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Block Print by Mike Newman
Projects
Lessons in how to read music from the weekly bulletin.
Current Lesson, Part 11, April 24, 2016 – Refrains and Descants
Link to the reports from Jan 17 Annual Meeting
Daily meditations in words and music.
Your daily prayer online, since 1999
"We invite you to make a ‘Sacred Space’ in your day, praying here and now, as you visit our website, with the help of scripture chosen every day and on-screen guidance."
Saints of the Week, May 29 – June 5
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29
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30
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[Jeanne d’Arc (Joan of Arc), Mystic and Soldier, 1431] |
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31
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The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary |
The First Book of Common Prayer, 1549, is appropriately observed on a weekday following the Day of Pentecost.
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1
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Justin, Martyr at Rome, c. 167 | |
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2
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Blandina and Her Companions, 177 | |
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3
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The Martyrs of Uganda, 1886 | |
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4
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[John XXIII (Angelo Guiseppe Roncalli), Bishop of Rome, 1963] | |
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5
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Boniface, Archbishop of Mainz, Missionary to Germany, and Martyr, 754 | |
May 29, 2016 (full size gallery)
Sunday, May 29 Description with photos
June 1 – 10:00am, Ecumenical Bible Study, Parish House
June 1 – 5:00pm, Village Dinner, Parish House
June 2 – 6:45pm, Peumansend Jail Ministry
June 5 – 10:00am, Godly Play, preschool through 2nd grade
June 5 – 10:00am, "Weaving God’s Promises", 3rd grade and up, including adults
June 5 – 11:00am, Holy Eucharist, Rite II
Sunday, June 5 Readings and Servers
Coming up!
Toilet paper, paper towels and cleaning supplies needed for this month’s food distribution. The collection of these items will last for the first two Sundays in June.
Fill up those Blue Boxes by June 12!
The UTO offering, collected twice yearly by the
ECW is in thanksgiving for our many blessings and goes to help those in need throughout
the world.
Anything but Ordinary! Ordinary Time
Basically, Ordinary Time encompasses that part of the Christian year that does not fall within the seasons of Advent, Christmas, Lent, or Easter. The portion we are in now is called the "Season After Pentecost" in the Episcopal Church.
Ordinary Time is anything but ordinary. According to The General Norms for the Liturgical Year and the Calendar, the days of Ordinary Time, especially the Sundays, "are devoted to the mystery of Christ in all its aspects." We continue our trek through the both the Gospels of Luke and John- through parables challenges, healings – some great stories and teachings.
Lent is about preparing people to live as disciples of Jesus. Easter Season is about giving especially the newly baptized or confirmed time to focus deeply on the doctrinal foundations of the faith and on discerning the Spirit’s calling and gifts for ministry, culminating in a celebration and commissioning for these ministries at Pentecost. The Season after Pentecost is about seeking the Spirit’s guidance and supporting one another as we undertake these ministries in Christ’s name.
While there are parts of Ordinary Time through the year, we think of Trinity Sunday until Christ the King Sunday or up to Advent as the Sundays of Ordinary Time.
Lectionary, June 5, 2016
I. Theme – God’s Power over Life and Death
Widow of Nain– Corinne Peters
The lectionary readings are here or individually:
First Reading – 1 Kings 17:17-24
Psalm – Psalm 30
Epistle –Galatians 1:11-24
Gospel – Luke 7:11-17
This week’s scriptures describe God’s power over life and death. The passage from 1 Kings 17 tells the story of how God uses Elijah to raise the dead son of the widow at Zarephath. In Galatians 1 Paul asserts that the gospel he preaches comes to him from Jesus Christ, the resurrected lord, the victor over death. Jesus restores the life of the son of a widow at Nain, thus demonstrating that he shares the power that God earlier demonstrated through Elijah.
The social and cultural boundaries we live in are of human origin. We are the ones who decide who is in and who is out. We are the ones who decide who is included and who is excluded. But when we recognize the power of God’s love, our own boundaries and borders fade away. God’s love was extended to the widow of Zarephath, beyond the social, cultural and political boundaries of Israel. God’s love is extended beyond the boundaries of the rich, the well-to-do, the healthy, and to the poor, the oppressed, the imprisoned, the hungry, the widows and orphans. God’s love is extended beyond the border of when we think all hope is lost—beyond life and death
The truth being demonstrated here is that the lord is the sole and effective renewer of human life. In both Kings and the Gospel, a son is given back to his mother in simple compassion. Human compassion is but a shadow of God’s sympathy for those in trouble and grief.
Paul had been raised from the dead in another way; his faith and understanding of God’s will were redirected. Many of us have been suddenly enlightened by the Holy Spirit and set dramatically upon a different course. The conversion phenomenon is, in fact, quite visible on the current scene.
Gaining credibility for anything is difficult in our skeptical world. People often meet the same skepticism that Paul encountered at first within the community of believers. According to Paul’s account, it took nearly 17 years for him to gain credibility in the Jewish Christian community.
We too have a tendency to impose a proof period upon new believers who have had a dramatic conversion. We need to be merciful and supportive while they are doing the kind of personal sorting out Paul did in the Arabian desert for three years.
We have learned that the lord disturbs our security to make us cry to God for help. Initially, we are disintegrated when a former life support system is swept away. But the lord and giver of life quickly breathes new life into us. God touches our bier and raises us up to thank the lord for the merciful favor of letting us die to ourselves that we may live in Christ.
Ordinary Time on June 9 with the Widow of Nain
Our faith is meant to be lived through the year – not just for the extraordinary moments and sesaons. We are called by Jesus to live in community, our lives together guided not only by the example of Jesus, but by the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
The reading of Ordinary Time beginning June 2 emphasize discipleship. What does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus in matters such as decisions, money, use of time, priorities, etc? How do we encounter the Kingdom of God and perceive it in our daily lives? What are the conditions of discipleship? How will we ultimately be judged? The scripture June 5 illustrates this. Here is the scene:
In the town of Nain there were two crowds. One represents life from last week. On June 2, they had witnessed the joy of healing and restoration. They had seen the remarkable faith of the centurion and his love for his slave first hand as Jesus brought him back to normal life at Capernaum. This crowd was a celebratory one. It was the steady, persistent march of renewal. It was life.
At the gate of Nain (in Galilee south east of Nazareth), they collided with another group. As Lee Koontz writes "Coming out of the town we see a great crowd of mourners, following a widow woman who has just lost her son. They carry him through the gate on a funeral bier, and according to custom would have held him high into the air, crying loudly and vocalizing their grief in a chaotic mass of wailing and tears. It was the loud, unmistakable sound of human suffering and grief. It was death." Ironically, the name "Nain" means pleasant or green pastures.
As Koontz writes "Yet, in this text this God in Jesus Christ reminds us of God’s involvement in our joys and sorrows. Rather than remain far-off, unmoved by our suffering, God joins us in it. Jesus was “moved to the depths of his being”, and we can infer that God is no less moved by our suffering than Jesus was. Ours is a God who meets us in our suffering, speaks a word of comfort in the midst of the struggle, and finally shows us the once-and-for-all victory of life over death. He raises the widows son." This was the first miracle of raising of the dead.
The Apostle Paul said it this way: "We do not live to ourselves, and we do not die to ourselves. If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and lived again, so that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living."
We are confident Jesus will be meeting us in our lives. These few words uttered here, "Do not weep", encompass the whole purpose of Christ’s coming to the world. Luke 7:11-17 reminds us that Jesus came to wipe away our tears, to soften our pain, and to lighten the burden of life.
Widow of Nain another view
Derived from this source.
"The story of the Widow of Nain in Luke’s gospel is interesting. The focus could be the miracle. Jesus restored a dead young man to life as he was being carried to his grave. That is pretty amazing. Worth writing about—no question!
"But the focus isn’t on the miracle. It is on the compassion. Why did Jesus intrude on this funeral procession?
"It wasn’t for pity for the young life cut short. It was for what that young man’s life meant to those around him—particularly his mother.
"We don’t know how the young man died. What is it illness or accident? We know only that he was the only son of a widow. He was the family provider.
"Jesus saw a woman in distress and a society that couldn’t cope with supporting her. They had problems of their own. The social system as known to everyone was about to fail. All the widow’s friends, gathered on this day to help her mourn, would soon desert her. Bad things were going to happen if someone didn’t take preemptive action.
"Jesus, a stranger, intruded. Thank God!
Two artistic views:
1 Mario Minniti tackled the topic in the 1600s. The elements of the story are here. The crowd is bewildered. Jesus and the young man are central.
2 Corinne Peters- a modern view. Here, too, the focus is the reaction of the crowd just as the miracle is occurring. There is still no time to put their experience in perspective. They are frozen in the moment. They are joyful. They are relieved. At the same time they are frightened at the power of Jesus.