Grace to you and peace, from God our Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ!  Tomorrow is Palm Sunday, when we remember Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem.  The same day is often called Passion Sunday, because we know how the story continues: the same people who praised Jesus with loud Hosannas later called for his crucifixion.  Living between those poles of emotion is difficult and may feel too familiar from moments in our own lives, even if we haven’t anticipated judgment or betrayal.  How we navigate the movement between the breadth of experiences this life offers is the focus of this holy week, moving toward our celebration at Easter.  It begins tomorrow and continues with services here on Thursday at 7:00 p.m. in Fisher Hall (a dramatic presentation with players from New Surry Theater as well as our own congregation), the stations of the cross on the Murphy Trail at noon on Good Friday, and with two services on Easter morning.  The 10:00 service will provide the joy of musical clamor from Clair Maxwell on the organ, our chimes choir, trumpet, our musical consort, and our choir.  The quieter service at 6:00 a.m. at the foot of Blue Hill Mountain will be accompanied by birdsong and the brilliance of an Easter sunrise.  Join us in our contemplation and our celebration!
Blessings and peace, Lisa

Grace to you and peace, from God our Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ!  In some ways, it is hard to believe that the spring equinox is this coming week.  In other ways, we have experienced very little winter and are anxious to know what becomes of our weather, of our climate.  This ambiguous place, a kind of hovering between is often what the season of Lent can feel like for those who observe it.  We are still in the midst of it, while also anticipating something good that we haven’t quite seen or even truly conceived of yet.  Scripture can help us to understand how to navigate ambiguous moments and in this week’s Gospel readings, we are provided a symbol that may offer to be fruitful in putting our minds at ease.  

We also look forward this week to our quarterly meeting to follow worship, while we also enjoy a celebratory St. Patrick’s Day potluck luncheon together.  What are you bringing?  Sweet?  Savory?  

Blessings and peace, Lisa

Grace to you and peace, from God our Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ! First, a reminder for you:  we set the clocks ahead tonight!  So, while we may “lose an hour of sleep,” we gain light!  See you at 10:00, in daylight savings time.  What an odd concept: with the mere turn of a dial or flip of a number, we change our atmosphere.  Sometimes, don’t we wish we could do that in other ways, as well?  For people of faith–every faith tradition–there is a sense that by following a particular path, our circumstances change.  For Christians, we have a tradition that uses the image of light as that which exposes sin, but in more significant ways, we have the image of light as an eternal promise of what is good, beginning now.  We do not flip a switch in the transformation of our current lives, though, and the season in which we make our way toward Easter resurrection is one in which we focus our intention on living into the light.  We practice our faith in more conscious ways, trusting that God walks with us as we model ourselves after Jesus’ teachings.  It may be that the altered states we seek will be unfamiliar, but no more so than the myriad ways human beings regularly seek to soften suffering.  See you in church, where we regularly seek the joy of community and the promise of God’s grace.

Blessings and peace, Lisa

Grace to you and peace, from God our Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ!  “We are better together” is a phrase registered long ago as a kind of mantra of mine.  It is rallying in unity, as one body, that distinguishes people of faith in Jesus, for whom we say we are the hands and feet.  So, as many of us set out for Augusta this morning in solidarity with people living in poverty in this, our most wealthy nation, I pray for unity of spirit and of mind.  Together we may face every challenge and, in love, conquer every evil. 

Sometimes, though, to attempt change in the face of seemingly intractable difficulty feels foolish.  If so, I invite you to join me as “a fool for Christ,” in Paul’s words.  On this Communion Sunday, when we remember the self-sacrificial gift that Jesus gave us–so that we may live–I pray we may lean into the joy and the contentment of foolishness in the eyes of the world.  In so doing, perhaps we may know righteousness in the eyes of God.  Do you wonder what we’re talking about here?  Join us in conversation to discover our joy and our strength. 

Blessings and peace, Lisa

Grace to you and peace, from God our Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ!  I hope very much that you are looking forward to coming together in worship tomorrow morning.  I am.  Part of this, of course, has to do with seeing all of you and for the sense of community we share.  Part of this also has to do with echoes of the generations in my family before me who took time in their days to worship God, who made and loves us.  For them, as for many of us, we worship because we are “supposed” to do so.  Rather than this feeling like a chore or a burden, you may be like me and know this to be a blessed responsibility–my part in keeping covenant with God.  Our relationships, in faith, are different because we are called to love one another “as Christ loved us.”  Our relationship with God is also different because of Jesus; we still have a role in this relationship, and we might say both because of grace and in spite of grace.  So, we will sing hymns tomorrow that celebrate God’s great gifts to us and also sing of our response to those gifts.  That is covenant–different from contractual relationship or coercive bonds.  We choose to respond to God, because God loves us first.  Gaining strength to move our worship and our lives of faith from the sanctuary and back into the world is also why we gather.  Join us?

Blessings and peace, Lisa

Grace to you and peace, from God our Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ!  For this first Sunday of Lent, I hope we can spend time together learning about the concept, the word metanoia. We spoke of Jesus’ transfiguration last week, in part wondering how, through our faith, our lives and even our visages can be transfigured–from sorrow to joy, for example.  With metanoia, we are similarly invited into change.  Lent offers the opportunity for self-reflection and for penitence.  We also can embrace metanoia, which at its most literal translation means changing one’s mind, but in a Christian understanding is the particular change in one’s mind and heart that comes about in repentance.  From distancing ourselves from God and each other, we turn toward God and each other in deeper relationship.  We move from sin and the guilt that comes with it to more certain faith in our forgiveness, as well.  This transformation can be life changing, not only for ourselves but also for those with whom we interact and whom we serve.  How may we, together, deepen in faith and purpose this Lent?

Blessings and peace, Lisa