Moment of Clarity With Rev. Lorrie Daly-Price

May 7, 2017 | Seeing What We Need To See

All too often we find ourselves knee deep in the muck of life, trying desperately to survive and we forget that we are not in this alone. God is always with us, the constant and never-changing presence.

And we know this, we really do. “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” I would be willing to bet that everyone knows at least the first few lines of this psalm. But do we really believe it? “Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff— they comfort me.” When push comes to shove and when things that define our lives test us in real and stressful and painful ways, do we actually believe God is our Shepherd?

April 30, 2017 | When we are looking for something, we are more likely to see it. Like a certain kind of car, a colour or a particular coffee shop. It’s there, it pops out at us. But when we are not looking at all, we are more likely to miss it.

Like the two broken-hearted disciples on the road to Emmaus who meet up with a stranger along the way. Or is he a stranger? Everything has changed for the worst so they think? Maybe they are just not looking in the right place for the answers they seek.

April 23, 2017 | In Rev. Lorrie's absence, Mr. J. McKibbon joined us this week to share a message.

April 16, 2017 | On Easter Sunday we open ourselves to the kind of joy and celebration that comes out of darkness and fear. For Easter is the quintessential narrative of this type of hope. Easter reminds everyone that God’s power working through us can do so much more than we can ever ask or even imagine. Together in community with other Christians, we are part of something so much bigger than any one of us individually, something much more powerful, full of so much wonder, possibility and, yes, hope.

April 9, 2017 | The beginning of Holy Week, a week that what we see is not what we get. Just when we think the story is going to turn out one way, we are surprised by a different ending. Jerusalem was a big city with respect to Israel. The impromptu crowd of people accompanying Jesus along what became a parade route was the typical crowd of Galileans who were coming to Jerusalem for the celebration of the Passover. But Matthew tells us from our reading this week that, “When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking ‘Who is this?’” Let us go to Jerusalem with the crowds and join the parade.

April 2, 2017 | Here we are two weeks before Good Friday’s dying and Easter rising and we have the story of Lazarus, a man beloved by his sisters, and by Jesus. As with many of the scripture passages, we can assume that this is a story about ourselves as well. And our story begins with the threat of loss. But it prompts the question: what happens when we face loss? How do we handle it? A question we explore this week as we continue our journey towards Jerusalem.

March 26, 2017 | The things people say and the things people think and do. The story from John’s gospel reading is no exception. It all began with a question, seemingly a simple inquiry. “Who sinned, this man or his parents that he would be born blind?” A question on the surface that seems simple enough. Did the disciples really believe though, that God looked down from heaven and said, “All right fellow, I’ve seen you cheating on your income taxes; I’ve seen you skipping church. So I’ve decided to make a precious baby of yours to be born blind.” Join us as we explore this together.

March 19, 2017 | Why did the Samaritan woman come to draw water from the well at noon, the hottest time of the day? Could it be that she was trying to avoid the early morning crowds? The whispers and comments of the other women of the village?What are the places in our own lives where we are embarrassed, where we avoid interaction with others? What are the noon day wells of your life?This week as we hear the story of the Samaritan woman at the well and invite you to imagine yourself in her shoes.

March 5, 2017 | Matthew 4:1-11 | Playwright Oscar Wilde had a knack for formulating some of the most brilliant comments. One of the wittiest was, “Always forgive your enemies, nothing annoys them more.” As well, “I can resist everything except temptation.” Boy we understand that don’t we? Just think of the last time you went to the grocery and passed all sorts of cookies, desserts and salty snacks. You may not have gone in for any of these but you just might leave with one. 

For Jesus, during his 40 days in the desert, his temptations began. Starving, dehydrated, something tempts him to relieve his suffering. Does he give in to it?

February 26, 2017 | Matthew 17:1-9 | Think about the significance of being in a place where something happens to you that becomes a kind of benchmark, a defining moment that you return to in your memory. Sometimes you can even literary see more and more how you have been changed by what happened there in that place. Sometimes you have the need to go back to that place because it is there that you find strength to go on. You have learned something there that changed you — changed the way you look at your lives. Some of us might experience that defining moment as a wonder or a kind of positive experience, a mountaintop experience. Here something happens that takes us by surprise by its sudden clarity and brilliance, and we experience something we’ve never experienced before, something that takes our breath away. This Sunday we hear the reading from Matthew’s gospel of Jesus and the disciples up on the mountaintop. There in that moment, as the disciples gather with Jesus, something happens that will become their moment of clarity.