Well, the Summer is drawing to a close. One of the things I don’t miss about Summer is sunburn! What do you do to relieve the pain of sunburn? Probably an ointment with Aloe in it. Have you even seen an Aloe plant? Well, here is one, take a look. The Aloe plant is pretty amazing. If you planted an Aloe plant in a small area, in a season it would expand to produce many, many more plants. The Aloe plant is really special because it’s nectar has healing properties used to relief sunburn pain and other hurts, too. Sometimes we have other kinds of pain that needs healing. When our feelings are hurt, when we are disappointed in ourselves or others, or when we just don’t feel ourselves. What helps us to feel better? Jesus offers us a kind of spiritual Aloe so we can be whole, healed. John 3:17 reminds us that Jesus was sent to us to save the world. You know, the word for save also means heal. So God sent Jesus to the world to heal the world through him. Prayer is Aloe. Encouragement is aloe. Serving others is aloe. Reading the Bible and applying what it means is like applying aloe to our life. Jesus brings healing. This week, can you thnk of a few others who need healing? God can use you to be a kind of Aloe plant to them. Here, this Aloe plant is for you to keep in your room to remind you that Jesus heals, and that you are a healer, too.
Our Lectionary texts this week will help us to think about how to live our life “inside-out”. That is, how our inner spirit and motivations find expressions in our actions. In Mark 7, Jesus wants us to stand out from the crowd, not to draw attention to ourselves, but to reflect his character and values. The self-important religious leaders focused on what they ate, how they dressed, and where they stood in worship, and the importance they held in the eyes of others. The thing they missed was that God cared most for how they treated others, not how much money they put in the offering plate or the rituals they observed. The apostle James told his listeners, ”Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world” (James 1:27). How do we practice “undefiled religion” by caring for “orphans and widows in distress”? Given that all sin and fall short of the glory of God, we are all hypocrites to one degree or another and must grow to be more authentic and live with more integrity despite our inevitable mistakes and shortcomings. Let’s stand out from the crowd, in a good way, this week at Cold Spring Presbyterian Church!
(We apologize for a few audio glitches in this digital recording.)
Hello.
You’ve heard the adage, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” This expression may have been coined by Joseph P. Kennedy (1888-1969), father of the late American president John F. Kennedy. Strong people will hear this as a motivation to work harder and smarter when facing a difficult challenge. Another way of parsing the sentence is that you literally leave, you “get going”, meaning you abandon the struggle and remove yourself from the predicament in which you find yourself. Of course, we prefer the former view, but Jesus’ disciples preferred the latter. Why?
The message this week is again found in John 6 with Jesus saying he is the Bread of Life, that we need to be nourished on him and his words. The disciples found Jesus’ words offensive. They grumbled. Complained. They thought it was too hard to follow him (and it is!). And the disciple of Jesus realizes while it is not easy, following is the “only” best way to lead your life. Hard to forgive. Hard to love. It’s hard to do the right thing sometimes. We could stop complaining and grumbling. While the “narrow way” feels tight and constricting, it is actually freeing and filled with possibilities, as Peter exclaimed, “Lord, where else would we go to find eternal life?”
On Sunday, August 26, we worshiped, welcomed new elders and deacon and became better equipped for the journey ahead.
Life can be tough. We may find lots of reasons to complain. But God invites us to remain for the blessings that come from faithful work and not leave too soon. Jesus makes a way where there is no way. Thank you for connecting.
Sincerely,
Pastor Kevin
Where do you stand?: With Jesus you do not stand alone!
When you see someone bullied, you have three choices:
Join In (you become a bully)
Ignore it and walk away (condone the bully behaviors)
Stand up for them, tell an adult (Change a life, bully learns, victim helped)
God showed us in creation that: Difference, Disability, Diversity are to be welcomed. There is no reason or room for bullying. Take a stand, you will not stand alone!
Our “Jesus is the bread of Life” theme continues from John 6 in Pastor Kevin’s message, that connects “God’s Walking Words” from Ephesians 5:15-20 to an amazing story about a man named Mephibosheth. (Yes, its a bit hard to pronounce and even more difficult to spell!) It’s all about King David and his mission to show kindness to everyone, especially those considered to be unlovely. There are Mephibosheth’s in our lives, and what we will discover, we are all Mephibosheth’s! You will want to hear the good news about Jesus’ loving us all and inviting all of us to hear God’s walking words and join together in our Mephibosheth mission.
Cold Spring Presbyterian Church has always been and remains open to people of any faith, or no faith at all, because we believe God’s spiritual energy is accessible through Christ to everyone. Get more out of your life, and gain resources to help you put more into your life!
Ephesians 5:15-20 New International Version (NIV)
Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
2 Samuel 9 New International Version (NIV)
David asked, “Is there anyone still left of the house of Saul to whom I can show kindness for Jonathan’s sake?” Now there was a servant of Saul’s household named Ziba. They summoned him to appear before David, and the king said to him, “Are you Ziba?” “At your service,” he replied. The king asked, “Is there no one still alive from the house of Saul to whom I can show God’s kindness?” Ziba answered the king, “There is still a son of Jonathan; he is lame in both feet.” “Where is he?” the king asked. Ziba answered, “He is at the house of Makir son of Ammiel in Lo Debar.” So King David had him brought from Lo Debar, from the house of Makir son of Ammiel. When Mephibosheth son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, came to David, he bowed down to pay him honor. David said, “Mephibosheth!” “At your service,” he replied. “Don’t be afraid,” David said to him, “for I will surely show you kindness for the sake of your father Jonathan. I will restore to you all the land that belonged to your grandfather Saul, and you will always eat at my table.”
Mephibosheth bowed down and said, “What is your servant, that you should notice a dead dog like me?”
Then the king summoned Ziba, Saul’s steward, and said to him, “I have given your master’s grandson everything that belonged to Saul and his family. You and your sons and your servants are to farm the land for him and bring in the crops, so that your master’s grandson may be provided for. And Mephibosheth, grandson of your master, will always eat at my table.” (Now Ziba had fifteen sons and twenty servants.)
Then Ziba said to the king, “Your servant will do whatever my lord the king commands his servant to do.” So Mephibosheth ate at David’s table like one of the king’s sons. Mephibosheth had a young son named Mika, and all the members of Ziba’s household were servants of Mephibosheth. And Mephibosheth lived in Jerusalem, because he always ate at the king’s table; he was lame in both feet.
One day a man was walking along the beach when he noticed a girl about your age picking something up and gently throwing it into the ocean. Approaching the girl, he asked, “What are you doing?” She replied, “I’m throwing starfish back into the ocean. The surf is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them back, they’ll die.” The man said, “There are hundreds of starfish on the miles of beach ahead, you can’t make a difference.”
After listening politely, the girl bent down, picked up another starfish, and threw it back into the surf. Then, smiling at the man, he said…” I made a difference for that one. Now, will you join me to save one more.”
We are fearfully and wonderfully made. Let’s consider the worth of one another more highly than ourselves. The ancient scholars, the wisemen, followed the star to find Jesus. Let’s consider the starfish on our beaches, in our lives, that we can help get to a safer place.
Our message this week from Pastor Kevin builds upon the recent theme of Jesus as the Bread of Life. We will consider Paul’s advice to citizens in Ephesus about using language that lifts people up in love, and do everything we can to put our hands together to ensure that everyone experiences that love. Take a look at the photo above of two clasped hands across a wall separating the Protestant graveyard from the Roman Catholic graveyard in Holland. In 1880, Colonel van Gorkum died in Roermond, Holland, and was buried in the Protestant cemetery because even though his wife Lady van Aefferden was Catholic, neither could be buried together. A few years later she died, but instead of being buried in her family plot, she chose a secluded spot at the wall that separated the Protestants from the Catholics and commissioned some clasped hands to connect with her husband’s tombstone to her’s symbolizing their love and togetherness. Language matters and how we think and how we speak to each other has profound consequences. Let’s speak to each other with love and in dignity and respect. With communion between Protestants and Roman Catholics remaining “closed,” this photo is a powerful symbol both of how far we’ve come and how far we have to go to put our hands together.
Our cemetery and our worship have always been and remain open to people of any faith, or no faith at all, because we believe God’s spiritual energy is accessible through Christ to everyone. Get more out of your life, and gain resources to help you put more into your life!
Let’s let love lift us with friendly smiles, special music, conversation, prayer, and a message of Gospel hope. All this and so much more this Sunday, August 12.
“The earth is degenerating. Bribery and corrupt speech and deeds abound. The end of the world is fast approaching.”
-Assyrian tablet, c. 2800 BC via @Pzizz
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.” -Martin Luther King Jr.
Contempt cannot drive out contempt. Only empathy can do that.
We don’t have an anger problem in our communities, according to clinical psychologist John Gottman and thinker Arthur Brooks, we have a contempt problem. And we can fix it! We can put our hands and hearts together!
Jesus walks in our shoes and shows us how to grow in our empathy for others by walking in another’s shoes.