Andrew Klumpenhouwer speaks on Psalm 23 during our series, 'Summer of Psalms'.

Megan Little speaks on Psalm 46 during our series, 'Summer of Psalms'.

Diane Albert speaks on Psalm 61 during our summer series, 'Summer of Psalms'.

Andy Groen speaks on Psalm 32 during our summer series, 'Summer of Psalms'.

Mark Standish speaks on Psalm 88, as part of our 'Summer of Psalms' series.

Our full time staff of Amy, Matt, and Dave, take time to share reflections on behalf of the staff team and leadership team at St. Clair. We talk about the significance of the Black Lives Matter movement, how we can respond personally and what are the implications for us moving forward.

Reimagine Church: Outsiders Inside 

Acts Chapter 10 is a key moment in the life of the Church. Cornelius encounters an Angel and Peter a vision. Peter is sent to Cornelius to proclaim the Gentiles are part of the promise, and in that moment the Gentiles receive the same gift of the Holy Spirit. What is happening here is a new understanding of family. This is all initiated by God, not Peter’s good ideas. How is the Church to love with the vision of people from all tribes, nations, and tongues, being brought together in Christ.

Ephesians 3:10

Genesis 12:1-2

Isaiah 49:6

Leviticus 19:34

"The book of Acts speaks of revolution. We must never forget this. It depicts life in the disrupting presence of the Spirit of God. There is only one central character here in this story of Acts. It is God, the Holy Spirit." -Dr Willie Jennings

“The problem with the world is not a shortage of theories or feel good slogans, the problem is that we confuse proliferation of progressive terminology with empathy and engagement. We say the right things, but we fail to act on them, because we want to feel virtuous without paying a price.” - Payam Akhavan

"If a world caught up in the unrelenting exchange system of violence was to be overcome, then here was the very means God would use to overcome violence - by the introduction of a new reality of belonging that drew together different people’s into a way of life that intercepted ancient bonds and redrew them around the body of Jesus and in the power of the Spirit." - Dr Willie Jennings

Reimagine Church: People of Peace

The encounter between Philip and the Ethopian in Acts 8 is a profound example of God doing a unique work, though at the heart of what is taking place is a simple conversation.  To Reimagine Church we to need to rethink what it is to speak the good news of Jesus in a world desperate to know another way is possible.

Acts 8:26-40

Acts 8

Acts 1:8

2 Corintians 5:11-20

CH Spurgeon

Be true to truth as it comes to you.  If God gives you only a common candle-light, make good use of it… Instead of complaining that you have no more light, make good use of what you have.  Many groan over their inabilities, and yet they have never gone to the end of their abilities: this is sheer hypocrisy.

CH Spurgeon

Ah my brothers, you and I have need to understand the Bible.  I will suppose you read it-let me hope that I am not mistaken; but when you read it, do labour above all things, to understand it.  The book was written to be understood…. “I heard a person say once that they read through the bible six times on his knees in search of trying to understand a particular doctrine and I said ‘ Brother, that is an awkward position to read the Bible.  You should have sat upon a chair and studied it in an easy posture!  You should not have galloped through it racing over the chapters but rather read a little at a time and just try to understand it”

Rainer Maria Rilke

God speaks to each of us as he makes us,

Then walks with us silently out of the night.

These are the words we dimly hear.

You, send out beyond your recall.

Go the limits of your longing.

Embody me.

Flare up like a flame

And make big shadows I can move in.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.

Just keep going. No feeling is final.

Don’t let yourself lose me.

Nearby is the country they call life.

You will know it by its seriousness.

Give me your hand.

Reimagine Church: Holy Disruption

Acts 4:13 says, “When they saw the courage of these unschooled ordinary men they were astonished and took note they had been with Jesus”. What does it mean for the Church to look like people who have been with Jesus? The world and Church is being disrupted and shaken. How do we look like Jesus in the midst of this? In the passage we see three things; Kindness, Courage and the Miraculous. Following Jesus involves all three. As Jacques Ellul says, "Christians are meant to be holy troublemakers".

Acts 4:1-14

Luke 6:32-36

Titus 3:3-4

Ephesians 2:7

“Christians were never meant to be normal. We’ve always been holy troublemakers, we’ve always been creators of uncertainty, agents of dimension that’s incompatible with the status quo; we do not accept the world as it is, but we insist on the world becoming the way that God wants it to be. And the Kingdom of God is different from the patterns of this world.” - Jacques Elul

“ In America Christianity has become more of a social group, status symbol or class rather than a transformative grace that leads the enemies of God to himself and helps them to love the things they once hated.” - Sho Baraka

“Whilst the pagan priests neglect the poor, the hated Galileans devote themselves to works of charity . . . These impious Galileans not only feed their own poor, but ours also; welcoming them into their agape." - Roman Emperor Julian (on Early Church)

In the Western Church we are educated way beyond our obedience.

"If you take care of the least of these, i’ll take care of the church”. - A word for St.Clair from Josiah

"Jesus is Lord is not my personal opinion, I take it to be a determative political claim. The difficulty is following a crucified Lord entails embodying a politic that cannot resort to coercion and violence. Its a politic of persuasion all the way down. Its a tiring business that is slow and time consuming. But Christians believe that by redeeming time, Christ has given us all the time we need to be politically for peace." - Stanley Hauwerwas

“The mind which asks for a non-miraculous Christianity is a mind in process of relapsing from Christianity into mere 'religion'.” - CS Lewis

Reimagine Church: Property and Possessions

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With so much disruption in the world right now and so many ways we could respond, we look again at the example of the early church.  Seeing the posture of the followers of Jesus, we are challenged by the need to separate ourselves from our dependencies on our stuff at the risk it would blind us to our own privilege.  Pentecost Sunday reminds us that God has poured out his Spirit for the life of the world and we are invited to a life of repentance in response.

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Acts 2

Mark 1:15

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John Calvin

Repentance is being wounded by an awareness of our wrongness.

Cornell West

We are stuck in joyless quest for pleasure

Walter Brueggemann

The prophetic task of the church is to tell the truth in a society that lives in illusion, grieve in a society that practices denial, and express hope in a society that lives in despair.

James Cone

The gospel of Jesus is not a rational concept to be explained in a theory of salvation, but a story about God’s presence in Jesus’ solidarity with the oppressed.

Rudolph Bahro

When the forms of an old culture are dying, the new culture is created by a few people who are not afraid to be insecure.