Prayer for Mission in China

This week we pray for Tom and Lynnea Morse, our missionaries who have served in China.  Tom assisted with English communications at the Nanjing Drum Tower Hospital and Lynnea worked through Church World Service in teaching English with the Amity Foundation.

You can read more about the mission to China here, including the story of two students joining an aging congregation and celebrating their baptism into Christ's church.

There are Christian missionaries serving on our behalf in 70 countries around the world.  Each week, Global Missions highlights one of these missions and asks the wider church to pray for its continued vitality in spreading the Gospel.

Expecting Others to Do Things Our Way

Recently, I've been reading a book with advice from well-regarded pastors and seminary professors for ministers.  Called Best Advice, it offers insight into ministry and preaching based on years of experience.

While the essays are definitely intended for those who preach regularly and serve in congregational ministry, there are nuggets of wisdom for everyone in the church about how better to live out our calling as Christians.

Recently, while reading an essay on trying to increase diversity in congregations -- where it still remains true that Sunday worship is the most segregated hour in this country each week -- I was pleasantly surprised to read about newness in a way that more Christians should take to heart.  Too often, I see Christians who want to insist that they alone have figured out God's truth, and try again and again to make others see things -- and then do things -- that one way, their way.  As you might imagine, this could be a challenge to worshiping and serving with others who are different, whether that difference is racial, economic, general age, disposition toward technology, or whatever.

Miguel A. De La Torre writes:

Becoming a new creature in Christ is not to be taken figuratively, but literally.  The question that the church must ask itself is how much it is willing to change to become a new place where all can come to worship the Lord.  The church willing to diversify will never succeed while holding on to the attitude that "this is the way we've always done it and if you want to join us, you must convert and become like us."  The church that is "saved" is less concerned with converting the world to its doctrine or way of worshiping God.  Rather, it is focused on how much it must be converted to become more Christlike in order to be relevant to a hurting and disjointed world.
-- Miguel A. De La Torre, "Dealing with Diversity," Best Advice: Wisdom on Ministry from 30 Leading Pastors and Preachers, p. 59

Of course, some will rightly question how we approach those who do not have a relationship with God or Jesus Christ without encouraging people to do things our way.  But how much better for us to worry more about our ongoing conversion -- or discipleship, if you prefer -- to Christ's way of doing things in this world, than to dictate how others must live or believe in order to be Christian.

And this is especially true when we invite people to join our congregation.  If we are not open to them, if we only insist on our way, we will be closed off to the gifts that they could share with us, to the new opportunities for growth they may offer us, and to the new insight into the gracious splendor of God's creation.

January 6 Worship: "The King's House"

We gathered on Epiphany, Three Kings' Day, which celebrates the arrival of the magi in Bethlehem to pay honor to the Christ child.  We marked the day, the first Sunday of 2013, with special music, including the timeless carol, "We Three Kings."

During the sermon, I encouraged us to consider what we can learn from the quest of the magi to find the newborn king.  These three travelers, from a faraway land, followed a star in the heavens, which they took as a sign of the new king's birth.  They then arrive in Jerusalem, and pay a call on the current king, Herod the Great, to discover where the new king has been born, but Herod is unaware of the birth.  Calling together his advisers, he learns that the promised king is to be born in Bethlehem, which he shares with the magi.

Rather than focusing on the motivation of these famous travelers with their exotic and expensive gifts, I encouraged us to pay attention to the dysfunctional relationships evident in "The King's House."  Surely more people saw the star than the three magi, and some probably even correctly identified it as a sign, but only these three completed the journey to Bethlehem.  It wasn't for lack of information, but for lack of communication and openness, that Herod was unaware of Christ's birth.  How often, I wonder, do we see the signs, but refuse to act upon them in our lives?

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.

Letting Jesus' Boyhood Teach Us About the Incarnation

Having now completed the 12 Days of Christmas, we move to the brief moment in the church calendar when we remember Jesus' life between infancy and adulthood.  In some ways, it's hard not to make the jump, given that there is only one brief story in the Bible about Jesus during his boyhood -- the story of Jesus discussing things with religious teachers in the Temple.

But remembering these several years in Jesus' life, with a bit of our own childlike curiosity, can remind us of the Jesus humanity and the completeness of the incarnation.  Ed Moore, an ordained Methodist minister, asks an illuminating question in a recent article, "Did Jesus Wear His Halo to School?"

How might you ask this 6-year-old's question?  Maybe even more important, how might you ask the 6-year-old's question?  What was Jesus -- flesh and blood Jesus -- really like when he was a child, and how can we better understand God through Jesus' humanity?

Prayer for Mission in East Timor

This week we pray for Monica and Tom Liddle, our missionaries to East Timor serving the Protestant Church of East Timor.  Monica serves as a Naturopathic Doctor in a clinic and Tom teaches English and works with programs to help strengthen congregations and assist in clergy continuing education.

You can read more about the mission to East Timor here, including a description of some of the challenges posed by the rural Southeast Asian country.

There are Christian missionaries serving on our behalf in 70 countries around the world.  Each week, Global Missions highlights one of these missions and asks the wider church to pray for its continued vitality in spreading the Gospel.

Coming Up Sunday, January 6

As we begin the new year, we return to our normal Sunday worship schedule, with Sunday School at 9:15 and Worship at 10:25.  We will gather on Epiphany, January 6, the day when the church celebrates the coming of the Magi to visit the Christ child.  (In some cultures, this is the day, not December 25, when gifts are exchanged.)  I imagine there will be several familiar songs about those ancient travelers, following a star.

Continuing our Advent and Christmas sermon series, "Looking for Home: Faith in the Holiday Season," we will consider a couple of the lessons we can learn from these three wise, and likely wealthy, magi as they make their way from the East, to Herod's palace in Jerusalem, and to Bethlehem, where they find Jesus.  In "The King's Home," we will consider how they went about their search, and what we can learn from them in our searching.

December 30 Worship: "Dedication Day"

On the final Sunday of 2012, we gathered to continue our Christmas celebration.  We enjoyed some favorite carols, even as many of us had people on our hearts.

We also continued our Advent and Christmas sermon series, "Looking for Home: Faith in the Holiday Season," by considering the next part of the Christmas story, when Mary and Joseph presented Jesus in the Temple.  In "Dedication Day," we considered how we are expected to follow Christ's example in being presented in God's house, seeking divine blessing as we seek to live out Christ's virtues in our own lives.

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.