New Life

God’s grace leads us to new life, not just a better life. Rather than recreating the past, Jesus calls for us to live fully in the present, looking forward to God's future.

May we be like new wineskins, receiving God’s mercies that are fresh every morning.

Expectations

It helps to know what you’re looking for if you want to find it. As we search, wrong expectations often mislead us.

If we want to know the reality of God’s love, presence, and power in our lives, we must look past our expectations of Jesus to see who he truly is.

Dare to Live Faith

Often, the very things we think are interruptions are exactly where God is at work. All too often we expect God to do things the way we think he should, and if we do we can easily mistake God's purposes and presence as an interruption rather than the whole point.

In today's scripture Jesus' preaching is interrupted, but the interruption reveals Jesus as the Son of God.

Jesus Chooses

The many choices we make every day, both big and small, reveal what is most important to us. A man with leprosy says to Jesus, "If you choose, you can make me clean." Jesus chooses to do something others were afraid to do, he reaches out and touches this man others regarded as untouchable and heals him.

Jesus' choice to touch an unclean outcast reveals a powerful truth about the value God places on those in need, people regarded as unclean, and humility.

May we receive this grace for ourselves and generously share it with others - particularly those others avoid.

Into the Quiet

We live in the midst of a busy and chaotic world with never ceasing demands for our attention and efforts. Faced with demands and expectations, Jesus found a quiet place and prayed. May we do likewise.

Divine Interruptions

We all miss gathering together, hugs, and the fellowship of those we love. We all long to return to the way thing were, and there much of eternal value to that, but God never leads anyone back to the way things once were. Instead, God’s purposes and path fully embrace the present while leading toward what is yet to be.

Faith on the Edge

The call of Jesus, by its very nature, takes us far beyond what we can do on our own, so God can accomplish, in and through us, what only God can do.

Bigger and Better

Philip and Nathanael recognized Jesus as the Messiah and had high expectations for him. What they did not expect was that God had big and better plans for them. And, if we dare, for us too.

Endings and transitions bring change, and very possibly fear, anxiety, and sadness. But let us remember that God is at work fulfilling God's good will.

We may be reluctant to close a chapter in our life, but let us trust God together. God was here before us, God is here with us in this moment, and God will see us through.

Epiphany Sunday

Epiphany refers to something being revealed or a sudden insight.

What would happen if we experienced an epiphany revealing Jesus beyond our tame expectations? Why do we often avoid what we consider "costly" steps of faith that are actually the path following Jesus?