The Gathering

As we prepare for Christmas, many of us declutter our homes to prepare for fresh decorations, marking us as someone who celebrates the season. The same can be said of our spiritual lives. We're called to live in a manner that sets us apart during the Christmas season, and beyond.

During the Christmas season, we're invited to take inventory of our lives. What habits are serving us? What tendencies draw us far from God? God wants to do something new in your life. But, first, you've got to make room.

When bad things happen, what does God do? God limits suffering. God shows up, and is present with us until the suffering ends, offering hope in the midst of hardship.

Often we think of “negative emotions,” like anger, doubt, disappointment, or sadness, as a lack of faith, and think we cannot express them to God. We explore the role that these emotions can have in strengthening our faith, and try to answer the overriding question - Is it ok to be angry with (or annoyed with, or disappointed in, or to doubt…) God?

Is God fair or just? Many people think God’s idea of justice is retributive - basically that if you do something bad, he will punish you by having bad things happen to you. But, there is another way to understand justice. Perhaps God does not act according to strict retributive justice, but instead promises us restorative justice, or setting right what sin has eroded. Perhaps God is less interested in punishing wrongdoers than moving them towards repentance, forgiveness, and transformation.

It’s human nature to want to believe that “everything happens for a reason,” especially when we’re suffering. We want to believe that suffering serves some greater purpose. We’re taking a look at the role that suffering plays in our life, what God can offer us through it, and the limitations of trying to always give our suffering a greater meaning.

Every day, we’re faced with everything from tragedy in the world to struggles in our everyday life, leaving us constantly wondering why? We're exploring this question by looking at the story of Job, learning how God shows up even in our darkest moments.

Political fear is something the disciples experienced, also.

We're talking about how Jesus centers us in a climate where our fear is not only real but also exploited. Fear in fact was a major theme of Jesus’ ministry, evidenced by how often he says, “fear not."

Politics can threaten our relationships.

When we feel that divide unfolding, we can practice 3 simple rules of engagement:

1. Do No Harm

2. Do Good

3. Stay in Love with God

These three rules, coined by Methodist Founder John Wesley, offer us a framework for love that can often challenge us, but that models Jesus.

Jesus is the foundation of our faith, and that faith shapes how we engage in politics and how we respond to those we deeply disagree with. Many of us are asking the question, "How does my faith shape the way I respond to what's going on around me?"

Luckily, we can look to Jesus' political engagement as an example for our own. But, we first must dispel two myths: Jesus wasn't political. Jesus was partisan.

He was involved in politics, but he didn't align with any party or side. Let's unpack what that means for us today.