by Steve
As I was visiting one of our resthome residents this week, he asked me how many people we, as a church, have who are in resthomes, who are shut-ins, or have health problems which prevent them from coming to church. As I started to name them, the numbers astounded even me:
Fred White, Red Jurney, [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »
by Steve
From Brett McCracken:
If the evangelical Christian leadership thinks that “cool Christianity” is a sustainable path forward, they are severely mistaken. As a twentysomething, I can say with confidence that when it comes to church, we don’t want cool as much as we want real.
If we are interested in Christianity in any sort of serious [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »
by Steve
Found in my inbox this morning after a lively debate in Sunday School yesterday:
Steve,
SS has opened lots of conversation between my husband and me. Two things I wanted to share. I am constantly reminded that if God had wanted us all to be alike, he would have made us that way. He did not [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
3 Comments »
by Steve
From Jim Wallis in a recent issue of Sojourners magazine:
Arizona’s law is a social and racial sin, and it should be denounced by people of faith and conscience across the nation. Arizona is threatening to wage war on the body of Christ. We should say that if you come after one part of [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »
by Steve
After a wonderful two week vacation at the lake, Judy and I are back in UG and it feels good to be back in the saddle again. I began my day with an hour on the bike at 7 am, and I tried to focus on the beauty around me as I rode.
I was [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »
by Steve
Hope you will enjoy this Q and A as much as I did. Very insightful!
Dr. Lennart Peterson of Gainesville, Florida, writes:
I am professor of physics, emeritus, from the University of Florida and I am a Unitarian. Several years ago, I had a conversation with a man who was doing some carpentry work for me [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »
by Steve
Taken as a whole, I really enjoyed my Memorial Day…particularly the annual concert from Washington, DC, presented by Public TV. But my day did not start off well…in fact, it started off with my being about as angry as I ever get. About 9:00 am, when I opened my email, I had one [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »
by Steve
A vote to keep ‘them’ away from ‘us’
By Jim Winkler, General Secretary, General Board of Church & Society
The bishops of The United Methodist Church have certified that the proposed amendment 1 to the denomination’s constitution has been rejected by a vote of 25,764-23,614.
The proposed amendment read:
Inclusiveness of the Church — The United Methodist [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
1 Comment »
by Steve
This one is for the folks who, for good reason or bad, do not come to Wonderful Wednesdays. Let me just start by saying that, in my never-to-be-humble opinion, WW is one of the very best things we have going here at UGUMC. Last night after our Bible study on Psalm 148, during [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »
by Steve
U.S. membership in the United Methodist Church fell to 7.7 million in 2008, its biggest one-year percentage drop since 1974. Giving was also down in that first year of the recession, with our largest mainline denomination receiving only 89% of what was budgeted for domestic and foreign missions. To make matters worse, attendance [...]
Filed under: Blogging Toward Sunday
No Comments »