Words of Welcome

2 Corinthians 13:11-13 It is Trinity Sunday, which is a good time to stop and think about the God we serve and worship.  Most Christian traditions confess God to be One, and yet three.  This is the confession we raise when we sing: “Holy, Holy, Holy! Lord God Almighty!  Early in the morning our song shall rise to thee; holy, holy, holy!  Merciful and mighty!  God in three persons, blessed Trinity!” (Reginald Heber).     This doctrine of the Trinity that we celebrate today is complicated, and yet there are incredible spiritual riches to be found in this confession.  The benediction that closes Paul’s second Corinthian letter offers us one of the more explicit Trinitarian confessions in the New Testament.  While this isn’t a fully developed theology of the Trinity, because it closes one of Paul’s most difficult letters, it might have some practical importance.  Paul wrote to a congregation he started, but which was now dee...

1 Samuel 3:1-10 When Teddy Roosevelt became President in 1901 he was the first President since James Buchanan who hadn’t been directly involved in the Civil War.  Though Grover Cleveland did pay a substitute to take his place in the Union Army. Bill Clinton was the first post-World War II generation President, and since Barack Obama’s election in 2008, it appears that the torch may be in the process of being passed once again. Passing the torch of responsibility from one generation to the next is inevitable –   in politics, in business, in sports, and in the church. At Central Woodward, we’re blessed with members who can remember the earliest days of this congregation, back when it sat on Woodward Avenue.  It’s good to hear your stories, and we’re hoping to get them down on video soon.  But a new day is dawning, and new generations are taking up the mantle of leadership.  And that’s the way it should be. The story of Eli and Samuel that we h...