Weekly Email

Church family and friends, 

Grace and peace to you. I hope that you and your loved ones are staying safe in this pandemic season. This weekend is a special one for our church. It’s the Rutherford families last Sunday with us before they move for Eric’s new job. I hope you join us in celebrating their ministry and saying goodbye.

We will also begin a new sermon series called “Enough”. We will begin by celebrating Pentecost. Pentecost means “fifty.” Originally, Jewish people would have gathered fifty days after Passover to celebrate the wheat harvest. Today, Christians celebrate Pentecost fifty days after Easter to celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit to the early believers.

If you want to get a head start on the weekend, please read the first two chapters of Acts. Our time will specifically focus on Acts chapter 2. The start of the Church after Jesus Ressurection feels very appropriate for what’s happening in our world. In light of all that is happening, we are in uncharted territory and have an opportunity to deepen our discipleship as followers of Jesus. 

Please keep Minneapolis in your prayers as they continue to struggle in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death. if you would like to learn more about Floyd’s death, please search for it online or you an check out my Facebook page for some responses from clergy I respect dearly.

I look forward to worshipping with you this weekend.

Grace and peace, 

Pastor DJ

Weekly email

Surely God is my salvation;

    I will trust, and will not be afraid,

for the Lord God is my strength and my might;

    he has become my salvation.

With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. And you will say in that day:

Give thanks to the Lord,  call on his name;

make known his deeds among the nations;

    proclaim that his name is exalted. 

Sing praises to the Lord, for he has done gloriously;

    let this be known in all the earth.

Shout aloud and sing for joy, O royal Zion,

    for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel. (Isaiah 12:2-6)

Greetings Friends and Families of Federal Way UMC, 

This morning I was reading this Scripture passage in Isaiah. I thought about some of the ways we are called to give thanks to God and call on God’s name. We are all in a time of a transition together. There is so much happening in our world and one of the ways we can care for our neighbors and community is to stay home and stay healthy. 

As a people of faith, we have an opportunity to take the time we have to deepen our faith. We can draw water from the wells of salvation. If you don’t regularly read your Bible and spend at least 5 minutes in devotion with God, I highly encourage you to do so. One of my favorite books to use is an oldie but a goody, Oswald Chambers My utmost for His highest is a great devotional. If you have a devotional you use, please feel free to share it in the comments below. That way we can all learn from one another. 

I believe that spending time caring for our spiritual life with God does pour positivity into other aspects of our lives. Just as good nutrition cares for our body and caring for our mental and emotional well being affects our relationship with ourself and others. 

Please take the time to assess this week how you are doing spiritually, emotionally, mentally and physically. Lord knows we can’t fix everything all at once. But, we can invest in small ways everyday to train our habits overall to become healthier and more in tune with God. I hope you know that I’m praying for you daily. I pray that you are holding our community and world in your prayers as well. 

Worship

I apologize for the poor video quality from our worship service last week. We believe we know why it happened and are working hard to ensure that it doesn’t happen again. We have many amazing servant leaders (volunteers) spending extra time each week to help put together our service with great care. 

This Sunday, Reverend Brian Wood will be teaching about Aldersgate Sunday, he’ll be using Romans 5:1-11 as the grounding Scripture. As you prepare for worship this Sunday, I suggest you read the first five chapters of Romans.

The Rutherford family

We have two weeks left where we can worship with the Rutherford family before they move. If you would like to send any cards or a monetary gift, please email our Staff Parish Relations chair SandyShinbo@comcast.net.

Grace and Peace to you all, 

Pastor DJ

Weekly email April 29, 2020

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.

image courtesy of Hypable.com

April 9, 2020

April 8, 2020