Ever feel like you could spend 100% of your time at work, 100% taking care of family things, and wish you could spend a larger chunk of time of hobbies and leisure time? This Sunday we talk about how to strike a healthy balance in our lives.
Join us 10:35 a.m. on Sunday for worship or watch live by hitting on the “Watch Live” link.
If you have ever struggled with feeling like you can’t forgive yourself for mistakes you have made, or had difficulty with forgiving others who have harmed you in some way, or even feel that things you have done have somehow made you unforgivable in God’s sight you are encouraged to join us this Sunday as the issue of forgiveness is addressed. Come hear and discuss just how big God’s love is and how to work through issues around forgiveness.
This will also be the subject for the children and teens, who are with us all in the worship service for the first half and then go to their own programs for the second part of service.
See you Sunday at 10:30 a.m.
You are invited to join us in celebrating Easter with a worship service about the new life the Lord can bring to us as we strive to learn from Him and to follow His teachings. There will be special music to enjoy and songs to sing along with. There will be a time to bring flowers forward to the altar as a symbol of our thanks to the Lord and a sign of hope for the new life the Lord gives us. An Easter Egg hunt for the children will follow the service. Please come celebrate with us – 10:30 a.m.
The Easter Garden – by David Roth, Pastor
Imagine the darkness of night. Picture it as the night is giving way to daylight, right before the sunrise. There is mist in the air, the moon is still in sky, there is a splendor of colors at the rising of the sun. A new day is dawning, but it is not just another day.
Picture the scene at the garden where there was the tomb in which the body of Jesus, just two days before, was lain. You can imagine the dew on the flowers and leaves. Into this scene come a very sad woman coming to pay her last respects to a Man who she had great hopes would be with her always. She dared to hope and believe that He was the Son of God. To her perhaps now that dream seemed lost. And to add to her devastation now when she looked into the tomb she saw it empty. His body was gone. He was gone. Even that last hope of visiting the place of his burial was taken.
Mary decides to go and get Peter and John to tell them what has happened. In disbelief they run to the tomb and also find the empty tomb. Believing the worst they go back home, leaving Mary standing there alone weeping. She again stooped down and looked into the tomb and then saw two angels who asked her why she was weeping. She told them and then turned around and saw Jesus, who she thought was the gardener, and asked Him where the body of Jesus was.
Mary did not recognize the Lord. Why? The Lord let His Human die and be buried so He could show Himself to His disciples in a new Form – Glorified – the Human made Divine. As we read, “Jesus answered them, saying, ‘The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain.’” (John 12:24)
If you buried a seed in the soil and came back later the seed would be gone. Where did it go? Did someone take it? No it turned into something else, a plant. A seed is very different looking than the plant that springs up, even unrecognizable.
After Mary’s inquiry of where the body was the Lord said Mary’s name and she immediately recognized Him. Imagine her joy and her amazement! It’s all true! He’s not gone, He’s not dead, He is alive!
All of this happened in a garden for a reason. The story of the Lord’s people starts in a garden. For the Most Ancient Church, or the Lord’s first church on earth, their history is told metaphorically in the story of the garden of Eden. The church following this one, the Ancient Church, was again described metaphorically by the story of Noah. When Noah came out of the ark, picturing the start of this new church, he first planted a garden. The next church, the Jewish church, was seeking a garden – a land flowing with milk and honey. The next church, the Christian church, based on the Risen Lord, began in a garden, as we have just discussed. And the next church, the New Church, described in symbolic language in the book of revelation, had at the center of the Holy City a tree, the tree of life. These churches all have this connection to a garden because the Lord’s church is a garden, the Lord’s garden. His garden, or His church, was in danger of dying. If the Lord didn’t come and tend to it nothing could have grown. What gardener wouldn’t take out weeds, strangling vines and thorns, and make sure their was sun making to the plants. So the Lord did what He had to do to ensure the health and vitality of His Garden.
We are also like gardens as to our spiritual life. The Lord gives us the pleasure of tending the garden, or our life, with a real sense that life is our own. But it is important to recognize that we do work the garden, but it is the Lord that makes things grow – we don’t.
If we don’t do the work and provide the things for the garden we won’t have the benefits. So it is with our reformation and spiritual growth. We need to get active on our garden, or spiritual life, and when we do the Lord can create miracles. We read, “The things that you must provide yourself with are the knowledges of truth and good from the Word, from the doctrine of the church, from the world, and by your own labor. The Lord does everything else while you are unaware of it.” (Apocalypse Explained 1154)
May your garden grow and bloom beautifully this Easter season.
“Blessed are those who trust in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD. They shall be like a tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream. It shall not fear when heat comes, and its leaves shall stay green; in the year of drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit.” (Jeremiah 17:7-8)
This Sunday, April 1st, is Palm Sunday – no fooling.
We are wrapping up our seven part series on the Miracles of Jesus Christ with the story of Lazarus being brought back to life after being dead for four days. It is a good lead into the story of Jesus’s own resurrection on Easter Sunday.
The miracle of this story reminds us of our own life, which will go one even after the death of our bodies. It also reminds us that the Lord has the ability to bring back to life our lost hopes and dreams, to pump life back into relationships that seem dead or lifeless, and to lift us up and set us back on our feet when we have fallen – no matter how far.
Join us for worship and a potluck lunch following the service.
The Holy Supper or Communion will also be offered during the service to help us to connect with the Lord and His love and plans for us.
See you Sunday at 10:30 a.m.
If you’ve ever wondered if God can take our seemingly small efforts to do what is kind and the few things we know to be true and do something spectacular with them, the answer is “Yes, He can!”
We are moving through the series of miracles that Jesus performs in the Gospel of John. This week we look at the miracle of Jesus feeding thousands of people with five loaves of bread and two small fish. This story shows how a big miracle performed in the world thousands of years ago by Jesus is just God’s way of illustrating to each of us the kinds of huge changes that can be made inside our hearts and minds. Are you ready to be changed from the inside out?
See you Sunday at 10:30 a.m. (Don’t forget to set your clock ahead by an hour before bed on Saturday night)
There are times when we feel stuck; when we feel like there is nothing we can do to change how we are, or how we react to things.
There is a story in the Bible about a man sitting by a pool of water in a town called Bethesda. This pool is special because every so often an angel would stir up the water in the pool and the person that was able to immerse themselves in the water first would be healed of whatever disease they had. You can’t blame him for hanging out there and hoping to get his chance. The problem was that he had been there for 38 years already with no success. It is at this point that he meets Jesus who offers him an alternative solution.
Come this Sunday and we will talk together about how to get unstuck–how to do something different that will change our lives. Our service begins at 10:30 a.m. There is always a time during the service to offer your thoughts and perspective or to ask questions.
See you Sunday!
We are presenting a series of sermons from the Gospel of John on the Miracles of Jesus Christ. One of the big questions that comes up when we consider these miracles is whether we are to believe that we can expect the same kinds of miracles Jesus performed to happen for us or our loved ones? What are the personal lessons of these miracles in the Word?
This week the story is about the healing of the Nobleman’s son. The nobleman comes to Jesus asking him to come to his house to heal his son because his son is about to die. Jesus simply tells him to go back home–his son lives. He trusts Jesus enough to begin the twenty mile walk home alone.
Come learn how this story shows us how we can be healed of spiritual diseases–how our misguided and hurtful thoughts and patterns of thinking can be cured and how our negative emotions can be removed. These are the signs that the Lord is present with us and transforming us from within.
Join us for worship at 10:30 a.m. or watch us live on this website.
This Sunday the subject is marriage. The focus will be on bringing kindness and tenderness into one’s marriage and how this can change things dramatically. With Valentine’s Day coming up it might be a good time to gain some insight, practical skills and hear some Divinely inspired teachings on the subject of marriage.
If your marriage could use a tune up or maybe even a complete overhaul, come worship with us Sunday. A little effort goes a long way in matters of the heart.
Sunday 10:30 a.m.
This Sunday with the children we will talk about what really matters in the life of religion. The leaders of the church were disturbed by Jesus’s eating without first washing his hands. Why did Jesus make a point of not keeping a ancient ritual like this?
During the adult portion of the service we will dig a little deeper into this subject and also look into some teachings about things that happen to us that obviously harm us, but that are not our fault. What things that we think, intend, and do are we really accountable for and what things are we not.
Join us Sunday at 10:30 a.m.
Starting February 19th
We are beginning a series of talks leading up to Easter on seven miracles the Lord performed in His three years of ministry. Each of these miracles has a deeper message for healing in our spiritual lives. During these seven weeks we want to offer some small groups to discuss how these healings apply to us and what applications we can make in our own lives. These will be low key in comparison to the Journey groups in the fall and will follow the regular small group format.
