Ancient.

Hello, friends near and far! Life here in Fallon, Nevada is good. Full of the joys and sorrows and successes and disappointments and busyness and quiet of ordinary life. I pray that your life is full, and rich, and good. It won't be all happiness and sunshine, of course. This moment might be especially difficult, even. But I hope that it is good, even so.

I may have mentioned at some point (probably at several points) that I was born with a very strange attachment to old things. The ordinary lives lived by ordinary people long before I was born, and the things they left behind that they used, touched, lived in, loved. Like letters. And the pressed flowers I found in the 100+ year old hymnal Dennis and I found in an antique shop. And the old kitchen things, with wear marks from long use. I remember going to the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose
when I was 11 or 12, and the tour guide pointed out to us which parts of the house were original and which had been replaced or "restored," and it gave me goosebumps to see the wear patterns in the floors and on the bannisters. It irritated me to no end that we weren't allowed to touch them. I remember feeling the same way the first time I saw grinding rocks outside Portola, California, and when my friend Becky and I stopped by the Fallon museum and got to take a tour of the cave at Grimes Point. I don't know what it is, but that connection to grandmothers and brothers and little girls and young men generations and centuries and millennia ago is something I have always found incredibly powerful.

A couple of weeks ago, I had the joy of spending a couple of days at the Kings Beach Methodist Retreat Center with the pastors of the northern Nevada Methodist churches, and our spouses. We had a little bit of stuff planned, but mostly we just planned to socialize and cook and enjoy each other's company. On Wednesday morning, Pastor Betty Weiser of Yerington and Smith Valley UMC led us in a brief workshop about prayer. We experienced several different kinds of prayer, but I was particularly drawn to the prayer beads. Now, if you have spent any time around me at all, you know that my hands shake constantly; anything that takes very careful, fine-motor-skills kinds of work can be next to impossible for me. I cannot *tell you* how irritating I find it sometimes. But somehow I managed to thread the Godblessed things with their tiny, tiny holes onto the tiny, tiny wire, and get the incredibly tiny metal crimp beads into the right place, and I only had to have Betty fix it once, and

I was only briefly tempted to throw it across the room and give up on the whole Godblessed project, when lo and behold it was done and we sat down to pray. And I was overwhelmed as I prayed with this sense of connectedness to people just like me, hundreds and thousands of years ago, clutching beads like these to guide their devotion. For we are surrounded, someone wrote 2000 years ago in a letter to the Hebrews, by a great cloud of witnesses...and those witnesses were brave, and flawed, and good ordinary people with loves and losses and short tempers and shaking hands and a desperate need for God.

I've carried those beads with me in my pocket every day since.

For the past few weeks, we at Epworth UMC have been praying with and talking about and learning from the prophets of the Hebrew Scriptures. We have spent time with Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. We have learned from them what God's priorities were, what God's frustrations were, and where hope was to be found even in times of desperate struggle. We have learned something about the character of God: mysterious and strange and awe-some, powerful and righteous and just, loving, forgiving, and merciful. We have been made uncomfortably aware of how similar we are, and how similar our mistakes and sinful tendencies are to those who lived and worshiped so long ago. And those are good reasons to read and study the prophets. But the biggest reason, the most important reason, is that Jesus is there.

Right there. In the Word of God spoken and heard and written down hundreds of years before he was born. Right there.

That's why they matter, those words written so long ago. It's easy to dismiss and discard old things, and replace them with something new. But what is new is rooted in all that went before. That's true in Biblical history, it's true in our families, and it's true in our Christian faith. It may not give you goosebumps the weird way it does me, but God is there in all of it, waiting to be encountered, powerfully present yesterday, today, and forever.

Tomorrow morning in worship, we will spend some time with the prophets Hosea and Amos. They are each pretty short books, so I hope you are able to find some time to read them this week. Take them a little bit at a time, in the quiet if you can. Pray before you open your Bible, and while you're reading, and after you've finished for the day. You will find that God will surprise you in it, grab your attention, and have something to say to you. Because though this Bible is the very, very old Word of an impossibly ancient God, it is a living thing, new every moment.

Tomorrow morning at 9am we begin with music and prayer. At around 9:30am you can find us on the radio at KVLV 99.3FM or 980AM, or live on my Facebook page (Dawn Blundell). See you in worship. :-)

Love and blessings,
Pastor Dawn

In the Potter's Hands

Happy Saturday evening, friends!

It has been a good week in the Blundell household, and a good week in ministry. After a powerful, prayer-filled, exhausting couple days of work with some other pastors around our Conference at the Jesuit Conference Center in Los Altos, I was glad to spend some time gardening, and baking, and being with Mr Dennis. The time away was profound, but it was good to be home. While I was away with these 10 other pastors and our Fearless Leaders, we heard about the ways God is working in communities all around California and Nevada, heard the ways God is inspiring new ministries and re-invigorating existing ones, and prayed with and for each other. It is cathartic, this work...a potent


exercise in putting ourselves fully in God's hands, and doing the deep soul-work that relationship with God requires. So a couple of days to rest and breathe and be was also very, very good. And then, I was blessed to do some visiting, to study Scripture for worship tomorrow, to do some planning for the fall, and to look for ways we can better be God's hands and feet to each other and to our neighbors. I was so thankful to attend the PEO fundraiser last night, spending time in a beautiful setting to raise money for scholarships for women and girls, to drive around town with Mr Dennis for no reason at all, to talk with church leaders about the upcoming Chrysalis flight (it's a retreat weekend of laughter and food and storytelling and prayer for teenagers and young adults), and to pray toward all God has in store for us together. It has been a good week, with touches of God everywhere.

In the taste of fresh tomatoes and peppers and peaches and melons, grown in gardens by farmers and home gardeners, whose hands are covered in earth and whose bones are full of the love of their work.

In time spent on the grounds of a place whose walls echo with 100 years of prayer and music and devotion.

In the blessings of home, and husband, and hairy, slobbery dogs. Familiar sights and sounds and touches.

In missing my mom, and being even more grateful for her now, and understanding her better, than before she died.

In the biggest, most brightly colored dragonflies I have ever seen, chasing each other overhead and driving the dogs nuts.

In the heat that makes us slow, and adds life and warmth and growth to everything. And in the air conditioning that some blessed soul invented.

In people praying together, striving together, encouraging and uplifting and serving each other.

So many blessings. I hope your week has been good, too. It's bound to have had its joys and its difficulties, more one than the other. I hope that you have seen the Holy Spirit's comforting, encouraging, challenging, standing-up-for-you Presence all over the place.

Tomorrow we come, at the end of the week and at the beginning, to our sabbath rest. We will hear from Jeremiah, the reluctant Weeping Prophet, whose heart breaks at the failure of people to trust in God...and whose heart is full of the love of God and those same people, preaching a profound and powerful word of grace.

You might like to open your bible tonight or tomorrow morning, and read a bit of Jeremiah. Or Lamentations. Maybe Jeremiah 18:1-7, for example. Or Lamentations 3:19-24. Or start from the beginning, and read until God grabs your attention. Sit with it awhile, and see what God may have to say to you through it. It will prepare your heart and mind for worship, and lead you to come in to your sabbath worship expectant. Because God always, always shows up.

See you in worship, fellow seekers.

In the steadfast love of God,
Pastor Dawn

It Only Takes a Spark

Hello friends!

It is a gorgeous early summer day in Fallon, Nevada, and a wild and crazy day at a wonderfully busy church. Our time today has been filled with guests for different reasons, and tastes and touches of different ministries. Sweet little curly-haired kids waiting for their adopted grandma (sorry, that's "Memaw", she says) to finish her (SO appreciated) volunteer work here in the office. Big, strong cowboys setting up for a celebration of life tomorrow afternoon. Volunteers taking inventory to see what we need grocery-wise for next week's community meals. Our long-lost wonderful church secretary, back after months away to get our office life back in order (PRAISE THE LORD). Folks coming in to tidy up inside and out. Folks just popping in to say hello. It has been loud, and a little bit chaotic, as you can probably imagine...and it reminds me what a joy it is to be in ministry here.

This Sunday in worship, we begin a new worship series using movies as modern-day parables. There are a whole lot of reasons why I personally love to do this.

• Jesus gave some of his most powerful lessons by telling stories. So did the prophets before him. It is a great way to broaden our understanding of God, and ourselves...a very effective way to inspire our spiritual imagination to see where God is alive and active in everyday life.
• CS Lewis wrote in his Chronicles of Narnia that he introduced children to Jesus via wonderful stories and magical lands so that they would learn to recognize Jesus when they met him in real life. In the same way, stories can open closed minds and hearts in powerful ways, allowing us to meet Jesus again for the first time.
• I absolutely love it when I am listening to music or watching a movie or reading a story and God speaks through it. Whether the original author intended it or not, I love when God makes God's way in unexpectedly. I love that kind of surprise.
• It's a great excuse to spend time with friends and family! And as a bonus, we get to support the Fallon Theatre, too.

Our movie this week is "Star Wars: The Last Jedi." Star Wars is a funny thing, I am discovering: people seem to love it, or have no interest in it at all. And for Star Wars purists, this particular installment is especially irritating. But wow, does it have an outstanding message! Several, actually. We watched it this week at the Fallon Theatre (which is looking great, by the way, and serving pizza and bagel dogs along with their usual excellent selection of movie snacks and popcorn), but if you missed it not to worry! It's available on Amazon to watch on your computer, and it's for sale at WalMart. Probably it is also available on Redbox. If you can watch the movie before worship on Sunday, that would be great! But if you're not able, or you hate movies, or you hate THIS movie, fear not: it won't detract at all from your experience of worship. Since we are really talking about the Bible, and God in Jesus Christ, you don't have to worry about being able to follow along. The movie is just a metaphor we are using. Trust me.

But if you DO get a chance to watch it, pray first, and keep your eyes and ears open for a few things. Look for themes of power, and self-sacrifice. Success and failure. Destructive and lifegiving kinds of anger. Redemption. Parenthood, and mentoring, and being a student. Obedience and rebellion. Heritage and legacy. The light and darkness in all of us. And the spark that sets the world on fire.

This week is Father's Day, too! So spend some time thinking of the men in your life -- fathers, grandfathers, adoptive fathers, mentors, coaches, teachers of all kinds -- who have helped make you who you are today. Give thanks to God for them, and let their imperfect example inspire you to be the best human being you can be.

Our scripture this week is 1 John 2:7-11. Spend some time in prayer with this passage, if you're able. It will help prepare your heart for worship, and will open spiritual doors for the Holy Spirit to enter in. If you're a writing sort of person, you might like to write down how it feels to read it, or what thoughts or questions come up for you as you turn the words over in your mind. And then, come to worship in anticipation of the presence of God!

See you Sunday, friends.

Love and blessings,
Pastor Dawn

Oh and PS. Don't forget our Emmaus gathering tomorrow (Saturday the 15th) at noon in the Fireside Room! Bring a pot luck dish to share if you can, but most of all just bring yourself. We will sing, and pray for the upcoming Walks in Reno, talk about Emmaus-y stuff, and have a great lunch together. Hope to see you there.

AND PPS. Next week's movie is "O Brother, Where Art Thou." It is really strange and wonderful, with an awesome old timey gospel soundtrack. It's PG-13 for comic criminality, and one suggestive scene. It is one of my all time favorite movies. Come see it with us on Wednesday at 6pm at the downtown Fallon Theatre! And feel free to bring friends and neighbors, the more the merrier. Any snacks you buy at the concession stand go to support the Save the Fallon Theatre project, too, so that's a bonus. :-)

Resurrection and the Upside Down Kingdom

Raise your voices, Easter people, Christ is Risen! 

It is a beautiful spring day here in Fallon, Nevada, and I am still feeling the glow of Easter worship. I hope you are, too. I hope that you have a wonderful, life-giving, Christ-centered church home where you feel welcomed, challenged, and deeply loved both by God and by the people who worship with you. If you haven't found a church like that yet, you are always welcome at Epworth UMC! If you are reading this from farther away than would be practical, then you are always welcome to reach out by email (pastor@eumcfallon.org), or by phone at 775-423-4714, and join us via Facebook live for the sermon every Sunday at 9:30am PDT. And in the meantime, I will pray that you do find a great church home...there is really no substitute for that. :-)

When I was a kid, I was fascinated with the Holy Grail, and all things King Arthur. I loved the romance and adventure of it, the whole "long, long ago" aspect of it, and especially the idea of this wondrous object stashed away somewhere that people could follow clues and actually *find*! There are all kinds of medieval paintings and stories about it, and it's always described (or painted) as golden, surrounded by light, sometimes with jewels and ornate handles, looking a lot like the golden chalices used to serve Holy Communion in enormous old cathedrals. There are relics all around the world that claim to be the Grail, some of them pretty old, but True Grail Enthusiasts know better. There were several times in my young life when I decided that when I retire, I would spend all of my time in dusty libraries and museums and churches around the world and search for the real Holy Grail. And honestly, I still think it would be an outstanding hobby. 

Still, even as a kid, as fascinated as I was with this whole thing, there were aspects of the legends that I thought were pretty weird. I mean, for one thing why would anyone save one of the random cups used at the last supper? Where did  Joseph of Arimathea get it, and why would he have it with him at the crucifixion, and why on God's green earth would he think to catch Jesus’ blood in it? Why would it be all ornate and jewel encrusted, and why would it gain magical powers to provide eternal youth and happiness, and restore blighted lands to prosperity (although the symbolism of that last does kinda fit with the return of Jesus)? And so when Indiana Jones came along and correctly pointed out that something like that would never have been the cup of a poor carpenter, I felt an instant respect for Indy. 

It is a tendency of human life to get things backward. To misunderstand and turn upside down everything that God has done and said so that it better fits our expectations. The Bible is full of the ways, starting from the very beginning, human beings have sought glory for ourselves and have been drawn to every shiny object thinking it will satisfy us, bring us happiness and prestige, defeat our enemies, shield us from every problem. Over and over and over God draws his people to real, true, full, wonderful life by obedience…teaches us that what we seek is found in prayer, worship, generosity, forgiveness, love and kindness to friend and stranger…and over and over and over God’s people reject that idea for the false sense of security provided by shiny objects. 

This season at Epworth, we have been following Jesus’ ministry in the Gospel of Luke, which has sometimes been called the Gospel of the least, the last, and the lost. In it, we have been noticing together the ways that Jesus interprets the Law and chooses people, and describes God, and says and does things in the ways that we least expect it. That he prioritizes the poor, the ordinary, the outcast and rejected…and he calls the religious ones, the supposedly righteous and faithful ones, the sinners who need healing. Even his closest disciples didn’t get it, and up to the very last day, at the Last Supper, moments before Jesus’ arrest, they were STILL arguing with each other about who was the greatest among them, who would be in charge, who would sit at Jesus’ right hand when he came into his kingdom. Undoubtedly they still imagined a kingdom of this world, where Jesus would conquer his enemies, restore Israel to being a great and prosperous nation, where Jesus would sit on a throne and wear a golden, jewel-encrusted crown with these his favorites by his side to rule with him. But, as we have been noticing together this season, the Kingdom Jesus was referring to, the Kingdom God is building in and through him, is not that kind of Kingdom at all. It is an upside down kingdom, where the king is born in a manger and attended by shepherds and lives the simple life of a carpenter and a traveling preacher…where the last are first and the first are last, where the greatest of all must be the servant of all…where the wounded find healing and hope and love, and the powerful are humbled and healed, too.

When Jesus was arrested, every one of the disciples fled in terror. Peter followed Jesus for awhile, hiding in the shadows, but then of course Peter betrays Jesus too. This was not how the story was supposed to go. Maybe they hoped Jesus would miraculously defeat his enemies, even now. But he didn’t. At least, not in the way they expected. Later in Luke’s gospel we hear about their despair and confusion and fear, and their eventual shock and wonder when Jesus appears to them, but here all we know is that at Jesus’ death these faithful disciples aren’t there. Just the women. The women are there.

Which makes no sense at all. Except in the upside down Kingdom, where it makes perfect sense.

Most of the women aren’t named, the ones who have prepared the spices and waited impatiently for the very first moment they could go and care for Jesus’ body while not breaking any law about working on the Sabbath. The different Gospel accounts each name slightly different women who went to the tomb in the early dawn, but all of them name Mary Magdalene. Mary of Magdala was a nobody, and partly it is her name that tells us that. If she were married, usually she would be called Mary wife of so and so. If she had children, she would be called Mary mother of so and so. But she’s not. Just Mary, from Magdala. When Luke introduces us to her in Chapter 8, he tells us that she has had 7 demons driven out of her. We don't know anything about that period of Mary's life, but we do know that things we might see as mental or physical illnesses were described in the Bible as demon possession, and so if nothing else we can guess that Mary exhibited some problematic behaviors before those demons were driven out. We can guess that Mary's neighbors remembered her as someone who was troubled. Strange. Maybe this explains why she does not seem to be married, and does not seem to have children of her own. She was a nobody. And yet, in this upside down Kingdom of God it is this nobody -- this single woman who people probably don’t think very highly of -- who is the first person to discover that Jesus has been resurrected.

In Luke’s gospel, Mary and the other women see angelic messengers who tell them that Jesus has been raised, and are instructed to go and tell the others. In each gospel the details are a little bit different, but in every story when the women go and tell the disciples, the disciples don’t believe them. Peter (and in John’s gospel, the unnamed beloved disciple with him) eventually goes to check things out, and all of the disciples meet the resurrected Jesus in the coming days and weeks. They become convinced by this incredible, impossible miracle that God has the power to overcome death, and that Jesus is the son of God come to earth, their long-awaited Messiah. But at first they didn’t believe. It was an idle tale, they thought. Because these were women, and they couldn’t be trusted really. And Mary of Magdala, the one who used to have 7 demons and who they remembered as being not quite right, she couldn’t be trusted either. They weren’t the ones to announce the resurrection. They couldn’t be.

But they were. Because in the upside down kingdom where the last are first and the first are last, where our human definitions of who is good enough, who is worthy, who is welcome are turned upside down and inside out and cast aside altogether, of course they were.

Every one of us is affected by this story, by the truth of Jesus’ death and resurrection. If we accept it and take it deeply in, every one of us is changed by it, because there is something miraculous, something healing, some life-changing truth in it for every one of us.

For the least, the last, the lost...for you who are hurting so deeply that you are afraid you won’t ever feel whole again...for you who have made mistakes that you aren’t sure you can ever come back from, this is the good news for you: you are not as lost as you think you are, you are worth more than you can imagine, and God loves you more than you think you deserve. Your story is not over. For every mistake you have made or think you have made, you are forgiven. God promises you healing, hope, and even joy, and will show you the way to find it.

Remember the thief on the cross next to Jesus, remember the people who mocked and beat and crucified him, who Jesus prayed for and forgave even in the midst of it.

Remember the prodigal son who rejected his family and lived a life of excess and selfishness, who returned home in despair hoping only to be allowed to work as a servant in his father's house, who God in the person of the son’s father ran to meet overjoyed and welcomed home with overflowing love.

Remember all of those outcasts that Jesus fed, and healed, and welcomed, and loved.

Remember the flawed, doubting, fearful disciples who were Jesus’ closest friends.

And know the miracle of the resurrection: in his death, Jesus allowed all of the forces of evil to do their worst, allowed human beings to do all of the very worst things they could do, and defeated them. Because though evil deals in death, God is LIFE and life is stronger, and love always, always, always wins. Your story is not over. In Jesus, you are free.

For you who already know all of this, who know your own value and are already first in this world in so many ways, this is the Good News for you: you are free. You are more loved, more precious than you can imagine. You are free from the world’s expectations on you, definition of you, demands on you, and your demands on yourself to be the master of your own universe. You are free to be last, to take your place in the upside down Kingdom where you will find the way, and the truth, and the life.

You are set free from slavery to all of those shiny objects. You are set free to use all that you have been given to seek out the least, the last, and the lost and set a table for them in the name of Jesus Christ.

You who have been healed, you are set free to be God’s instrument of healing to someone else.

You who have plenty, you are commissioned to be the builders, the makers, the cooks, the enthusiastic welcome-givers, the foot washers at the Lord’s table.

You are set free from the pride, the greed, the self-righteousness that blinds you and stops up your ears, so that you can hear the Word of God and rejoice in the power of the Holy Spirit even when it comes from the most unlikely people and places. 

In 1962, the famed theologian Karl Barth was on a speaking tour of the United States. He had written thousands upon thousands of words about the Bible, about the nature of God, about Jesus, about the meaning of the cross and the resurrection, and about how we human beings should live in response to all of that. On at least one of his stops, in Richmond Virginia, he was asked if he could summarize all that he knew and wanted to teach the world. He answered, "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so." And that is truly the Good News for all of us, the door through which we can enter the Upside Down Kingdom and the foundation and mortar and bricks with which we can help to build it: Jesus loves us. God loves us. And we are free.

Raise your voices, Easter people, Christ is risen! Alleluia!

Pastor Dawn

Click the link below for a really good contemporary version of the children's hymn:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysxtpdnQfxY

Of Protesters and Rebels

We had a protester a couple of weeks ago.

He arrived just before worship and returned around the time we ended. He stood on the sidewalk outside our front doors, with a big sign and a headset microphone and speaker, to "greet" our members and guests as they arrived and as they made their way home. Several of us stood outside to welcome people in and out, to be sure they saw a friendly face and hopefully prevent him from yelling directly at them. We tried to talk with him, but (surprise!) he wasn't interested in conversation. Thankfully, he wasn't saying anything too extremely offensive...just that we were "harboring Democrats and baby killers" and that we supported "the Gay Agenda" and needed to REPENT!!

I won't deny, it did cause a bit of a buzz, a little tension and "what on earth? is he serious?" kinds of bemused conversation. But when I mentioned it as worship began, in order to further ease any discomfort and encourage people to be kind to him, a beloved member of our congregation spoke up and said, "It's OK, he is just telling the world how welcoming we are!" And the wonderful spirit of kinship we share at Epworth was further stoked, warming all of us from the inside out.

Praise God, I just love this place. So much. If he comes back, I am absolutely going to gather the entire church to go outside and circle around him, singing something fun about the love and grace of Jesus at the TOP of our lungs.

As he hollered outside, a thousand things were going through my mind. Things like, who is he? What events in his life have led him to this moment? What is his goal, really? What has led him to believe that this is an effective way to share the Good News? He evidently does this sort of thing a lot, at our summer parades and outside the high school, and has been spoken to by the police more than once. There is a wonderful pentecostal pastor in town named Jean who spends her early Sunday mornings driving to every church in town and praying for all of us (how amazing is THAT, by the way?); apparently she encountered our protester and tried to dissuade him to no avail, and let me know that he had been at Trinity Episcopal the same day, going back and forth between our churches. And, as he stood out there refusing to be in actual conversation, one thought overrode everything else: he doesn't know us at all.

When my kids were young, and before my youngest brothers and sisters had kids of their own and life kinda scattered all of us a bit, we spent almost every Sunday evening at dinner with my parents. It was crowded and loud and silly and joyful. I miss it. Sometimes we would get into very intense conversations about religion or politics, but not for one second do I remember feeling (or anyone else feeling) angry, or having any hard feelings toward each other. There was always laughter, and genuine affection, because we prized our relationships with each other above all else. That experience has given me a sense that people who disagree with each other can have whole, healthy, life-giving relationships.

Maybe that is why I feel so blessed to serve a church like Epworth. We are Democrats, Republicans, Independents, and Libertarians. We are as far Left (whatever that means) as you can get, and we are -- in the words of another beloved church member -- to the Right of Ghengis Khan. We are gay and transgender and straight; we are married and single and remarried and widowed. We are business owners and farmers, administrators and teachers and students, peaceniks and veterans and active military, nurses and musicians and bookkeepers and stay-at-home parents. We are not of one mind, on any pressing issue in our church or in our culture. We are put together in families as widely varied as you could imagine, and are as different as a group of a couple hundred people could possibly be. And we drive each other crazy, and love each other beyond all reason, because we know that none of those differences matter one iota. The things that bring us together are too important.

We share a passionate commitment to the transforming, life-changing power of Jesus Christ.

We love Scripture and believe wholeheartedly in the ability of God to speak through it into every part of our lives, and deep into our hearts.

We have experienced the movement of the Holy Spirit, and seen miracles of healing in bodies, spirits, and relationships.

We have been broken and made whole...we have sinned and been forgiven...we have been lost, and are found.

We have each come here to Epworth with a story, one that is uniquely our own, that has landed us in this place, with these people, in this moment. So we come here to worship, pray, serve, and sing, and learn with each passing day what it means to love one another.

"Here in this place, new light is streaming, 
now is the darkness vanished away. 
See, in this space, our fears and our dreamings, 
brought here to you in the light of this day. 
Gather us in - the lost and forsaken,
gather us in - the blind and the lame. 
Call to us now, and we shall awaken, 
we shall arise at the sound of our name.

Not in the dark of buildings confining, 
not in some heaven, light years away, 
but here in this place, the new light is shining; 
now is the Kingdom, now is the day. 
Gather us in - and hold us forever, 
gather us in - and make us your own. 
Gather us in - all peoples together, 
fire of love in our flesh and our bone."

~ from "Gather Us In" by Marty Haugen

So I pray that God continues to stretch and challenge us. I pray that we continue to learn from each other and teach other, sing together and pray for each other, and work together to serve those in need. Because we never feel the power of God more strongly than when we engage in that kind of holy, outrageous rebellion.

Love and blessings,

Pastor Dawn