Words of Welcome

1 Samuel 17:57-18:5 The American Psychological Association defines friendship as: A voluntary relationship between two or more people that is relatively long-lasting and in which those involved tend to be concerned with meeting the others’ needs and interests as well as satisfying their own desires. Friendships frequently develop through shared experiences in which the people involved learn that their association with one another is mutually gratifying. One of the key dimensions of this definition is its emphasis on mutuality, which means true friendships are not one-sided. They also tend to be long-lasting. Many of us have friendships that go back to childhood. We may only have a few deep friendships in life, but these and other friendships bring joy and sustenance to our lives. The chorus of the song “ That’s What Friends Are For” captures this truth for us: Keep smilin', keep shinin' Knowing you can always  count on me for sure That's what friends are f...

John 20:19-31 Last Sunday the sanctuary was filled with color and the music was stirring. We declared: “Christ the Lord is Risen Today. ” And who can forget the powerful strains of the “Hallelujah Chorus” on the organ as the service concluded. Most of the tulips are gone, but there are still signs of Easter’s glory in the sanctuary. That’s good news, because the season of Easter has just gotten started. There are still Easter hymns like “Thine Is the Glory” to sing, and encounters with the risen Christ yet to be explored. In the Gospel of John, Easter morning begins with Mary Magdalene’s encounter with the Risen Christ. This makes her the first witness to the resurrection. After her encounter with Jesus, she went and shared the good news with the rest of the community. Despite Mary’s good news, fear still reigned among the disciples as evening rolled around. They locked themselves in a room somewhere in Jerusalem out of fear of the religious authorities. They’ve heard goo...

John 20:19-23     “He breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’”    John has his own story of how the Spirit fell upon the followers of Jesus.  It’s different from the traditional Pentecost story, but what he does is connect the Holy Spirit with the very essence of life. In fact, there’s a connection between this story and the story of creation in Genesis 2.  In that story, God created the first human being by forming a body from the dust of the ground, and then God “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being” (Genesis 2:7).  The biblical words for breath and Spirit are the same.  So to have breath is to have the Spirit.       We see this connection in the book of Ezekiel, where the “spirit of the Lord” took the prophet to the Valley of Dry Bones.  Then the Lord asked Ezekiel – “can these dry bones live?”  God then told Ezekiel ...

Matthew 20:1-16 Jesus liked to tell stories, and the story we’ve heard this morning speaks of a vineyard owner who goes down to the corner, where the day-laborers gather, to hire some help for the day.   Back in California, in places where construction is taking place or in agricultural areas, a scene like this is quite common.  A truck drives up, a person gets out, asks the group if anyone there needs a job.  The prospective employer will describe the job, tell the prospective workers how much the job will pay, and if there are any takers, the laborers jump in the truck and off they go. That’s not all that different from what happens in Jesus’ story – except for the pickup truck – for obvious reasons.    In Jesus’ parable, the vineyard owner goes down to the corner early in the morning, hires the hands he needs and puts them to work.  He’ll continue doing this throughout the day.  I don’t know if the job ended up being bigger than ...