Month: February 2023

Scripture: John 11:43-53

Dear Church,

There’s a hymn called ‘I love to tell the story’ that we sang frequently in a church I used to serve.  In the first verse you sing, ‘I love to tell the story of unseen things above, of Jesus and his glory, of Jesus and his love.’  The second verse continues, ‘I love to tell the story, tis pleasant to repeat, it seems each time I tell it, more wonderfully sweet.’

I do love to tell the story of Jesus.  I love to tell the story of the incarnation, of our God who loved the world so much that he took on flesh and was born among us, poor and vulnerable in a stable.  I love to tell the story of Jesus calling fishermen and outcasts and sinners–choosing all the people no one else wanted tp be his disciples.  I love to tell the story of Jesus casting out demons and healing the sick and restoring lepers to community.  I love to tell the story of Jesus’ disciples wanting to send a hungry crowd away, and Jesus showing them that when they trust the little they have to him, it miraculously becomes more than enough.  I love the story of Jesus flipping out in the temple, calling out the Pharisees and healing the wounds of the soldier who came to arrest him.  I love to tell the story of the last supper and Jesus’ washing his disciples’ feet and the new command he gives us.

I do love to tell the story of Jesus, except for one part.  One part that is not wonderfully sweet, one part that is never pleasant to repeat.  One part that was terribly, gruesomely not unseen.  But it is the part of the story, more than any other, which reveals the nature of Jesus’ glory and love.  That part, of course, is the cross. 

The cross is the most essential and revelatory piece of the story.

I’ve heard a lot of people tell the story of the cross badly.  I’ve heard them tell it as divine child abuse, as justification for hatred and violence against Jewish people, as a blank check permitting Christians to do whatever seems good in their own eyes. Some of us have seen and heard such awful things about the cross that we’ve learned to barely mention it when we tell the story of Jesus. 

If the cross seems nothing but violent, nothing but tragic, nothing but bad news–the answer isn’t to look away, the answer is to learn to see the cross differently.  And that is what we, with God’s grace, will do in the coming weeks–we will learn to see the cross in new ways.  Because for us, the cross of Jesus is the glory of God, it is the catalyst of salvation, it is hope, it is peace, it is the end of violence, separation and enmity, it is astonishingly good news.  The story of the cross will never be pleasant or sweet, but it is wonder-filled.

Come and see.

Peace,

Pastor Kate

Want to chat about what you have heard? Click here:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/connect-with-us

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scripture: Mark 2:23 – 3:6

Dear Church,

Jesus could not have been crucified without the efforts of people of faith.  It wasn’t pagan priests or Roman senators who wanted Jesus dead–folks like that had never even heard of him.  It was his own fellow believers who worked the systems to have him destroyed.

Why?

Because he invited them to begin again.  He showed them that they weren’t God experts.  He showed them that they did not know the God they loved.  We think it all flipped when turned the tables (see what I did there?), but actually the bitterness and enmity started much earlier, when he challenged how they practiced sabbath.  It was way back then, in chapter 2, when religious folks started plotting to destroy him.

In Jesus’ day, people of faith were taught that how you kept sabbath was everything.  In our day, we’re taught that sabbath means nothing at all.  But Jesus is Lord of the sabbath.  What if we’re wrong to reject this sacred gift?  What if, like our spiritual ancestors, we are wrong about some of the things we are most certain of?  What if keeping sabbath is more than a break, more than a relic, what if it is a key to entering into the fullness of life Jesus promised us?

Peace,

Pastor Kate

Want to chat about what you have heard? Click here:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/connect-with-us

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scripture: Genesis 1:31-2:3, Mark 2:23-28

Dear Church,

Scripture starts with the beginning of everything–the story of God creating all that is, land and sky, stars, sun and moon, seas and creatures and plants and birds and humans, made in the image of the maker. 

But, contrary to how you might have heard it, humans are not the grand-flourish- culmination of creation.  God’s ultimate act of creation is a seventh day, the day of rest.  

God’s own creative choice to rest is the root of our practice of sabbath.

And why did God rest?  Because at the end of the sixth sacred day of creation work, God ‘looked at all that he had made and saw that it was very good.’

God rested because all that had been made was, not just good, not good enough, but very good.  And you and I, on our best days and on our worst days and all the days in-between, we are beheld by God’s gaze and included in that declaration.

We are part of the very good.  

And so, one day in seven, we who bear the image of God in our sacred flesh, we rest with our Creator.  We stop to return the gaze of the one who is gazing in delight at us.  You–you–especially you–are very good in God’s eyes.  

I hope you will join me as we rest, remember & rejoice in the life-giving truth that God sees us and claims us and declares us very good!

Peace,
Pastor Kate

Want to chat about what you have heard? Click here:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/connect-with-us

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scripture: Deuteronomy 5:12-15

Dear Church,

God has a gift for each one of us… a good gift: sabbath.

If you heard that Christians don’t ‘have’ to keep sabbath, if the word sabbath makes you feel guilty, if you think sabbath is only about rules and obligations and not doing anything enjoyable, I have good news for you…sabbath is not what you’ve heard.

Many of us do not recognize that sabbath is a gift from God to each one of us. We haven’t been taught that God gives us sabbath to enjoy.  We don’t know that enjoying sabbath is serious and essential spiritual work.  Surprise! Sometimes, spiritual growth feels delightful.  This is one of those times.

I hope you’ll join me as we learn how to receive and enjoy the gift of sabbath together.  You’re not going to believe how good this is!

Peace,

Pastor Kate

Want to chat about what you have heard? Click here:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/connect-with-us

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS