This Sunday, we turn back to John 8:12 to consider the I AM statement there, "I am the light of the world."  We'll consider the beauty in both the dark and the light.  We'll wrestle with the lessons that we learn and the ways we meet God in the dark and in the light.  We'll also consider what kind…

Maps. They guide us, offer direction if we choose to follow them, can keep us safe in the wilderness, help us find our way out of challenging situations, help us with height and depth, crooked and straight places. Fromthe ancient times and on into today, they have been created as a guide. Yet they also show boundaries and…

I've been thinking about leadership lately. There are at least two ways of thinking about leadership. One way is to think that most of us are followers and there are a few leaders among us who are accomplished in some way. They can show the rest of us where to go and what to do. In this…

Conflict .  It seems unavoidable.  We all have it in our lives but the question is, how do we deal with it?  Some deal with it with hoped for avoidance.  For others it can be like a competition, with a winner and a loser.  The goal is to win.  For others it becomes quickly volatile, and for others it involves "the quiet treatment."  In today's world…

This week in worship, we will welcome the families and teachers from the Aldersgate Christian Preschool who are part of our church in ways that don't always include Sunday morning worship. We will focus on one of the stories in the book of John where Jesus heals a child. It's the second of the seven signs that John includes…

On Sunday we welcome Rev. Thomas Yang into the pulpit. Bishop Elaine J.W. Stanovsky appointed Pastor Thomas to start a Pan Asian multicultural expression of United Methodism in Bellevue, Washington beginning July 1, 2017. He is an ordained elder from the Northern Illinois Annual Conference. Please give him a warm welcome. More than anything else, Pastor Thomas…

So gates ...do they keep things in or keep them out? I remember on the ranches I worked early on in my life, one of the first rules was to never...ever...leave a gate open. You just don't do it. In many cases the gate fills two needs. It keeps things in and keeps things out. The gate…

Life Savers come in a variety of flavors. Some come in a variety of colors. To some extent, when talking of the candy, the roll is like a rainbow. Some are sweet and others not so much. And, by the way, throughout this season you'll be receiving a lot of these. Beyond the candy, you'll see all…

On New Year's Eve, we will gather for an informal service of worship with everyone together at 10:00am. We will come to celebrate the passing of one year into the next and to recommit ourselves to go with God into the new year. This prayer taught to us by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. helps…

This Sunday morning we pause just before we get to Christmas to consider the role of travel in our holiday gifts, both received and given. Jesus traveled throughout the book of John, back and forth between Galilee which was the borderlands between cultures and peoples and Jerusalem which was the location of the Jewish Temple and the…