Your Custom Text Here
by Mandy Grisham, Executive Pastor
Last Sunday I had the privilege to teach in the Godly Play classroom where our 4 year olds through 5th graders learn. We began our circle time looking at the church calendar and reflecting about last Sunday being Easter.
Read more
As I prepare to start Seminary this September, I’ve been thinking through this last year of the pandemic and some of the more difficult emotions and memories bubbling up to the forefront of my mind. My career change a year ago brought on feelings of fear, insecurity, and inadequacy as I looked toward the future.
Read more
Have you ever had something you felt was secure, suddenly end? A treasured thing or person, taken away before you knew what was happening? Maybe it was a piece of your security abruptly pulled out from under you - the loss of a good job, the end of a relationship you thought was a sure thing, or unexpectedly receiving information that shocks you to your core? Or perhaps, you’ve experienced a permanent or traumatic loss of someone or something beloved to you, and had to process life after loss?
Read more
He is Risen indeed! Alleluia! What words and feelings come to mind when you think of Easter?
What about: alarmed, trembling, bewildered, fled, afraid. These aren’t our typical pastel and pasteurized Easter words and feelings. But these 5 words come from the Mark 16 (NIV) account of the resurrection and are some of the adjectives and verbs attributed to the women who first arrived at the tomb. Imagine with me a time in which you experienced…
Read more
Last week I was helping my parents in Nashville tear down a broken fence when we found an old wooden planter. As I began to take apart the planter, I discovered a thick root system that grew through the wood into the earth below. Often when potted plants lack adequate nutrients, their roots will find ways outside their container in order to survive and continue flourishing.
Read more
Lent is a time for deep self-reflection and repentance, yet, what I found myself missing for many years is the communal nature of Lent. As we recited the Litany of Penitence last week during our Ash Wednesday service, it struck me again that confession, repentance, and examination is a collective task:
“We have been deaf to your call to serve, as Christ served us.
We have not been true to the mind of Christ. We have grieved your Holy Spirit.
Have mercy on us, Lord…”
Read more
In a recent sermon, Jamin defined Biblical justice as “The poor are not poor anymore. The hungry are not hungry anymore. Those on the outside are brought in.” Some of us were taught in the past that God is mainly concerned with eternity; salvation is already more than we deserve, so we shouldn’t expect better circumstances on earth, for ourselves or anyone else.
Read more
Three important questions about Showing Mercy:
Who is a good example of someone who Shows Mercy?
Let’s take a look at Job 29. Job is making a final defense of his character before his “wise” friends, who’ve been considering all the reasons why he might be suffering…
Read more
Ever since I first heard this story a few years ago, it keeps circling in my head: Isadora Duncan, famed American dancer, was asked after a performance to explain the meaning of her dance. She reportedly replied to the questioner, “No, I can't explain the dance to you; if I could tell you what it meant, there would be no point in dancing it.”
Art is subjective. Able to reveal deeper truths than the most poignant soundbite, yet, ask anyone on the street what it is and you’ll get as many definitions as individuals questioned.
I can’t begin to tally up the number of pages I’ve read over the last two decades on the role of the church in engaging culture. Over the last two thousand years we’ve seen times when the church got it right. But it seems that we’ve seen even more times when the church got it so wrong.
Read more