January 22, 2025

January 22, 2025

by | Jan 22, 2025 | PS from PS

ps from ps


Don’t eat yellow snow.  (Especially in Houston or New Orleans of all places!)

Don’t poke the bear.

Just do it!

Be the change.

So many short phrases to recenter us and help us to make better choices, reframe the hard moments and direct our dailyness.

Could sermons be this short?? 

Could my sermons be this short one day?  Maybe.  (It’s OK if you’re saying “Hopefully!:)

Jesus had one.  In Luke 4, he’s in the temple teaching, reads Scripture, rolls us the scroll and says: This Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.

Mic drop!  

Sermon over.

And the crowd soaked it in and appreciated his brief message.  They were fine with it!

Interesting part of the Scripture he read though.  It proclaimed who he was and what his calling was: bring good news, proclaim release to the captives, sight to the blind and freedom to those oppressed.  And to let folks know that God has broken in.

So, much like those pithy little statements, it seems that this sermon and that text is meant to do the same thing: to recenter us and help us to make better choices, reframe the hard moments and direct our dailyness.  

What’s intriguing to me is that he says: it’s fulfilled in your hearing.  He didn’t say: in your doing.  The crowd is very comfortable with his sermon and proclamation when he’s just talking about “hearing it”.  

But, immediately after his mini-sermon, he actually heads out and starts DOING it!  And that’s when they get uncomfortable.  Maybe our “hearing” is meant and intended to motivate and guide our “doing” and we, like those who heard the sermon the first time, can get uncomfortable too?

I mean, that would never happen still in church today, right?  A preacher sharing tough words about release to captives, sight to blind, freedom to the oppressed and then after hearing it, being invited to do it and getting uncomfortable??  

Monday, on MLK Jr and Inauguration Day, I watched the Episcopal Bishop of Washington DC share a sermon in the prayer service with the incoming President, as tradition holds.  She reflected Jesus’ teachings and made a passionate plea for those in need today, which sounded quite similar to the scroll Jesus read.  When asked after worship how the President liked the service, he said: it wasn’t very good.

Turning the hearing into doing makes us uncomfortable.

How’s your comfort level today?  Are we ready to hear Jesus open that scroll for us again today?  To hear that God’s good news had indeed broken in, and the call to the doing of that good news is as needed now as it was then?  “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me
        to bring good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
    and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.  And maybe also, your doing. 
Lord, thanks for this powerful and short sermon.  Amen

Still in One Peace,
ps
January 22, 2025

January 15, 2025

by | Jan 15, 2025 | PS from PS

ps from ps

“Softball pitch this Sunday” – Pastor Scott Hannon says to me as we contemplate life and faith together.  

What’s the text? – I ask him.

“Wedding at Cana” – Scott replies.

That’s a good one.  Why do you say?. – I inquire. 

“Beginnings become endings.  Endings become beginnings.” – He replies again.  

Then he picked up a piece of tape and held it in front of me.  “A beginning and an ending right?”  Yep, I said.  Then he took the tape and stuck the two ends together to make a loop.

“Same tape.  But now – Beginnings become endings.  Endings become beginnings.”

In John’s gospel, Jesus, already in chapter 2, is at a wedding.  Wine runs dry.  His mom and others panic a bit.  So Jesus turns som water into wine.  What looked like a wedding coming to an end was now a wedding just beginning.  What seems like fears just beginning became doubts ending as they were washed over by God’s miracles.

We live a circular life.  It’s not linear at all.  Our birth to death cycle is only linear if you forget about the resurrection.  Our fears driving us to despair are only linear if we lose hope in God’s provision.  Our health concerns are only linear if we don’t allow for God’s healing.  Our lostness is only linear if we discount the Holy Spirit’s guidance.

Beginnings become endings.  Endings become beginnings.

May you see God’s power to turn water into wine again today.  May you sense that the moment you are in right now isn’t linear at all.  It’s a loop of tape.  A loop of faith.  A loop of hope.  A loop of the miraculous..

Lord, thank you for cycling me through miracle after miracle.  Amen

Still in One Peace,

ps
January 22, 2025

January 8, 2025

by | Jan 8, 2025 | PS from PS

ps from ps
What is distracting you today?

For many of us, our personalities, styles and modes of operating through life allow for distractions to pull us away, listen to the wrong voices and maybe even lead us toward bad choices.

When you read through stories in the Bible, we’re not alone!

As we launched into the season of the NFL Playoffs….I mean Epiphany (see what happened, I got distracted again!) we got to hear about the wise men getting distracted by Herod.  He’s the ruler boss of the land and wasn’t super thrilled about some new “God-baby” coming into town and potentially zapping some of his power and authority.  

The wise guys were summoned to see him.  So they went and listened.  But they realized the distraction in live time.  Whether it was hearing how sketchy Herod’s motives were or being in the presence of this God-baby themselves, they picked up on it.  It motivated to them to return him a different way and not get derailed by the dis-Herod-traction so that they could announce the presence of God in the world to their home country.  

Distractions can be story changing.  They can be injury causing and energy zapping.

What distractions pull you in the wrong direction?  Pull your energy…your faith energy…away from the journey God has set for you?

As we move into 2025, take some time to name some…or even one…of them.  Pray about them.  And maybe even take some action steps to set them aside, move away from them or battle with them in live time.  

And if you get distracted from noticing the distractions, you aren’t the first and won’t be the last.  That just reminds me that we’re in this together.  But let’s give it a shot and allow the wise men’s live time recognition be an inspiration for our own faith journey.

Lord, help me to stay focus on your love for me.  Amen

Still in One Peace,

ps
December 25, 2024

December 25, 2024

by | Dec 30, 2024 | PS from PS

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It’s pretty simple today: Joy to the world; the Lord has come!

Merry Christmas everyone.

Still in One Peace,ps



Luke 2 – In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 All went to their own towns to be registered. 4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.8 In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: 11 to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Messiah,[a] the Lord. 12 This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.’ 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host,[b]praising God and saying,14 ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven,
    and on earth peace among those whom he favours!’[c]15 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.’ 16 So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. 17 When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. 19 But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. 20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

(ps from ps/pk will be back in mid-January – roughly 39% of the way through Biegner Winter)
January 22, 2025

December 18, 2024

by | Dec 18, 2024 | PS from PS

ps from ps


We are roughly a week away from Christmas, depending on when you are reading this.  And you probably have a ton of things to do and get ready for.

Maybe you had a plan for this week….month…year and it’s about to get sliced up by other circumstances?  Like it did for Joseph.

Maybe you’ll be asked to do some monumental thing this week and you’ll pause…redirect…and realize it’s part of God’s awesome plan?  Like Mary had to do.

Maybe you didn’t have much to do this week outside of the normal vocational routine, but sense you might be called to travel to see something amazing?  Like the shepherds were.

Maybe you thought everything was fine in your house?  It was a little bit dirty and smelly and needed some freshening…and then a whole extra family showed up to stay with you!  Like the animals in the barn had happen.

The players used in God’s new entrance in the world were just regular folks, doing regular things.  And when they realized they were part of God’s redemptive story for the world, it sure changed their week.

Read their story again (at the bottom of the email).  And imagine yourself in it.  Imagine your week this week being in it.  And in doing that, I hope you will see God’s story come alive right here and right now.  In your prep.  In your cleaning.  In your travel.  In your gatherings. In your shopping.  In your wrapping.

They didn’t think they’d be a part of a story of this magnitude.  But they were that week.

And so are we…this week.  

Lord, help me embrace this week as sacred  Amen.
 

Still in One Peace,ps

Luke 2 – In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 All went to their own towns to be registered. 4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.8 In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: 11 to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Messiah,[a] the Lord. 12 This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.’ 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host,[b]praising God and saying,14 ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven,
    and on earth peace among those whom he favours!’[c]15 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.’ 16 So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. 17 When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. 19 But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. 20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

December 25, 2024

December 11, 2024

by | Dec 11, 2024 | PS from PS

ps from ps


All is calm.  All is bright.

We’re just a few days away from the Children’s Christmas Pageant this coming Sunday.  

Where these costumes will come alive again.



And they will remind us of an incredible story and promise.  

Now don’t get me wrong.  This will not go perfectly.  Someone will miss a cue.  Someone will fall down.  There’s a chance of tears or a nose being picked.  There will be off key notes and maybe some pushing here or there.  

But as it unfolds and culminates, at some point, we’ll get it.  The beauty of the story will come through.  The promise will be emphasized.  God’s love will be realized.  

And isn’t that a little like life today – not perfect, a few missed cues, some falling down and a few tears.  But the promise is as true today as it was back then and will be this Sunday.  God is with us.  

So break out your costumes.  Bring out your donkey.  Let all the parts and pieces of the story remind you in the imperfections of today of God’s presence love for you.   

Lord, make the story real again today.  Amen.
 

Still in One Peace,
ps