Words of Welcome

1 John 4:7-21 “What the world needs now is love, sweet love.” That may be true, but what is love and where does it come from? Do we need to just sing some silly love songs, because, as Paul McCartney put it, “some people wanna fill the world with silly love songs, and what’s wrong with that?”   If what the world needs now is love, then we need to define our terms. Is love a feeling, an emotion, or something else? The love songs that fill the air usually speak of tender feelings between two people, because “when I fall in love, it will be forever, or I’ll never fall in love.” If we’re honest with ourselves, each of us has probably “fallen in love” a couple of times. It’s possible that we have found a love that  “will be forever,” but perhaps not.  When Jesus shared the two love commands, which he drew from the Hebrew Bible, he had more in mind than feelings. He used the parable of the Good Samaritan to illustrate neighborly love. You know the story, a person gets mugged

1 John 3:1-7 Who am I? What is my identity? We’ve all asked these kinds of questions of ourselves. In that spirit, let me introduce myself to you, as I know myself relationally. I am Bob, the son of Robert and Beverly, brother of Jim, husband of Cheryl, and father of Brett. If that doesn’t tell you enough about who I am, I could add that I am pastor of Central Woodward Christian Church in Troy, Michigan. If you need more, I can show you my resume, which gives details about my occupational and educational background, along with a lot of other details.  Our reading this morning from 1 John adds another important element to my identity. In fact, it might be the most important factor of all, because it applies to all of us gathered here this morning. John invites us to “see what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God.”

1 John 1:1-2:2 “Christ the Lord is Risen Today. Alleluia” This morning that declaration continues to ring out as we hear the invitation to walk in the light of God. As the author of 1 John points out, we meet the God who “is light and in him there is no darkness at all” in the person of the risen Christ.   Here is the message of Easter: The risen Christ shines the light of God into the darkness of this world, with that light comes a new age of the Spirit. The old age, which is marked by sin and death has lost its grip on power. It’s still with us. We see it all around us, but a new age is breaking into our world, and Jesus invites us to carry this light of God into a world where the agents of the old age are resisting the light.  

1 Corinthians 15:1-11 What makes Easter Sunday memorable? I invite you to take a moment to picture in your mind something that stands out about Easter. Maybe it was something recent or something you remember from childhood . . .   What came to my mind was picking up a pansy from the parish hall at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church after the Easter service. I don’t know why I remember those trays of pansies laid out on the table for the children to take home, but I do. I don’t even remember what I did with it when I got it home. Still, I remember those colorful trays beckoning me. Your memory might be similar or very different, but we all have memories of Easter past.  One of those memories might involve singing “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today.” For many of us, Easter is not Easter without singing this very old Charles Wesley hymn, which boldly proclaims:  Lives again our Glorious King, Alleluia!  Where, O death is now your sting? Alleluia! Easter has a lot of traditi