Bothell Amplified

This week, Pastor Joe wraps up our series on Gathering and Belonging by turning to the story of Paul and Silas in the prison in Acts 16:16-34. In his sermon, he challenges us to be and to bring the Good News of a God who is love, which means to combat the thousands of years of narrative and culture that has told us that God’s love comes with conditions. If we are silent, who will share that Good News?

This week, we welcome the Rev. Liz Kearny from Liberating Lineages Collective as she continues our Gathering and Belonging series by turning to Lydia's story in Acts 16:9-15. In her sermon, she challenges us to finally embrace that the good news isn’t just for someone else, but for us, too, and to understand that when we commit the entirety of our lives to solidarity with the most oppressed, we are all made more free.

This week, Pastor Joe continues our sermon series on Gathering and Belonging by turning to Peter retelling his experiences before the believers in Jerusalem. In this sermon, he reminds us that it is often institutionalized religion that hinders the movement of the Spirit, and that we are called to recognize that belonging begins with God, with the Spirit, and with the grace that arrives before we expect it. 

This week, we begin a new sermon series called "Gathering and Belonging" as Pastor Kristin challenges us to read the story of God's people, and especially this text of Tabitha being resurrected, as one of inclusion and belonging! 

This week, Pastor Joe continues in the series, Post-Resurrection Stories, by turning to when Jesus met the disciples on the beach. In this sermon, he reminds us to remember who we are by trusting in a therapeutic God who desires relationship with us and challenges us to tend God's people in community. 

This week, Pastor Joe shares about the disciples' experience of encountering Jesus soon after the Resurrection and challenges us to be resurrected people, not about certainty or lack of doubt, but about belief that is relationship. In a world built on fear and division, how might our faith be one that reaches out, even when it’s scary? 

Happy Easter! This week, Pastor Joe reminds us that Easter is a call to resistance against empire. He challenges us to find intentionally rest and to remember the ways of Jesus for the sake of the kin-dom.

This week, Pastor Joe continues to focus on resistance as a theme for Lent as we journey with Jesus into Jerusalem on what is known as Palm Sunday. He challenges us to take a side: to either align with power and empire or to follow Christ into a new way of love, justice, and communal courage. 

This week, Pastor Joe continues our Lenten Journey with Jesus and the theme of resistance by turning to John 12:1-8 when Mary anoints Jesus. He suggests that much of this text is intended to be subversive and challenges us to resist the ways of the world and live in a different way!

This week, we continue our Lent series, Journeying with Jesus, by turning to what is often called the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Pastor Joe offers that this text is more for religious folk, and could be named, as others have suggested, the Parable of the Elder Son or the Parable of the Forgiving Father. Check out how this text encourages us into resistance through this season of Lent.