Pastor Eric invites us to imagine what the world might look like fifty years from now, and to hold it alongside God's dream--our hope--for what the world would look like. How do we bridge that divide? Listen in and reflect with us.

This is the second installment of our annual "Ask Me Anything" series where Pastor Eric answers the questions that are most on people's hearts and minds. The questions were submitted anonymously and then drawn from a bowl during the "sermon" time. Listen in and hear what people asked and how Pastor Eric responded!

In this final message in our series exploring sabbath rest, Pastor Eric challenges us to consider the ways that our common wisdom of "self-care" fails to adequately respond to the magnitude of the crises in our lives and world. Instead, he calls us to imagine and live into an ethic of "community care."

As much as it feels safer to try and heal alone--what with all the frustrations and annoyances of other humans--there is a degree of healing and transformation that is only possible in community. Rather than valorizing exhaustion, as community too often does, the kind of community imagined through sabbath is one where there is enough for everyone to live at a pace and in ways that make them come alive and keep them close to their humanity. Are we willing to build and participate in such a community?

In this message, Pastor Eric continues reflecting on the meaning of sabbath and both its challenge and transformational power for our lives and world.

In particular, he calls us to reflect on how the lack of sabbath, of deep rest that actually restores us, de-humanizes us--cuts us off from core parts of what it means to be human: to give space to our grief or anger, our joy and gratitude, to cry, to dream, to savor life. When we are cut off from these parts of ourselves, we become less spacious, less gracious, less forgiving, less generous, and more embattled with others.

How do we stay close to our humanity in a world where forces everywhere are constantly trying to strip us of it? What makes it possible to not just survive this chaotic historical moment, but to continue living with purpose and conviction, with hope and a commitment to showing up for our neighbors for the long-haul?

The answer, perhaps surprisingly, is found in the ancient Jewish and Christian practice of "sabbath."

In this message, Pastor Eric reflects on the enduring--and liberating--challenge of "practicing the sabbath." From the debates Jesus had in his own time to our own struggles with exhaustion and burnout, Pastor Eric reflects on his sabbatical and how sabbath invites both a new vision of our world and calls us to inhabit it differently. At the core of this vision is the reminder that you are human; our faith calls for lives, communities, and a world that are structured in ways that honor our humanity (with all of our limits and mental, emotional, physical needs).What might it look like for us to bring the wisdom of the sabbath, of rest, of renewal, of wholeness, of community care into our lives--individually and as local communities like our church?

In this message, Pastor Eric continues reflecting on resurrection. In Christian faith, Easter is not merely a day, but a season; and resurrection is not merely an event we remember, but a reality we are called to participate in. Listen in as Pastor Eric invites us to go beyond merely "believing" in the resurrection to living it with our whole lives. This seemingly small shift makes a world of difference. Indeed, it calls us to open ourselves that we might be filled with the Life-Giving Spirit that longs to re-make the world so that all would experience new life.

In this Easter message, Pastor Eric concludes our Lenten sermon series exploring how to live an integrated and whole life beyond simplistic binaries and dichotomies by reflecting on grief AND hope.With this reframing, we realize that the first Easter began not with joy, but grief; not with hope, but despair. In fact, it was only in moving toward the site of their grief--Jesus's tomb--that they were able to move toward hope.Rather than simply being about believing historical facts about an event 2,000 years ago, the Easter proclamation of resurrection is a radical assertion that the religious and political forces of death that sought to silence, humiliate, torture, and disappear Jesus do not--WILL NOT--have the last word. Life does. Now as then--hope is not mere wishful thinking or staying positive. It is a force that compels us to move beyond the shadow of fear and guilt and shame, move toward our grief, with the promise that Life will always rise from the ashes--even when and where it feels impossible.

In this Palm Sunday message, Pastor Eric explores themes of "silence" and "shouting" in Jesus' dramatic entrance into Jerusalem for the Passover festival celebrating their ancestor's liberation from bondage in Egypt, and his disruptive actions immediately afterward in the Temple.

Often missed is how intentional, deliberate, and organized his actions were; Jesus is engaged in street theater, in a public protest against injustice and corrupt rulers.

Does the Jesus we find here surprise us? What if we cannot truly understand who crucified Jesus and why apart from these actions? What does that reveal about Jesus--his mission and his teachings? What does that mean for us as those who seek to follow Jesus through the mess of injustice, corruption, and violence in our own world?

Listen in as we wrestle with these questions.

In this sermon, Pastor Eric continues our Lenten series exploring binaries that our world often divides the world into and pushes us to choose between. This week, we explore "Righteousness" (and, similarly, justice) vs. "mercy."Rather than seeing these as opposites, in this story, Jesus calls us to pursue mercy as the pathway to building a world of justice and righteousness. If our justice/righteousness shames, blames, and alienates people from community, it is not building a better world. It is reproducing the death-dealing forces of what's already out there. At the same time, if our mercy doesn't center the hurt of victims and accountability for one's actions, then the powerful and privileged merely use it to maintain the status quo, like a "get out of jail free" card.The story of Zacchaeus surprises and challenges all of us as it illustrates the powerful ways individual redemption and community restoration are inextricably linked. Righteousness/Justice VS. Mercy is a false choice. It must be both!

In this message, Pastor Eric explores the dichotomy of “lost” vs. “found.” How often does our world separate out those who are "in" as "found," and those who are not as "lost." And how often, we then give these a value: to be lost is "bad"--and one who is lost is somehow deficient--and to be found is "good," as is the one who is found.But what if we took these value judgments out. What if one can be both found AND lost at the same time, or in the same season?Through Jesus's "Parable of the Lost Sheep," Pastor Eric invites us to consider: what if lost or found is not a dichotomy where we choose one and avoid the other, but rather an invitation to recognize how, throughout life, we find ourselves moving between the two, embodying both. Rather than judging them, what if considering how this is true for us simply invites deeper reflection as we continue growing along life's journey?