From the Pastor

As most of you know, we just finished a sermon series called Lessons to a Teenaged Me. Judging from comments from many of you, it was well received. As with any sermon or sermon series, my hope is that we don’t just hear the message, but we also heed the message. And to tell you the truth, that is often hard for me to do as well. I hope you know that I do not pick on any one person or group of people any harder than I pick on myself. I often (always?) feel like I am stepping on my own toes when I preach.

I know our Book of Discipline says that some people are set apart for ministry in the church. Our church education usually echoes this fact. By position, pastors automatically are put in a position of authority. Many times, the church body places even more weight on the pastoral role, and we end up being on some sort of imaginary pedestal. Too often, too many people think that since we are ordained, we have all our stuff together. But I am here to tell you, we don’t. Or at least I don’t. I am still human. I still have all the frailties that each one of us has, and I often   struggle to live in the tension created between trusting God’s direction and wanting to do things my way.

The Lessons to a Teenaged Me brought out a lot of that struggle for me. What this series became was vastly different than what I envisioned when I was first forming the concept. I did a lot of thinking about what an awkward, shy, non-athletic teenager struggled with in the 1980s (ok…I did a lot of thinking about what I struggled with back then), and I thought I would be      addressing those things…things that for the most part I have worked through in the last forty years…things that would be relatively easy to preach for me. Yet as always happens, God had   different ideas. God used today’s teenagers and their struggles to knock me off that proverbial  pedestal.

I have said all of that so I can ask for grace. Grace for me. Grace for you. Grace for each other. Even grace for the stranger. Like you, I am not perfect. There is really nothing about me that warrants life on a pedestal. We are all ministers in God’s kingdom. The only difference between me and any other person is how my ministry takes shape. All this to say that every topic we      covered over the last month and a half is one that I struggle with almost daily, especially while I am also in graduate school. So, if you see me stressed out or if my perfectionist tendencies are  getting in the way of things, have grace. Instead of judging, call me out in love and guide me back to the heart of God. And allow me the same privilege when I see it in you. We need each other for our own benefit and for the benefit of God’s kingdom.

Which leads me to a second point. We are all ministers in God’s kingdom. It is just that most ministries in the church do not look like pastoral ministry. Your church needs you! We need your gifts and graces. We need your time and your talents. Dwight Moody, the great      American evangelist of the 1800s taught that there is a “job” for every person in the church, and every person in his church – which was the largest one in Chicago at the time – was expected to step up and do their job. We have gotten a long way away from that expectation in the years since then. So, what we have ended up with is the same 10% of the church’s people doing 90% of the church’s work. Frankly, we are all overworked and exhausted. Imagine what our church could do for God’s kingdom if we could change those numbers. What would happen if 100% of the people each did even 1% of the work?

John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, stated that good works are a natural outpouring of faith and love. James, the brother of Jesus, writes, “So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.” (James 2:17, NRSV). I am calling each one of us to deliberately enter into a time of prayer and discernment, for however long it takes. It is way past time to figure out where and how we are called to serve. It is way past time for us to put our faith into action. Your church needs you. I need you. God needs you.

 

January and February 2025 Financial Report

January

Needed Each Month to Meet Budget:     $18,182.00

Received in January       $20,944.70

Difference from Budget for January $2,762.70

February

Needed Each Week to Meet Budget:   $4,196.00

Received Week of February 25^th     $2,791.40

Difference from Budget for February 25^th  -$1,404.60

Needed Each Month to Meet Budget: $18,182.00

Received in February $14,409.09

Difference from Budget for February -$3,772.91

Year-To-Date

Budgeted Year-to-Date $36,364.00

Received Year-to-Date $35,353.79

Difference from Budget Year-to-Date  -$1,010.21