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As followers of Jesus, we are partners with God in sharing the good news of Jesus. Paul says we are "ministers of reconciliation." Today we celebrate Pentecost, one of the high holy days of the church, and the giving of the Holy Spirit.
What is the intersection of Ascension Sunday and Aldersgate Day? We are calling it Transformation Sunday!
We take the opportunity of Senior Sunday to explore how we can reach people who feel "far from God," or even people who we feel are far from God. And, of course, to honor our graduating seniors.
Rev. Rachel Heyduck's final message as an Associate Pastor at Euless First United Methodist Church. For Mother's Day, Rev. Heyduck shares some insights on how to maintain and persevere during the pandemic, and how she draws insight for this from Acts 7 and John 14.
This year is the 50th anniversary of our church's preschool. We are blessed to be able to offer the preschool to our community, and are excited for the opportunities it has given and will give us to follow Jesus better today and in the future.
Christians in America (I don't know about the rest of the world) ues the word repent as though it is some high, holy word that is particular to the Christian faith. Or maybe to religion. It isn't. Repent means "Change your heart and life." Following Jesus includes changing one's heart and life. How has yours changed? How does it still need to change?
What's Next part 1: Credible Witness. Want to help others follow Jesus? What is one thing about your life that you could tell someone to show them that following Jesus is worthwhile?
Thanks to the pandemic, we can maybe grasp a bit of the anxiety and uncertainty Mary, Mary, and the disciples likely felt that first Easter. Matthew tells us Mary and Mary felt "fear and great excitement." May you feel the excitement of knowing the Risen Christ in the midst of whatever fear you have.
You never really had control anyway, why do we fight so hard to give up what we don't have?
A friend recently tweeted, "I gave up sweets for Lent. I gave up Lent for coronavirus." This pandemic has changed all our lives. But it has not stopped, and nothing can stop, our mission of helping others follow Jesus better today than yesterday. We pray this message helps you!
The sound quality isn't quite as good on this one as usual; this was our first live-streaming worship experience, and we pulled this from that! Today's readings are Exodus 17:1-7 and John 4:5-15. What these have in common is water. Thirsty people. What do you do when you are thirsty? If you can get past literal, physical thirst, what do you do when your soul in thirsty? Do you grumble and complain? Do you reach out to God? The good news for today is that God is faithful and good EVEN IF we grumble and complain!
God has called you. God is calling you. God will call you. A God who calls is a God who is close enough for us to hear, close enough for us to feel God's breath. Like God's call of Abram in Genesis 12, God is calling you and me to be part of blessing all the families of the earth. How is God calling you? What is God calling you to do?
Much of American Christianity is cynical about sin. We don't believe, or act like we don't believe, in the transformative power of God in our lives, specifically over and about sin. Take this definition of sin from John Wesley, "sin is a willful violation of a known law of God." Take this definition because this is the kind of sin you and I, with the loving support of our church families, can actually do something about!
Ash Wednesday begins the season of Lent, a season which many Christians observe by giving up something. This year, we are focusing on "giving up for good;" whatever we give up, we do so because we want it to strengthen our connection with and deepen our experience of God.
Have you ever lost something? Ever felt lost? We want you to know that God is always looking for the lost. Walk with us through the parable of the Prodigal Son.
Psalm 23 is one of the most widely recognized sections of scripture. Let's think about it together, and see what life and encouragement it offers.
Turn with me to Acts 8:37. Oh, wait - Help! There are verses missing from my Bible! In a Christian subculture that tries to maintain that the Bible we have now is exactly the Bible that believers have always had, how do we deal with textual variations? Easy: we accept that we have the Bible God wants us to have, and we apply the Wesleyan Quadrilateral. The Quadrilateral is Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience. Scripture is primary, but we cannot access scripture without the other three. United Methodists trust God and one another so that through tradition, reason, and experience, we can read the Bible faithfully and find there everything necessary for salvation.
How is your relationship with the Bible? For the 3rd week in a row, we have read scriptures about people reading scriptures. First, Jesus, then King Josiah, and now this week, an Ethiopian Eunuch. Don't know what a eunuch is? Go ask your dad. What each of these people find in scripture is that God offers hope, freedom, and inclusion rather than condemnation, oppression, and exclusion.
The Bible we use is the Bible we inherited from our parents, our parent's parents, and our parent's parent's parents. The Bible we use is NOT the collection of writings Jesus knew as sacred scripture or even the collection that all Christians everywhere agree are the one and only sacred scripture. So, then, what is the Bible? United Methodists believe the Bible contains and/or reveals all things necessary for our salvation. May the Bible offer you with what you need for salvation!
We start our "Focus on the Bible" series with Luke 4:14-30, a splendid example of how Jesus read the Bible. Jesus was offered the Isaiah scroll, and choose to read from what we know as chapters 61 and 58. This reading refers trained listeners to Leviticus 15 and Deuteronomy 25 which meant really, really good and exciting news to God's people.