As you gather with whomever you find yourself with this Thanksgiving, how can you offer belonging as an act of hospitality?
What is your favorite part of a worship service?
Is it the Call to Worship? Is it Prayers of the People? The Sermon? Or maybe the Children’s Message?
For me, it is the Benediction.
Recently I participated in my first Baptism. Having a freshly printed Seminary Degree, and the designation of “Reverend” in the bulletin gave me, I thought, all the tools I would need to assist in this baptism.
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There is a space between us that isn’t there,
A space that springs from things we share.
We are the same, you and I,
In ways unseen with our eye.
We are the same, you and I,
In the ways that we care.
It was a beautiful morning in the early autumn. Several folks had gathered at the community garden to enjoy the fruits of the sweet potato crop. Up walks Joseph, listing a bit and slurring his speech. I had never met him before. He began talking to anyone who would listen, telling us which nearby bridge was his temporary shelter.
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The Bethesda UMC congregation in East Asheville, North Carolina, recently returned to their sanctuary after being located next door in the retreat house/parsonage for over two years. The newly remodeled space, now available for a variety of uses throughout the week through Haw Creek Commons, went through several unexpected delays, otherwise the small congregation would have sought temporary arrangements elsewhere.
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Growing up in America in a middle-class white household I always felt safe. I was so naïve and truly didn’t understand there were others that didn’t experience the same things I did daily: go to school and get educated; come home to a decent sized home where both of my parents were waiting; get help with my homework; eat dinner; go to sleep in my warm and clean bed—repeat the next day. Although my parents taught us about responsibility, hard-work, and respecting others, I was never truly put in a situation where I felt unsafe or needed to be brave.
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Once there was a group of people. These people lived long ago, and, therefore, far away, but they were not so different from you and me. They loved, hoped, ate, and bickered. They had been following a great leader, but he had left them. They had been instructed to wait, and, like so many who wait, they did so fretfully.
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