Friends and family of federal Methodist Church.

I want to begin by saying thank you. Thank you for the many ways that you continue to be engaged in the life of our church in our community.Thank you for the ways that you are generous with your prayers, your presence, your gifts, your service and your witness. Thank you for all the that you engage with our neighbors, family and friends. For the ways you continue to learn to engage with us through social media and online worship.

Thank you for the ways that you connect with the people that you regularly connect with each and every day. Thank you also for the ways that you stretch your understanding of community by reaching out to those in your community. We're in a time when what we are doing and how we're living in our community is not business as usual.

Very little of what we're doing, and the new habits we are forming is business as usual. There are many in our community who are furloughed, losing their jobs or unsure if their job will be there in weeks, if not months from now, and yet you keep showing up. You keep logging in, and you keep practicing faith that never discounts doubt but understands that doubt can strengthened and formed with faith in Jesus who we believe is with us in the midst of this pandemic season.

So thank you.

Thank you for the ways that you continue to be who you are, for the ways that you seek to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. For the ways you're a gracious and patient. And thank you for the ways that you're not gracious. You're not patient. Thank you, that you show up, even when the days are harder than we want them to be. Thank you for logging in and showing up in the midst of struggles of times when it's hard to get out of bed. Times when hard to know what to eat, or when you are feeling tired of the day or even this season.

It’s tempting as your pastor to say that we're in this together. It's tempting to want to tell you that we'll get through the season, and all will be well. And there's truth in that and also a bit of falseness. The truth is we know that all things are in God's hands. And the truth is that we also know that we don't know what the day will bring us.

I keep thinking about the Scripture, and the Hebrew Scriptures, talks about the lilies of the field and how we're not meant to worry. And I keep looking outside of my office window and seeing that some of our plants are blooming and others are yet to bloom. And so it is like faith sometimes where some of it has bloomed and we could hold on to it. And there's other aspects of what we do and how we live that hasn’t bloomed yet. If you feel like your faith is holding you steady, if you feel like you see beauty around you, and it's giving you just enough to make it through the days, so you can start tomorrow, asking for daily bread… give thanks feel like you're still waiting for the lilies of the field to bloom for hope to be renewed for energy to come again. Let's also give thanks that we worship a God who never leaves us with never turn away from us. God meets us exactly where we are, because of who we are and how we are made in God's image.

This Sunday at worship and we're going to be continuing our study on the Gospel of Mark, As we focus on specific verses chapter eight. For our weekly email this week, I want to say thank you.

Thank you for who you are.

For your grit, your passion, for the times you get upset and feel fed up and want to throw the towel and yet you get up anyway.

You make it through the day no matter how it goes.

You are beautiful, because you were made in God's creation.

I pray today you feel that you know that, and you live that.

Talk to you soon.

Pastor DJ.