Here's a little something that got sucked into my black hole of non-blogging during the last [gulp] half of 2015: That is a picture of the results of the Offering of Letters we collected in October. Apparently, it wasn't as memorable as I would have liked. When I asked our church's Administrative Council what the …
Tag: Woodridge UMC
Happy New Year
[Note: I originally wrote this as my year-end letter to my congregation. But I thought it might be worth sharing a little wider.] I intended to help us ring in the new year with a couple suggestions of ways we can challenge ourselves to learn and grow in our faith -- which is to say, …
What’s in a name?
What is distinctive about the United Methodist Church? What is United Methodist identity? In other words, what makes United Methodists United Methodists? This is the question our Confirmation class pondered the last couple weeks. How would you respond? (Or, for my non-UMC readers, how would you answer the question for your denomination or religion or …
Dancing fools
If you've been around Woodridge United Methodist Church (the church I serve as Koinonia Pastor) at all during the last couple of Advent seasons, you likely know that I'm a big fan of the song, "The King of Glory Comes." I liked it well enough on it's own, but after I found this video, well, …
Hypocrisy on purpose?
I had an epiphany in our Lenten Study. [Are epiphanies allowed during Lent? Even after 19+ years working at Woodridge United Methodist Church, I still get confused about ecclesial particularities like the seasons of the church year. Which seems silly. I've now been working and worshiping in the UMC longer than I attended the American …
Welcome to Parable Club
This Sunday, March 1, through Easter at Woodridge UMC, Pastor Danita and I are preaching a sermon series, The Parables of Lent (aka #ParablesofLent when you tweet, post, & pic about it each week 😉 ). We decided we needed a group effort of some kind in order to help us navigate these tricky stories …
Late to the Lent party #ashtag
Lent started, ahem, five days ago. So might well have read scores of ways to celebrate this season of the church. I know my timelines were full of them the last few days. Still, late as it is, here's what I'm thinking about... Lent: that season of the church year during which millions of Christians …
Continuing conversations on race
Yes, the church season of Lent has begun. But today, at Woodridge UMC, we're delaying our Lenten sermon series on Jesus' parables so we can continue our Black History Monty sermon-discussion series, "Conversations on Race." Thus far, the collaboration among our senior pastor, Rev. Danita Anderson, the congregation, and I has been honest, uncomfortable, and …
Uncomfortable on purpose
The huge snowstorm that hit last weekend (5th largest in area history!) may have impeded travel, may have been fun to play in, and may have even kept you from attending our worship services. But as bad as the weather was, it could do nothing to dampen the spirit - or dare I say Spirit …
Sleep Out Saturday
Gonna try live blogging Sleep Out Saturday. Haven't done that before so bear with me... 2:00pm Home preparing to go on a bike ride with our kids. Being away from them is the hardest part of any overnight youth event. In the next day or two, I'll share more SOS insights from WUMC teenagers in …
All That I Can't Leave Unsaid 