Sanctified Imagination
This past week I had the opportunity to attend the Schooler Institute on Preaching at the Methodist Theological School in Ohio. It was led by the Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney who drew on her expertise in biblical interpretation and womanist hermeneutics to challenge and inspire attendees to take seriously our…
Fellow Travelers and Co-Interpreters
It is that time of year again: time to start looking forward to our Coming of Age Celebration on February 4, 2018 during our Sunday morning worship. Starting this coming Sunday, our Junior High Sunday School class will begin planning the worship service for February 4, offering their ideas, suggestions,…
From ‘Knowing’ to ‘Making Meaning’
You might remember from a previous blog post that I am in the middle of preparing to be the speaker of Camp Friedenswald’s Junior High Winter Retreat on the topic of “What do we do with the Bible?” It is a topic I chose because it is something I still…
Piecing the Puzzle of Scripture
I have been asked to be the featured speaker at the upcoming Jr. High Winter Retreat at Camp Friedenswald in January. For my topic, I decided to go with: “What do we do with the Bible?” I chose this topic partially because the High School Sunday School class is already…
Journeying with the Anabaptists (Part 2)
As I mentioned last month, I am participating in an online course called ““Exploring Anabaptist History and Theology.” When I wrote the last blog, it was the first week of the course, and we were still looking at the very beginnings of the the Anabaptist movement. Well, we are now…
Journeying with the Anabaptists
I am currently participating in an online course through the Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary called “Exploring Anabaptist History and Theology.” Because I attended a Methodist seminary, this is a chance for me to gain more formal training in the history of the tradition in which I am now ministering. Like…
Curiosity and Wondering
Before we put Vacation Bible School (VBS) completely out of our minds, I wanted to take a minute to reflect back on the takeaways from a week that zoomed by so quickly. There were plenty of takeaways about what kinds of things worked well this year and what kinds of…
MCUSA Reflections
Many of you heard some of my thoughts about the MCUSA Convention on Sunday. (If you missed it, you can find the text of my sermon HERE.) As a way of continuing the conversation about our time of discerning together as a denomination, we will be sending out reflections from…
The results are in…
I know you all have been waiting with bated breath, but wait no longer because the results of the 12 Hymn Nominations are in! But first, I feel like I should acknowledge that these results were not obtained in any real scientific way, and there were probably a number of…
12 Hymns Project Nominations
You have likely started to hear rumors about the upcoming summer worship series. Starting on June 11 and running through August 13, we will be exploring the results of our 12 Hymns Project (similar to the 12 Scriptures Project from three years ago). During this worship series, we will center…
