Do We Have “B.F.F.s” or “K.O.F’s”?

Do We Have “B.F.F.s” or “K.O.F’s”?

This weekend, we are going to be continuing our “One Month to Live” sermon series and will be speaking to our relationships.  Most of us, if we really had 30 days to live, would want to spend more time with family and close friends.  When push comes to shove, people are what really matter.

            But in our time, this is also a challenge.  According to a recent article in the New York Times, our circle of close friends is getting smaller. Over the past twenty years, the number of people we can discuss "matters important to us" dropped nearly a third. The number of people who said they had no one to talk to about important matters more than doubled, to nearly 25 percent.

The Times article added that this scarcity of close friends has especially impacted mid-lifers:

 “In your 30s and 40s, plenty of new people enter your life, through work, children's play dates and, of course, Facebook. But actual close friends—the kind you make in college, the kind you call in a crisis—those are in shorter supply. As people approach midlife, the days of youthful exploration, when life felt like one big blind date, are fading. Schedules compress, priorities change and people often become pickier in what they want in their friends. No matter how many friends you make, a sense of fatalism can creep in: the period for making B.F.F.'s [best friends forever], the way you did in your teens or early 20s, is pretty much over. It's time to resign yourself to situational friends: K.O.F.'s (kind of friends)—for now.” (Alex Williams, "Friends of a Certain Age," The New York Times, 7-13-12)

            The article says this is just the way it is.  As we get older, we simply are going to have fewer close friends and relationships.  But in contrast, this weekend, we are going to look at the beautiful story of Ruth.  She tells us that it doesn’t have to be this way.  She found strength, hope and power in God and in the people around her.  As all of us strive to “love completely” Ruth can show all of us, including mid-lifers the way.  Come and join us.  You can even bring your “K.O.F”!

See you in worship,

Pastor Pete

One Month to Live

Part II:  Live Passionately!



               Years ago, I served as a chaplain intern at VCU hospital.  Every day, I saw something new.  One of the premier things that I have never forgotten was a conversation with a Catholic priest I met while I was there.  He worked specifically with all the HIV/AIDS patients.  This was 1989, and the world of AIDS was different.  In those days, a diagnosis was a death sentence.  This particular priest worked with all those troubled, typically young males, who were facing their impending death.

               One day he told me about one of his patients.  In a surprising way, this particular man spoke of the blessing of his disease.  The priest asked him more about this, what he meant, and this man said this: “Everyone in the world has a bullet headed straight for their forehead.  I am blessed because I can see it coming, and I can get ready for it.”

               That dying man’s perspective speaks to our current Lenten sermon series. Hopefully by now, you know about our theme for these forty days.  Basically, we are asking ourselves the question, “If I had one month to live, what would I change about my life?”

               It is an appropriate question for Lent.  The ashes of Ash Wednesday are there to remind us that we are mortal.  All of us will go the way of the earth one day.  But the purpose of these forty days of self-examination is not solely upon the dark and gloomy.  They are here to point us to Jesus, and his journey to the cross.  In his death, he found and offered new life.  Death to self became a vehicle for life for us. 

               And so we follow him with the same perspective.  By facing our mortality, we actually find new life for us individually and even for the people around us.  Each week, we are looking at different ways that we might face our limits, and live differently right now.

               This weekend, we are recognizing that many of us would like to live more passionately.  All too often, especially as we grow older, we drift to the safe and moderate middle.  That may be a good thing in some places, like politics and other categories, but it is a dangerous place spiritually.  Spiritual passion may scare us, and to be sure, that have been places where it has gone astray.  But this weekend, we are going to take a look at Peter, the man who was moved by the appearance of Jesus on those waves, and found his passion carrying him out of the boat and on to the water.  Could we find this same Jesus and those same sure steps today?

               Come to worship on Saturday and Sunday, and we will speak of this some more.  See you there!!

Pastor Pete

The Church is Beautiful

The Church is Beautiful



This weekend, we will be concluding our five week "Lessons From the Road" sermon series around the country.  This has been a great series and I have really enjoyed your comments and feedback.  Thanks so much!  We will finish up  with two stops in Detroit and New York City. 

I was struck with my time in these two cities, but especially during my few days in Detroit.  As most are aware, the city of Detroit has not fared well during these last years.  The region has suffered dramatically from our recent recession.  It is one thing to read about it in the headlines, but it is another entirely to spend a few days there.  While there are still remnants of the glory days of old, for the most part, driving the streets of Detroit and its suburbs is stark.  Businesses are closed or closing, signs are falling down, streets are in disrepair, and there exists a general sense that this community is on the downhill side of the graph.

In contrast, I had the privilege of meeting an incredible church just outside of the city limits: Redford Aldersgate United Methodist.  They invited me to their Wednesday night dinner and Bible study, and I had the opportunity to meet their pastor, Jeff Nelson.  The contrast of the church and the surroundings was simply phenomenal.  There was life everywhere.  The night was filled with laughter, stories, and radical hospitality and generosity with me as a visitor.  More importantly, while the majority of the city is moving out of downtown, this church is moving in, with new ministries and even planting a new church in ground zero of the urban evacuation.

All of this offers a reminder of which we will speak this week.  In the midst of the world’s problems and struggles, the church is beautiful.  Certainly, the church has its scars and sins, but it doesn’t change the fact that when you read the Bible, our risen Lord looks at us and our future, and sees the church with eyes of beauty. 

When we, like that little church in Detroit, live up to that beauty, we shine in the midst of all that human pain and suffering.  I invite you to come and join us in worship on Sunday.  We will speak more of this beauty with this story and another like it in New York City.  In all the ugliness that we see in this world each day, we can all use a reminder that despite us, the church is still beautiful.   See you in worship,

Pastor Pete

This past Sunday in worship, I spoke about my visit to Shreveport, Louisiana and how inspired I was when I met Donnie Brook, an incredible woman with a heroic story. 

We were also reminded that according to a Gallup survey, Shreveport is the most "Christian" city in the United States.  Specifically, 98% of those surveyed indicated that they were Christian.  This topped every other locality in the country.

This Sunday, we are going to change gears pretty rapidly.  I am going to share my experiences on the West Coast, in San Francisco and Seattle.  In contrast to Shreveport, they are the most un-churched cities in the country.  I am looking forward to sharing some stories of two churches who have found way to do ministry in the midst of challenges that we, at the edge of the Bible belt, may struggle to comprehend.

To understand their world, I am looking forward to discussing a passage in the book of Ezekiel.  In the eleventh chapter, God promises that he "will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh"  How does God do this?  We don't necessarily have to travel to the West Coast to deal with this.  Every one of us have met folks with that heart of stone.  Sometimes we meet that heart when we look in the mirror!  As we will see, right here is God's greatest miracle; changing out our hard hearts and softening them into something that carries the hope and compassion of Jesus himself.

As we will see, there is a lot of "hardness" to the world of ministry on the West Coast.  But we will also remember that our neighbors in the West don't have a monopoly on those hard hearts.  Jesus has plenty of work to do on us.  Come join us on Sunday morning and we will talk about this some more.

See you in worship!
Pastor Pete

Traveling to Shreveport, Louisiana (and a bit of Washington State)

This Sunday in worship, we will be traveling to Shreveport Louisiana.  I am excited to tell you about a woman I met there by the name of Donnie Brook.  Donnie has led an amazing, indeed heroic life but you would never know it at first glance. 

Donnie is a reminder that many people around us have phenomenal stories. There is always more to those around us. 

Though I am getting ahead of myself, I was reminded of this when I was in Bellingham Washington in my travels.  While there, I stopped in to see my wife Lynn's sister and her husband Rand.  As I was visiting with him in his living room, I told him about my travels, and about listening to people's stories all around the country.  He then handed me a big thick green binder, and told me that this was his story.  In fact, it was his recently completed manuscript of a book he was writing.  Rand is a Professor of History at Western Washington University in Washtington state and had just completed this draft of his account of what it was like to grow up in the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham, Alabama, in the thick of the battles.  His father was an American Baptist Pastor and served as one of the leaders in conjunction with Dr. Martin Luther King and others.  As a result, Rand had a very hard childhood. He was ostracized in schools and churches again and again because of what his father did.  For the rest of the journey, I read his 500 page manuscript, understanding for the first time what it was like to grow up in the extreme racism of Birmingham Alabama in 1962.  At the end of every chapter, I would simply close the book and say to myself, "I have known Rand for 30 years and I never had any idea..."

Everybody has a story and they are typically more powerful than we think.  They are also not as well known to others around us. 

Jesus said that we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.  As such, he reminds us that our faith is not just for our own private enjoyment.  Ultimately, it is there to send us out as salt and light.  This weekend, we are going to talk about how critical it is to learn to share our stories and our faith in a more public environment.  To be sure, many have done that poorly before us, but that doesn't change who we are.  It is important that we learn to share our stories in a way that encourages others.  Let's talk more about this as we go to Shreveport Louisiana on Sunday!  See you in worship,

In Christ,
Pastor Pete
I found myself thanking God for Rand and for his willingness to tell his story.  I found spiritual power and encouragement.

Lessons From the Road: Jacksonville Beach

This Sunday in worship, we are going to be traveling to Jacksonville Beach Florida.  We are continuing with our sermon series entitled "Lessons from the Road" and I am looking forward to introducing two women to you.  When I was at Beach United Methodist Church in August, I was invited to a special baptism service.  After the regular Sunday morning worship, the church left the sanctuary, walked two blocks, and prepared for a baptism service at the beach for 72 people!

As we were making their way to the water, a huge thunderstorm broke loose.  The beach patrol closed the beach and we all went running back to the sanctuary in pouring rain.  The church had to postpone the baptism for two weeks, but that gave me the opportunity to listen to some incredible stories.  As it poured outside, for three and a half hours, I met with Liz and Kelly in the church youth room.  They told me of painful childhood stories, but how in their later years, their faith pulled them through.  In those early years, seeds of faith were sown that came to life years later.  Today, the two of them are leading an incredible and transformational ministry with children in poverty.

Time spent with them was a reminder that we need to pay attention to the children.  Seeds sown now form little lives and even sprout to make fruit in the decades to come. 

Sometimes we get so busy, we simply drift through our time with the children.  This weekend, as we look to the Scriptures and as we listen to miraculous stories from Florida, I pray that all of us can remember that time spent on the children, is spiritual time well spent.  See you in worship!

Pastor Pete

This week in worship, I will be beginning a new sermon series entitled "Lessons From the Road".  For the next five weeks, we will be traveling around the country together, listening to stories from folks all around this nation.  Together, we will journey to Conyers, Georgia, Jacksonville, Florida, Shreveport, Louisiana, the West Coast, Detroit, and New York City.  Each location will offer what I am calling a "lesson from the road".  The lesson will be based on a Scripture and will be something that I pray all of us can take home.

This weekend, we will be traveling to Conyers, a town outside Atlanta Georgia.  This was a remarkable visit, and I met incredible folks.  One by one, they told me their story and I was impressed by the way a consistent theme ran through all of them.  Simply said, each one of these persons were loved by the folks in this church.  Some were deailng with alcohol, others struggling marriages.  But many instances, simple acts of love changed their lives.  Those seemingly simple acts of love literally brought them into the kingdom of God. 

To be sure, love is the central building block in this kingdom and we will be talking more about this.  But at the same time, sometimes we make this love very complicated.  Together on Sunday, we will be speaking to how sometimes, the simplest things, offered to another, can make all the difference. 

I hope you will come and join us as we begin this journey.  Please join me in praying that all these "Lessons From the Road" will be encouraging and inspirational for all of us as they have been for me! 

See you in worship!
Pastor Pete