We were in Eugene, OR, on this Sunday. Googled UMC and found four. One was meeting at the Yacht Club, one met at 10:00, one was all about inclusion, the fourth was only the find-a-church link (which I find are usually sorely outdated). So to the 10:00, we went.
Jack was with me, as he couldn't be elsewhere. We arrived and entered the building. We were greeted warmly, went to our seats, and waited for worship to begin.
The church had a lead pastor and a "neighborhood" pastor. The neighborhood pastor filled the role of announcements, children's message, prayer time, etc.
The church seemed very community oriented. A special offering was taken for their African village, a blessings offering was taken for the discretionary fund, and they are pursuing a zoning change in order to build a community coffee shop on the church grounds.
The message was very interesting. The verses after the Good Samaritan parable have the disciples asking Jesus if they should rain down brim fire on Samaria. This was tied to the OT story of Elijah calling down brim fire on the fifty men sent by the king (twice) and refraining from doing so a third time. The disciples would have known this story and for them, it was perfectly logical to rain down fire from heaven on people.
The point of the sermon was how do we treat those who are not hospitable to us. How do we respond like Jesus to those whom we have a history...remember, Jesus often went through Samaria on his way from Jerusalem to Galilee rather than going around as was the norm.
I really enjoyed this experience.
No comments:
Post a Comment