Ovilla United Methodist Church

Reverend Rachel Heyduck kicks off our summer series, "Checked or Carry-On? What are you doing with your baggage?" by taking us into the discomfort or life and growth.

Sermon for Senior Sunday. Scripture Philippians 4.4-9

This week's lesson is about Jesus calling Peter to follow him. Before it gets to that, though, Jesus tests Peter patience a little. Maybe. We don't really know. But we do know they had met before and that Jesus apparently came across to Peter as trustworthy.

The most basic truth of relationships is that we ALL need connection. This week's scripture, Luke 2.22-40, reminds us that Jesus' family, and Jesus himself, share this same need with us.

The hardest part of forgiveness might be that Christians are responsible for letting the world know the good news of God's forgiveness of sins.

We present a straightforward, easy to follow process for forgiving someone.

Do we have to forgive to be forgiven?  That's pretty much what Jesus says in Matthew 6:14-15. This is the first message in our 3 part Forgiveness Series. 

Julia Castleman shares some of her story, offering hope for you and for many in the New Year. If you aren't a New Year's Resolution kind of person, this message might have you rethinking that.

The finale of our "The Story 'Til Now" series.

Even when we are not faithful, God is faithful. The people wanted a king; God wanted to be their king, but they wanted a human king.

God gave them what they wanted. When has God gone ahead and given you what you wanted?

God's people want to be just like everyone else. After all God has done for us, how can this be?

"To obey is better than sacrifice," we learn from the OT, and the era of Joshua and the Judges show us that message in SO many ways!

We remember the saints who have gone on before us and we wait. Grieving is part of life and part of grieving is waiting. Learning to wait makes us better people.

This week's episode of "The Story "til Now" focuses on Moses and God's people being DELIVERED. How, and from what, have you been delivered? From what do you still need to be delivered? God is still at work; delivering is what God does!

What Joseph's life (Genesis 37-50) reminds us is that God equips us for the lives we are to live.

Jacob, son of Isaac and Rebekah, slightly-younger brother of Esau, helps us all learn an important lesson about life lived with other humans, and therefore, with God.

Abraham is such a big part of the story, he gets an extra Sunday!  This message presents the value of blessing, how to bless, and why we are also called to bless - so that through us God may bless "all the families of the earth."

We have an extra treat for you this week!  John and Becky Leverington, with Wycliffe Bible Translators shared with us about their ministry. Most recently, they opened and ran a counseling center in Anatalya, Turkey, for missionaries from around the world.

Then we finish with part 3 of our The Story 'Til Now series, introducing Abraham.

Part 2 of our "The Story 'Til Now." We started with Creation, and this week add Frustration.

We are taking 10 Sundays to go through the entire story of the Old Testament. We start where our story starts, with creation. How do you know if a story is your story or not? Come and see!

Closing out our Closer Look series

Sometimes we can't make it on our own. (thanks, U2) To live as faithful followers of Jesus, we need help: support, community. We are part of a team, a group, a family, a body; the Body of Christ. We need each other.

Can you handle the Truth? Truth is, worship is important, even essential, in our being disciples of Jesus.

What about your baptism? One thing that happens in baptism is we are initiated into something bigger than ourselves. This was true even for Jesus.

1st in a 5 part series called "Closer Look," we're looking closely at some of the most basic elements of being a Christian. It all starts with confession: any challenge, issue, problem, brokeness we are willing to confess, God is willing to being healing.

We wrap up the "Do I Belong" series with this message based on Luke 13:1-9. Do the bad things I've done - or that have happened to me - affect God's love for me? Do I belong to God even if I've done horrible things? In a word, yes. But check out the whole message. Roughlock Falls Nature Area | Black Hills & Badlands - South Dakota (blackhillsbadlands.com)

Do I belong to God if I struggle to believe? We are thankful that our belonging to God depends on God rather than on us!  Director of Student Ministries and Worship Leader Julia Castleman brings it with this message shared Sunday morning, July 18, 2021.

Guest Preacher Rev. Marianne Brown-Trigg, Campus Minister for United Methodist college students in Denton, Texas, offers an insightful glimpse at the splendor of Jesus' people gathered together.

In the USA, there are a lot of mixed messages about the overlap or intersection of being a believer and being a patriot. Here's how we think Jesus can help us address this.

Is it ok to have friends who aren't Christian? Well, Jesus seems to have enjoyed spending time with "Tax Collectors and sinners."

The answer to the question "Do I Belong" depends more on God than on us, or on what anyone else says. What does the character of God tell us about whether or not we belong?

Jesus and the Pharisees. Need we say more? Yes; we should say more. Whenever we read about Jesus and the Pharisees, we ought to check ourselves to see how we are like the Pharisees, or at least how we are in danger of being like the Pharisees.

"God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him won’t perish but will have eternal life." Why do we have so much trouble trusting the truth of this statement of Jesus? Why do so many doubt and wonder and question whether or not they are loved by God?  We are going to spend 8 or so weeks trying to help.

Do you have trouble understanding the Trinity - how Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three and at the same time one?  That's ok; God doesn't require understanding. Just follow Jesus, believe Jesus, and believe in Jesus. The Trinity will come along.

Pentecost celebrates the Holy Spirit as the "downpayment on our inheritance." (Ephesians 1) How will you live out your inheritance, your glimpse of the presence of heaven here on earth?
 

In the form of an awards show, we look at the value and importance of hospitality in the Bible. Also like an awards show, it ran a little long....

Our fifth Easter Practice is worship

As Wesleyan Methodists, we are "going on to perfection." Whether or not we expect to "be made perfect in love in this lifetime," as everyone ordained in the United Methodist Church have affirmed, we all believe that, as Max Lucado said, "God loves us just the way we are, but God loves us too much to leave us this way." Reverends Rachel and Steve Heyduck examine this quote to invite you to join us in the kind of self examination that lives in the love that accepts us as we are and helps us gain the abundant life Jesus offers. 

The point of sabbath is to have a day without a point. It's also commanded. So: STOP!

Christians understand and practice fasting as essential to holding onto our awareness that we are limited creatures serving and loved by an unlimited Creator

We are practicing Easter because following Jesus takes practice. we will focus on a practice a week, and this week's practice is prayer.

Christ is risen - Christ is risen indeed!  Here's the good news of Easter we focused on at OUMC - that the resurrection of Jesus means fear, and death have been defeated. That's HAVE BEEN defeated! We can now, NOW, live without fear of death!

Jesus wasn't the king the people expected and wanted him to be, but he didn't correct them.

Yes: we are all following Jesus, but we are not all starting from the same place, so our paths will look different. 

Following Jesus is a Journey, and one that we want to live as Pilgrims rather than Tourists. 

Last week we talked about what Jesus requires disciples to carry on the Journey - nothing. This week we focus on what we ought to leave behind - the past.  Don't let your past rule your present and your future.

Following Jesus is a journey. Our destination is Jesus. In Mark 6, Jesus tells us what to take on our journey. Nothing. How do we do this?  Listen and find out!

Sometimes a Christian might mistakenly say that the destination of our journey is heaven. Heaven may be considered a final landing place, but our destination is Jesus, not heaven. When we focus on heaven, we will likely find times when we have missed Jesus. If we focus on Jesus, we will never miss heaven.

Our Lent series is called "The Journey," because our lives of following Jesus ARE journeys. We start the series with Ash Wednesday, taking the day as a reminder not only that we are human "From dust we have come, and to dust we shall return," but also that human is exactly what God created us to be.

The final Sunday before Lent is Transfiguration Sunday. This message invites you to consider what it might have felt like for Peter, James, and John to go up that mountain with Jesus.