the men about an empty tomb. But none of that mattered to their broken hearts. It turned out, Jesus wasn’t who they’d hoped he was.
Then, along came a stranger. A curious stranger who didn’t seem to know anything about Jesus. The ex-disciples had nothing better to do, so they filled him in on everything that had happened. Not just what they knew, but also how they felt–their sadness and shame and disappointment.
And then a second miracle happens: they listen to the stranger. They thought they were the experts, but all of a sudden, he’s teaching them, showing them how Moses and the prophets foretold things would happen in exactly this way. They are so fascinated by the stranger, so engaged by the conversation, that they invite him to join them for dinner.
And then the third miracle happens.
As they sit at table, the stranger takes bread, gives thanks, breaks it and gives it to them and their eyes are opened, and they recognized him. The stranger isn’t a stranger after all. The stranger is Jesus, the one they thought they knew so well.
I can’t tell you how much I am looking forward to being with you all again! I am incredibly grateful for the time you gave me to step away and work on my book, but I have missed being with you so much. I follow Jesus better when I walk with you.
We are living the truth of the Emmaus story at the Grove. Those who once were strangers have become treasured friends. There are vital truths about Jesus that we can never discover for ourselves, we can only receive them from one another. Now, as then, Jesus reveals himself to us in our friendships with those who once were unknown to us. No matter how mature we are, we will never outgrow our need for one another.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: John 11:1-74Dr.
Dear Church,
During this season of Eastertide, we are celebrating the reality of a risen Jesus and how this Jesus still encounters us today. That can be a wonderful thing, but it’s also uncontrollable and often uncomfortable. As James Baldwin wrote, “The Lord never seems to get there when you want him, but when he arrives he’s always right on time.” This Sunday we’ll be exploring the story of Lazarus in John 11 and how Jesus encountered each character not when or how they wanted, but in fitting and transformative ways. How might the Lord be meeting us in similar ways? How is God calling you into a whole new resurrection life? I hope you can join us as we listen to the Spirit together.
Grace and peace-
Wes Vander Lugt
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Scripture: Genesis 1:26-31, 2:4-9, 2:15
This Sunday we will be blessed with the words of guest preacher Cedric Lundy. A native of Ann Arbor, MI, Cedric Lundy moved to Charlotte NC in the summer of 2004 after earning his Bachelor’s Degree in Youth Ministry and Biblical Studies from Spring Arbor University. Husband to wife Emma since 2007 they are parents to daughter Isla. Cedric spent thirteen years in local church pastoral ministry predominantly as a Middle School Student Ministry Pastor, but also as a Campus Pastor and Pastor of Justice & Teams. Cedric’s burden in ministry and influence expanded beyond just youth. He regularly facilitated seminars for parents, preaches at local churches, and co-hosts a podcast.
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Scripture: Ephesians 4:1-16 (NIV)
Dear Church,
Have you ever wondered how you were going to get through something? Has anything in your life seemed so painful or overwhelming that you can’t begin to see a positive outcome or any outcome at all? Without knowing your problem let me offer you an answer. We will get through it together. We you may ask, we who? We, the body of Christ. We, your brothers and sisters who are charged to bear one another’s burdens. We who will celebrate the wins you experience and mourn the losses that come your way. This is what comes with being in community with one another, we are never alone. This Sunday we will read from the epistle of the Apostle Paul to the Ephesians and explore how we are equipped to support one another as a community.
Peace,
Nicole Thompson
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Scripture: Luke 10:38-42
This week the Grove was pulsing with life, tiny feet kicking the back of pews, little hands struggling to squeeze out exactly the right amount of glue, big people taking deep breaths trying to remain present to the joy and promise bursting forth out of the chaos. The day after Easter, you created an oasis of welcome and creativity and wonder and hope and lively peace for children and their families.
Because the truth is–there is no day after Easter. When Christ rose from the grave, he renewed creation–as it was in the beginning, as it ever shall be, the good news of resurrection is that it is that way now, with Christ. The kingdom of God is in the midst of us–and signs of new life, the Kingdom of God, are all around us. They may not always be visible or impressive to those who are not seeking the Kingdom, but for those whose minds have been renewed in Christ, there is more than enough to celebrate.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 28:1-10
Dear Church,
It is not only good, but also necessary that we celebrate the resurrection on Sunday. The rocks would cry out if we didn’t. But don’t come for the celebration–come to receive what we are celebrating. Because if Easter doesn’t change everything, it really doesn’t matter at all.
All the color, all the sound and surprises, all the excitement, all the hallelujahs–they’re only the signs. They’re only the celebration. It’s the revelation of the empty tomb that changes everything, the entire cosmos, even & especially us. It’s not the celebration itself that matters, it’s what we’re celebrating.
It didn’t just happen to Jesus. Paul says, ‘if anyone is in Christ–new creation!’
Come and see.
Come and see what we’re made of now.
Come and see what we’re made for now.
Come and see.
But don’t come for the show.
Come for
Real.
New.
Life.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Luke 19:28-42
Dear Church,
This Sunday is my favorite Sunday of the year. (I know, I know, I say this a lot, but I always mean it.). It’s the first day of Holy Week. Traditionally, churches will center their worship on the story of Jesus entering into Jerusalem for his final confrontation with the sacred, secular and spiritual powers & principalities of his day. We call it Palm Sunday.
We shouldn’t.
The story of Jesus entering into Jerusalem is included in all four gospels, but only John mentions the palms. And John is clear about who introduces them, ‘they took palm branches and went out to meet him.’ Jesus carefully orchestrated his entrance into the city. But the palms weren’t his idea, they were the people’s choice. We spend so much time focusing on the symbol that the crowd chose for Jesus, but we overlook the symbol that Jesus chose for himself: the donkey. All four gospels carefully describe how Jesus sent his disciples to find a donkey and how he rode it into the city. Jesus is showing us something about himself, but we keep looking away.
The palms represent our ideas of a savior, who we expect and desire Jesus to be. The donkey is Jesus’ revelation to us of who he actually is–and who he is calling us to be. If you don’t understand why Jesus rode a donkey, you don’t understand Jesus. If the donkey isn’t one of the things you love about Jesus–then you may be loving and worshipping a Jesus-shaped idol.
You can’t get to the cross without the donkey. I hope you’ll join us as we recommit ourselves to the astonishing, unexpected, life-giving way of our donkey-riding Savior.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: 1 Corinthians 1:17-19 and Matthew 27:27-54
Dear Church,
I used to love those Era detergent commercials. Do you remember them? You’d see grass, mud and blood stains on a t-shirt. Then they’d write the name ‘Era’ on the stains with the clear detergent. Then they’d spray it with water, and you’d see the word appear like magic. Every part of the stain covered by the detergent would be washed clean.
But would the stains covered in bargain detergent be so transformed? Nay–not so. Only the superior cleaning power of Era (and later Era Plus) could handle the really tough stains. It’s possible I watched too much TV as a child.
Sometimes we act like the cross is bargain brand detergent, only capable of cleaning what isn’t really dirty, only powerful enough to fix what isn’t that broken. We live like the goodness of God is powerful enough to transform the lives of already-pretty-good people in not-so-bad situations. But when lives are truly twisted and crushed, when evil is palpable and all consuming, we despair.
Friends–the cross is not bad news. It’s not medicine we have to choke down to get to the goodness of resurrection. For us, the cross is power. A power the world has never known–a merciful power, a beautiful power, a good power. A power strong enough to transform the most brutal and broken. A power that gives us hope.
Together, by God’s grace, we will learn to see the hope of the cross.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Colossians 2:13-15
Dear Church,
There is so much beauty this time of year.
As the world transitions from winter to spring we see beautiful new life everywhere in the natural world. And the beauty our common life as the church is especially visible in this season–the goodness of new friends joining the church, special worship services for Holy Week and the joy of sharing what we have with our neighbors–whether that’s fresh vegetables at the Bulb, treasures at the yard give or healthy meals and joyful activities during our spring break vacation bible school.
As good as all of this is, as pleasing as it is in our eyes, there is another beautiful thing at the center of our life together and its beauty is harder to see. I’m talking, of course, about the cross.
Let’s be honest, we see the cross as many things–essential, powerful, necessary, revelatory. But it’s hard to see the cross as beautiful. The blooms of dogwood trees and azalea bushes are beautiful; the Carolina blue sky is beautiful, friends sharing faith and food and abundance is beautiful, strangers becoming neighbors becoming family is beautiful, a group of children laughing and playing and making art together is beautiful. But the son of God who was born among to heal and work miracles and welcome everyone into God’s love, seeing him nailed to a cross, suffering and dying–how is that beautiful?
The cross reveals ancient and forgotten beauty, a beauty deeper than appearance, a beauty that is, the beauty that is source of all goodness and grace, a beauty that never fades away. On the cross we learn to believe in the beauty we cannot see and to see a beauty that cannot be believed.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Genesis 15:7-21, Romans 5:6-11
Dear Church,
The first question that the cross inspires in us is why? Why did this happen? What was the point?
If you’ve ever asked that question, someone has probably tried to answer by saying that it had to happen–so that the penalty for sin could be paid, so that the wrath of God could be satisfied, so that God’s righteousness would no longer be offended by the sinfulness of humanity. These are all different ways of describing what theologians call ‘penal substitutionary atonement.’ It’s the idea that God couldn’t show mercy to humans until someone suffered the consequences of all our evil actions, because mercy without punishment would be the same as condoning sin, which is something God’s righteousness simply won’t allow God to do. So Jesus took the punishment we earned and deserved and now we can be forgiven by God.
Substitutionary atonement isn’t the only way to understand the cross, but it is the simplest and most popular. But it bears a suspicious resemblance to the way our secular justice system works, so it’s faithful to wonder–is this how God responds to sin and evil or how we do? Does the cross shows us redemption is accomplished by penal substitutionary atonement? Or is that what we’ve learned to look for?
Today, we’re taking a deep biblical dive all the way back the Genesis 15 and God’s original salvation covenant with our father Abraham. This story is teaching me new ways to look at the cross.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Luke 6:12-20; 27-36, Luke 23:32-34
Jesus begins with the beatitudes, and then he jumps right in, ‘I tell you who hear me; Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you…love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without any expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, as your father is merciful.’
He says it, and then on the cross he lives it, praying for those who are crucifying him, ‘Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.’
The theory of enemy love sounds aspirational in the pews, it seems wonderful when you are looking down from the mountaintop. But it sounds different in practice, when you hear the victim praying for his victimizers. It’s different when you are looking up at a dying man, as he gasps for air on a cross and asks God to forgive his murderers.
When we look at the cross, we must see Jesus loving and praying for his enemies, using his last breaths to plead for their forgiveness. If we are, by the power and grace of the Holy Spirit, the body of Christ, then this is our way too. If we are one with Christ, we won’t just talk about enemy love, we won’t just agree with it–we will practice it.
Do you have enemies? Does the way you love Jesus empower you to love them? Or does your faith harden your heart against them?
‘To you who are ready for the truth, I say this: Love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst.’ (Luke 6:27, The Message)
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: John 11:43-53
Dear Church,
There’s a hymn called ‘I love to tell the story’ that we sang frequently in a church I used to serve. In the first verse you sing, ‘I love to tell the story of unseen things above, of Jesus and his glory, of Jesus and his love.’ The second verse continues, ‘I love to tell the story, tis pleasant to repeat, it seems each time I tell it, more wonderfully sweet.’
I do love to tell the story of Jesus. I love to tell the story of the incarnation, of our God who loved the world so much that he took on flesh and was born among us, poor and vulnerable in a stable. I love to tell the story of Jesus calling fishermen and outcasts and sinners–choosing all the people no one else wanted tp be his disciples. I love to tell the story of Jesus casting out demons and healing the sick and restoring lepers to community. I love to tell the story of Jesus’ disciples wanting to send a hungry crowd away, and Jesus showing them that when they trust the little they have to him, it miraculously becomes more than enough. I love the story of Jesus flipping out in the temple, calling out the Pharisees and healing the wounds of the soldier who came to arrest him. I love to tell the story of the last supper and Jesus’ washing his disciples’ feet and the new command he gives us.
I do love to tell the story of Jesus, except for one part. One part that is not wonderfully sweet, one part that is never pleasant to repeat. One part that was terribly, gruesomely not unseen. But it is the part of the story, more than any other, which reveals the nature of Jesus’ glory and love. That part, of course, is the cross.
The cross is the most essential and revelatory piece of the story.
I’ve heard a lot of people tell the story of the cross badly. I’ve heard them tell it as divine child abuse, as justification for hatred and violence against Jewish people, as a blank check permitting Christians to do whatever seems good in their own eyes. Some of us have seen and heard such awful things about the cross that we’ve learned to barely mention it when we tell the story of Jesus.
If the cross seems nothing but violent, nothing but tragic, nothing but bad news–the answer isn’t to look away, the answer is to learn to see the cross differently. And that is what we, with God’s grace, will do in the coming weeks–we will learn to see the cross in new ways. Because for us, the cross of Jesus is the glory of God, it is the catalyst of salvation, it is hope, it is peace, it is the end of violence, separation and enmity, it is astonishingly good news. The story of the cross will never be pleasant or sweet, but it is wonder-filled.
Come and see.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Mark 2:23 – 3:6
Dear Church,
Jesus could not have been crucified without the efforts of people of faith. It wasn’t pagan priests or Roman senators who wanted Jesus dead–folks like that had never even heard of him. It was his own fellow believers who worked the systems to have him destroyed.
Why?
Because he invited them to begin again. He showed them that they weren’t God experts. He showed them that they did not know the God they loved. We think it all flipped when turned the tables (see what I did there?), but actually the bitterness and enmity started much earlier, when he challenged how they practiced sabbath. It was way back then, in chapter 2, when religious folks started plotting to destroy him.
In Jesus’ day, people of faith were taught that how you kept sabbath was everything. In our day, we’re taught that sabbath means nothing at all. But Jesus is Lord of the sabbath. What if we’re wrong to reject this sacred gift? What if, like our spiritual ancestors, we are wrong about some of the things we are most certain of? What if keeping sabbath is more than a break, more than a relic, what if it is a key to entering into the fullness of life Jesus promised us?
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Genesis 1:31-2:3, Mark 2:23-28
Dear Church,
Scripture starts with the beginning of everything–the story of God creating all that is, land and sky, stars, sun and moon, seas and creatures and plants and birds and humans, made in the image of the maker.
But, contrary to how you might have heard it, humans are not the grand-flourish- culmination of creation. God’s ultimate act of creation is a seventh day, the day of rest.
God’s own creative choice to rest is the root of our practice of sabbath.
And why did God rest? Because at the end of the sixth sacred day of creation work, God ‘looked at all that he had made and saw that it was very good.’
God rested because all that had been made was, not just good, not good enough, but very good. And you and I, on our best days and on our worst days and all the days in-between, we are beheld by God’s gaze and included in that declaration.
We are part of the very good.
And so, one day in seven, we who bear the image of God in our sacred flesh, we rest with our Creator. We stop to return the gaze of the one who is gazing in delight at us. You–you–especially you–are very good in God’s eyes.
I hope you will join me as we rest, remember & rejoice in the life-giving truth that God sees us and claims us and declares us very good!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Deuteronomy 5:12-15
Dear Church,
God has a gift for each one of us… a good gift: sabbath.
If you heard that Christians don’t ‘have’ to keep sabbath, if the word sabbath makes you feel guilty, if you think sabbath is only about rules and obligations and not doing anything enjoyable, I have good news for you…sabbath is not what you’ve heard.
Many of us do not recognize that sabbath is a gift from God to each one of us. We haven’t been taught that God gives us sabbath to enjoy. We don’t know that enjoying sabbath is serious and essential spiritual work. Surprise! Sometimes, spiritual growth feels delightful. This is one of those times.
I hope you’ll join me as we learn how to receive and enjoy the gift of sabbath together. You’re not going to believe how good this is!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Genesis 28:10-22
Dear Church,
In recent years we’ve dedicated the month of January to renewing our commitment to our mission here at the Grove. We’ve done a deep dive on the three parts of our mission statement (inviting all to serve and come alive in Christ).
Every year we’re on the same mission, but each year is a new season with its own beautiful gifts and challenges.
I hope you’ll join me as we gather around the story of God’s promise to our ancestor Jacob and reveal our ‘word of the year,’ It’s a word that captures God’s posture towards us and inspires our posture towards one another and our neighbors. I’m excited to share it with you!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Exodus 3:1-9
Dear Church,
This week we turn our focus to the third portion of our mission statement, ‘inviting all to serve and come alive in Christ.’ And it’s important that we understand that this third part isn’t something that we resolve to do for God, but something we hope, trust and expect God to do for us–by the power of the Holy Spirit, make us alive in Christ.
What does that even mean?
To come alive in Christ, to be born again, to be filled with the Holy Spirit–depending on the kinds of Christian communities you’ve experienced, it’s either the essential marker of loving and being loved by Jesus or the way ‘not-our-kind’ of Christians talk about Jesus. It’s either something to be sought single-mindedly or avoided at all costs. Whatever baggage you might carry to this conversation, these two things are indisputable:
Jesus said it was essential,
it’s a gift and a promise, not a burden or a threat.
you are in control or when you give up control
I hope you’ll join me for worship on Sunday at 10am–in the sanctuary or on the live-stream–as we turn aside and behold what it looks like to be filled by the Holy Spirit in a wild and beautiful story from the book of Exodus.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 14:13-21
Dear Church,
Each January our community returns to its mission–inviting all to serve and come alive in Christ–to review, to renew, to recommit. This Sunday, we focus on the call to serve that’s at the center of our common life and the story of the feeding of the crowd in Matthew 14. Most bibles give this passage of scripture the subtitle ‘Jesus Feeds the Five Thousand,’ but it wasn’t Jesus who did the feeding. The disciples ended up feeding the people that day, but only after they tried to send them away.
The disciples had been serving the crowd with Jesus all day. They noticed the growing hunger in the crowd, but assumed it was not their job. They came to Jesus and asked him to send the people away so they could find food for themselves. After all, they signed up to ‘fish for people,’ not feed them fish. They assumed people were responsible for caring for their own physical needs.
They were wrong.
They didn’t understand the assignment.
And we continue to struggle. Some of us feel that people’s spiritual needs are all that matter. Others of us are convinced that our call is only to meet physical needs. A few understand that everything, every need, every encounter is spiritual, but are paralyzed by their own limited resources.
Today we consider how the power of Jesus still flows through us to meet the needs we notice.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 3:1-17
Dear Church,
This Sunday we are looking at another one of those rare stories that appears in all four gospels, the baptism of Jesus. If you have even the most rudimentary understanding of baptism–or of Jesus, this is a moment that does not make sense.
I don’t know about you, but I was taught that baptism was for the forgiveness of sins, and I was also taught that Jesus didn’t have any sins. So, what’s Jesus doing being baptized? If you are wondering this, you are in good company because Jesus’ baptism really confused and offended John the Baptizer as well. When Jesus came before him to be baptized, John refused to do it saying, ‘I need to be baptized by you, why are you coming to me?’ It makes it look like Jesus is confused about who he is and what’s going on here.
But of course, Jesus isn’t confused–we are. And that’s his answer to John, ‘it needs to be this way now, this is what will fulfill all righteousness.’ What seems right and righteous to us doesn’t to Jesus. In fact, the righteousness of Jesus is often unrecognizable to us.
Friends, there was nobody more all in and fully committed to Jesus than John. The man ate bugs, for God’s sake. Literally. But when John actually came face to face with Jesus, when John encountered not an idea about Jesus or a ministry task for Jesus, but Jesus in his flesh–Jesus made him uncomfortable. Jesus challenged John’s expectations and his ministry practice and his faith. The righteousness of Jesus wasn’t what he expected. He couldn’t recognize it as holy.
Every January we spend a season examining and reclaiming our mission as a church, together as a community. I hope you’ll join us as we learn how John’s encounter with the Lord and the higher righteousness displayed in the baptism of Jesus can guide and shape us as we recommit to the first part of our mission, inviting all people to share in the goodness we’ve found in Jesus and one another.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 2:1-12
Dear Church,
The world has moved on from Christmas, but we are still wrapped up in wonder, joy and celebration of Jesus. I hope you are still savoring the astonishing words of the angel who announced the birth to the shepherds, who were still working hard in the dark of a cold night, ‘Do not be afraid, I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all people. Today, in the town of David a savior has been born to you; he is the messiah, the Lord.’
The world has rushed on to gawk at the New Year, promising us that if we plot resolutions and self-improvement plans we can change everything for ourselves and finally be happy. But the Spirit invites us to imagine a different kind of life, one that does not ask us to lose weight, get organized, work harder, save more money or do anything else to become acceptable in our own sight. The Spirit finds us in our dark nights and whispers that although Jesus was born long ago, he was born for us too, he is our messiah-savior-the-one-we’ve-been-waiting-for, he will be Lord of the lives we already have. There is peace, there is wholeness, there is freedom for us here and now, in him. The one who has changed everything does not require us to change before he loves and accepts us. In him, we find the abundant life the self-help-industrial-complex promises us.
This New Year’s Day we will continue to keep Christmas as we celebrate Epiphany, the story of the wise ones who followed a strange star that led them to Jesus and the revelation that the child born King of the Jews was also born the redeemer of all creation. From the very beginning, the circle of salvation was widening to include those who are strangers to us but known as beloved to God.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Tonight we gather to worship on Christmas Eve, the most sacred night of the year, to rejoice in the marginless nature of God’s love and salvation. Come and hear. Rejoice in the good news: our God has come to bring us boundless love, forgiveness, peace, and joy.
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Scripture: Luke 1:26-38
This Sunday we light the fourth Advent candle for love and turn to the story at the heart of this season. I know everyone focuses on the babe in the manger, the shepherds, and angels and all the glorious details of the birth, but hidden in the quiet months of waiting before the birth there was a conversation that changed everything. Scholars, artists, and poets call that moment the annunciation–the time an angel of the Lord appeared to an ordinary young girl and told her who she was in the eyes of the Lord and asked her to yield her life, her very flesh, to the Holy Spirit and bear the Christ child into the world.
Before there was the birth, there was a moment when God asked a question and waited for an answer and the story of salvation hinged on her reply.
This is a story we return to year after year, because it is not just Mary’s story. Because the story of every believer includes an annunciation. God comes to each of us–man, woman and child–to tell us who we are in the eyes of the Lord and to invite us to yield our whole selves to the power of the Holy Spirit so that we too can bear Christ into the world. Jesus is still born among us when we say yes to the impossible invitation of incarnation.
I hope you will join me as we listen deeply to Mary’s annunciation in order to hear our own.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Zephaniah 3:17
Dear Church,
This Sunday we light the candle for Joy on the Advent wreath–and we will hear the words the prophet Zephaniah speaks over us:
The Lord your God in your midst, The Mighty One, will save;
He will rejoice over you with gladness, He will quiet you with His love,
He will rejoice over you with singing.
Come and hear the song of comfort and love God is singing over you, over us, this Sunday. I hope you will join me for our Christmas Cantata. There will be singing and dancing, scripture and psalm and so, so–so–much joy.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 3:1-12 & Matthew 12:15-24
Dear Church,
The prophet Isaiah foretold the coming of the messiah and described to the people the one they were waiting for:
he will proclaim justice to the nations.
He will not quarrel or cry out;
No one will hear his voice in the streets.
A bruised reed he will not break,
and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out,
till he has brought justice through to victory.
In his name the nations will put their hope
There is a lot about Jesus that confuses and offends us. He refuses to meet our expectations. He consistently does the very opposite of what we expect. Instead of saving us by erasing what is weak and imperfect, instead of tearing out bruised reeds and smashing smoldering wicks, instead of destroying our enemies, Jesus saves…tenderly.
It is the tenderness of Jesus that redeems us. It is in the tenderness of Jesus that we have hope.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Isaiah 2:1-5; 11:1-10
Dear Church,
‘There is no avoiding the fact that we live at the mercy of our ideas. This is never more true than with our ideas about God.”
These words, from one of Dallas Willard’s books on prayer, leapt out at me this week. They weren’t the main point, but I couldn’t move past them. I was stunned by how true they are. We are at the mercy of our ideas about God. And oftentimes our ideas about God are more formed by our experience in the world, our wounds & triumphs, our fears and desires than by the revelation of scripture and our experience of God. If we think that God is angry or tired of us, if we think that the world is so disfigured by sin that it is only worthy for destruction, if we think God isn’t able or interested in helping or knowing us, then our lives will be shackled and shaped by those thoughts. Truly, we will be at the mercy of our most merciless thoughts.
I don’t share this to challenge you to control your thoughts or give you permission to beat yourself up. I’m sharing them with you as an invitation into the season of Advent that begins this Sunday. Because all the good news of scripture could be summed up in this one simple statement: God is not who we expect. A life of freedom and wholeness begins when we replace our thinking about God with the revelation of scripture. During Advent, we prepare for the coming of the Lord. We prepare for the birth of our savior, yes. But that is only the beginning. We also prepare and wait and hope for the end of the story–and the end is not what we expect. It’s not destruction, it’s renewal. It’s not rejection, it’s redemption. It’s not suffering, it’s comfort.
We need to replace our ideas about God with the promises of God: weapons into tools of harvest, wolves playing with lambs, desert lands blossoming into life, gladness and joy overtaking us as sorrow and sighing run away. These are not our ideas. No human heart could conceive this goodness. The revelation of God’s truth frees us from merciless ideas and brings us unspeakable peace.
I hope you’ll join me for worship this Sunday at 10 am, in the sanctuary or on the livestream, as we worship and receive the first gift of this season–the peace that comes from replacing our ideas about God with the truth of Christ.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
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Scripture: Matthew 7:13-29 (NIV & The Message) It’s not like what came before was easy, but I find the last words of the sermon on the mount the most startling: knowing the correct password–saying ‘Master, Master,’ for instance–isn’t’ going to get you anywhere with me. What is required is serious obedience–doing what my Father wills. … Continue reading "The Mountain View-Week 7 // The Narrow Gate // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 7:7-12 Hello Grove Friends: First, I am incredibly thankful that God placed me at The Grove Church as a supervised ministry intern! Thank you for welcoming me so wildly and so warmly; thank you for mentoring and supporting me in ways you may not even realize; and thank you for showing me what … Continue reading "The Mountain View-Week 6 // Ask, Seek, Knock // Intern Allison Tibe"
Scripture: Matthew 7:1-6 Dear Church, Last week we heard Jesus’ teaching about wealth which many consider the most challenging and troubling pieces of scripture. I think those folks may not have considered the full implications of the next thing Jesus says. In my opinion, it’s far more difficult: Do not judge, or you too will … Continue reading "The Mountain View-Week 5 // Do not judge… // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 6:19-34 Dear Church, Jesus teaches us to pray, ‘give us this day our daily bread.’ He goes on to explain what a life shaped by that prayer looks like: ‘consider the birds of the air, they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, yet your heavenly father feeds them…consider the … Continue reading "The Mountain View-Week 4 // The “Right” Way? // Pastor Kate Murphy"
NOTE: We only have the last nine minutes of this week’s message. Dear Church, Remember the time Jesus climbed up a mountain and told us, ‘“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead, they … Continue reading "The Mountain View-Week 3 // Secret, Sacred Time with God // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 5:17-48 (NIV), John 1:1-4, 14, Ezekiel 36:25-28, Jeremiah 31: 31-34 Dear Church, There is a lot of frantic speculation going on these days about whether the U.S. economy will enter into recession. People are desperate to know if it will happen, when it will happen, how long it will last and how bad … Continue reading "Mountain View-Week 2 // We Know the Future // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 5:1-16 Dear Church, Now when he saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him and he began to teach them. (Matthew 5:1-2) A lot of people around here are into nature and hiking. I don’t understand, but I love them anyway. Why risk the … Continue reading "The Mountain View-Week 1 // Beatitudes // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Romans 12:1-2, John 15:4-5 Dear Church, So, it’s going to be a really special day at the Grove on Sunday (I know, I know–I say that a lot), Pastor Ron McClelland will be preaching a message on how we can live our whole lives with the Lord. Afterwards, he will lead the first of … Continue reading "Rule of Life // Alive in Christ // Pastor Ron McClelland"
Scripture: Judges 6:33-40 Dear Church, When we meet Gideon, he is literally bent over, cowering in fear while hiding from his enemies. And then an angel of the Lord appears to him with a series of stunning revelations: he is seen and known by God, he is called to a life of wonder beyond his … Continue reading "Again, Lord!-Week 4 // After the Revelation // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Judges 6:1-27 In the book of Judges we find the story of a man named Gideon, an Israelite who lived in dangerous and depressing times. The country was under constant threat of enemy invasion, farms were frequently attacked and raided, the nation’s glory days seemed far behind them. People believed that God had abandoned … Continue reading "Again, Lord!-Week 3 // Idols & False Gods // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Genesis 21:1-21 One of the most painful things about being a follower of Jesus Christ is listening to folks who have been brutally wounded by the church. I didn’t grow up in the church, but when I was a teenager, I was invited by a friend to come to youth group. There I found … Continue reading "September 11, 2022 – Again, Lord! Series-Week 2– Elder Nicole Thompson"
Scripture: Acts 10:1-23 Peter had been through a season of intense transformation–a call to leave all things behind and follow Jesus, a new name, receiving the keys to the kingdom and the announcement that he’d be the rock of the church, being called Satan by Jesus, confidently declaring his allegiance to the Lord and then … Continue reading "Again, Lord!-Week 1 // God’s Call // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Luke 7:36-50 Many of us are moving into a new season, new work, new responsibilities–shifting from the rhythms of summer into the increased demands of the fall. At this hinge between ending and beginning, it is right that we gather to think one more time about our Kingdom legacy. It is easy to get … Continue reading "A Kingdom Legacy-5 // Understanding God’s Heart // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Numbers 16 Dear Church, This Sunday we welcome a Grove favorite to the pulpit – Pastor Cedric Lundy. He will be preaching the message “Korah’s Rebellion” from the book of Numbers. Cedric is the director of Urban Promise and an adjunct teaching pastor at Watershed church. Previously, he served Charlotte churches as pastor of … Continue reading "A Kingdom Legacy-4 // Korah’s Rebellion // Pastor Cedric Lundy"
Scripture: Jonah 3:1-5. 10 Dear Church, This Sunday one of my favorite people is coming to the Grove to share one of my favorite stories. Rev. Daniel Heath will be preaching a message on the book of Jonah. Some of you might remember Daniel from the times he’s led worship at the Grove, or you … Continue reading "A Kingdom Legacy-3 // Jonah // Rev. Daniel Heath"
There is a line I love in Psalm 145 that says, one generation commends your work to another, they tell of your mighty acts. We’ve been able to share the goodness of our God with the next generations this summer, because of you–you gave resources, you prayed, you packed, you drove, you cooked, (and cooked … Continue reading "Kingdom Legacy-Week 3 // More Than Enough // The Grove Youth"
Scripture: Luke 12:13-21 Dear Church, At the end of each of his crusades Billy Graham famously asked the same question, ‘If you died tonight, do you know if you are going to heaven or hell?” He asked that question to encourage everyone in the audience to make a decision to follow Christ. Respectfully, I believe … Continue reading "July 31, 2022 // A Kingdom Legacy // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Hosea 1:1 – 2:2 Dear Church, Today we begin a new worship series on the book of Hosea, which has one of the most unforgettable beginnings in all of scripture: The Lord said to Hosea, ‘Go, and marry a wife of whoredom’ Who talks like that? Apparently, God does. God commands the prophet to … Continue reading "HOSEA-Outrageous Love-Week 1 // We Are All Gomer // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scriptures: Exodus 31:1-11, 1 Corinthians 12:1-11. 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 Dear Church, We are coming up on our last session of Spirit School and we’ve saved the best part: gifts. Spiritual gifts. I know some of us just felt a thrill and are thinking, ‘finally!’ Others of us are taking deep breaths and trying to manage … Continue reading "Spirit School-Week 7 // Spiritual Gifts // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Colossians 1:1-15 We are called to rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn. Some days, some seasons it seems as though there is nothing but morning–as though the whole world is nothing but woe and even the church of Jesus Christ has nothing to offer. Who am I kidding? Even … Continue reading "Spirit School-Week 6 // We’ll Get Over It // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Acts 1:1-9 Dear Church, This Sunday when we gather for worship many in our community will already be celebrating Independence Day. If you have been hanging around the Grove for very many years you might have noticed that Every year on the Sunday closest to July 4th, I preach the crucifixion of our Lord. … Continue reading "Spirit School-Week 5 // The Righteous Power of God // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Dear Church, I really like the lectures of a Bible professor named N.T. Wright. He ends many of them with the same challenge to his students: inhabit what you’ve heard. In other words, don’t just think about this, don’t just know it or agree with it–live it. Ultimately, what we believe only matters if it leads us into … Continue reading "Spirit School-Week 4 // Live It! // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Romans 16:17-20 Dear Church, This Sunday I am so excited to welcome Elder Nicole Thompson to the pulpit to preach the next lesson in our Spirit School worship series: The Holy Spirit and Justice. It also happens to be Juneteenth, a holiday many Black Americans have been celebrating for generations. Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865–the day … Continue reading "Spirit School-Week 3 // Justice // Elder Nicole Thompson"
Scripture: Psalm 1 Dear Church, Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way of sinnersor sit in the company of mockers,but whose delight is in the law of the Lord and who mediates on his law day and night These are the very first words of the Book … Continue reading "Holy Spirit School-Week 2 // More Than Avoiding Evil // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Acts 2:1-21 Dear Church– At the last meal he shared with his disciples before his death, Jesus told them, ‘it is good that I am leaving you.’ Even though no one was brave or foolish enough to say it, I’m sure they were all thinking that was crazy. How could it be good that … Continue reading "Holy Spirit School-Pentecost // What God Desires of Us // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 28:16-20, 2 Timothy:6-7 Dear Church, When Sandy Hook happened 9 years ago, I cried for days. This week, I haven’t shed a single tear. I am stunned and horrified and afraid but mostly I am numb. This is the last Sunday of our season celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. That means next we … Continue reading "Make Love the Measure-Week 6 // Instead of Despair // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Acts 1:12-26 Dear Church, What does it look like to love the risen Lord? Sometimes–much more often than we’d like–it looks like waiting. In the book of Acts, Luke tells us that Jesus spent 40 days with his followers after his resurrection. It was a season full of meals and ministry and teaching about … Continue reading "Make Love the Measure-Week 5 // Waiting // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Acts 9:18-31 Dear Church, Last week in our ‘Make Love the Measure’ worship series we shared the story of Ananias, the foolishly faithful believer who trusted the Lord’s call and healed & welcomed a man named Saul. That seems like a pretty ‘normal’ biblical story until you learn Saul was blinded by the Lord … Continue reading "Make Love the Measure-Week 4 // Our Part // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Acts 9:10-19 Dear Church Ananias was a brave and faithful man who risked all he had, including his life, to follow Jesus. One day the Lord called to him in a vision and told him to go and heal a man named Saul who had come to town to arrest and execute Christians.God told … Continue reading "Make Love the Measure-Week 3 // Ananias Visions // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: John 21:1-25 Why Peter? This Sunday we read the story of Jesus’ breakfast on the beach with Peter. Scholars call it the rehabilitation of Peter. Here we see Jesus re-claiming and re-commissioning Peter as the leader of the church. If you take the gospels seriously you ask questions, and sooner or later one of … Continue reading "Make Love the Measure-Week 2 // Why Peter? // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Psalm 145, Luke 24:13-35 (NIV) This is my favorite Sunday of the year, because the Sunday after Easter is the day ‘Alleluia, He is Risen!’ stops being a worship response and starts determining how we LIVE. Because we believe that Jesus is risen, we make different choices–we live differently, work differently, form community differently. … Continue reading "Make Love the Measure // The Road to Emmaus // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 28:1-10 Dear Church, On Good Friday, we gathered at 7 to watch and pray. On Holy Saturday, as we waited, we walked the stations of the cross in our Labyrinth. But friends–we know the end of the story. We did not watch or wait as those without hope. Sunday is coming–resurrection is coming. I … Continue reading "The Grove // Easter 2022 // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 21:1-17 As he left Jericho and began his very last journey to Jerusalem, Jesus passed two blind men on the side of the road. Hearing he was coming, the men cried out, ‘Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!’ The crowd tried to shut them up and push them aside, but Jesus … Continue reading "Into the Shadows // Palm Sunday // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Dear Church, Sometimes the good news sounds like bad news at first. As we move deeper into the shadows of Lent, this is one of those times. This Sunday we gather around the communion table and consider the words Jesus gave us when he gave us this sacrament: ‘This is my body, which is for … Continue reading "Into the Shadows-Week 5 // Sounds Like Bad News // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Luke 1:26-38 & Luke 1:46-55 Dear Church, Today (if you are reading this note on Friday) is the day the church celebrates the annunciation of the Lord–the moment that the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary, a poor young girl and announced that Almighty God was inviting her to become the mother of the messiah, … Continue reading "Into the Shadows-Week 4 // Mary’s Song // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 16:13-26 Dear Church, As we allow the Holy Spirit to lead us past what is bright and familiar into the shadows of our faith, we begin to see that many of our foundational assumptions about Jesus are unhelpful. We rejoice that our savior is strong and powerful and unshakable–and he is. But we … Continue reading "Into the Shadows-Week 3 // Weakness and Vulnerability // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Luke 4:28-30, Luke 4:40-43, Luke 5:15-16 Dear Church, In Luke chapter 5, a man with leprosy finds Jesus, falls on the ground before him and begs, ‘Lord, if you are willing, I know you can make me clean.’ We see God’s heart for those who suffer in Jesus’ answer. ‘I am willing. Be clean!’ Instantly, … Continue reading "Into the Shadows-Week 2 // That time Jesus left // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Matthew 4:1-11 Before he began any ministry, Jesus was baptized–and as he came up from the water, the Holy Spirit came down like a dove and rested on him. And with the Spirit, a voice:‘You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.’ All this happened before Jesus did a thing for God. … Continue reading "Into the Shadows-Week 1 // Being Beloved // Pastor Kate Murphy"
Scripture: Exodus 16:21-36
Dear Church,
The first thing the people had to learn how to do was–trust God.
The second the people had to learn was how to do was–rest.
Once you’ve mastered the first, the second is easy. Without the first, the second is almost impossible.
If you want to measure how much you trust God, try to rest.
You can’t keep sabbath until you trust God. And if you can’t keep sabbath…
I hope you can join me for worship this Sunday. Together with the Holy Spirit, we’ll co-create a culture of sacred sabbath rest.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Scripture: Exodus 16:1-21
‘if only we had died by the Lord’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted…’
That’s what the Hebrew people said to Moses just 30 days after the Lord liberated them from Egyptian enslavement. Isn’t memory a funny thing? We compare the worst of what is to the best of what never was–and then we are swallowed up in despair.
It was a tricky moment for the soon-to-be-Israelites–they were camped out in the Desert of Sin and stuck between the life they had, and the life God was creating for them. They were living in in-between times. The past was gone, and the future was unknown–they were scared and sad and so, so far out of their comfort zone. So they grumbled and they complained, and they turned on Moses and God and one another.
And Moses told Aaron, ‘Say to the entire community, ‘Come before the Lord, for he has heard your grumbling.’
The people gathered in terror to find out what God would do to them. And what happened next reveals everything about the nature of our God–whose goodness is far more beautiful than we ever dare to imagine.
I don’t think I’m the only one struggling with fear and despair these days. The pandemic should be over, but it isn’t. I do a lot grumbling and complaining and creative remembering. Sometimes, when I remember God hears, my heart fills with dread. And then the Spirit leads me to stories like this one, and I remember–God is better than I expect or deserve. I remember, God’s goodness is for us, not against us. God meets us where we are, not where we think we should be.
If you are seeking hope and strength and grace in these days, I hope you join us as we gather to worship the God who met our ancestors in the Desert of Sin and fed them with the bread of heaven.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Dear Church,
All the hip young cool pastors have tattoos of their favorite Bible verses. I am none of those things, and for this and many reasons I will never get inked. But, if I did–it would be Exodus 3:12: And God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.”
When he was young, Moses had dreams of being a revolutionary. Though he grew up as Pharaoh’s son, he believed that he could set his people free. And he tried and he failed, and he ran for his life and found…a comfortable one. Minding his own business, a productive middle manager in his father in law’s shepherding business. Until the day God pulled him aside and called back into the fight for freedom and justice–right back to the place of failure he’d spent his whole adult life putting behind him. And when he asked God for a sign that God would make sure he wouldn’t flail and fail again, God said–and I’m paraphrasing Exodus 3:12–when you’re done, you’ll know it was me who did it.
thanksGod
Life with God is abundant–it’s freedom, it’s flourishing, it’s receiving the grace to become the person you were created to be. AND–it’s also deeply, deeply uncomfortable. It’s walking toward the deepest places of suffering and pain in your world. It’s facing all the parts of yourself and your past you’d rather run from. It’s never going alone again.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Scripture: Matthew 5:1-12
Dear Church,
…poor – …meek – …mourning – …hungry & thirsty
…persecuted – …merciful – …peacemakers
Jesus climbed up a mountain and sat down to teach about his kingdom. He began by saying that those were the blessed ones–the poor, meek, sad, longing, wounded, conflicted, persecuted ones. How strange the realm of God is to us. Most of us come to God seeking blessings–but these are not the blessings we desire. If these are blessings, we pray for an empty cup.
This Sunday we begin a new worship series called ‘Uncomfortable Blessings,’ exploring the ways that God meets us, grows us, heals us and–yes–blesses us in the most difficult and painful times in our lives. The irony is not lost on me that we’re turning to these ideas as many of us are living in one of the most prolonged seasons of discomfort and loss of our lives.
But I promise you, church–this is good news.
Because Jesus has no need to lie to us. Here he is reassuring us that even in our most broken human moments, God’s goodness hovers over us. When our hearts are shattered by this fallen world, God’s goodness gathers the shards and binds us back together in grace. Even when we are forced to walk through the valley of the shadow of death, God’s goodness and mercy chase after us. Wherever we are, however we are–God’s goodness follows and finds and frees us.
Jesus is announcing that the goodness of his Kingdom lifts up and restores those the world grinds down. If your heart is heavy, if your soul is weary, this good news is especially for you.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Dear Church,
‘Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.’ (Matthew 8:1-4)
For me, these are some of the most poignant words in all of scripture. They were spoken by a man who was known, not by his name, but by his disease–leprosy. His disease defined him and divided him from his community. This Sunday we look at the final piece of our church’s mission statement–coming alive in Christ–and this story is particularly relevant because in Jesus’ day, people who contracted leprosy were considered spiritually dead. Lepers were the original walking dead. They still existed, but they could never belong. Once you were identified as a leper–that was it. You could never come back.
This man knew that Jesus could change his life, but he wondered if he would. Many of us are living this story. We know Jesus is able, but we too wonder if he is willing.
Friends–I hope you’ll join me as we consider what it means for us that Jesus is still able, and still willing to heal and restore the walking dead to life and community. What does it mean to be a community that doesn’t just read that story–but lives it? What does it mean for us to join our brother, the no-longer-leper, walking in new life in Christ?
Peace,
Pastor Kate
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King taught that ‘everybody can be great because anyone can serve.”
It makes sense that Dr. King thought this way–because he was a follower of Jesus, and Jesus taught that ‘the greatest among you shall be servant of all.’ In the Kingdom of God, greatness comes from serving, not being served–and that’s why serving is the heart center of our mission and life together at the Grove.
But it’s not enough that we choose to serve–we must serve with mutuality, humility and deep, deep love. We must serve like Jesus (John 13:1-17),
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Dear Church,
Ever since you took my hand, I’m on the right way. (psalm 16:11, the message)
We stand on that glorious promise as we begin a new year together. We stand with courage and hope–not because we’re confident about what’s going on around us or what’s within us–but because God has taken our hands and is leading us on the right way. We can joyfully renew our commitment to our mission (inviting all to serve and come alive in Christ) because we’re not on our own.
Jesus is leading us (maybe sometimes dragging us) by the hand.
This Sunday, we start at the beginning–inviting all.
One of the most beautiful things about our life together is the love we have for one another. But we must never forget that all who belong are not here yet. The family hasn’t fully gathered. Our mission is to always search the horizon to see how the Lord is leading us–not just to welcome, but to invite into the joy and belonging we find in Jesus.
I hope you’ll join us as our friend Cedric Lundy preaches from Ephesians 2:11-16, to show why we are called to create a culture of inviting all–and how to do it!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Scripture: Matthew 7:7 & Jonah 2:1-3:2
I have no resolutions for this new year.
What I do have is a tremendous well of gratitude for the gift of being church with you all, a defiant hope in all that God is doing in our midst and a fierce resolve to partner as fully as I can with God and all of you in the days to come.
This Sunday, we begin a new worship series called “re:”. It’s a nod to all of those words we throw around in the month of January–recommit, renew, refresh, reclaim. As is our tradition, we’ll be walking through the three parts of our unique mission at the Grove (inviting all to serve and come alive in Christ). But first, this Sunday I’ll be sharing with you a word of the year that I hope will give us common focus and purpose for life together in our next season of being the Grove.
Curious?
I’ll leave you with some of the beautiful lyrics from the new songs Edmond and the team will be sharing with us–new songs for a new season, eternal truths that will anchor us for whatever lies ahead:
I’ll never be more loved than I am right now
Wasn’t holding you up
so I can never let you down…
Going through a storm but I won’t go down
You’ve never been closer than you are right now…
The song is holy because it’s true.
Let’s learn to sing it–and live it–together with the Holy Spirit in the year to come!
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Dear Church,
It’s a new year, and something wholly new lies before us. This is true every day, but most of the time we don’t know it. We don’t notice. Because of Jesus, we are always standing on the threshold of a new season, a new revelation, new possibilities with God–but often we are too blinded by fear, stress and familiarity to cross over.
This Sunday, we look at the story of Epiphany--where everyone receives the revelation that the messiah has come. And most people do… nothing. They are invested in the life they have. They aren’t interested in participating in the new thing God is doing in their midst. Or worse–they actively oppose it with deception and horrific violence. The story of Epiphany shows us the gamut of human responses to God–we can participate in what God is doing, we can ignore it or we can actively oppose God’s will.
Every day we choose how we respond to the coming of Christ into the world. Christmas is our celebration of the revelation that God is for us and here with us saving us. But with revelation comes responsibility. Now that we know, now that we have rejoiced–will we allow God to lead us to step into the new life Christ brings? Or will we pack up our decorations and pick up where we left off?
Peace,
Pastor Kate
The marketplace loses interest in Christmas after December 25th–while our sacred tradition sets aside twelve days to celebrate the savior, born to us as a child in the manger. These days are not after-Christmas, after all. They are set apart for our collective wonder, designated time to ponder in our hearts what this means for us. This is when the holidays once again become holy days.
Please join Pastor Barbara Smith for the message this Sunday–on the second day of Christmas. Too much has happened for us to rush on to what’s next. The holy celebration isn’t over. In fact–it’s just begun.
This time of year, you can’t turn on a radio without hearing someone sincerely sing the question, Mary, did you know? It’s a beautiful song with a haunting melody, but if you read Luke 1, it’s clear. She knew. She was all in from the start.
The real question is…what did Joseph know and when did he know it?
Because Matthew 1:18 says that Mary ‘was found out to be pregnant’ after they were engaged but before they were married. It goes on to say that because Joseph was ‘faithful to the law’ he made up his mind to divorce her quietly. And I wonder–how did Joseph learn Mary was pregnant? Did Mary come and tell him and try to make him understand? Did someone else find out and tell him, and if so–did he try to talk to her at all? Did he listen and not believe–or was he so certain he already knew what was going on that he didn’t bother to ask? When the angel appeared to him in a dream and told him Mary’s pregnancy was from God–was that new news, or confirmation that Mary’s improbable story was true?
My whole life I’ve been taught to celebrate Joseph’s compassionate decision to put her aside quietly–to see it as proof that he was a very, very good man, to see it as the most anyone could expect of a righteous God-fearing man. But now I wonder if we’ve been reading this part of the story all wrong. Is Matthew trying to get us to celebrate Joseph’s righteousness–or to warn us, that even our most faithful and righteous choices can be in opposition to what God is trying to do in the world?
Is Joseph a model we try to live up to–or a warning we try to learn from? It all depends on what he knew and when he knew it.
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Saint Matthew begins his gospel with what looks like a long, boring, irrelevant list of names:
Perez begat Herron, Hezron begat Ram, Ram begat Amminadab, Amminadab begat Nahshon…
Why in the world are the names of these long dead men included? What could their lost stories possibly have to teach us about the coming of Jesus?
We begin to understand once we remember that this is a redemption story. Christ comes to redeem all of God’s creation–to reclaim and refashion it for God. That means no piece of human history is left out–no life is untouched. Learning these strange names–and about the lives behind them–uncovers the blinding scope and power of God’s redemptive work in Christ. Uzziah, Shealtiel, Jehoshaphat and Zerrubbabel–all of their stories are part of the story of Jesus. I hope you’ll join me to learn how. (If nothing else, it’ll be fun to watch my struggle to pronounce their names!)
Peace,
Pastor Kate
Dear Church,
Ready or not, believe it or not–this Sunday is the first day of the new year. For generations, Christians have marked time differently. We mark the days not by the seasons or the calendar, but by the rhythm of telling and re-telling the story of Christ. This Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent–the season where we prepare for the coming of the messiah while remembering why he came and rejoicing in anticipation that he will come again.
So while the whole world will celebrate a new year in January, we keep time differently. This Sunday, at the very end of the calendar year, we begin again. For us, the ending is a new beginning–that is our sacred story.
And this year, in this Advent season, we will be learning new spiritual songs–Songs of Redemption. Because, even though it doesn’t often seem like it, all of scripture is telling one story. The story of God and creation. And the essence of that story is one word: Redemption. God formed all that is out of love–and though creation has been twisted and torn, God will not abandon or destroy–God will redeem God’s own.
It’s a truth so glorious it can only be told as a song.
Through the prophet Isaiah, God sings to us
For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth;
the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.
Be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating;
for I am about to create a new Jerusalem as a joy,
and its people as a delight.
I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people;
no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it or the cry of distress.
That’s a song of redemption, Church. Liars will tell you that what God is doing is only for the beautiful innocent few–that it will happen somewhere else or someone else. But God says otherwise–the beautiful new heaven and earth will be made from and for the old. Jerusalem won’t be destroyed and forgotten, but remade and renewed. Our relationship will be restored, not severed.
In time and truth, what looks like the end is actually the sacred beginning.
I hope you’ll join me as we open our whole selves up to new life and new beginnings in Christ.
Peace,
Pastor Kate