A beautiful day at St. Peter’s with bright sunshine and seasonable temperatures.
We had 45 people in church though we were delayed with one of the St. Peter’s cats desiring to attend the service.
We were happy to happy Lamar Key on oboe providing support during our hymns and offertory. In fact, he will be here for the next two Sundays.
It was coffee hour and Cookie and Cindy prepared a spread – venision, pasta, chicken salad sandwiches, cantouloupe and two types of cake.
The smell of venison cooking wafted in the air as we began Sunday School – Part 3 of the Hidden Power of the Gospels where Dr. Shaia provided an overview of all 4 gospels which can be found here. We next tried to apply it to today’s Gospel – the story of the blind man who was given his sight in John 9. John was written to help with the newly formed jewish and gentile community of Ephesus which had grown rapidly, born not of bloodline but of faith. They had to be open to new understandings and not be paralyzed in thought and action as the Pharisees or to become self-righteous as they were. The outline for our study can be found here.
The sermon also considered John 9 considering the characters – the blind man, his parents and the Pharisees. "And so out of all these trapped and blinded people, one man makes the choice for sight, and freedom. Everyone else stays blinded and trapped… Jesus says that he is in the world so that all of us who are trapped and blind can make a decision. Do we really want our sight and the freedom that sight brings with it or not? We get to make the choice. Where are your blind spots, the things in your life that are keeping you from living fully as children of the light? What things in your life keep you from accepting God’s presence, goodness and mercy?
"I challenge you to take the risk—To choose the gifts that Jesus offers to each and every one of us—the gift of sight, the gift of freedom from whatever it is that oppresses you." The entire sermon is here along with the bulletin.