Dear Friends in Christ,
Happy New Year! And, a Wondrous Epiphany season, too!

I greet you this way because the year 2024 is over. And, Christmas has come and gone.

But of course, neither is finished with us. The past lives in the present, and the past has consequences for our future. This is why English artist, Caryll Houselander, wrote in her 1949 book The Passion of the Infant Christ, “Christ is born in us today.” In us…

Of course, the question is, what does it mean to declare this? Is it merely a belief statement of the mind or an emotional feeling of the heart? Or is it a transformational growth experience in your portion of soul?

When you hear or say that “Christ is born in us today,” what does it mean for you? The season of Epiphany – which means manifestation, perception or insight , especially of a divine nature, – is a season for pondering this question. And for having a deep, God-moment-kind of experience!

So, when I wish for you the blessings of this season, I mean to say, “I hope you discover and experience the eternal love of Christ Jesus growing in and around you in a powerful, life-changing kind of way!”

Blessings of Epiphany,
Pastor Ed

Dear Friends in Christ,

Halfway through Advent, I’m wondering how your preparations for Christmas are coming along. I don’t mean decorating, baking, shopping, wrapping, entertaining, or any one of a hundred other “external” tasks.  Rather, I’m wondering how you are inside – where your heart beats and your mind wanders.  For these constitute what Christian Christmas touches.  

On Christmas Eve, we shall sing, “O Little Town of Bethlehem.”  In it, we sing “the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”  Many interpret this line as geography about a literal birth of a baby named Jesus in Bethlehem.  But really, we’re singing about our hopes and fears – wherever we have lived or live – and how these are met in the “eternal and everywhere” love of God in Christ.  

Which is why several church members and I are preparing a special time, sometimes called a Blue Christmas service. You may think this service, scheduled for next Wednesday evening, is for those who are especially sad at this time of year, but it’s really for anyone having any kind of hard time coming to – and experiencing – this season’s ultimate gifts of the Spirit: the hope, joy, peace, and love that constitute God’s divine holiness coming in a human being – and through any human-being that follows his Way. 

In a time of year when we may be prone to the gravity of our personal feelings pulling us down – as well as in a year in which a “fog of malaise” permeates our society and our breath, I invite you to join us next Wednesday night “in between the hopes and fears of all your years.”  In doing so, perhaps, you’ll be more prepared to receive – and experience – the gift of Christmas itself – in spite of it all.   

Blessings of Advent Preparation for a More Than a Merry Christmas,
Pastor Ed

Dear Friends in Christ,
Remember Irving Berlin’s, I’m dreaming of a White Christmas? It was first sung by Bing Crosby in 1942 followed by many others, and it was one of my favorite pop Christmas songs as a kid. After all, I liked winter’s snow. It was good for building snow forts, making snowmen, tunneling into, sliding on, and throwing balls at friends – not to mention cancellations of school!

But, when Barb and I moved to Phoenix, singing this song seemed strange. I mean: have you ever seen snow falling on cacti when temperatures are in the 70’s? I have – in a Peanuts’ cartoon and on occasional instances when an unusually cold low-pressure system would drop snow on the upper elevations of the mountains surrounding Phoenix. Still it never seemed quite right singing this song in Arizona’s “sun valley!”

Today, I enjoy listening to most any rendition of this song because it gets me to thinking about dreaming. Which is what being a Christian, especially in the Advent season, is all about. This year, in particular, when our society and the world are awash in winds of change, chaos, and conflict, I’m dreaming about much more than a “white Christmas.” How about you?

Whatever constitutes your dream life these days, we’ll be considering dreams and dreaming in our sermon regarding this aspect of Advent stewardship when we worship on this upcoming Sunday.

Blessings of Advent Preparation for a More Than a Merry Christmas,
Pastor Ed

Dear Members and Friends,

Those of you who heard our sermon on the last Sunday of Pentecost heard me say in effect, “While it’s beginning to look and sound a lot like Christmas outside our walls, I’m not yet ready to celebrate it because we haven’t even come to a most wonderful holiday of the year, a holiday for the soul:  Thanksgiving!”  (How’s that for a one-sentence summary of a sermon?) 

And, when we gather on this upcoming Sunday for worship, I still won’t be ready because Christmas isn’t meant to be a holiday we simply “come to.”  Rather it’s an incredible holiday that we “prepare for.”  Which is why we’ve been given the season of Advent on the Christian calendar.  Its purpose is to give us time to prepare for receiving the greatest gift of Christmas: the new life of Jesus, our Christ!  

So, it is, we’ll begin preparing, and not just for Christmas Day, but for Christmastide, the season of Christmas.  Yes, just as Christmas doesn’t come the day after Halloween when all the decorations are rolled out in stores and online, neither does Christmas come on December 25^th, the day after Santa Claus comes down the chimney.  For, Christmas is more than our rituals, whether commercial-based or family-based.  Christmas is the very love of God come into our hearts!  And, it’s an elusive thing. 

If you don’t believe me, or have wonderings about all this, stay tuned.  For we have preparations to make.  Meanwhile, I hope you have a Blessed Thanksgiving Day – and week!

Pastor Ed

Dear Friends in Christ,
Many summers ago, I spent a three week vacation in the Sierra-Nevada mountains putting in “sweat equity” on our friends’ vacation house – a home in which we shared many good times over 30 years of friendship. Toward the end of a third 15 hour work-day, their son, who had stopped working with me for the day at 4 pm, asked, “Ed, why are you doing this?” “One word,” I replied, “Gratitude.”

Now, given the look on his face, I don’t think he quite understood me. But, maybe, you do?

Gratitude has undergirded my decision-making in life. Gratitude is the reason I worked in social services and, then, responded to a sense of being called to church ministry. Gratitude has motivated my volunteering of time and energy to community service organizations. Gratitude has led me to make substantive financial contributions to the church and charitable agencies. I am, simply, grateful for life and moved to give to life in return. How about you?

The ancient Roman scholar, Marcus Tullius Cicero wrote, “Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.” Contemporary motivational speaker and leadership consultant, Anthony Robbins, says, “When we are grateful, fear disappears, and abundance appears.”

In this season of Thanksgiving, may you experience fear’s dissipation through your giving of yourself and all your resources. And, then, may abundances of all good kinds appear before your eyes!

Blessings of a Joyful Thanksgiving,
Pastor Ed

Dear Friends in Christ,
November is not my favorite month on the calendar. It’s an “in-between” month. When I was a kid it was a less exciting time between Halloween and Christmas, costume-wearing and candy, Christmas and toys! Now it’s a barren time between colorful foliage and snow-covered branches. It’s a stark, barren time filled with shades of tan and gray when the skeletons of trees and bushes have been laid bare. It can be a little depressing to the eye.

But, spiritually, it’s a reminder that blessings, as the saying goes, can come “in disguise.” November is a leaner time of easily appreciated pleasures. It’s a time of waning sunlight and scarcer warmth when basking in these gives way to turning on indoor lights, turning up thermostats and sitting by a fire or a heater.

November is a faith-builder. For what’s a faith for if not for trusting, discovering, and “seeing” that good things sometimes come wrapped in under-appreciated, and even un-comfortable, clothing?

Emerging November exposures culminate in Thanksgiving dinner tables topped with an abundance of mouth-watering foods that are surrounded by friends and family, blessed traditions – and memories of Thanksgivings past.

Whenever I complained too much about “how little I had,” my mother would say to me, “Edward, count your blessings. Her’s was a reminder not so much to literally count things as it was a pointer to this spiritual truth: in any fleeting moment of experience and feeling, we likely already have more blessings than we know.

When not in any of your “most wonderful times of the year”, may “November blessings” appear to you,
Pastor Ed

Dear Friends in Christ,

It’s actually a more or less “usual week” in this age. For, sociologists have called ours the “Age of Anxiety.” And, during any given week, many people are experiencing anxiety.

But wait a minute! People have been feeling anxious for a long, long time! How do I know? I read the Bible!

Yes, ancient characters of Scripture – and people of old – experienced anxiety. The author of the 55th Psalm, presumably a civic leader, maybe even King David, expressed anxiety over enemies telling lies and threatening his life. Famously, the author of the 23 rd Psalm spoke of his faith’s calming effect on his anxiety, writing, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil.”

And, Jesus encountered anxiety in his followers which occasioned his asking, “What can your worry add to your life?” And, then, he added, consider the quality and strength of God’s love.

Indeed! If we’re anxious about the coming days in our nation (And, why shouldn’t we be – given the egregious conduct of some of our political leaders, candidates, and their followers?), – we ought wonder what we may bring today to our feelings by virtue of our faith. And, then perhaps we ought discuss it with one another as well as pray about it together!

It’s all a part of our stewardship, our care for God’s creation! And, who knows what helpful gifts – in words and deeds – we might bring to others and our society as well as ourselves? Who knows?

Blessings of Peace,
Pastor Ed

Dear Friends in Christ,

Our days are “numbered.” In my 40 years of being a pastor, I have officiated at over 500 funerals of persons ranging in age from a few hours to 107 years – or as the deceased’s 84-year-old daughter said at her mother’s funeral: “107 – and a half – years!”

We never know “the length” of our days. But, of living, a fictional death-row character, prison guard, Paul Edgecomb, played by Tom Hanks in the 1999 movie, “The Green Mile,” said: “Everyone owes life one death.”

This debt is sobering at best. But living with it need not be! Especially for those who harbor a faith’s trust upon hearing Jesus say to his followers, “Do not let your hearts be troubled” (for) “in my Father’s house, there are many dwelling places,” (and in) “a little while, you will no longer see me, but then, again, a little while later, you will see me.” (John 14:1 & 16:16)

Now, how about you and your faith’s trust? How do you experience living in the face of our common human destiny – or, as Tom Hank’s character puts it, our “debt.”

Whatever your experience and your answer, on this upcoming Sunday, All Saints and All Souls’ Sunday, we’ll be “eating and drinking” while remembering those who’ve paid their “debt” – including Jesus and Paul who each had something to say about life and living in the face of dying and death.

I hope to see you worshipping this Sunday,
Pastor Ed