United Church of Cohoes

This week, we continue our Lent series, “Into the Wilderness.” Today, we examine how wilderness times can be moments of comfort. We will explore the idea that comfort most ready comes from receiving hope—hope from God. There are many examples of God sending angles to comfort people and provide hope. How can we take part in this long tradition of being a messenger of God send to comfort and give hope. Our main passages this week are Mark 1:12-13.

This week, we continue our Lent series, “Into the Wilderness.” Today, we examine how wilderness times are often times of doubt. We will explore why doubt has been so vilified by the church over the years. We look at how Jesus handed cases of doubt and then ask how do we embrace the idea of doubt as a way for us to grow? Our main passages this week are Mark 9:2—25.

Tonight, we conclude our series on the Minor Prophets by diving into short book of Malachi. We examine how this book lays out some troubling behaviors by the people, but how it points to a coming home for all. We will conclude by briefly looking at the major themes that ran throughout the entire corpus of the minor prophets.

This week, we continue our Lent series, “Into the Wilderness.” Today, we examine how wilderness times are often times of dependence. We will explore the notion that being dependent on God is not a bad thing, how over time we learn that God will be there for us in all the small ways we often don’t see; that just like the Children of Israel learned to depend on their daily bread we too have to learn to depend on daily mercies from God. Our main passages this week are Exodus 16:2-4.

Tonight, we continue our series on the Minor Prophets by diving into short book of Joel. We examine how this book walks the line of prophecy and apocalyptic literature. We then ask ourselves why this shift happened and what we do in moments when new do not see God moving as we would like.

This week, we continue our Lent series, “Into the Wilderness.” Today, we examine how wilderness times are often the times when we are challenged the most. We will explore the idea that temptations are simply shortcuts that are presented to us that pull us off the path God wants us to be on. Our main passages this week are Matthew 4:1-11.

Tonight, we continue our series on the Minor Prophets by diving into the second part of Zechariah. We look at the two oracles in these chapters and see what they meant for their day and how we can understand them today.

This week, we kick off our Lent series, “Into the Wilderness.” This week we examine how wilderness times are often the times when we learn the most about ourselves and what is important in our lives. We ask ourselves some questions that invite God to speak to us during these difficult times. Our main passages this week are Matthew 4:1-11.

This week, we continue our new series journeying together through the book of Mark. Today, AJ shares with us about Jesus’ interaction with a man who was a leper. We look at how Jesus went out of his way to connect and love this person. We close by asking ourselves who are the lepers of today that society as a whole tells us we shouldn’t love, but Jesus tells us we should? Our main passages this week are Mark 1:40-46.

Tonight, we take a half-sidestep from our Thursday evening series on the Minor Prophets by giving some narrative background via the book of Ezra. Ken will highlight the major points of the book and talk about the idea of reconciliation and how that theme is still so relevant for us today.