New Sermon Series!

Dear church family,

In a recent sermon, I mentioned that I’ve been reading through a new biography of Eugene Peterson, the beloved Presbyterian pastor who died in 2018.  It is called “A Burning in My Bones,” and I commend it to all of you.  It offers a beautiful look into a pastor’s life (and, more so, a Christian’s life), revealing the heart of someone who sought to follow Jesus along the dusty road of discipleship.

One aspect of the book stood out to me, which was Peterson’s commitment to Bible reading.  As a preacher, teacher, and author, Peterson was constantly immersed in Scripture.  At the same time, he recognized the ways that we get Scripture wrong.  We mishandle it and thus fail to experience its riches.  We so often treat the Bible like a textbook, or even like the phone book (does anybody use phonebooks anymore?!) that we fail to see it as God’s book, intended less for our information and more for our transformation.  Yet that is precisely why God gave it to us.

Peterson himself once wrote:

The challenge… regarding the Christian Scriptures is getting them read, but read on their own terms, as God’s revelation.  It seems as if it would be the easiest thing in the world… But as it turns out, in this business of living the Christian life, ranking high among the most neglected aspects is one having to do with the reading of the Christians Scriptures.  Not that Christians don’t own and read their Bibles.  And not that Christians don’t believe their Bibles are the word of God.  What is neglected is reading the Scriptures formatively, reading in order to live.

“Reading in order to live.”  I like that.  It’s what I hope we, as a congregation, are doing every Sunday, and on the days in between.  We read in order to live.  When we worship, we come into the presence of God and are sent back out by God.  And at the center of that rhythm is the Word – the written Word that bears witness to the living Word, King Jesus.  We Christians read, listen, and respond in order to live.

If you’re like me, you could use a refresher on this kind of reading.  Things have been so out of whack for the past 15 months that we may have fallen out of practice!  So why not make a fresh start?  Why not clear away the clutter and recommit yourself to a practice of daily Scripture reading and prayer, with weekly Sunday worship as your anchoring point?

Beginning this Sunday, June 6, I will be preaching through the Old Testament book of Exodus.  This is, hands down, one of my favorite books in the Bible – for good reason.  Exodus tells the story of Moses, the great hero of God’s people, Israel; and the story of God’s mercy, which carried the people out of slavery, through the wilderness, and into the promised land.  Because of this, Exodus remains the foundational story for the Jewish people today.  And it’s foundational for us Christians, too, as we turn our eyes to the new Moses, whose name is Jesus.

I want to invite you to read Exodus with me for the next three months.  Read Exodus not just for information, but for transformation.  Read Exodus the way you would enter the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  Explore its rivers and trails, its mountaintops and valleys, its people and promise.  Find someone to read it with you.  Ask questions.  Wrestle with the text.  Pray.  This summer let’s find ourselves within this story – and the great Story of God – that we might truly live.

See you Sunday,
Blake

Pastor's Letter

Wilderness is a major theme in Scripture.  Think of Moses and the Israelites in the book of Exodus, or Jesus being tempted by the devil in the Gospels.  The wilderness is a place of testing and trial, in which we see our sins with honesty and humility.  It’s also a time of restoration and renewal, as we learn to trust God and receive his grace in a whole new way.  We may not always like the wilderness, but notice that the Lord always leads his people through it – and they never emerge the same as they were before.

The season of Lent is like that: a 40-day wilderness pilgrimage with Jesus as our guide.  As we begin Lent together, I encourage you to spend some time reflecting on this theme.  What do you need to get rid of to start your wilderness journey?  Are there temptations or distractions that stand in your way?  If so, let them go and let the Lord take their place.  On the flip side, what do you need to take on to help you along the way?  Is there a Bible study, prayer retreat, or service project you can jump into to help with the journey ahead?  If so, commit to it and trust that Jesus will use it for your betterment. 

As a church we’ve been studying the Lord’s Prayer on Sunday mornings.  If you need direction, why not start there and pray it slowly and intentionally every single day?  We have prayer guides online and here at the church to guide you in this – just ask me or Emily and we’ll help you out.  For now, I’ll leave you with Jesus’ own words from Matthew 6, beautifully translated by Eugene Peterson in The Message:

Here’s what I want you to do:

Find a quiet, secluded place so you won’t be tempted to role-play before God.  Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage.  The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense his grace…

This is your Father you are dealing with, and he knows better than you what you need.  With a God like this loving you, you can pray very simply. Like this:

Our Father in heaven,
Reveal who you are.
Set the world right;
Do what’s best—
    as above, so below.
Keep us alive with three square meals.
Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others.
Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.
You’re in charge!
You can do anything you want!
You’re ablaze in beauty!
  Yes. Yes. Yes.

With you in the wilderness,

Blake

Jesus Says: I Am the Way

““Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going.”

Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.””

— John 14:1-7

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Today we turned to the "Farewell Discourse" in John's Gospel (chapters 14-17).  It begins with Jesus giving his disciples a word of assurance, a challenge of allegiance, and a call to adventure.  Take a look at these other resources that complement the sermon.

- Blake

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““Are you not thirsty?” said the Lion.
”I am dying of thirst,” said Jill.
”Then drink,” said the Lion.
”May I — could I — would you mind going away while I do?” said Jill.

The Lion answered this only by a look and a very low growl. And as Jill gazed at its motionless bulk, she realized that she might as well have asked the whole mountain to move aside for her convenience. The delicious rippling noise of the stream was driving her nearly frantic.

”Will you promise not to — do anything to me, if I do come?” said Jill.
”I make no promise,” said the Lion.
Jill was so thirsty now that, without noticing it, she had come a step nearer.
”Do you eat girls?” she said.
”I have swallowed up girls and boys, women and men, kings and emperors, cities and realms,” said the Lion. It didn’t say this as if it were boasting, nor as if it were sorry, nor as if it were angry. It just said it.

”I daren’t come and drink,” said Jill.
”Then you will die of thirst,” said the Lion.
”Oh dear!” said Jill, coming another step nearer. “I suppose I must go and look for another stream then.”

”There is no other stream,” said the Lion.””

— C.S. Lewis, "The Silver Chair"

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“It has become customary to classify views on the relation of Christianity to the world religions as either pluralist, exclusivist, or inclusivist … [My] position is exclusivist in the sense that it affirms the unique truth of the revelation in Jesus Christ, but it is not exclusivist in the sense of denying the possibility of the salvation of the non-Christian. It is inclusivist in the sense that it refuses to limit the saving grace of God to the members of the Christian church, but it rejects the inclusivism which regards the non-Christian religions as vehicles of salvation. It is pluralist in the sense of acknowledging the gracious work of God in the lives of all human beings, but it rejects a pluralism which denies the uniqueness and decisiveness of what God has done in Jesus Christ.”

— Lesslie Newbigin, "The Gospel in a Pluralist Society"

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“The way of Jesus cannot be imposed or mapped — it requires an active participation in following Jesus as he leads us through sometimes strange and unfamiliar territory, in circumstances that become clear only in the hesitations and questionings, in the pauses and reflections where we engage in prayerful conversation with one another and with him.”

— Eugene Peterson, "The Jesus Way: A Conversation on the Ways that Jesus is the Way"

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Praise the Lord

Psalm 134 - the last of the songs of ascent - ends with a call to praise:

“Praise the Lord, all you servants of the Lord
who minister by night in the house of the Lord.

Lift up your hands in the sanctuary
and praise the Lord.

May the Lord bless you from Zion,
he who is the Maker of heaven and earth.”

This reminds us that we are made to praise God.  That our chief end (as the Westminster Catechism says) is to glorify God and enjoy him forever!  Could there be a more fitting call for Christ the King Sunday?

Eugene Peterson says this:

“Glorify.  Enjoy.  There are other things involved in Christian discipleship... But it is extremely important to know the one thing that overrides everything else.  The main thing is not work for the Lord; it is not suffering in the name of the Lord; it is not witnessing to the Lord; it is not teaching Sunday School for the Lord; it is not being responsible for the sake of the Lord in community; it is not keeping the Ten Commandments; not loving your neighbor; not observing the golden rule.  ‘The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.’  Or, in the vocabulary of Psalm 134, to bless God.”

— A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, 198

Bono & Eugene Peterson on The PSALMS

Our study of the Psalms continues!  Check out this great conversation between Eugene Peterson (writer of The Message) and Bono (lead singer of U2):