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It is customary for a United Methodist pastor to take several weeks off between appointments. Usually they are filled with moving, settling into a new home and establishing a rapport and routine with the new staff at the church they are being moved to. It gives us time to decompress from the flurry of leaving … [Read more…]

Scripture: Mark 2:23-3:6 Mark Rober is a former NASA engineer who began making fun videos to help young people “think like an engineer.”   Six years ago a couple of porch pirates stole a package from his doorstep, and he decided to approach this problem like an engineer.  Porch piracy, stealing amazon and other delivery packages, … [Read more…]

Scripture:  Mark 3:20-35 Storytelling often relies on tropes.  These are well established set-ups, plot devices, and structures that get used over and over again.   The reason why tropes become tropes is because they work incredibly well and they often connect with the viewer or reader of the story.  Over the past several years there was … [Read more…]

Late night host Jimmy Fallon has a reoccurring bit where he will publicly write thank you cards on his show.  While he usually writes his thank you cards for comedic effect, I do want to copy the idea of making my “thank you” cards public.   As my appointment to North Judson UMC draws to a … [Read more…]

Scripture:  Romans 8:22-27 Something I am fairly certain I have said in the past, that you might remember about me is that I love to play games.  As a family we have a lot of games and we play them together quite often.  On several occasions when talking with someone and I mention how much … [Read more…]

Acts 1:15-17; 21-26 There is a decent chance that you may not immediately recognize the name Eric Roberts.  If you saw a picture of him you he would likely look familiar, but you may not be able to place why you recognize him.   Eric Roberts is one of the most prolific actors in Hollywood.  The … [Read more…]

Acts 8:26-40 In Detroit Michigan on a mostly unassuming day in 1937 the most amazing thing happened.  A man by the name of Joseph Figlock was dutifully doing his job as a street sweeper and he was cleaning the alleyway between two buildings.  Meanwhile, four stories up a young mother experienced every parent’s worst nightmare … [Read more…]

Last month and into this month, our Wednesday night study has focused on what it means to be United Methodist.  Since not everyone is able to take part in this, I wanted to share a small piece of what this four-week study has covered about what makes the United Methodist Church unique. Like nearly all … [Read more…]

Scripture:  1 John 3:16-24 Songs have been written to cover just about every topic imaginable, but there is one subject that seems to be the most popular:  A crazy, little thing called love.   It is estimated that more than 100 million love songs have been recorded.  The variety of love songs is staggering as they … [Read more…]

Scripture:  1 John 3:1-7 I know many of you know this, but being a parent is tough.  One of the things that makes it hard is that it seems everyone has an opinion about how you are supposed to be a parent, and it does not matter what a parent does they are doing it … [Read more…]