Messiah News

This coming Sunday, May 12, 2024, is Mother's Day. The gift of life our mothers have given us; the journey of pregnancy and carrying an alien - yet integral - "other" within one's body; the experiences of miscarriages and loss of one's child even before a birth; the bond that is unique to mother and child once born; these are th...

Dear Friends, Thank you for wrestling with me about the implications of Sunday's Bible Lesson on the baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch. Several people asked me for a copy of the sermon. So, you can view the sermon any time at https://www.youtube.com/live/wlGjvkBTRPk?si=9v06SVpk43crDtb6  (Thank you to our hard working crew in the video booth who ...

During the Season of Lent we shaped worship in a couple of different ways. For one thing, we added a part of the traditional Sunday liturgy we haven't used for a while - the Kyrie. ("Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord have mercy.") We hope that helped support a sense of what Lent is all about. We could keep doing the  Kyrie - is a formal...

This Sunday - Easter Sunday, March 31, 2024 - we will once again hear the story of Jesus being raised from the dead. What a glorious story! And what a troubling story, perhaps.  So let me get this straight. Some guy, Jesus, executed by the Roman Empire in the first century on trumped up charges . . . (I get that part. Same old, same old.)...

Mark is my favorite Gospel. It's energetic, approachable, clear, and, and, and - but that's just me. Fortunately for me, though, this year has been the "Year of Mark" for us in worship. Our style of worship rotates through three years, one each telling the story of Jesus through the eyes of Matthew, Mark and Luke respectively. The Gospel of John doesn't get it's own year because it doesn't really tell a chronological story of Jesus like the other three. So, we sprinkle in a little John here and there every year just so he doesn't feel unloved. (But I digress.) My point is that this has been the year of Mark. Mark is especially clear about the last week of Jesus' life, what we call Holy Week. This Sunday, March 24, we begin the Holy Week journey. As we read the story, though, we discover that each writer seems to emphasizes something different in their...