Church of the Ascension
By Church of the Ascension
Church of the AscensionMay 22, 2022
Cornelius of Caesarea
Peter’s love for Cornelius can only be mimicked by us when we love the other—one who is different from us in race, socio-economic condition, position, influence, whatever the criteria might be. When we can see the other, not through our differences but in how we are the same, we can discover how to love them.
Planting Season
To bear fruit is to act in love, which is always a communal act and to live as a branch is to live in a community shaped by love. In order for us to take our place in this relationship we must find our own seedpods and withering flowers that must be removed so that our energy might flow into those efforts and more importantly into the people that we are being called to serve and that we are being called to love. Let us find comfort in this season of pruning and deadheading as a time when beauty and love are revealed in the channeling of our energy toward one another.
Good Shepherd Sunday
When we stop objectifying God and focus on God as the subject of our lives, we discover that our relationship with God and one another deepens—not just with family and friends, but with stranger, with those who are the other, who understand the world in vastly different ways than we do. We stop seeing God as a good shepherd and start experiencing life in the flock in which our shepherd is willing to lay down his life for us.
What Really is Our Fear?
We can take comfort in knowing that Jesus is with us and that when two or three are gathered in His name, He will be in the midst of them. We help each other to seek and to see Jesus by helping each other to be Jesus in the world. Fear never has the last word because fear is born out of isolation and when we invite our Lord into the middle of our messy lives, we are simply acknowledging what has always been and what we should always know and that is that God is always with us.
Youth Sunday
"Life is short and we do not have much time to gladden the hearts of the faithful, so be swift to love and make haste to be kind and go in peace to love and serve the lord."
Easter Sunday
How will your write your story?
Good Friday
On Good Friday God, clears out our hearts and minds and begins the task of renewing and reestablishing his relationship with man. God knows that we too like those old houses need a little bit of love. God has humbled himself and taken on flesh in Jesus and will now establish that new relationship with man. A relationship grounded in love and grace that no one can break and that is forever life-giving.
Maundy Thursday
We tell the story of salvation and freedom and promise, and just as the story of the Passover begins with bitter herbs, our story of the Passion begins in that same bitter place. The ugliness of captivity is not simply the story of the oppressor and the oppressed, it is the story that lays claim upon our own hearts when we are imprisoned by fear and anger and suffering. It is the story of what Judas would do.
Palm Sunday
We are all the beloved creations of God made in his image. In our Baptismal Covenant we commit to serving Christ in all others. That is an unqualified statement making no distinction between anyone. We are stronger together and meant to be one body loving God and each other.
Pantocrator
The eyes of blessing and judgment gaze upon us, into us, and we are known by God at our most basic sense as an expression of God’s own love. This is the Pantocrator—the all-powerful—the one who will hesitate a moment in his ego and respond from his soul as the two become one unity, ordered in the divine/human offering he makes for us.
Intermission
We have been reflecting on what sources of technology we use, why we use them and then trying to moderate our engagement with our screens or other tools of technology. Now at this midpoint in our journey we will begin to look at ways to improve our relationships with those tools.
Thomas Cranmer
We have no power in ourselves to help ourselves—but we can choose to focus on God and call upon him for our protection and defense such that our souls may not be hurt or assaulted.
Taking Time to Reflect
This Lent we are being called to remember that we are created in God’s image and made for relationship with him. Our collect this morning is reminding us that God is gracious to all who have gone astray. Understanding ourselves is all about understanding our place in Holy Fellowship with Him and with each other.
I Want My MTV
Change your background chorus from “I want my MTV” (or whatever worldly thing that calls your name) to “I want my mighty God.” Make that your covenant this Lent and through all the days of your wandering life.
Ash Wednesday
God always loves us—no matter what—and hatest nothing he has made. Linger not in depravation this Lent, lamenting that which you have given up or not given up, but turn your hearts to God.
Timing is Everything
Timing is everything. And on that mountain in that moment of transfiguration, God is revealed. I want to yell, “Peter, stop! Don’t miss it.” And then I realize, that is because we are all so like Peter—distracted by the world and our desires to control that which we do not understand rather than bearing witness to the revelation of God all around us. The Transfiguration is about Jesus, but I cannot help but to think of Moses, Elijah, Rosa Parks, Absalom jones, and all the giants who have borne witness to the God who is revealed here in this world.
Scout Sunday
I have many wonderful memories and maybe more importantly, I am the person I am today thanks in large part to my involvement in Scouting. Thank you all for what you do and most importantly for who you are and for sharing your light with one another and all those whom you serve.
Ghost Stories
We take comfort in knowing that our God is continually seeking us out, until we say here I am Lord.
Casting Your Net
Jesus didn’t tell the four fishermen to stop being fishermen. He invited them to fish for something different—to fish for people, to grow in relationship. Jesus continues to invite us to come and follow him even today. He doesn’t tell us we have to be something different, only that we reconsider and reorient our purposes so that they align with his—that they focus on relationships; our partnering with God and one another.
Season of Light
Epiphany is a season of light, a time to reflect on how our hearts and lives can be a light to others. One thing about this light is that it's not meant for us to keep it to ourselves. We aren’t meant to hide the light away and keep it a secret. It is meant for all so that all might see the gifts of creation.
The Why of Baptism
It seems to me that Jesus’ baptism is maybe more about the revelation of his true identity and his commissioning into God’s shared earthly ministry here on earth rather than on a need for repentance. As beings created in God’s image, Jesus is modeling for us what our new calling here on earth will be. That the repentance in our baptisms is maybe less about our personal need for forgiveness and maybe more about an acceptance of our calling into this shared work of love.
Mount Saint Helens
For as the earth brings forth its shoots,
And as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up.
So the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise
To spring up before all the nations.
The End is Near
To trust God is to recognize that Advent is about trusting in God’s promise of renewal and hope. It is not the time of the ending of all things, but a time of new hope, new possibility, new beginnings.
Remember the Past, Embrace the Future
Isaiah reminds us that we are called to remember the past while embracing the future. This is embodied in Jesus. In this season of new beginnings let us reflect on our past while embracing all the hope and joy that the future has to offer as we walk hand in hand with Jesus and with each other.
Act 4
If we think we are living in act five—the end times—and allowing fear to drive our beliefs and choices, then we are missing out on the joy, opportunity, and creative nature that is the church. Most of all, we are missing out on nurturing our relationship with the one who shapes us as the work of his hands: the Father in which we are the clay and he is the potter.
Wellness Check
When we feed, give drink, visit, welcome, and cloth the stranger we do this to Jesus because we are all created in our beloved maker’s image and so are created with his light and life in us. While we all are a little bit goat and we all are a little bit sheep, I think Jesus is calling us this morning to be his sheep in the world as we seek to spread his love in a world full of goats.
Hope and Possibility
That is the invitation we are always being offered by God. The invitation to live in this world from a position of hope instead of fear, from possibility instead of doubt.
Being Prepared
The kingdom of heaven summons us to new life, active waiting in hope, and renewed vigor in faith. The best part of all of this is that Jesus is preparing a huge feast for us. A feast that we are all invited to. The real truth is that the door is always open for us at all times, day or night, but we must be prepared to enter that door when the time comes.
All Saints' Sunday
Jesus reminds us through the beatitudes that this life is not an easy one but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a joyful one. Blessed are we when we do not allow the distractions of the world to keep us from dying to false self and embracing our true self in joy and wonder; when we embrace the spirit of all the saints as a little child might receive them and claim our true inheritance in the kingdom of God.
Sergeant York
Jesus shows us that what is most important is that we give our hearts to God and the rest will follow. In giving our hearts to God, our motivations will be good. We won’t always get it right but in loving God our intentions will be good.
Confirmation Sunday
Confirmation Sunday with Rt. Rev. Dr. Glenda Curry.
Fall Harvest
God gives us fertile soil in which to grow in the rich relationships that we are given as caretakers. Our family and friends, our church, our work relationships, and social groups are all fertile grounds of connection that we are called to nurture. How are we doing with our harvest?
Blessing of the Animals
With everything going on today in our lives, I ask you to take a moment and be wholly present here today and bless all of these precious creatures God gave us. Remove those outside distractions because they will still be there when we are done. And remember, there is a God who is fully present in all our days and all our moments. Good and Bad, God is fully present with us.
Eat the Worms
We can choose to pout and sing songs like, “Nobody loves me, everybody hates me…” and eat the worms of dissatisfaction and disengagement or we can choose to give as God gives to each of us. We can choose to be offensive in our grace—giving in such a way that is unexpected, even to ourselves. The parable Jesus tells this morning is one of equality in the eyes of God. It is also one of choice—we can choose to be the laborers who rise early and get to work—giving fully of ourselves and expecting fully of God.
Forgiveness is the Attitude of the Strong
While there must be an effort on our part to seek reconciliation with ourselves and with those whom we have wronged, we are called to recognize our own humanity so that we may seek and serve that same humanity in others.
Rolling in Dead Fish
The goal of the church, of those who belong to the salvific community of Christ, is to embody the holiness of God in life and witness. We do that by being the place of return; an open and inviting place that praises one another for our willingness to return to God—even and especially when that choice is hard. We don’t go to church to avoid the devil; we go to church to grow in our love of God and one another.
Bearing the Cross
Cross-bearing does not have to mean what it meant for Jesus: the price is already paid for in his blood. For most of us today, cross-bearing means serving others with compassion. Because all of us are cross-bearers, and all of us are gods’ allies. And, when we take up our cross and faithfully follow Jesus without worldly distractions, we find ourselves resurrected to a new life in many different ways.
Son of Man
God doesn’t perceive us as sinners in need of redemption. He knows us to be his children. Our perception as sinners is a name we give ourselves. And in so doing, we have lost the awareness of who we truly are.
Fountains of Youth
When Jesus doesn’t respond to us in the way we want, what does our pursuit of him look like? Are we willing to accept the miracles he gives and continue to pursue him even when the miracles he gives are not the miracles we expected?
Walking on Water
We laugh because God laughs too.
The Transfiguration
We must open our eyes and see the world as it is, as a beloved child of God. We must let God's love transfigure our hearts and then take that love down from the mountain and bring it into the world to share.
Pass or Fail
As recipients of God’s love, we are called to in turn share that love with all those whom we encounter. This is the work of building the kingdom.
Heroes & Heroines
Our stories are how we understand who we are, and what we strive for in the world.
Sowing Seeds
Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seed you plant
Be Christopher Robin
It it better to hurt with the truth than comfort with a lie.
Life is a Pilgrimage
The Christian life is a pilgrimage from earth to heaven, and our task is to take as many as possible with us as we make this journey.
The Trail of Tears... And Hope
Hope makes room for love. It liberates us, freeing us from our fears. It unites us, breaking down the barriers that isolate us from one another. Hope is about casting vision. The more we share in hope, the brighter the light will shine. Hope knows the shadow of darkness, but it does not linger there.
Beautiful Sunsets Need Cloudy Skies
Notice those little signs from God that help strengthen your faith and continue your call to Follow.
In the Beginning
As people of the Trinity, we know that the only way to live in unity is by celebrating our diversity and turning our hearts to the possibility and promise that God’s very creation offers us.
The Day of Pentecost
Come Holy Spirit upon all of us this Day! Like a mighty rushing wind that blows through those doors and ignites that flame within all of our hearts today and forevermore.