Invitation The profoundest act of worship is to try to understand. Jesus, the archetypal human, in which DIVINITY is embodied, confirms that human life, does not die, but is resurrected, transformed. Jesus called them together and said, You know how among the Gentiles those who exercise authority are domineering and arrogant; those great ones know how to make their own importance felt. The sun is in the same place at the same time as it was yesterday, but today all our clocks insist that it is actually 11:00 and not 10:00. Church that is. Text and image William Livingstone Wallacebut available for free use. Fortunately, the youth hostel was full, and we were forced to hike up and out of town to find a suitable spot to pitch our tents. Nothing was said until dinner the next day, by which time Steve and Anna had been back to church twice. Every time I do not serve my neighbour, every time I walk away from the poor. Metanoia is an invitation to think new thoughts. Last week, I compiled a list of online video resources for worship. We have tasted your nourishing, nurturing presence; Luke 21:25-36. The people of Israel have abandoned your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death by the sword. They not yet but already here EMPIRE of DIVINITY is here in every stranger who welcomes a refugee, in every aid worker, doctor without borders, in every reckless fool who risks it all for the kind of justice which makes peace. You see Paul was skilled in the ancient art of rhetoric and would recognize my own rhetoric for what it is. LONG LIVE GOD! Gig Harbor, WA 98335 Mishandling scripture to avoid traditional interpretations of it. var thisact = jQuery('#submission-action').val(); Humans wrote the Bible; God wrote the rocks. Liturgy - Easter Liturgy Index Next Easter Day In Western Christianity, Easter marks the end of Lent, a period of fasting and penitence in preparation for Easter, which begins on Ash Wednesday and lasts forty days (not counting Sundays). Among the passages was the text which is assigned for this very Sunday from Pauls letter to the church in Corinth. The moss, the kelp, the zebrafish, the very mice and flies, Christos Aneste! You can also find "Affirmations of Faith" by clicking on Affirmation of faith in the list of "Labels" at the lower right side of the page. Breathe forth the goodness that is within you. But Alan and I, we knew exactly what they were, and they certainly werent beautiful orcas to us. There we stood, we three kindred creatures, waving together as ONE, held in a vast Cosmos touched by the MYSTERY which is the LOVE which permeates ALL that IS, including us, for we are ONE, ONE with DIVINITY. In my bleakest moments, I could imagine the worst. This week, I have been transfigured by the face of CHRIST, not glowing on a mountaintop, but weeping. Or study cells, or living things, seek truth with open hand. So the question about the kind of body the risen Jesus had was, as Paul puts it, quite simply, stupid. We covenant to love as Jesus the Christ loved us- loving our neighbors as ourselves. Alas, if only. And we who listen to the stars, or walk the dusty grade God offered him, so that by his blood he should become the means by which peoples sins are forgiven through their faith in him. They were compiled over the years to complement the official resource, the Roman Missal. Change), You are commenting using your Twitter account. Nor can I believe that Jesus saw YAHWEH, the GREAT I AM as a fool. Petes words remind me over and over, and over again that Jesus lived and died embodying the CHRIST which is the DIVINE LOVE which rises in with through and beyond you and I, again, and again, and again. Enjoy! window.location.replace('https://progressivechristianity.org/paupress/?rel=contact&pau_form=contact_form'); We lose our capacity for peace and joy, we struggle to show compassion and to connect with others, and we may find ourselves slipping into toxic and destructive attitudes and habits. We give thanks for all the influences in our lives that have helped us see beyond the present and have called us to live in hope and trust whatever endings we have experienced. In both Ukraine and in Russia a wounded CHRIST is struggling to rise from death. It was as if my body was teaming up with my mind to convince my spirit to abandon this peculiar excursion. window.location.replace('https://progressivechristianity.org/paupress/?rel=pauContent&pau_type='+thisact); As we prepare for todays celebration, let us express our regret for the limits we have put on Gods Spirit at work in us. My friend and radical theologian Peter Rollin says it much better than I ever could. Send us your: ResourceEventNewsIdeasnow *Leader: Congregation of Jesus Christ, since the Lord has blessed us with his Word (and Holy Supper), let us praise his name with thanksgiving. There is so much more we can do and offer our readership with your support! The Cross and Easter are two faces of the one mystery. According to the story, paralyzed by their fear, hiding behind a locked door, something happened that gave them the strength to burst forth from their own tomb and change the world. What matters is that LOVE rises. Christ is risen! Do this in remembrance of me." You would be correct to conclude that I do believe in resurrection. Christ is risen! Theres nothing wrong with that. Leader: Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord has prepared this table for all who love him and trust in him alone for their salvation. The nursery rhyme dates back to the English civil war, when the Royalists were being attacked by the Parliamentarians, they put their faith in the size of their cannons, one of them was so large it went by the name Humpty Dumpty, which at the time was a term used to describe fat rich guys. Amen. The writers of our creeds firmly established that God lived in heaven. McCourt asks: Who says its an egg?, Of course, its an egg. We will never know what actually happened two thousand years ago, we will always. Amen. Christ is risen! A Liturgical and Devotional Guide for Lent When we face pain and suffering, we often feel like we become less than human. Faced with the task of communicating the gospel, the early followers of the risen Christ, began to articulate experiences of the risen Christ in ways that the Greek influenced Roman Empire could understand giving rise (pardon the pun), giving rise to the question of a physical resurrection. Sign up for our FREE monthly eNewsletter! I was unbeatable. The term liturgy merely means "the . Alleluia! It was the summer of 1978, when twenty-somethings like myself, we couldnt get enough of the Bee Gees and their Disco tunes. It is in Jesus life, not his death that we will find salvation. I knew I was about to drown. I am the only one left, and now theyre trying to kill me, too. Elohim (thats an ancient Hebrew word which we translate simply as God or Lord. Anna and Steve were Pentecostals who were convinced that my slack Lutheran ways simply werent serious enough to earn me a coveted spot in the Heaven of their dreams. We know that humans are continuing to evolve. See if you can pick them out. What kind of body will they have? What a stupid question! My oh, my, oh my In my sacred imagination, I can see Paul sitting up from his letter writing and nodding as if to say, there that out to stop those endless arguments about the resuscitation of a corpse.. I only know that they appeared to follow in my footsteps in the snow as they ventured out to the place where the Cosmos had made itself known to me. Let us metanoia Let us think new thoughts about who Jesus was and why Jesus died. The prayer book revision Facebook group, with more than 4,000 members, was created in 2017 by the Rev. People: Almighty God, who through your Son overcame death and opened to us the gate of everlasting life, grant that we who celebrate our Lord'sresurrection may arise from the death of our sin through the renewal of your Holy Spirit and may hear and obey your living Wordof truth;through Jesus Christ our Lord, who now lives and reigns with you and theHoly Spirit, one God forever. Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com. The truth is Humpty Dumpty was not an egg. But I digress. So, Im trusting that it doesnt much matter whether or not you or I or anyone believes or doesnt believe in the physical resuscitation of Jesus corpse. by acting as if we were disconnected and separate from God, our neighbor, and our world. Christ was alive to those early followers. What tombs of conformity does society create in order to control the spirit of fully alive divergence? For we have been blessed with the ability to grasp so many more details about the Cosmos in which we live and move and have our being, than our ancestors could ever have imagined. Creator of Our Earth: We celebrate the shifting of seasons from one to the next. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.. O God, who gifts us moments of amazement, help us to accept the rhythm of the ordinary and the extraordinary that we may retain a steady awareness of your presence both in grey days and in bright. Amen. Perhaps someone will ask, How are the dead to be raised up? For there is no division within the divine. After work, I convinced the housekeeper at the lodged where I worked, to rent me a room for a couple of nights at a reduced rate and I headed over to the apartment to pack up my things. Practicing resurrection requires that we gather sharing our gifts, talents and treasure for the good of all. Risen as he said! View the full Transfiguration Worship Video below, Yes! Where, O death is your sting?. Come then to the joyful feast of the Lord! Amen. And he took a cup, and when he had given . Do we have the courage to serve? Living the Questions is happy to join other Michael Morwood fans in welcoming the arrival of Michael's newest book, Prayers for Progressive Christians. Do you still have a hold of that candy? Mmm humm. We all must take care of ourselves. Heaven above the Earth and Hell below, all depending upon a smile or a frown from the omniscient god, Himself confined to sit in judgement in a celestial realm from which He sent His Son, to save creatures of His own creation from their own depravity. Humans were cast out of the perfection of the garden and alienated for their creator. The truth has left its living word for anyone to read. Shalom. Get their attention and then, deliver your point! What shalom there will be as SHALOM is restored through justice. Amen. I can hear them now, those held captive to by our ancestors limited understanding, I can hear them. So it is with the resurrection of the dead. When asked what he thought was the solution to the planetary crisis, Cosmologist Brian Swimme said, "It would be to reinvent ourselves, at the . Risen indeed! Required fields are marked *. But way back then; the bay was only accessible by the most treacherous of logging roads. On first inspection Divinity appeared to the seekers to be like a luminous egg, well rounded, self contained, completely clothed in light and amenable to definition. Only a foolWould search and look and scour and puzzle, bend and peer, lift and move everything, to find a single coin. The distortion of maps deceived me into believing that it would be a short trip from Bergen to Narvik. Life in the spirit continues in ways beyond our imagining. Amen. You can skip to the end and leave a response. There are flowers in the sanctuary during Lent! For the Lord Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it (here the minister shall break the bread) and said, "This is my body which is for you. Odd, long-vanished creatures and their tracks & shells are found; I Do Deny the Resurrection! Evolving beyond the myth that violence can solve our problems, or bring us peace, is vital. I also want you to resist making the story all about you. Lets try to focus on what is actually happening in the story. Set free from a Three-Tiered Universe! Give us today our daily bread. Leader: For Christ indeed has been raised from the dead [here the minister lifts the elements], the First-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. Humans wrote the Bible; God wrote the sky. Well, like, this egg falls off the wall and if you study biology or physics, you know you can never put an egg back together again. They were big giant killer whales, and we knew that we were their lunch. Fosdick Dr. NW #80 We may watch and study or may shudder and deny, He lives, and presides at this Feast! Easter is the eternal moment that supersedes all time; the vision that puts into perspective all visionless living. When we forgo our obsession with Jesus death and open ourselves to the passions of Jesus life, we begin to see new ways to understand the new images of the HOLY ONE that Jesus encouraged his followers to see. You can put it Sunday between November 27 and December 3. pour out your Holy Spirit upon us and upon these your gifts of bread and cup. I suspect that most of us have heard these parables of loss so many times that it is the many and varied of interpretations of these parables, which tend to stick with us, rather than the details and circumstances under which these particular parables were born and raised. var thisact = jQuery('#submission-action').val(); What could have changed these bumbling, terrified, betrayers, abandoners, who seemed to be always getting things wrong, into a bunch of leaders who began a movement that spread throughout the Empire within their own life-times and then based on the power of their witness, spread throughout the world and continues to nourish and sustain millions of people from generation to generation? Repent: Metanoia: to think new thoughts. Peace begins with non-violent resistance. When soap didnt work she reached for the butter. Crystal cried out, Mommy Im stuck. I expect things to be resolved. 3:4 Everyone who commits sin is guilty of lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. Are we prepared to make sacrifices in order to ransom those who suffer the indignities of the hell we have created here on Earth for the one and a half billion people held in the captivity of poverty? Give us the gifts of this holy communion , [This triple blessing and sending/commissioning may be delivered by three different voices.]. Only a fool would rejoice with such extravagance. Well, I deny the resurrection in the very same way as I suspect you deny the resurrection. What can progressive Christians say about the story of Easter? Alleluia! Our Hebrew storyteller paints such a vivid picture of the Thin Place in which Elijah stands. Let us be LOVE. How dare I claim freedom from the old-manin the sky-god only to embrace half-baked notions of a MYSTERY which is called LOVE, as if LOVE is the answer? Pachena Bay is by far one of the most beautiful places in all of creation. What is sown is ignoble, what is raised is glorious. Not all flesh is the same. <>/XObject<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/MediaBox[ 0 0 594.96 842.04] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S/StructParents 0>> Your resurrection we affirm with joy. This particular interpretation is a poor translation, but it was very popular way back in the day. Life is somehow stronger than death. Death, not even violent death at the hands of a powerful empire could keep Jesus commitment to compassionate resistance to the forces of empire from those who longed for the Shalom of the Reign of GOD which Jesus proclaimed with his life. Excuse me if I sound a little too indignant but jockeying for a seat during a global pandemic is more than a little tone deaf, when according to the United Nations, yet another 150 million or so people will be plunged into poverty this year, swelling the ranks of the global poor to over one and a half-billion people, over half of which are children. Some walking away to become refugees, joining the endless flow of the displaced. I stomped my feet upon the ice in a vain gesture of defiance until my stomping evolved into a dance of freedom, as I gleefully celebrated our liberation from the captivity of a three-tiered universe. The Bible was written by men who believed that they lived in a three-tiered universe. He conveyed to us the importance of love and compassion. DONATE NOW! I am tweaking this for this Sunday credit to your site will be given. Limitations which the evolving nature of our understanding of reality compel us to reject. Hosanna in the highest. "Our Father". Blessed is the one who comes in the name of our God. endobj At the time, I didnt know what the word countenance meant. Thank you! I can hear them tut tutting at the audacity of my taking such liberties with the Gospel. (I have searched for the source of this story, withoutsuccess. Once again, I struggled to keep a straight face. As the earth sheds its snow, it begins to drink in the warm rains and creation comes alive once again. SALTs Lectionary Commentary for Lent 3, Cross Purposes: SALTs Lectionary Commentary for Lent 2, Change Your Life: SALTS Lectionary Commentary for Lent 1, What Freedom Is For: SALTs Lectionary Commentary for Epiphany Week 5, Revised Common Lectionary Commentary Mark 1, Revised Common Lectionary Commentary Mark 1:29-39, Revised Common Lectionary Commentary Isaiah 40:21-31, What Is Salvation? The delight of new awareness can be a prelude to a life lived inthe mellow light of love. As a Pharisee, Paul believed in the resurrection of the dead and certainly he believed that Jesus had been raised from the dead. When we do see ourselves in the story we are usually the lost the lost sheep or the lost coin and we take comfort in the reality that no matter how lost we may become GOD the supernatural being, out there, or up there, will find us. Imagine if you will, trying to understand the life of Martin Luther King, or Mahatma Gandhi simply by focusing upon their death. There was no room in my wildest imaginings for thoughts of war. Letting go isnt as simple as it sounds. Send us into the world resurrected, refreshed and ready to share Christs unconditional love. Let us give thanks to the Lord our God. Easter is the sky that encloses the broken egg. }); Join thousands of others like you who are contributing their voice to Progressive Christianity and list your church, organization or yourself in our global directory. I just knew that if God really did come up with such a barbaric bargain, then God must be in league with the Devil himself. Starters for Sunday. Support our mission with a tax-deductible donation! Mark 10:35-45, Sermon: BAT KOL, the Daughter of a Sound Welling Up Within, Lent: Letting Go of our Tightly Held Piety to See Our Need of Confession, Wrestling With the Almighty: Locating Our Very Selves in the Sacred Story a sermon on Genesis 32:3-31, What Can We Learn from Jesus? And the blessing of God almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always. What can Jesus teach us about God? Thats at least 20 years before the Gospel according to Mark, 30 to 40 years before the gospels according to Matthew and Luke and probably nearly 50 years before the Gospel according to John. It was Solon's Feb. 1 post that drew the Facebook group's attention to the Washington resolution. And so in this spirit of brightness and life, we celebrate. 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