EPC Resources
Nashville nativity scene brings community together, while staying apart
By Levi Ismail
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — The congregation of Emmanuel Presbyterian Church is drawing on experience to create a nativity scene they hope brings people together, while remaining apart.
Pastor Jane Herring and her daughter Annie came up with the idea when brainstorming how to help parishioners feel like Christmas wasn’t forgotten. Using the materials at hand, they transformed a nearby patio into a nativity scene complete with lights.
Wednesday night, strong winds blew many of the pieces to the ground. The very next day is when we found Gus Laux helping to clean up. Anyone watching his efforts may have thought Laux created the works of art himself. As it turns out, he is just a neighbor who appreciates art when he sees it. Sure he makes it to the occasional church get-together, but he knows those may not happen again anytime soon.
“The church is taking this very seriously for the health and benefit of everybody,” Laux said.
People are instead encouraged to drive through, take in the scene and who knows, you may even catch a glimpse of someone they haven’t seen in months.
The idea was never to make this perfect, but to show parishioners this church still cares even from afar.
“This was a way to help not only the members of the congregation but everyone in the community to come by and see something,” Laux said.
The nativity scene will remain up through January 6 and will be illuminated at night for anyone planning a visit.
11/29/20
Sermon Notes:
The new joy that Advent promises is not afraid of our worst nightmares. Perhaps this is another reason the first Sunday of Advent always begins with an apocalyptic text. This year, our passage is from the “little apocalypse” in Mark 13:30-37.
The season of Advent is about waiting for the Christ child. Something is coming into our lives, something good, something saving, someone whose birth and life and death are all for the love of us.
The wisdom of the liturgical calendar takes us through this waiting every single year. Four weeks of anticipation, beginning with our fears and nightmares, beginning with the farthest point away from joy.
I do not know how the promise of Advent is growing in each of you at this time. I do not know if that growth will exactly follow the calendar timeline of being revealed to you over the course of Advent and born into life on Christmas day. I do not even know these things for myself.
What I do know is this: As Christ followers we are people of the promise of new life.
Contrary to the biological model of life that depicts birth, growth, maturity, decline and death, the Christian model of new life tells us the spiritual beings in these bodies of clay is made new over and over again in our lifetimes by the Master’s hand.
Even into the moment of death, God is bringing forth new growth in us. I confess I would feel foolish writing these words if I had not witnessed it time and time again in my work as a chaplain. God is full of surprises and overflows through us as we cultivate open, willing hearts throughout the trials of this life.
What new life is God bringing forth in you…
Despite the illness you are facing.
Despite the sadness you carry.
Despite the fact that you feel superior to others and are cut off from feeling the need for newness.
Despite the resentment you feel against the people who harmed you.
Despite the overwhelming goodness in your life of which you already feel unworthy.
Despite the tragedy or trauma that haunts you still.
Despite the struggles you face. Despite the fatigue.
Despite the forgiveness you have not yet been able to accept or offer.
What new life is God bringing forth in you? What is being born anew in you?
We do not have to know the answer, but it helps to find ways to soften our hearts and open our hearts to beauty and goodness, to the touch of God’s hand on our lives that is bringing forth newness and goodness even now.
The Advent season gives us words and models and ways of calling forth an open heart, open to the new life poured out by God’s grace and the coming of Christ into our lives.
11/22/20
Sermon Notes:
What Jesus says in Matthew 25:31-46 was countercultural when he said it, and it is countercultural as we read it today. Jesus is repeating the same message all of the prophets brought: take care of the weak and vulnerable, hungry and lost.
Jesus uses shocking language of either “inheriting the kingdom” or being cast into “eternal punishment” based on whether or not people took care of the “least of these.” Both the people who inherit and the people who go to punishment are surprised when Jesus says he himself WAS the least of these for whom care was given or denied.
What saves the people who inherit the kingdom?
They are saved by love. They are saved by acts of compassion.
Who are we and what is really motivating us when we serve? Only God can know the answer. We cannot judge ourselves, nor can we judge one another.
When we help people in need, we are not saving them, they are saving us.
No doubt this passage is disturbing. Here is a question that helps me investigate that disturbance:
Am I disturbed by the threat of eternal fire or am I disturbed by the idea that there may be people in my life and in my world that I do not see as Jesus? Are there saving acts of love and compassion that I miss out on because I judge some people as worth more than other people?
11/15/20
Sermon Notes:
We will not read 1 Thessalonians 5: 1-10 in the service this week, though it is a lectionary offering for Sunday. It’s a beautiful and encouraging passage; I hope you will take a look at it. “…put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
There is so much uncertain, ambiguous, fearful and conflicting in our lives today, in our world, our nation, and even in our hearts. My prayer is that we take these words from 1 Thessalonians to heart and cover ourselves in faith and love and hope, that we encourage one another, and open our hearts to receive encouragement. This can be easier said than done in times like these.
I pray we all practice approaching problems with a light touch, practice speaking to God about what bothers us and practice looking for ways that we can actually experience the relief of giving our problems to God to work on, as we clothe ourselves in love and wait in strength for direction, and for the signs of healing and restoration.
Hopefully these times of trouble will soon pass, and peace and health will soon prevail. More than this though, may we take deep into our hearts the truth that we will always have times of trouble in this life and, more importantly, we will always have God with us, helping us handle what we encounter. May we take refuge in the light of Christ and the sweet presence of the Holy Spirit in all these things.
See you Sunday –
Jane
11/08/20
Sermon Notes:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones." (Proverbs 17:22)
The sermon this week is on Matthew 25: 1-13 in which Jesus tells the story of the bridesmaids who wait for the bridegroom. The bridegroom is late, so some of the bridesmaids run out of oil for their lamps and go running into the night to find more. The bridesmaids who have plenty of oil go into the wedding feast, and the door is closed behind them.
This is the stuff of nightmares: those dreams of showing up to work without your clothes on or finding out there is a class on which you will be tested though you have done none of the work (mine was always math class).
The word Jesus uses to describe the maidens who get to go to the wedding is “wise.” In Greek the word is phronesis, meaning “mindful” or “intelligent in a practical way.”
What helps you stay awake as you wait for the bridegroom? What is it to be mindful, wise, or intelligent in a practical way?
Jesus’ parables can be hard to decipher, but we know this: Jesus’ goal for us is to have hearts of light and love, to experience our spirits as strong and whole.
This week has brought record numbers of new infections of covid 19 and a tense presidential election. In times like this it can be hard to be mindful, hard to stay awake, hard to remain practical and wise. Tempers flare and despair threatens our hearts.
The good news for Christians is that God is God no matter what else is true in our lives or in this world. God loves you and works with you, guides you and shows up for you, even if it feels like the bridegroom is never going to show up for the great feast.
You are all in my prayers. I pray God’s good medicine for your life, and a happy heart for you and yours. No matter what happens in this world, we are in the loving, gracious arms of God.
See you Sunday!
11/01/20
Sermon Notes:
This Sunday is the 22nd Sunday of Pentecost, Communion Sunday, and All Saints Day. The liturgy for the service will follow the lectionary readings for the season of Pentecost, but the short message before Holy Communion will center on the meaning of All Saints Day.
Take a look at the readings for Sunday: Joshua 3: 7-17, Psalm 107, 1 Thessalonians 2:9-13, and Matthew 23:1-12.
All of these passages ask us the same question that so many Bible passages, in unique ways, ask us: how do you live the gospel?
It is one thing to understand or talk about the gospel, but how do you live it? It is one thing to study the teachings of a church or leader, but how do you live the gospel?
How do you encourage others in their faith? How do you live so that the way you live is encouraging rather than discouraging to yourself or others?
And perhaps more pointedly, do you live in a manner that your inner relationship with God shows through to your outer life?
For such simple questions, they are tough and go right to the heart of what we do every day: putting our trust in God when we are afraid, asking God to use us for his glory, to bless and to be a blessing. Simple words, lifelong path.
See you Sunday!
Jane
10/25/20
Sermon Notes:
Here are the lectionary selections for Sunday, October 25, 2020 Deuteronomy 34:1-12 and Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17 • Leviticus 19:1-2, 15-18 and Psalm 1 • 1 Thessalonians 2:1-8 • Matthew 22:34-46
On Sunday, we will hear Jesus tell of the two greatest commandments, to love God with all that is in you and to love your neighbor as yourself. This is, in essence, the work of the church. The church is certainly a non-profit meant to help those in need. It is also, and first, a community of believers who have committed to these tasks of loving God and loving self in order to love others well.
This “greatest commandment” is important enough to make it into all three of the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke). Everything we do at the church is an opportunity to bring these commandments to life in our lives. When the session takes on the work of the church, sometimes joyous, sometimes hard. When fellowship plans fun outings. When mission takes us to meet and serve people we do not ordinarily see. When, in worship, we make a connection from God’s word to our lived experience. Or when we work in the yard together.
These two commandments sound simple, but they are the work of generations of saints, of which you are a part. In this long line of saints, the ribbon that connects us is persistence in God’s Word and the sign of that persistence is love – love of God, self, and neighbor.
See you Sunday for more on these greatest commandments.
10/18/2020
Sermon Notes:
On Sunday, we will hear Jesus ask the people to look at what image is on the Roman coin. His interrogators are trying to put him in a corner and get him in trouble about who he serves and how he would or would not spend coin on paying taxes.
In first century Rome, it was not easy to claim you worshipped the one true God when the Roman emperor was supposed to be your god.
Jesus turns the questions around and asks them, and us, whose image is on the human being. In essence, who do you serve by the way you “spend” yourself?
You spend your days and your precious life’s time in many different ways. You do not all have the same professions, nor the same ideas about society, nor the same political views, nor the exact same theology. But you all serve God in a thousand different ways every single day because you love and worship God in your heart and soul, and you serve and glorify God by how you continue to build and serve Emmanuel, even during a global pandemic.
God is doing something amongst us and with us at EPC, even in this time of pandemic.
Since the pandemic I have had more visitors to my office and inquiries about who we are at EPC than we had in the 6 months previous to the pandemic. The pandemic has not stopped us from worshipping God. If anything, our worship and our care and service to one another has increased.
Since the pandemic, we have grown a new mission to the Oasis center and have used the blessing of our outdoor spaces to help others safely meet, mourn, and conduct small business when they would otherwise not be able to do so for fear of spreading disease. We are about to start a new ministry, thanks to Diana Braud, called Greif Share. Our Wednesday night prayer ministry has grown stronger than ever in its spirit of deep and sincere prayer for God’s people.
The pandemic has not stopped us from being a people who serve God by nurturing our community, praying, worshipping, and building up our church to be a spiritual center from which to continue doing these things, and more, in the name of Jesus Christ.
As I prepare the sermon for Sunday, reading the Bible and thinking about God’s word to us, I want to tell you how humbled I am to get to be your pastor, how proud I am and how grateful I am to serve you. No pastor is perfect for everyone. That is the nature of being a human. But in my eyes, each of you are perfect for EPC and I know you are perfect for God, because it is God’s image in which you are made and God’s image you seek to serve in all the ways you live and build up EPC. Thank you for being the shining example of God’s people that you are.
Ruth Chapter 4
Notes:
Ruth Chapter 4. Questions for Reflection
• A note from last week’s discussion about the language around Ruth’s encounter with Boaz on the threshing floor from Sex Texts from the Bible, translated and annotated by Teresa J. Hornsby. 1. Page 8. “Ruth comes out from hiding and stealthily uncovers his “feet.” Bible scholar Amy-Jill Levine makes a strong case that Ruth seduces Boaz here. She hides until the time is right, approaches him when he has reclined and is a bit tipsey, exposes his genitals, and then lies back and waits for him.” 2. Page 8 “ This is an odd euphemism that is not clear to translators. Some interpret “un/covering his feet” as urinating while others think he could be masturbating, defecating, or having sex.
Questions for Reflection
Set 1.
1. What in your life humbles you?
2. Do you embrace what lowers you or do you often find yourself trying to “fix” or “raise” the things in your life that you deem lowly, broken, weak?
3. What do you think of the seemingly contradictory messages to Israel about their relationship to foreigners?
4. What do you think of the urge to choose one or the other?
5. Why is it so difficult to hold the two in balance and approach life on a case by case basis? And how can God guide us in this, rather, how can we take our guidance from God? Does it require simplifying? Slowing down? Lowering expectations? Or…other ideas?
6. Judah did Tamar wrong by not allowing her to marry her deceased husband’s son and he himself ended up as her “husband.” Perez is the child of this coupling. Think about the other ancestors in the lineage of David and Jesus. What do they have in common with your own lineage?
Set 2.
1. Have you ever heard the story of Jephthah? You can read it in Judges chapter 11 and 12.
2. Do you think the story of Jephthah a caution against being too proud to “break a vow?”
3. Have you been in a situation in which doing the right thing by the “letter” was a betrayal of life and love?
4. Is there such a thing as being “too” good or “too” observant or “too” conscientious?
5. What do you make of the disappearance of the line of Jephthah and the fruitfulness of the line of Perez?
Set 3. One big question: When we experience the fallible and fragile in our lives, it can make the heart quiver. When we are found wanting, sinful, overly emotional, hard hearted, difficult, distant, “broken” in any number of ways it is hard not to feel so bad that we just want to FIX it.
Conversely, it can be so painful to SEE ourselves in these conditions that we simply fall into denial.
HOW can we hold ourselves open to God’s grace and God’s love so that God’s love and redemption can shine against the backdrop of our lives as they are?
10/11/20
Sermon notes:
You all know I have a deep appreciation for the revised common lectionary. Some Sundays, though, I wish we could hang out together all day reading and rereading every one of the offered selections.
This week is just such a time:
Exodus 32: 1-14 tells of the impatience of the people who built a golden calf while Moses was delayed on the mountain. What a story!
The selected lines from Psalm 106 tell of Moses arguing with God, pleading a case for his people who turned to the worship of idols, and Isaiah 25: 1-9 tells of our God wiping away every tear and clearing all disgrace from the faces of his people.
Philippians 4:1-9 is one of my favorite accounts. An argument between Euodia and Syntyche has been so contentions news has travelled to Paul all the way from Philippi. He writes to them, calling them back to their senses, back to gentleness with each other, back to hearts and minds guarded in the love of Jesus Christ.
Finally, Matthew 22:1-14 gives us another strange and troubling parable, rich with possibility and life-giving in its challenges to us.
We are so blessed to have these stories, psalms, and accounts of our mothers and fathers in faith, to read of their struggles and triumphs. Most of all, we are blessed to be reminded that the same love of God that delivered them also delivers us.
With integrity, compassion and humility, let us be the mothers and fathers of future generations. Let us plead the case to God for lost ones. Let us return to one another, united in the mind of Christ, even as we differ. Let us tell the stories and ask the hard questions. Let us hold together, even as we are apart. It is not political. It is holy. Let us be God’s holy people, perhaps not perfect, but always persistent.
Ruth Chapter 2
Notes:
Reflection Questions
1st Set. Questions -
How do you find your heart closing and becoming hard in times of difficulty?
Does the current news cycle frighten you and challenge your sense of peace in God?
What ways have you found to assert yourself in gentleness and strength of faith?
What daily practices help keep your heart open to God’s healing power for you and for the world?
2nd Set. Questions -
What does it take for you to live life abundant?
Are there ways that you participate in gleaning?
Would you like to participate more?
Are there ways you have received through others: gleaning, family sharing, scholarships, community sharing or other?
3rd Set.Questions-
In what ways do you feel stuck?
Is there a way you can step out today, just one action and wait for God to reveal the next step?
Can you sit with the tension of not knowing what to do, yet believing all the while that God loves you and is walking with you?
In what ways do you feel God’s power alive in your life?
Or have you known men and women who exhibit this to you?
Ruth Chapter 1
Notes:
Study questions can be found below.
1st set
The stories of the Bible go for a kind of honesty that we do not often see in historical accounts.
The mothers and fathers of our faith grappled with personal flaws and inner darkness that we often forget about.
What is the price we pay when we gloss over their personal and historical struggles?
How can we see ourselves as living through a history much like theirs?
How can we be as honest as the Bible about our social location and personal flaws?
What do you do when you are faced with a troubling truth about yourself, your community, your nation or human nature?
How can you use this troubling truth to draw closer to the God who knows and loves you?
2nd set
When have you seen Christian values exhibited more by people who are not Christian?
What do you think Mahatma Gandhi meant in his interview with Dr. J.H. Holmes when he said "I like your Christ, but not your Christianity.”?
How do you limit the action of God outside Christianity?
What benefit do you see in limiting God to Christian beliefs, doctrines, and believers?
3rd set
How can you take the story of Ruth personally, for your life and for the world in which we live? Where in your life has one loss or trouble followed another? That is the place where the Spirit is walking with you through dark. Where are your creative ideas coming from? Where is your heart opening in compassion regardless of what the law books say? Regardless of what your tradition has said, where is your caring heart insisting on the power of God’s love in the face of indifference, despair and division? The Holy Spirit is breathing into this hope and pain with you. Stay with it. Where are you the one who is the outcast? The illegal one the disapproved of one? The Spirit is with you there, as you struggle to find a way forward, the Spirit is there at your back. As close as your breath. The Spirit is here.
10/04/20
Sermon Notes:
For our service on Sunday we will hear from Paul’s letters to the Philippians and another of Jesus’ parables from the Gospel of Matthew, the parable of the wicked servants.
One of the ideas connecting these two passages is the notion of our human tendency to fall into self-absorption. Paul talks about the uselessness of having all the “it” factors a culture might hold in esteem, and Jesus tells of the folly of those who do not recognize the truth when they encounter it because it does not “look” a certain way.
When we are young, it is natural to imagine oneself at the center of it all. As infants, we even believe the mother is simply an extension of ourselves. It is a matter of survival. As we grow in stature and in grace over the decades of life, our sense of life expands and we sense that our own experience and existence occurs within a larger stream of life that contains others who have similar or very different lives. As Christians, we believe all these lives of all the different people are held in one love, the love of God.
It would be nice if we came to that realization and lived in that acceptance, but often we do not. Instead, we develop ranking systems of worth, we fail to see with God’s eyes of love and abundance, or we imagine that somehow we are more or less important to God than others. Both Paul and Jesus (through his parable) ask us to step into the mystery of acceptance, accepting that God is in charge and that God is leading us somewhere good.
I pray you sense this goodness in your life this week, and always.
See you Sunday!
Jane
9/27/20
Sermon Notes:
The sermon this Sunday will be based on Matthew 21:23-32. In this passage we see the tension building between Jesus and the chief priests and elders of the synagogue.
They seem to be really upset with the “good news” Jesus is bringing. In their questions they try to depict him as a fraud or even a heretic.
These leaders get a bad reputation with good reason, but it is still important to be discerning when we consider them.
For this newsletter, I would like to share with you something I think is really important about how the New Testament addresses “chief priests and elders” in this case, and “the Jewish people” or “the house of Israel” in other places.
If we do not carefully consider the time and place of the Holy Word, we may end up falling into antisemitism or supersessionism.
The books that make up the New Testament were internal documents, or family stories. The early Christians were Jewish. Jesus was Jewish. When the writers of the books of the New Testament wrote, they were writing to themselves about themselves.
My mother had many sayings about our various family lines that are something like what the New Testament writers do. She might say “well, the Myers men communicate by joking,” or “the McCarley women have a temperamental streak,” or “you would not want an Irwin in charge of what’s to eat.”
Thinking of these family sayings helps me remember that when I read about the tension between Jesus and the chief priests and elders, I am reading about Jesus being at odds with his own people. And now, thanks be to God, we have been adopted, grafted onto that vine. We too are “his own people.” We are blessed to apply Jesus’ teachings and wisdoms to ourselves and our own lives when we are in positions that resonate with the actions and attitudes of those in the stories and parables, even those of the chief priests and elders.
I am grateful to discern the Word of God with you all every week. It is a joy and an honor.
Peace of Christ to you, and see you Sunday!
Jane
9/20/20
Sermon Notes:
On Sunday we will hear passages from Exodus and Matthew.
Exodus 16: 2-15 gives an account of how the freed Israelites get along when they find themselves out from under the control of Egypt. They are so happy? Right? They flourish in the freedom to build their own lives? Right? They start each day with praise and humble gratitude? Right?
Alas, no. God’s miraculous provision for them falls short of their wants and their romanticized memories of life as slaves in Egypt. All manner of grumbling ensues.
In the parable Jesus tells from Matthew 20: 1-16, a landowner pays all the workers the same. No matter what time a worker shows up, no matter how much work the worker does, each worker is paid the same. In the parable, the workers who arrive first are less than happy.
Not unlike the Israelites who complain even after the prophet Miriam models for them praise and thanksgiving to God who has provided for all, the workers are unable to be happy that everyone gets the same amount of money.
We have such powerful minds. We can remember days and years. We have magnificent powers of observation, attending to the smallest details of what someone wore at an event long ago or the color of the sky on a given day. These are gifts, but they are also gifts that can be used to compare and criticize in ways that leave us questioning God and unhappy with our lives. This makes us vulnerable to bitterness and envy.
The good news is this: we can engage our God-given gift of creative thinking to take what the day brings, thank God for what we do have, and rejoice that God has a plan of goodness for all of us, no two alike, no one better than the other.
We will ponder these ideas more on Sunday. For now, I will leave you with these questions that have proven to be a blessing in my spiritual journey.
When have you been confident of God’s love and presence in your life?
When have you been uncertain?
See you Sunday!
Yours with love in Christ,
Jane