November 9 Worship: "1 Samuel - Kings and Princes"

On Sunday, we continued our journey along Godsway 66 into 1 Samuel, the beginning of the history of the Jewish monarchy.  The first part tells how the Israelites demanded a king, likely after the chaos of the period of the Judges, especially in figuring out who would take power after a tribal leader died.

However, the prophet Samuel gives God's response to this request -- you don't really understand what you're asking for.  A king would place huge demands on the people, money and manpower needed to provide for both the military and the royal household.  Still, God accepts the Israelites' desire and guides Samuel to a man who looks and acts like a king, Saul.

After some initial success, Saul falls short.  He becomes too enamored with power -- thinking himself almost a god.  And he becomes desperate to maintain that power, even to the point of seeing potential threats everywhere.  Interestingly, Saul's successor will not be one of his sons, but will be another man hand-chosen by God -- David.

If you missed Sunday's sermon, if you'd like to listen to it again, or if you'd like to share it with others, you can find an audio recording here.

You can also listen to the Communion meditation and the closing benediction.

November 2 Worship: "Ruth - Gaming the System"

On Sunday, we continued our Godsway 66 journey through the beautiful book of Ruth, which tells the story of King David's great-grandmother.  I focused on the three main characters: the widow Naomi, her now-widowed daughter-in-law Ruth, and Naomi's distant relative Boaz.  Eventually, Ruth and Boaz will marry; however, all three people have to work outside of social customs for this to occur.  Ruth has to stay with her mother-in-law, rather than return to her family.  Both women have to throw themselves on the mercy of a distant relative to survive.  Ruth has to use her feminine wiles to attract Boaz' attentions.  Boaz has to maneuver in order to be able to marry Ruth.

Usually, we have a bad image of people "gaming the system" -- thinking that they are just looking for unfair and undeserved advantages.  However, in Ruth, these three people are trying to work around the system for good reasons.  As Christians, living in a sinful world, we too have to find ways to work around some of the broken systems around us too -- even if some of our systems are less awful than those of the ancient world.

If you missed Sunday's sermon, if you'd like to listen to it again, or if you'd like to share it with others, you can find an audio recording here.

You can also listen to the Communion meditation and the closing benediction.

Also, you can listen to the a cappella version of "Poor Wayfaring Stranger" that I sang during Sunday's offering.