Today’s words grew out of those suggested when I was crowdsourcing ideas for my Lenten writings. The suggestion was best friends. After hearing from some lifelong friends over the past several days in different ways, I made a slight adjustment. Thinking about the words set me to thinking of songs, and so I offer another musical journey…
”What About Me?” Mark 5:21-43 A Sermon for First Congregational Church of Guilford UCC February 28, 2016 Let me begin this morning by saying you’re going to hear a story you’ve heard before. In fact, you’re going to hear one you heard just a couple of weeks ago when Ginger preached about the woman who…
From time to time, as I read an author’s work, my connection with the writer moves beyond the page to a more personal connection. They become my friend—an odd use of the word, I suppose, having never met them—because of the resonance I feel. Reading their books becomes a conversation of sorts. I can almost…
⋅I have been working on a sermon for this coming Sunday. I get to preach at our church for the first time. My text is Matthew 5:21-43 that contains the story of Jesus’ healing of the woman who had hemorrhaged for twelve years, which is sandwiched between the account of Jairus coming to ask Jesus…
Today has been a day of missing for me. I began by posting this picture of my mother’s recipe box, which now resides here in Guilford. She has stayed on my mind ever since. My brother and sister-in-law left today for Cambodia , which they have done before, but somehow it matters more this time….
Our church has a gathering each Wednesday night during Lent and they asked me to prepare the meals. I spent the day working on soups and bread and dessert for sixty and, after sitting here at the computer for some time now trying to keep my promise, I have found the words elusive, other than…
weather report yes, there’s a certain sadness in the tears of a late night rain, the showers of memories, now caught in tiny sidewalk ponds— and I’m stepping around them, wishing you would call to say you saw the storm on the news, them ask about the weather as if our lives depended on it….
When I asked for words to ponder during Lent, one friend offered two: soul music. As I started thinking about it, I began to think of songs, though not necessarily Motown. I began to think of songs that have spoken to me in recent times–some old, some new. Tonight, then, I offer a Lenten soundtrack…
For all of my life in church I have noticed that Jesus’ basic formula for the parables was to begin with, “A certain man had two sons . . . ‘“ and, almost inevitably, the story had to do with how the brothers responded differently, and, on occasion, how they responded to each other. The…
I spent the better part of yesterday and all of this morning cooking with friends in order to serve lunch for Stigma and Mercy: Prison Re-Entry and Restorative Justice Conference, which was held at our church today. One hundred and fifty people showed up to talk about how we help folks get back into society…