Position: Design Coordinator

Hours: 4-5 hours per week

Duties: Format, print, transport bulletins weekly. Format, edit Sunday slides. Create flyers/inserts as needed.

Qualifications: Familiarity with InDesign or equivalent, able to be trained on slides platform.

Interested?

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The Church is called to care for vulnerable children and their families. As James 1:27 says, “Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.” Children in foster care are children who don’t have a permanent, safe, loving home. The Church, as a spirit filled community, is uniquely equipped to surround children and families with love and support. 

This May, our church is joining with DC127 to participate in Foster Care Awareness Month. DC is facing a foster care crisis and this is a critical moment for the Church to respond. This call is for all of us. Everyone can do something when it comes to foster care. Maybe God is calling you to become a foster home, or to volunteer to support a foster, kinship, or family at-risk of separation, or simply to donate and fund DC127’s work.

If you have questions or would like to learn more, please connect with the DC127 church advocate Courtney Bell after the service or check out the DC127 website for more information.

If you would like to join us in prayer this month, check out the prayer guide provided by DC127.

The post Foster Care Awareness Month appeared first on GraceDC.

Grace Downtown – Belonging Through Serving Event Recap: April 11, 2026 

Panel 1: Meeting the Need in D.C. | This panel discussed the current ways our neighbors in DC are experiencing need and how the community can step up to meet those needs.

Panelists included:

● Charity Beam, Faith Community Liaison, D.C. Mayor’s Office. Ms. Beam discussed pressing needs in DC, including the rising cost of living. Ms. Beam noted that neighbors in Wards 7 and 8 feel the effects of rising costs most sharply, and experience difficulty accessing food given the limited number of grocery stores in those wards. She highlighted the efforts of churches around D.C. to meet the needs, including one church’s project to help at-risk individuals complete the paperwork necessary to access resources like housing assistance. 

● Tony Casson, Manager of Mission Muffins, Central Union Mission. Mr. Casson shared his experience leading Central Union Mission’s Mission Muffins program, which equips homeless and employment-challenged individuals with skills applicable to the job market. Mr. Casson described how. each person doing their part to make a difference matters for Christ’s kingdom. 

○ Learn more about Mission Muffins and get involved here. Stop by the food truck 6:30-11:30am Monday-Friday to snag a treat and support the mission (65 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20001) 

● Pastor William Spence, Representative of Breadcoin. Breadcoin distributes food tokens, or “Breadcoins,” to people who are hungry or food-insecure that can be used like cash at local restaurants, bakeries, markets, food trucks, and more. Breadcoin helps feed our neighbors with dignity and support local restaurants. Pastor Spence shared the transformative impact of sharing a table with our neighbors, and the value of helping people access nutritious meals, rather than the cheapest which are often the most unhealthy. 

○ Learn more about Breadcoin and get involved here. 

Panel 2: Making the Leap | This panel addressed common barriers to engagement and best practices for getting started in serving the community. Panelists: 

● Andre Thomas, Mission Muffins Volunteer and Graduate of Restoration and Transformation Program. Mr. Thomas described the value of seeing people as people, recognizing everyone wants to be known, seen and talked to. Reliance on the Holy Spirit and prayer as you go, he said, helps overcome fear and uncertainty when making the leap into serving in new ways. 

● Emma Wenckowski, Grace DT Member & Little Lights Volunteer. Ms. Wenckowski discussed the value of her regular commitment with Little Lights and her belief that giving one’s time should be a sacrifice, just like a tithe. She shared how much it’s blessed her to teach children difficult concepts and show them they can do hard things. Ms. Wenckowski emphasized the importance of humility in service, recognizing we have much to learn from the people we serve.

○ Learn more about Little Lights and get involved here. 

● Ryan Roegge, Executive Director, Love in Action. Mr. Roegge discussed how Love in Action, helps remove the obstacles to service by offering regular Saturday morning service opportunities. Mr. Roegge noted that opportunities are available for any age and shared how many families with children joined with community gardening projects or group outreach walks. 

○ Find out more about Love in Action and how to get involved here. 

● John Nasby, Grace DT Member & Central Union Mission Volunteer. Mr. Nasby highlighted the value of knowing the neighbors and neighborhoods around you, and the importance of being present where God has placed you. When interacting with folks experiencing homelessness, Mr. Nasby explained how simple acts, like remembering names, can go a long way. Mr. Nasby also noted that it can be surprisingly empowering to ask people in need for help, treating them as people with something to offer, rather than problems to be solved.

The post Belonging Through Serving Recap appeared first on GraceDC.

1. The most important thing in the world

The one doctrine that I have supremely in my heart is that of faith in Christ, from whom, through whom, and unto whom all my theological thinking flows back and forth day and night. This rock, which we call the doctrine of justification through faith, was shaken by Satan in Paradise when he persuaded our first parents that they might by their own wisdom and power become like God. Ever since then the whole world has invented innumerable religions and ways through which, without the aid of Christ, to use their works to redeem themselves from evils and sins.

When Paul discusses the biblical doctrine of justification by faith, he explains that there are several kinds of “righteousness.” First, there is political or civil righteousness —the nation’s public laws—which magistrates and lawyers may defend and teach. Second, there is cultural righteousness—the standards of our family and social grouping or class—which parents and schools may teach. Third, there is ethical righteousness—the Ten Commandments and law of God—which the church may teach but only in light of Christian righteousness. So all these may be received without danger, as long as we attribute to them no power to satisfy for sin, to please God, or to deserve grace . . . . These kinds of righteousness are gifts of God, like all good things we enjoy . . . .

Yet there is another righteousness, far above the others, which Paul calls “the righteousness of faith”—Christian righteousness. God imputes it to us apart from our works. In other words, it is passive righteousness, as the others are active. For we do nothing for it and we give nothing for it. We only receive it.

2. The need for Christian righteousness

This “passive” righteousness is a mystery the world cannot understand. Indeed, Christians never completely understand it themselves, and thus do not take advantage of it when they are troubled and tempted. So we have to constantly teach it, repeat it, and work it out in practice. Anyone who does not understand this righteousness or cherish it in the heart and conscience will continually be buffeted by fears and depression. Nothing gives peace like this passive righteousness.

Human beings by nature, when they get near either danger or death itself, will of necessity examine their own worthiness. We defend ourselves before all threats by recounting our good deeds and moral efforts. But then the remembrance of sins and flaws inevitably comes to mind and this tears us apart. We think, “How many errors and sins and wrongs I have done! Please God, let me live so I can fix and amend things.” We become obsessed with our active righteousness and are terrified by its imperfections. But the real evil is that we trust our own power to be righteous and will not lift up our eyes to see what Christ has done for us. . . . So the troubled conscience has no cure for its desperation and feeling of unworthiness unless it takes hold of the forgiveness of sins by grace, offered free of charge in Jesus Christ, which is this passive or Christian righteousness. . . . If I tried to fulfill the law myself, I could not trust in what I had accomplished, neither could it stand up to the judgment of God. So . . . I rest only upon the righteousness of Christ . . . which I do not produce but receive; God the Father freely giving it to us through Jesus Christ.

3. Law and grace

It is an absolute and unique teaching in all the world, to teach people, through Christ, to live as if there were no law or wrath or punishment. In a sense, they do not exist any longer for the Christian, but only total grace and mercy for Christ’s sake. Once you are in Christ, the law is the greatest guide for your life, but until you have Christian righteousness, all the law can do is to show you how sinful and condemned you are. In fact, to those outside of Christian righteousness, the law needs to be expounded in all its force. Why? So that people who think they have power to be righteous before God will be humbled by the law and understand that they are sinners.

Therefore we must be careful to use the law appropriately. If we used the law in order to be accepted by God through obedience, then Christian righteousness becomes mixed up with earned/moral righteousness in our minds. If we try to earn our righteousness by doing many good deeds, we actually do nothing. We neither please God through our works-righteousness nor do we honor the purpose for which the law was given. But if we first receive Christian righteousness, then we can use the law, not for our salvation, but for his honor and glory, and to lovingly show our gratitude.

So then, have we nothing to do to obtain this righteousness? No, nothing at all! For this righteousness comes by doing nothing, hearing nothing, knowing nothing, but rather in knowing and believing this only—that Christ has gone to the right hand of the Father, not to become our judge, but to become for us our wisdom, our righteousness, our holiness, our salvation! Now God sees no sin in us, for in this heavenly righteousness sin has no place. So now we may certainly think, “Although I still sin, I don’t despair, because Christ lives, who is both my righteousness and my eternal life.” In that righteousness I have no sin, no fear, no guilty conscience, no fear of death. I am indeed a sinner in this life of mine and in my own righteousness, but I have another life, another righteousness, above this life, which is in Christ, the Son of God, who knows no sin or death, but is eternal righteousness and eternal life.

4. Living the gospel

While we live here on earth, we will be accused, exercised with temptations, oppressed with heaviness and sorrow, and bruised by the law with its demands of active righteousness. Because of this, Paul sets out in this letter of Galatians to teach us, to comfort us, and to keep us constantly aware of this Christian righteousness. For if the truth of being justified by Christ alone (not by our works) is lost, then all Christian truths are lost. There is no middle ground between Christian righteousness and works-righteousness. There is no alternative to Christian righteousness but works-righteousness: If you do not build your confidence on the work of Christ, you must build your confidence on your own work. On this truth and only on this truth the church is built and has its being.

This distinction is easy to utter in words, but in use and experience it is very hard. So I challenge you to exercise yourselves continually in these matters through study, reading, meditation on the Word and prayer, so that in the time of trial you will be able to both inform and comfort both your consciences and others, to bring them from law to grace, from active/works-righteousness to passive/Christ’s righteousness. In times of struggle, the Devil will seek to terrify us by using against us our past record and the wrath and law of God. So if we cannot see the differences between the two kinds of righteousness, and if we do not take hold of Christ by faith, sitting at the right hand of God (Heb. 7:25) and pleading our case as sinners to the Father, then we are under the law, not under grace. Christ is no savior, but a lawgiver, and no longer our salvation, but an eternal despair.

So learn to “speak the gospel” to your own heart. For example, when the law creeps into your conscience, learn to be a cunning logician. Learn to use arguments of the gospel against it. Say:

O law! You would climb up into the kingdom of my conscience, and there reign and condemn me for sin, and would take from me the joy of my heart, which I have by faith in Christ, and drive me to desperation, that I might be without hope. You have overstepped your bounds. Know your place! You are a guide for my behavior, but you are not Savior and Lord of my heart. For I am baptized, and through the gospel I am called to receive righteousness and eternal life. . . . So trouble me not! For I will not allow you, so intolerable a tyrant and tormentor, to reign in my heart and conscience—for they are the seat and temple of Christ the Son of God, who is the King of righteousness and peace, and my most sweet Savior and Mediator. He shall keep my conscience joyful and quiet in the sound and pure doctrine of the gospel, through the knowledge of this passive and heavenly righteousness.

When we are assured of this righteousness, we not only cheerfully work well in our vocations, but we submit to all manner of burdens and dangers in this present life, because we know that this is the will of God, and that this obedience pleases him. This then is the argument of this epistle, which Paul expounds against the false teachers who had darkened the Galatians’ understanding of this righteousness by faith.

The post Galatians Series: Belonging in Gospel Family appeared first on GraceDC.

“For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (Gal. 5:1).

“Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen” (Luke 24:5-6). This is what the angels say to the women who go to the tomb at first light the morning after the Sabbath. They brought spices and ointments for Jesus’ body. How did they think they were going to get to his body? Who was going to roll the stone away? Questions. One thing they knew about Jesus was that he was dead. They had seen him die an undeserving death. They certainly were not expecting to be the first to experience the victory of God in the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In Luke’s account of the resurrection we hear their response to the angels, “they remembered his words” (Luke 24:9). Imagine their astonishment when they realized, “He told us that he would be crucified and that he would rise on the third day! We didn’t understand it, but it’s happened!” 

The writer to the Hebrews tells us that Jesus’s death is our liberty (Heb. 2:15). In the victory of God over death we are freed from bondage to the fear of death. What’s striking is that when the women report the resurrection to the apostles, their response wasn’t rejoicing in the victory of God. Their response was unbelief (Luke 24:11). Do you ever struggle to embrace the reality of the resurrection? You’re not alone. There are any number of reasons why we may wrestle with belief.

Holy Week culminates in victory. Holy Week culminates in liberty. Even so, we are challenged to reject the things that tempt us to live in bondage and embrace what it means to live in liberty. This is Paul’s exhortation to the Galatians. “Stand firm,” he says. You’ve been in bondage. Live free. 

Because of the redemption that Jesus’s resurrection secures for us the apostle says, you are no longer a slave. You are a son. And if you are a son, then you are an heir through God (Gal. 4:7). This is the message of assurance. If you have put your faith in Jesus Christ alone for salvation, rest assured. Your days of slavery are in the past. There is only freedom in the risen Christ. And when you struggle, remember that God has sent his Holy Spirit into the very seat of your will and emotions, into your heart to assure you that he is your Father, and you are his special child.

Here’s our third invitation. Reflect on what it would mean for you to live with less fear and more liberty in Christ.

A prayer: “Father, you assure us that Christ has set us free to live a free life in him. Help me to resist the temptation to be bound by fear and live more fully into the liberty you have provided.”

The post Holy Week: The Week That Changed The World (pt 3) appeared first on GraceDC.

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20).

Toward the end of the week, Jesus celebrates the Passover with his disciples. Two days before this, Jesus tells his disciples for the third time that he would be handed over to be crucified (Matt. 26:1). A woman with an alabaster flask of very expensive ointment takes her ointment and pours it over his head to anoint his body for burial (Matt. 26:6-13). Jesus tells his disciples during the Passover meal that one of them would betray him. During this same meal he blesses the bread of the Passover, breaks it and says to the disciples, “Take, eat; this is my body.” He takes the cup of wine, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is the blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matt. 26:20-28). 

He and the disciples then go out to the Mount of Olives and to a place called Gethsemane (Matt. 26:30, 36). What we find as our Savior prays in the Garden of Gethsemane is the same thing we saw in our first reflection. He will not be deterred from completing his mission. The shift has begun to take place. The crowds praising him are gone and he prepares the disciples the reality that they will desert him too. “You will all fall away because of me this night,” is the sober message (Matt. 26:31). An essential aspect of his mission is that he will glorify the Father by dying, and by dying alone.

You’ve read Peter’s words before, haven’t you? “Though they all fall away because of you, I will never fall away” (Matt. 26:33). What would you have said had you been there? Would you have joined the chorus with Peter and the disciples of denying your denial? “We will never deny you.” I think that I would have protested my denial right along with them. 

Here is the truth. Jesus suffered the gruesome scourging of the Roman whip, the crown of thorns on his head, the excruciating pain of being nailed to a wooden cross, and the shame of hanging naked. While he did it alone, he did it with you and I in mind. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, despising the shame (Heb. 12:2). He tasted death for us to bring us to glory (Heb. 2:9-10).

How do we respond to that this week, today, now? Paul helps us. He refuses to live for the approval of people (Gal. 1:10). His life is governed by the beauty that in the grotesque crucifixion of Christ is his own crucifixion. The cross didn’t only change the world. It changed him. He is more alive now than he was before faith in Jesus. He will tell the Galatians in chapter 3 that it was before their eyes that Jesus was publicly portrayed as crucified (Gal. 3:1). When you see the cross, do you have eyes to see the immeasurable love of the Son of God? “I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me.” 

My second invitation to us this week is twofold. I invite us to bask anew in the love of God that sent the Son of God to the cross for us. I invite us to examine our hearts for ways that we are refusing to believe God’s love for us.

A prayer: “Lord, help me to rejoice in and believe your love for me. Deliver me from seeking to find my joy in lesser loves.”

The post Holy Week: The Week That Changed The World (pt 2) appeared first on GraceDC.

“For am I now seeking the approval of people or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people I would not be a servant of Christ” (Gal. 1:10)

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20).

“For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (Gal. 5:1).

I have been reflecting on these passages in Galatians as we enter Holy Week. This is the week that changed the world. It begins in celebration on Palm Sunday. It is the week that puts the model of humble service in bold relief before us on Maundy Thursday. This week will pierce our souls with the gruesome agony of Good Friday. And it will bring us to unrestrained praise on Resurrection Sunday.

The three passages in Galatians are not the common verses of Scripture read or focused on during Holy Week. They have been helping me, however, consider the journey that God’s people walk as we make our way through these days.

Our Savior understood from the earliest of his days that he came to do the will of his Father (Luke 2:49; John 5:30), who loved him, and with whom he shared glory before the world began (John 17:5). At a certain point in his public ministry Jesus sets his face toward Jerusalem where he will be betrayed and crucified (Luke 9:51). Every Gospel writer narrates Jesus’ arrival to Jerusalem. What we encounter is the opposite of betrayal. Jesus enters Jerusalem riding on a donkey. The crowd on that first Palm Sunday is rejoicing and praising God, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Hosanna in the highest!! 

Maybe we are so familiar with the story that we rush by the shower of praise for Jesus because we know that the cross is coming. We know that the shout of “Hosanna” will become “Crucify him” in just a few days. I invite us to resist the urge to rush. Instead, pause and reflect upon how you feel when people celebrate you. It’s not likely that any of us have or will receive “Palm Sunday” kind of praise from others, even if we do something amazing. Yet, consider how tempting it is to live for the praise and approval of other people.

The apostle Paul asks the two rhetorical questions in 1:10. “Am I seeking the approval of people or of God?” “Am I trying to please people?” These are rhetorical questions because he is an apostle through Jesus Christ and God the Father (Gal. 1:1). The shouts of praise on Palm Sunday did not move Jesus the slightest bit off of his path to the cross. He was (and is!) the rightful recipient of praise, but secure in his Father’s love and plan, he was not living for that praise. This is one thing that the Spirit does for us through faith in Jesus Christ. Paul stands ten toes down to say that as a servant of Christ he does not live for the approval of people. 

My first invitation to us this week is to explore the ways we are seeking to live for the approval of others over what God commends and approves. Here is a simple prayer from the lectio I use: 

“Father, today I ask that you would liberate my heart from the approval of others. Let my desire be to please you in all things – you alone.”

Pastor Irwyn

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During one of my sermons last month I shared about a contemporary hero of mine, Rev. John Perkins. His shoulders are one of those we stand upon in our pursuit of cross-cultural life and love in Jesus’ name. He went home to be with the Lord last week at 95 years old. Christianity Today published the article below. I pray it encourages you in the faith.

Grace,

Pastor Irwyn

The post John Perkins’ Passing appeared first on GraceDC.

We have a host of resources and practices for Lent that you are invited to explore on our journey together. Don’t miss them on the Grace Mosaic Blog.

Wednesdays, Feb 25 – April 1 | 8:30-9:00am | On Zoom

The post Lent Morning Prayer  appeared first on GraceDC.

A Portrait of the Season

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who live in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Galatians 2:20 (ESV)

Family,

One of my favorite verses in Scripture is Galatians 2:20, 

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who live in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

This verse helps us as we enter the season of Lent next week. During this forty-day period from Ash Wednesday to Easter (not counting Sundays), we are reminded of and re-initiated into the essence of our faith. We belong to Christ as those who have been crucified with him. But just as he was raised to life, so are we! 

When we looked at the Sermon on a Level Place in Luke 6, we heard Jesus describe his disciples as blessed in our status as poor, hungry, weeping and hated. The sacrifice we make during Lent helps us to engage this status in practice as we live by faith in our Lord and his provision. Therefore, family, Lent leads us to joy.

We will mark the beginning of Lent together on Wednesday, February 18 with our Ash Wednesday service at 7 AM in the sanctuary. Before we fast, however, we will feast! Join us on Tuesday evening, February 17 at 6 PM for our Fat Tuesday Feast.

May our Lord be pleased to bless us with a robust experience of his love and grace during Lent as we walk with Jesus.

We have a host of resources and practices for Lent that you are invited to explore on our journey together!

Grace,

Pastor Irwyn

Practices for the Season

The Church has long used Lent as a time to intensify the regular practices of the faith: prayer, fasting, generosity, and repentant acts of love for others. Consider establishing and nurturing meaningful rituals such as these in the life of your home this Lent. Feel free to use your imagination!

• PRAYER. Use the season of Lent as a time to renew and reimagine rhythms of prayer in your life and in the life of your household. Consider establishing a steady rhythm of 20-30 minutes of prayer each morning and evening.
  • Corporate Prayer during Lent: Join our midweek Lenten prayer on Wednesdays at 8:30 am, in person and on Zoom, starting on February 25th.
  • Practice Lectio Divina (or “Abiding”): Want to know more? Read our article “Abiding” to explore this time-tested way of praying with the word of God.
• FASTING. Fasting, at its core, is the practice of abstaining from food for a period of time to devote oneself to feasting on God’s presence in prayer. Through fasting we come to terms with the weakness and humility of our condition and place ourselves in solidarity with those who hunger and thirst in our world. In the Christian Year, we feast and we fast, and then we feast again! The fast prepares us for the feast.
  • Corporate Fasting during Lent. During Lent, we invite the whole community to select a pattern of days/times/meals to fast throughout the week for the duration of Lent. Read our article “Fasting Before The Feast” to orient yourself to the practice and explore ways to implement it during this season.
• ALMSGIVING. Give your money, food, possessions, and time away. Take the money that you would often spend on yourself and give it to the poor. Choose to deny yourself and find the freedom of simplicity. Read our article “People of the Gift” to explore this practice more deeply. The article was written for the Christmas season but almsgiving is a perennial discipline of Christian spirituality.
• SERVICE. Read John 13:1-20. Take on the form of a servant to meet the needs of your neighbors, church family, and household. Serve joyfully in the name of Christ while imitating him. Consider instituting consistent rhythms of service during this Lenten season.

Schedule for the Season

LENT & HOLY WEEK SERVICES

ASH WEDNESDAY
Wednesday, February 18th, 7 am
Grace Mosaic

PALM SUNDAY
Sunday, March 29th, 9:30 am
Grace Mosaic

MAUNDY THURSDAY SERVICE
Thursday, April 2nd, 7 pm
Grace Meridian Hill

GOOD FRIDAY SERVICE
Friday, April 3rd, 7 pm
Grace Mosaic

EASTER SUNDAY
Sunday, April 5th, 9:30 am
Grace Mosaic

Music for the Season

Resources for the Season

Blogs

Read: Giving Up Shame For Lent by Chuck Degroat

“Lent is not a season of trying harder. Lent is a season of rest and return – a return to the goodness of the earth, the ground, that humble place out of which you might recover your heart and rediscover joy.”

Watch: Flemming Rutledge on ‘The Crucifixion’

Flemming Rutledge has written one of the most important books on the Crucifixion in modern times. If you are looking for a wonderful lecture to summarize that work, we recommend this one. It is full of passion, intellect, and Rutledge’s characteristic charm. The Cross is the Crux of the Christian faith. Listen and be in awe and wonder again at the passion of our Lord.

Read: The Origins of Lent by Rev. Dr. Tim Lecroy

Rev. Dr. Tim Lecroy, a doctor of Church History, discusses the historical origins of Lent and Ash Wednesday. If you are looking for a deeper explanation of the history and theology of the Lenten season, then dig into these resources!

Books

Lent by Esau McCaulley [Highly recommended new book!]

“Lent is inescapably about repenting.” Every year, the church invites us into a season of repentance and fasting in preparation for Holy Week. It’s an invitation to turn away from our sins and toward the mercy and grace of Christ.

Often, though, we experience the Lenten fast as either a mindless ritual or self-improvement program. In this short volume, priest and scholar Esau McCaulley introduces the season of Lent, showing us how its prayers and rituals point us not just to our own sinfulness but also beyond it to our merciful Savior.

Practicing The Way by John Mark Comer

“We are constantly being formed by the world around us. To be formed by Jesus will require us to become his apprentice.

To live by what the first Christian disciples called a Rule of Life—a set of practices and relational rhythms that slow us down and open up space in our daily lives for God to do what only God can do—transforms the deepest parts of us to become like him.

This introduction to spiritual formation is full of John Mark Comer’s trademark mix of theological substance and cultural insight as well as practical wisdom on developing your own Rule of Life.

These ancient practices have much to offer us. By learning to rearrange our days, we can follow the Way of Jesus. We can be with him. Become like him. And do as he did.”

Also, check out Comer’s Project of the same name here. We will begin to utilize this material in our own life of formation at Mosaic within the coming year.

The Crucifixion by Flemming Rutledge

“Though the apostle Paul boldly proclaimed “Christ crucified” as the heart of the gospel, Fleming Rutledge notes that preaching about the cross of Christ is remarkably neglected in most churches today. In this book Rutledge addresses the issues and controversies that have caused pastors to speak of the cross only in the most general, bland terms, precluding a full understanding and embrace of the gospel by their congregations.”

Bread and Wine: Readings for Lent and Easter by Various Authors

A wonderful collection of literary and theological writings on the themes of the Lenten season.

Resources for Families with Young Children

The Apostles Creed: For All God’s Children by Ben Myers, Ill. Natasha Kennedy

Historically, Lent was a period where newcomers to the faith would be instructed through the use of the Apostles’ Creed. This is a great children’s book adaptation of the creed!

Illustrated Ministries Lent Material

Illustrated Ministries creates coloring and craft materials for children and families for use during each season of the Christian Year. The material is lovely and cross-culturally accessible.

Wild Hope: Stories for Lent from the Vanishing by Gayle Boss

“As she did in All Creation Waits, Gayle Boss along with illustrator David G. Klein invite the reader into the wild world of creation. Whether or not one observes the liturgical season of Lent, one cannot help but be touched and inspired by this work to take the stewardship of creation more seriously. As Boss says, “The promise of Lent is that something will be born of the ruin, something so astoundingly better than the present moment we cannot imagine it.” Who among us does not want to live into that wild hope?”

The post The Season of Lent appeared first on GraceDC.

Is your child ready to express child-like faith and learn about becoming a communing member of Grace Mosaic? If so, join us for our upcoming children’s Communicants Class! We’ll meet at 8:30 AM four Sundays in a row: April 19, April 26, May 3, and May 10. We’ll explore God’s big story for the world, Jesus’ redemptive work, what the Sacraments are (and why we do them), what the church is (and what it means to be part of it), and more. This class is for children 5 years and up, and one (or both) parents/guardians. Coffee and donuts will be provided. Questions? Email Jahanna.

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Selah Vocal Ministry is back and will soon begin rehearsals for our Good Friday and Easter services. Reach out to Haley with your vocal part and any rehearsal conflicts to join!

*Please bring a pencil and a three-ring binder to rehearsal.

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Join us for 20 minutes of morning prayer and scripture reading on Zoom every Wednesday in Lent. We’ll pray for ourselves, our church and our neighborhood/city. 

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Auditions are held virtually and are open throughout the year with seasonal deadlines for onboarding and scheduling:

Spring Team (April 1), Summer Team (June 1), Fall Team (Sept 1), Holiday/Winter Team (Nov 1)

Questions? Contact Daniel Fitzpatrick

The post Worship Team Auditions appeared first on GraceDC.

• Watch a video remembering Rev. Jesse Jackson, who recently passed away.
• Learn more about Rev. Francis Grimké, the African American Presbyterian who pastored a church in Washington, DC for 50 years, check out these facts collected by CQ Core Group member Chip Slawson, who said, “I have thoroughly enjoyed learning about Grimké…What a fascinating man!”
• Grace Meridian Hill members have curated a special list of Black History Month events, books, resources and suggestions including:
  • Visit the Frederick Douglas National Historic Site
  • Enjoy a black-owned & black-led restaurant
  • Watch the “Eyes on the Prize” PBS documentary series
  • View the full list of resources and events

The post In Honor of Black Heritage Month appeared first on GraceDC.

Specifically, we ask that you would: 

• Praise the Lord that He has sustained us and our city during an administration change unlike any in recent history – resulting in job losses, National Guard deployment, and many other changes. Pray for the flourishing of our city, for wisdom and righteousness of those who lead us, and that God would attune our hearts to the needs of the city for the glory of God.  
• Praise the Lord that He provided us gifted gospel teachers to ensure the word was preached and table served each Sunday.  Praise the Lord for the provision of our interim Pastor in Rev. Irwyn Ince. Pray for Pastor Irwyn, and our sister Kim Ince, as he leads us in this season of transition.
• Praise the Lord for the work of the Pastoral Search Committee. Pray for the PSC as they work to identify our next lead pastor, and pray for our future pastor (and his family, as applicable) – that God would give a clear sense of calling toward GMo.
• Praise the Lord for the ways that you, the beloved Grace Mosaic community, have used your gifts for our church body, and pray for the ongoing ministries of music, welcome, communion, community partnerships, and all the unseen acts of service and encouragement, both large and small. 
• Praise the Lord that our community group ministry grew and deepened in the last year with two new groups. Pray for the leaders of these groups, and Haley as she leads this ministry.
• Praise the Lord for our children!  We had 8 baptisms, and served 54 kids in MoMo nights!  Pray for our covenant children and for Jahanna as she leads this ministry.
• Praise the Lord for KYM, which continues to welcome new students and deepen discipleship – with their best-attended winter retreat and new study on the book of Revelation! Pray for our youth and for Josh as he leads this ministry.   
• Praise the Lord that He has financially sustained our community, and that 6 months into the fiscal year, Tithes and Offerings are 20% above budget.  Through your generosity, GMo has provided $15,000 in scholarships to Howard University students, gift cards to feed hungry neighbors during Thanksgiving, and partnered with DC127 to serve the most vulnerable in our community.  Pray for continued financial support that would allow GMo to continue to powerfully serve our city and community. 
• Pray for the work of the elders, shepherdesses, diaconate, and staff for ongoing wisdom, patience, and discernment as we aim to work together to lead and serve this beloved community.

As you pray for our church, please pray for the denomination that we are a part of, the Presbyterian Church of America (PCA).  As we discussed at the September congregational meeting, a number of ethnic minority pastors have experienced significant and negative culture changes within the PCA in recent years, and have felt that these shifts have adversely impacted the mission to which they’re called.  Over the past few months, Pastor Duke and Pastor Irwyn have been in conversation with an informal group of minority leaders (including Pastor Russ) who’ve been processing this grief together.  This group produced an open letter titled “A Call to Prayer and Lament.”  The call does not seek to vent or condemn, but rather to sincerely call people to something more fruitful: prayer and fasting for the PCA. These prayers are fully aligned with GMo’s mission of unity in diversity.  We invite you to join this group and our leadership in praying and fasting for these items in a concerted manner between now and Easter. You will hear more about how we plan to do this through your Community Group.

Our mission remains unchanged.  We are committed to living as One Body, made of many different parts, following our One Lord here in Washington, DC, for the glory of God and the good of our neighbors – especially those in Ward 5.  While we don’t know what the year holds, we know who holds us and look forward to how God will continue to work in and through our community.  As always, if there are questions, please feel free to write to us at shepherding@gracemosaic.org.

Onward, together, by faith.

The Shepherding Team

Elders Kenny, Chris, Michael, Dolph, and Evan

Shepherdesses Ryland, Cheryl, and Katie

The post Prayers for the Start of 2026 appeared first on GraceDC.

Following are the CG Discussion guides for 2026 and earlier seasons as well.

2026 Discussion Guides

Week of Jan 18 + Announcements

The post Community Group Discussion Guides (2026) appeared first on GraceDC.

Calendar, Colors, and Icon

Dates: Sunday, November 30th – Wednesday, December 24th, 2025

Colors: Dark Blue and Pink (for Gaudete Sunday, the third Sunday of Advent)

Icon: The seasonal icon for Advent contains the Greek letters Alpha and Omega but slightly alters the Alpha to evoke the hands of a clock. This calls to mind Revelation 1:8: “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come….”

About the Season

Introduction to Advent: (Re)Formation Podcast

The people walking in darkness
have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness
a light has dawned.

Isaiah 9:1

There is a 1500-year-old tradition of celebrating Advent in the Christian church as a season of preparation for the feast of Christmas. Advent is the beginning of the liturgical calendar, which takes us through the drama of the story of Scripture and calls us out of our cultural rhythms to find ourselves in light of God’s time and story. Though it falls at the end of our calendar year, Advent is just the beginning.

“The liturgical year does not begin at the heart of the Christian enterprise. It does not immediately plunge us into the chaos of the Crucifixion or the giddy confusion of the Resurrection. Instead, the year opens with Advent, the season that teaches us to wait for what is beyond the obvious. It trains us to see what is behind the apparent. Advent makes us look for God in all those places we have until now, ignored.”– Joan Chittister

Every day of the Christian life, we are called to repent and seek the Lord. The liturgical calendar helps us to approach repentance in different ways. For instance, the repentance in Lent is one of mourning and lament, remembering we are dust, while the repentance in Advent has an orientation of joy and hopeful anticipation. Yes, the joy of Christmas, but also so much more.

In Advent, we are not merely waiting for the birth of Jesus. On this side of the story, we already know that Christ was born as a meek infant to a lowly virgin. And yet, we still find ourselves waiting in the darkness, like those of his time who awaited their Messiah, with news headlines that break our hearts, and our own sinful tendencies and patterns of brokenness overshadowing Christ in us and in our lives.

We are not meant to stay in the nativity story, and Advent doesn’t ask us to pretend as if we don’t already know about the incarnation. Yes, we remember and meditate upon our Lord’s humble birth, but there is more that Christ came to show us; there is more Advent invites us to see. This season of preparation, of prayerful watching and waiting, calls to mind another coming of Christ: the Parousia, the “Presence” or “Arrival” of Christ again in his Second Coming.

This Advent, our sermon series is titled “His Name Shall Be Called” and is grounded in Isaiah 9:

For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Of the greatness of his government and peace
there will be no end.
He will reign on David’s throne
and over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it
 with justice and righteousness
 from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the Lord Almighty
 will accomplish this.
– Isaiah 9:6-7

This is a season of remembering God’s promises to us in Scripture. We are watching and waiting for the comings of Christ, anticipated from old. God’s coming in the incarnation as a meek infant born to peasants, His coming into our lives, turning our world around and gifting us His Holy Spirit, and His coming again, which Scripture tells us is at hand. In Advent, we pray, Maranatha, or “the Lord has come,” and come, Lord Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us!

Practices for the Season

1. Pray. Use the season of Advent and beginning of the Christian Year as a time to renew and reimagine rhythms of prayer in your life and in the life of your household. Consider establishing a steady rhythm of 20-30 minutes of prayer each morning and evening. Consider setting alarms on your clock for morning, noon, evening, and bedtime that will remind you to pause and pray.
2. Fast before you feast. One traditional way to embody the preparatory waiting of the season of Advent is by holding off on major feasting and gifts until the 12 days of Christmas. Consider fasting from food throughout the weeks of Advent, choosing days or mealtimes to skip. During these times of emptiness, seek the fullness of God’s presence through prayer and serving others. Channel your desire for food towards the love of your Maker and neighbor.
3. Give your money, food, possessions, and time away. Take money that you would often spend on yourself or your family and give it to the poor. Consider restraining your household budget during this spending-heavy season when many of us will be tempted to go into debt paying for things we really do not need. Instead, choose to spend less on yourself and more on others who are in greater material need.
4. Serve those in your neighborhood and community. The holy days of Advent and Christmas can be a painfully lonely time for people in your congregation and neighborhood, especially this year. Consider baking and cooking food to deliver to your neighbors. Create gift baskets that can be given with ease to people in need.
5. Establish and nurture rituals and traditions. Keeping time through formative rituals and practices has always been at the life of the people of God (see our article on the Christian Year here). As we prepare to enter into the Christian Year, renew your commitment to the Church by first attending its services and events throughout the year. Additionally, consider establishing meaningful rituals and traditions in the life of your home. Keep an Advent Wreath (see below), establish a day where you serve other people, plan annual outings, etc. Use your imagination.

Resources for the Season

Seasonal Prayer Guide

The GMo staff compiled candle liturgies, devotional reflections, and daily readings for the seasons of Advent and Christmas. Our prayer is that these materials would help you to more deeply experience the beauty of the seasons. We hope you will engage these pages prayerfully, with an attunement to the Lord’s grace, mercy, and glory.

Download Guide

Advent Wreath

It is a beautiful tradition of Western Christianity to keep an Advent wreath on the center of the table and light the candles consecutively on the Sundays of Advent (the pink is for the third Sunday of Advent). In the middle of the wreath sits the Christ Candle, which is lit during the 12 days of Christmas all the way up until Epiphany on January 6th. We recommend buying a wreath from a local supplier and then arranging the five candles around it. Here are a few options:

• Advent candles (taper)
• Advent candles (pillar)
• Christ candle (pillar)
• Advent wreath
• Tiered candle holder

Music for the Season

Podcasts for the Season

Advent: The Season of Hope (Podcast) with Tish Harrison Warren (On the Trinity Forum)

Advent with Word & Table

Books for the Season

Advent: The Season of Hope by Tish Harrison Warren

We tend to think of Advent as the season of anticipation before Christmas―and while it is that, it’s also much more. Throughout its history, the church has observed Advent as a preparation not only for the first coming of Christ in his incarnation but also for his second coming at the last day. It’s also about a third coming: the coming of Christ to meet us in our present moment, to make us holy by his Word and Sacrament. In this short volume, priest and writer Tish Harrison Warren explores all three of these “comings” of Christ and invites us into a deeper experience of the first season of the Christian year.

Silence and Other Surprising Invitations of Advent by Enuma Okoro

Usually when we think of the Advent story, Mary, Joseph, and the angel Gabriel come to mind. Okoro approaches Advent a little differently, inviting us to sit for a while with Zechariah and Elizabeth and the story of how they came to bear their only son, John. The Advent story we so often associate with the joy of Christmas actually begins with deep sorrow and longing. But thankfully, in the kingdom of God, there is always more to the story than meets the eye, Enuma Okoro writes.

Advent: The Once & Future Coming of Jesus Christ by Flemming Rutledge

Advent, says Fleming Rutledge, is not for the faint of heart. As the midnight of the Christian year, the season of Advent is rife with dark, gritty realities. In this book, with her trademark wit and wisdom, Rutledge explores Advent as a time of rich paradoxes, a season celebrating at once Christ’s incarnation and his second coming, and she masterfully unfolds the ethical and future-oriented significance of Advent for the church.

Honest Advent: Awakening to the Wonder of God-with-Us Then, Here, and Now by Scott Erickson

In a world that’s difficult to make sense of, and a season that’s so often overtaken by consumerism, here you’ll find heart-stirring illustrations and thought-provoking meditations designed to show you the raw, powerfully sacred story of Christmas in a new light. Has the joy of the holiday season become painfully dissonant with the hard edges of life? Do you feel weary from the way Christmas has become a polished, predictable brand? You aren’t alone. For too many of us, Christmas has lost its wonder. What if we stopped treating the Christmas story as something that happened a long time ago and started believing that it’s a story that’s still happening today?

Light Upon Light: A Literary Guide to Prayer Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany by Various Authors

This collection contains daily and weekly inspirational readings to help the reader prayerfully experience God through the liturgical seasons of winter. Well-loved classics by Andersen, Dickens, and Eliot join contemporary works by Frederick Buechner and Gary Schmidt. Poems by Donne, Herbert, and Rossetti are paired with newer voices: Scott Cairns, Benjamín Alire Sáenz, Susanna Childress, and Amit Majmudar. Readers are invited to experience Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany in its raw strangeness, stripped of sentiment, and to turn toward Emmanuel.

Living The Christian Year: Time to Inhabit the Story of God by Bobby Gross

Infuse your days with meaning. You are part of a larger Story. And the One who began the Story is at work today, in your life, in the midst of your meetings and bills and family activities that make the days rush by and blur together. In these pages Bobby Gross opens to you–and opens you to–the liturgical year, helping you inhabit God’s Story every day.

Resources for Children and Families

Weekly Advent Children’s Bulletins

Pick up on Sundays at Grace Mosaic!

The Jesus Storybook Bible Advent Activity Book by Sally Lloyd-Jones (Author), Jago Silver (Illustrator)

This is your guide to a complete and creative celebration of the holiday season, filled with crafts, games, recipes, songs, and activities for every day of Advent. The Jesus Storybook Bible Advent Activity Book highlights the significance of the Nativity and meaning of God’s most precious gift.

Seek and Find: The First Christmas by Sarah Parker (Author), André Parker (Illustrator)

Search-and-find activity book with exciting things to find and lots of things to learn about the very first Christmas! Young children will love interacting with the Christmas story as they find, count, and sort over 450 hidden things in this large-format board book. They will learn key truths about the first Christmas through the biblically faithful illustrations and retellings of the Gospel accounts of Jesus’birth.

The Christmas Promise: A True Story from the Bible about God’s Forever King by Alison Mitchell (Author), Catalina Echeverri (Illustrator)

This hardback storybook is a captivating retelling of the Christmas story, showing how God kept his promise to send a new King, a rescuing King, a forever King!

A Very Noisy Christmas by Tim Thornborough (Author), Jennifer Davison (Illustrator)

Some people think that Christmas was a “Silent Night.” Far from it. It was filled with shouting, singing and screaming! It was as noisy as any of our Christmas celebrations. This fun and fresh retelling of the Christmas story comes with invitations to make some noise, so that children can join in as parents read to them. But it also shows children that at the heart of the Christmas story is something we should all be quiet and see: God’s Son Jesus was born, so that we can be friends with God forever.

All Creation Waits: The Advent Mystery of New Beginnings by Gayle Boss

Open a window each day of Advent onto the natural world. Here are twenty-five fresh images of the foundational truth that lies beneath and within the Christ story. In twenty-five portraits depicting how wild animals of the northern hemisphere ingeniously adapt when darkness and cold descend, we see and hear as if for the first time the ancient wisdom of Advent: The dark is not an end but the way a new beginning comes. 

Unwrapping the Greatest Gift: A Family Celebration of Christmas by Ann Voskamp

Unwrap the greatest Gift with your family this Advent season! With vivid, full-color illustrations, downloadable ornaments, and moving scenes from the Bible, this book is a gift your whole family can experience each day leading up to Christmas. Devotions by Ann Voskamp, bestselling author, daily Scripture readings, discussion questions, meaningful Advent activities, and beautiful illustrations.

The Biggest Story Advent: 25 Lift-the-Flap Devotions for Families by Kevin DeYoung (Author), Don Clark (Illustrator)

Kevin DeYoung, pastor and author of the popular Biggest Story Bible Storybook, has written 25 brand new advent devotions for kids that start from the beginning of Scripture and feature a daily surprise. Each reading opens with a fun lift-the-flap page, which kids open to reveal a Bible passage and colorful illustration. On the opposite page, DeYoung retells a related Bible story or prophecy that foretold Jesus’s coming, and shares a simple prayer to recite. Helping kids understand God’s redemption story from Genesis to Jesus’s birth, this devotional is a fun, interactive way to center your holiday traditions on Christ and to see how he is the fulfillment of promises God made throughout Scripture.

The One We’re Waiting For: An Illustrated Advent Devotional for Families by Taylor Combs (Author), Aedan Peterson (Illustrator), Natalie Peterson (Illustrator)

The whole Bible whispers about a coming King. Every book before His arrival gives hints about what He might be like, and during Advent, families around the world gather to wait and prepare for the celebration of His birth. The One We’re Waiting For is a 25-day family experience that will help kids from one to ninety-two anticipate and celebrate Christmas.

The post The Season of Advent appeared first on GraceDC.

Pastoral Search Committee Election Results

Thank you to all who were able to participate in Sunday’s congregational meeting.  We are pleased to announce that the Pastoral Search Committee (PSC) has been approved with the support of the congregation!  

Grace Mosaic PSC:

• Becca Beavers
• Duncan Bedlion
• Christopher Brown
• Kelsey Frierson
• Kenny Gibbs (Elder Representative)
• Sequins Gooding
• Robert Henderson
• Abby Maraya
• Heidi Simenson
• Matthew Schmidt
• Alex Tenney

We covet your continued prayers for these sisters and brothers as they undertake their work.

As always, ​please feel free to send any questions to elder@gracemosaic.org.

Grace and Peace, The Grace Mosaic Session (Kenny, Michael, Dolph and Evan)

Rev Josh Eby Joins Search and Updates

We are writing to follow up to our message last week in which we shared that Grace Mosaic has hired Rev. Josh Eby as a consultant in our Lead Pastor search process.  This email will give you a high level overview of the anticipated process.  

Before we get to the process, we first ask that you commit to steadfast prayer. At this time of transition, the enemy would like nothing more than to sow doubt, division and discord. It has been the faithful prayers of the saints that has built this community, and we are confident that through your prayers God will continue to extend the impactful ministry of Grace Mosaic. Pray for wisdom, for grace, for the search process, for unity, and for our new pastor – that God would be preparing him (and his family) for the work in store at Grace Mosaic. Pray also for Pastors Russ and Joel and their families as they pursue new calls from the Lord. We are working on developing additional times for corporate prayer and will let you know as those develop. 

Roadmap: This is a roadmap for the next steps in the process to recruit a candidate called to, excited about and capable of extending the cross-cultural gospel ministry of Grace Mosaic.  While ultimately the timing is up to the Lord (Gal 4:4), by God’s grace, we intend to kick off candidate recruitment this fall with the goal of having a new pastor start no later than next summer.  

Congregational Participation:  The congregation will play important roles in this process:

# 1. Pastoral search committee (PSC):  We are looking for members to serve as part of the pastoral search committee (PSC).  The PSC will work under the guidance of the church leadership to (a) develop a search packet that reflects our mission, vision and values, (b) interview and evaluate candidates, and (c) present a final recommendation to the congregation.

• PSC Composition: The PSC will consist of 9 individuals in total – 8 members of the church (4 women and 4 men) and 1 elder representative. These individuals will be members in good standing who can effectively represent and reflect our congregation (in terms of years of experience at the church, life stage, and contributions to the community).       
• PSC Nomination Period:
  • The nomination period will be from July 6 – July 20. Please prayerfully nominate members who you believe would be able to effectively participate on this committee.  
• PSC Vote: The Leadership team will assess the nominations and present a slate of candidates for a vote at a congregational meeting after service on July 27.  

#2. Congregational Survey: Whether or not you’re on the PSC, we want to hear your voice! We will send out a brief survey on July 6 so that we can hear from you about your experiences at GMo, and what you hope for in our next lead pastor. This formative feedback will provide valuable information as the PSC commences its work. The survey will be open July 6 – July 25.

#3. Voting to approve the final candidate: Once the PSC has concluded its work and made a final recommendation, the congregation will vote to approve that call. We will aim to keep the congregation up to date regularly so you are aware of the status of the process (~every month).

We know that this is a time of significant transition – in our church, city and world.  We also believe that we have all been called for such a time as this.   God remains at work in our community. God has good plans for our community.  We trust that God will continue to advance the beautiful, fruitful, cross-cultural ministry that He began through the leadership of Pastors Russ and Joel through our new pastor. Whether directly involved in the PSC or not, we encourage you to continue to invest in the life of our community – through prayer, attending Sunday worship, community groups, serving our children and youth, generous giving, attending the Fall Retreat, and the impactful neighbor love that our diaconate so capably leads.  This is what makes GMo so special, and what makes us excited about what the Lord has in store in the next chapter of this ministry.

Please feel free to send any questions to elder@gracemosaic.org.

With Trust in God and His Promises, and Hope for the Future,

The Grace Mosaic Session (Kenny, Michael, Dolph and Evan)

Pastoral Search Process Update

We are writing with excitement to announce that Grace Mosaic has retained Rev. Josh Eby (Ferros Search) as a consultant to help guide our search for our next Lead Pastor!  

Over the past month, Elder Kenny, Shepherdess Kim, and Pastor Glenn met with several potential firms to discern whether engaging their services would be fruitful.  They uniformly felt that having a guide through this process would be a great benefit to our congregation, and that Josh’s pastoral approach, focus on church health, and experience in cross-cultural ministry would best suit the needs of our congregation at this time of transition.  This recommendation was enthusiastically accepted by the broader leadership team!  

The elders met with Josh on Monday night of this week to pray and discuss the road ahead. We plan to send another email next week letting you know about the next steps in this process, including how you will be involved (step 1, pray!). We will follow up with an announcement at our service on 7/6. In the meantime, you can read a bit about Josh here:

Josh Eby is a PCA pastor. He grew up in the PCA in Colorado and California, where his dad served as a church planter. He has served our denomination in a number of ways, including as a church planter, missionary and founder of a ministry. He continues to serve as the Executive Director of Vida House, a ministry that trains international pastors and leaders and provides organizational leadership to their churches and ministries. He is intentionally bi-vocational and works with PCA churches across the country as a pastoral consultant, specializing in helping churches through pastoral transitions. He’s been married to Robin for 29 years and they have 5 children, ranging from 28 to 14. 

Please feel free to send any questions to elder@gracemosaic.org.

With hope and anticipation,

The Grace Mosaic Elders (Kenny, Michael, Dolph and Evan)

Transition Team Update #2

We have an exciting update for our community. After talks about the needs of our church and the opportunities we have, the GMo Leadership Team is happy to announce that Haley, Josh, Caleb, and Jahanna are all stepping into bigger roles at Grace Mosaic!

Haley, who previously served part-time as our Ministry Coordinator, will now serve full-time as our Director of Community Life and Staff, managing church operations in addition to continuing with ministry coordination. Josh and Caleb were Pastoral Residents, and their time at GMo was initially scheduled to conclude this spring as they graduate seminary. However, Josh will now join the GMo staff full-time as the Director of Youth Ministry and church finances. He’ll also be assisting Haley and contributing to the preaching rotation from time to time. Similarly, Caleb will increase his hours to assist with church operations and KYM, and he’ll also bless the community with preaching occasionally. Finally, Jahanna, our Children’s Ministry Coordinator who joined the staff last month, will be increasing her hours and expanding the role as Director of Children’s Ministry. In this new role, she will also be taking on additional responsibilities in communications consultation.

The Leadership Team is really enthusiastic about the continuity, passion, and creativity these four team members will bring to the church during this time. We’re grateful they are willing to step up and take on these new roles. Naturally, there might be some adjustments to job responsibilities as the church moves through this transition, especially as the church plans for an interim and then a permanent Lead Pastor. However, having these key people locked in before summer starts means they can make the most of the time they have with Pastor Joel to learn and take over responsibilities.

For those attending the network-wide Congregational Meeting on June 8th, you’ll see these staffing changes reflected in the budget. With the recent transition news, the Leadership Team has been working hard over the past few weeks to rework the budget. They’ve integrated the reduction of pastoral salaries, the increase in staff salaries, a budget line for an Interim Pastor, and a placeholder for potential search consultant fees.Please continue to pray without ceasing for our church’s transition, as we are just beginning the work. Even as we rejoice at our new staff commitments, we will mark a sad and monumental first milestone in this transition with Pastor Russ’s final Sunday this weekend. The prayers of our community and the powerful grace of our Father will carry us forward in both joy and sorrow. Thank you all for your dedication to GMo, your encouragement to us, and for your support in this season!

The Grace Mosaic Leadership Team

Transition Team Update #1

Thank you to those who participated on April 27th at the congregational meeting – the GMo team was thankful for your questions and for your initial feedback as we start into this transition together. If you were not able to make it, the audio of the meeting is available within the Members Homepage of the GMo website.

The GMo leadership team is working quickly to finalize a transition roadmap, working closely with the Grace DC network pastors. One key element of that will be standing up a search committee for a new lead pastor, following Pastor Russ’s departure on June 1. This will involve congregational participation, so stay tuned for more information on this. Another important line of effort is sustaining current congregant support structures and ensuring administrative functions of GMo continue uninterrupted in the interim before a new lead pastor is identified. While Pastor Joel will have a key role in this prior to his departure by summer’s end, this will be a team effort as we align the efforts of the shepherding team, the diaconate, and our current non-pastoral staff, who are an incredible blessing to our GMo family. We are grateful for the ways our staff will provide continuity and are very excited that Jahanna Schwab has just taken over as our children’s coordinator!

If you are wondering how you can help or what you can do immediately, here are four simple things we suggested during the congregational meeting:

1. Pray corporately and individually for this transition, for the leadership team, for unity of the body, and for God to sustain the work of His church in this city.

2. Take care of your GMo family members, looking for ways to serve your brothers and sisters – this is already an incredible strength of GMo! As the leadership team increases focus on the pastoral transition, each of you will be best positioned to recognize a GMo brother or sister in need and take action to help.

3. Lean into the GMo community by committing to your CG, joining a small group, volunteering with a ministry partner, and signing up to help with our children/youth ministry. Now is a great time to strengthen your investment in our church’s life!

4. Give us feedback. We are trying to plan wisely and anticipate gaps, but we’ll miss things. Your perspective is essential as we partner with you to provide care for this church body and continue to advance the Gospel in Northeast DC.

The leadership team will continue to provide updates, to include some specific reflections on this transition, to include a series of letters from Pastor Russ (the first sent last week), and we will schedule additional congregational meetings going forward. If you have specificquestions in the meantime, please reach out to a member of the leadership or email shepherding@gracemosaic.org.

In partnership with you,

The GMo Leadership Team

The post Pastoral Search Updates and Info appeared first on GraceDC.

Family of God: Belonging

Last year, our prayer and desire was to practice Welcoming. Post-Covid, our muscles were still weak. So, we prayed and practiced. And, God heard and acted! 

I have heard from several visitors–new residents to summer interns–that our community has been a place of intentional, joyful welcome. Praise God! 

As we approached our larger theme of “Family of God” for this ministry year, in the Spring, our leaders began to reflect on what they have seen and heard, seeking the Lord for vision for the upcoming year. That prayer and discussion led to one word: Belonging. That everyone in our community would view themselves not as newcomers or oldcomers but as Belongers. A “first born” child in God’s family; an indispensable part of Christ’s body; a seeker invited into the family circle.

We are in a cultural moment–even within the Church–where tremendous force is seeking to pull the Family of God apart. Political allegiance, cultural righteousness, even horrible violence have triggered heated debates and division among Christians. Taking up the weapons of the world (gossip, marginalizing, hatred) in an effort to fight flesh and blood (the opposition). More than ever we need to prioritize what is priority–the historic, intercultural, global Kingdom of Christ. 

As Paul states in Ephesians 4:“There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” If this is not our preoccupation chiefly, our meditation daily, and our orientation resolutely–we will be divided.  

BUT, over 20 years of God’s faithfulness to Grace Downtown leads me to a more hopeful conclusion:  “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”  As we “belong” to our call, and corporately call upon God for our “belonging,” we will emerge from this ministry year more unified and powerful as the Family of God. Let’s lean in, Family!

The post Pastoral Reflection on this Year’s Ministry Theme appeared first on GraceDC.

Colors and Icon

Dates: Easter Sunday (April 20th) – The Day of Pentecost (June 8th). Ascension Day (May 29th)

Colors: White and Gold

Icon: Our Easter seasonal icon combines the image of a crown and a throne, symbolizing our Lord’s Kingship and victory over death. But there is more than meets the eye: the crown is also an ichthys interwoven in a Trinitarian form. Masterfully designed by Atlas Minor Design Studio.

A Portrait of the Season

“To be a Christian is, perhaps above all things, to be a person whose life is anchored in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Indeed, the Christian life is unintelligible apart from this resurrection. We pray believing that He hears. We weep believing that He cares. We struggle believing that He helps. We live this life, in other words, because we believe that Jesus lives. And the work of such a life—its very meaning—is to bear witness to the reality of this resurrection in who we are and what we do.” – Gregory Thompson

“For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.” – 1 Corinthians 15:16–22

There is something incredibly satisfying and captivating about a solid first line. In an age where our attention spans are at an all-time low and distractions abound, a riveting hook is essential in sparking and sustaining our interest. Think of some of the most classic first-liners: “Call me Ishmael” (Herman Melville’s Moby Dick), “I am an invisible man” (Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man), “You better not never tell nobody but God” (Alice Walker’s The Color Purple). These few words catapult readers into whole worlds.

In Mark 1, we, too, are ushered into a new world. In his inaugural sermon, Jesus captures an entire city with the best of all one-liners: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand.” In the synoptic Gospels, we walk through plot, characters, and conflict until the grand climax, Jesus’s crucifixion. If it ended there, the story of the gospel would not be interesting at all, let alone a classic. Those first words would lack their power, falling on the ears of a dying people who would be, as Paul wrote, “most to be pitied.” And yet, as we know and celebrate in this Eastertide season, the story continues. Hallelujah!

After a weekend in the grave, Jesus is raised from the dead, and now, as N. T. Wright explains, “the resurrection completes the inauguration of God’s kingdom. . . . It is the decisive event demonstrating that God’s kingdom really has been launched on earth as it is in heaven.” Easter, then, is the celebration not only of our risen Savior, but also of our conquering king who defeated hell and the grave. Easter installs the kingdom of God, a kingdom of hope, peace, and life for all who would enter. The same Jesus who spoke that first line is now the “first fruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Cor. 15:20). This is significant, because while other stories may start with an iconic first line, they all inevitably end. This gospel story, though, is one that doesn’t end but, as C. S. Lewis quips, “goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

-Written by Ashley Williams, Ministry Coordinator of Grace Mosaic and co-director of the Daily Prayer Project. Adapting and updated from the introduction from the Easter 2023 Living Prayer Periodical of the Daily Prayer Project, a publication of Grace Mosaic.

“Easter is the highest feast of the Christian year and the central celebration of the story of our faith as Christians. In addition to fifty days of celebrating Jesus’s resurrection, the church also celebrates the ascension of Jesus on Ascension Day, which occurs forty days after Easter (Acts 1:3).”

Joel Littlepage

Practices for the Season

PRAYER

Use the season of Easter as a time to renew and reimagine rhythms of prayer in your life and in the life of your household. Consider establishing a steady rhythm of 20-30 minutes of prayer each morning and evening using the Daily Prayer Project.

FEASTING

The Easter season is the highest feast of the Christian year. So, throw feasts and parties! Practice hospitality and hosting in regular rhythms that allow for the practice to mature and spread. In the midst of this practice, remember our Lord’s words: “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.” (Luke 14:12–14). As Gregory Thompson writes in the article linked above: “We too are called to take on the role of Host in the name and power of the risen Jesus. And there is no better time to do this than the high feast of the Christian year: Easter.”

CREATION CARE

The resurrection of Jesus is the Creator’s renewed proclamation to the world that the Creation “is very good” and will all be healed (Rev. 21:5). Use this season to experience God’s creation more deeply and learn how to be better stewards of it. This begins with the care of our neighbors, image-bearers of God. Consider ways to work towards the flourishing of your neighbors in this season. Also, consider starting your own garden, or volunteering at community gardens, farms, or forest patches. Or, simply, pick up trash around your neighborhood.

ESTABLISH AND NURTURE RITUALS

Keeping time through formative rituals and practices has always been at the life of the people of God. Consider establishing meaningful rituals and traditions in the life of your home. Start times of household worship using passages or prayers from the Daily Prayer Project, establish a day where you serve other people, plan annual outings, etc. Use your imagination.

“…while other stories may start with an iconic first line, they all inevitably end. This gospel story, though, is one that doesn’t end but, as C. S. Lewis quips, “goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

Ashley Williams

Music for the Season

Articles and Videos

Watch: “Dawn Of The New Day ” by Bishop GE Patterson (Classic Easter Sermon)

Enjoy this classic Easter sermon from Bishop G.E. Patterson, recorded in 1992 at the Temple of Deliverance Church of God in Christ-Memphis, Tennessee

Read: Easter Sermon of St. John Chrysostom

The Easter sermon of John Chrysostom, an ancient Turkish church father, has remained a classic text for over 1700 years. Click and see why. “No one need grieve over sins; forgiveness has dawned from the tomb. No one need fear death; the Savior’s death has freed us from it.”

Watch: N.T. Wright on the Resurrection of Jesus: Fact or Ancient Fiction?

N.T. Wright, a foremost scholar of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, answers the common and obvious question: “Isn’t the resurrection just an ancient religious myth?” Additionally, his lecture entitled “Resurrection and the Renewal of Creation” is highly recommended.

Books

Surprised by Hope by N.T. Wright

“Wright outlines the present confusion about a Christian’s future hope and shows how it is deeply intertwined with how we live today. Wright asserts that Christianity’s most distinctive idea is bodily resurrection, and provides a magisterial defense for a literal resurrection of Jesus. Wright then explores our expectation of “new heavens and a new earth,” revealing what happens to the dead until then and what will happen with the “second coming” of Jesus. For many, including many Christians, it will come as a great surprise to learn that heaven comes to earth instead of us going to heaven.

Wright convincingly argues that what we believe about life after death directly affects what we believe about life before death. For if God intends to renew the whole creation—and if this has already begun in Jesus’s resurrection—the church cannot stop at “saving souls” but must anticipate the eventual renewal by working for God’s kingdom in the wider world, bringing healing and hope in the present life.”

Reparations: A Christian Call for Repentance and Repair by Duke Kwon and Gregory Thompson

“Christians are awakening to the legacy of racism in America like never before. Reparations explores the church’s responsibility for the deep racial brokenness at the heart of American culture, investigates the Bible’s call to repair it, and offers a vision for the work of reparation at the local level. The authors lead readers toward a moral imagination that views reparations as a long-overdue and necessary step in our collective journey toward healing and wholeness.”

Bread and Wine: A Love Letter to Life Around the Table with Recipes by Shauna Niequist

“Bread & Wine is a literary feast about the moments and meals that bring us together. With beautiful and evocative writing, Shauna celebrates the sweet and savory moments that happen when family and friends sit down together. She invites us to see how God teaches and feeds us even as we nourish the people around us, and she explores the ways that hunger, loneliness, and restlessness lead us back to the table again.”

Resources for Families with Young Children

The Apostles Creed: For All God’s Children by Ben Myers, Ill. Natasha Kennedy

Historically, Lent was a period where newcomers to the faith would be instructed through the use of the Apostles’ Creed. This is a great children’s book adaptation of the creed!

Illustrated Ministries Easter Material

Illustrated Ministries creates coloring and craft materials for children and families for use during each season of the Christian Year. The material is lovely and cross-culturally accessible.

The post The Season of Easter appeared first on GraceDC.

Holy Week 2025

Dates: Palm Sunday (April 13, 2025) – Holy Saturday (April 19, 2025)

Icon: Our Lenten seasonal icon prominently features an Ethiopian cross, designed by Atlas Minor.

“The liturgical year is an adventure in bringing the Christian life to fullness, the heart to alert, the soul to focus…It is the process of slow, sure immersion in the life of Christ that, in the end, claims us, too, as heralds of that life ourselves. ”

Joan Chittister, The Liturgical Year

A Portrait of Holy Week

“For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.”

(1 Corinthians 2:2) 

Dear sisters and brothers, the time of Holy Week is yet again upon us. This is the centerpiece of our annual cycle of worship together and represents the core of our faith: what we believe about God, ourselves, and the world, culminating in the life, death, and resurrection of the messiah Jesus Christ. As such, it is to be treated as holy, “set apart,” from other times within the calendar of our life together. Below you will find a calendar of the week, including in-person prayer services, stations of the cross pilgrimages, daily devotionals, and more.

May we all enter into this week with reverence, sobriety, and joy as we experience anew the love of God shown to us through the passion of Christ.

-Written by Rev. Joel Littlepage

HOLY WEEK SERVICES & EVENTS

PALM SUNDAY
Sunday, April 13, 9:30 AM
Grace Mosaic

SPRING BBQ
Sunday, April 13, 5 PM
Grace Mosaic

HOLY MONDAY PRAYER
Monday, April 14th, 12-12:30 PM
Grace Mosaic

HOLY TUESDAY PRAYER
Tuesday, April 15, 12-12:30 PM
Grace Mosaic

HOLY WEDNESDAY: STATIONS OF THE CROSS
Wednesday, April 16, 12 PM
Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in America

MAUNDY THURSDAY PRAYER
Thursday, April 17, 12-12:30 PM
Grace Mosaic

MAUNDY THURSDAY
Thursday, April 17, 7 PM
Grace Meridian Hill

GOOD FRIDAY
Friday, April 18, 7 PM
Grace Mosaic

EASTER SUNDAY
Sunday, April 20, 9:30 AM
Grace Mosaic

Holy Week Devotional Reflections

The Grace Mosaic staff has prepared daily reflections for Holy Week using readings and artwork from the Living Prayer Periodical.

• PALM SUNDAY
• HOLY MONDAY
• HOLY TUESDAY
• HOLY WEDNESDAY
• MAUNDY THURSDAY

The (Re)Formation Podcast explores spiritual formation into the way of Jesus for the Grace Mosaic community. During Holy Week, we will be releasing daily episodes with a gospel reading and staff devotion to guide your reflection and prayer in anticipation of Resurrection Sunday.

View Episodes

Resources

Lent Living Prayer Periodical

The Daily Prayer Project is a publication ministry of Grace Mosaic that supplies a holistic resource for spiritual formation to thousands across North America and the globe. You can access the Lent Living Prayer Periodical outside the sanctuary on Sunday mornings, or here.

Stations of the Cross Booklet

In the Stations of the Cross, Christians all over the globe engage in a profound act of remembrance during Holy Week. Dating back to the early Christian community, this ancient practice is a pilgrimage in the Spirit to the “places” where Jesus suffered for us and our salvation. In the neighborhood that Grace Mosaic calls home—Brookland—we are blessed with a replica of the traditional processional route in Jerusalem, The Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land at 14th & Quincy St. NE! On Wednesday, April 16 at Noon we will gather together in person at the monastery to meditate on the stations together. You can access Grace Mosaic’s Stations of the Cross Booklet here.

Music for Holy Week

A Brief History of Holy Week

The early history of Holy Week, principally the the Triduum(pronounced trij-oo-um)– Latin for “three days” (counted from sundown to sundown), consisting of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday–is complex and varied, from East to West.

The common dominator is the connection to the Jewish feast of Passover (or Pasch, from the Greek verb “to suffer,” which eventually becomes known in English as the “passion”). Even in the writings of Paul, you see a clear connection between Passover of old and the new covenant:

For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us therefore celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. (1 Corinthians 5:7–8)

The early foundations of the way we celebrate Holy Week are found within the liturgy of the ancient church of Jerusalem. A pilgrim named Egeria (mostly likely from Spain) came to Jerusalem sometime between the years 381-384 A.D. and kept a very detailed diary of her experience worshipping with the Christians of Jerusalem. She recounted the following testimony:

• The churches gathered on Thursday evening to celebrate the Lord’s Supper and then kept an all-night vigil until dawn(!).
• During that vigil, they ventured to the Garden Gethsemane and, at Dawn, walked back to Golgotha, the supposed location of the Crucifixion.
• They took a break until 8 AM. Then, with more readings, hymns, and psalms, they continued to worship from noon to 3 PM.
• At that point, the traditional time of the historical crucifixion, they read the crucifixion narratives and ended with a reading about the burial of Christ.
• After a long period of silence and fasting, on Saturday night, they gathered again to read through a large portion of the Old Testament (reviewing important episodes in God’s redemption) until finally, they arrived at the resurrection narratives and 1 Corinthians 15. They lit the “new fire” and sang the “alleluia!” sometime late on Saturday evening.
• During that service, the catechumens who had been instructed in the doctrines of the faith were baptized.
• On Sunday morning, they worshipped at sunrise and throughout the day. Those newly baptized members of the church partook of their first eucharist.
• Finally, they celebrated the feast of Easter for 8 days! Many came back to the church throughout those 8 days to receive lectures and teachings. 

If I could summarize, I would say that those early Christians saw this week as both the climax and the bedrock of the story of their faith. Many traveled to Jerusalem for this week. We walk and worship in their legacy of faith.

The post Holy Week 2025 appeared first on GraceDC.

Matter is not evil, nor is food, sex, power, or money. What is evil is the human desire to turn goods into greats, servants into masters, means into ends. These tyrannical forces appear harmless until we find ourselves beckoning at their every whim and call. Why can’t we stop eating even to our peril? Why can’t we kick addictions that leave us feeling ashamed and empty? Why can’t we stop ourselves in the midst of anger or unkind words? Why do our feelings of significance always involve chasing more accolades, higher paychecks, and a better reputation? The answer, of course is that we have been trained in these ways; they are second nature to us in a fallen world.

Jesus came bearing the news of a different world, the “Kingdom of heaven.” Heaven being the place of God’s presence, power, and plans. The world as it was meant to be: worship, communion, gratitude, justice, rest, satisfaction; in a word: love, for God is love.

The movement of Lent, the call of the season, is to redirect desire and action towards the love of God and all God loves. To “repent.” “Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent,” our Lord says to the lukewarm church of Laodicea, (Revelation 3:19 ESV). The word translated “zealous” here is a word of desire. Jesus says, in effect: “want it!”

Want what? A different kind of world than we’ve been trained for. God’s kind of world. And how do we get there? How do we get to a place of actually wanting the good? Like anything good in our lives, the source of that goodness is God himself and his gracious activity. But, of course, our call is to participate and grow in that grace. This participation can come in many tangible forms but for the purpose of our Lenten context, it seems that the most pressing exploration is that of fasting, for fasting hits us where it counts: in our bodies.

The practice of abstaining from food interrupts the flow of our desire for satisfaction. “Take and eat” becomes “stop and wait.” That movement is far more profound and foundational than we realize. Even if we simply fast from sweet things or meat, it will not be long before we encounter our strong desire for those things over against our intention to abstain. And it is here, in the place of our desire, where something profound can take place over time. We can learn, in our bodies, that we are not a slave to our desires; that there is freedom to choose what we want in a new way, even if those feelings are conflicted. In that moment, we can lean into brief prayers or meditations over Jesus’ loving self-denial.

Then, this training can begin to flow into different areas of desire in our bodies: the taming of our tongue (Jam. 3:5-8), the control of our sexual desires (1 Cor. 6:19), our materialism, our violence, and our proliferation of words (Eccl. 3:7). St. Paul says it like this: “But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified,” (1 Cor. 9:27 ESV).

All of this discipline (a bad word in the modern world if there ever was one!) is not an end in itself. Any “spiritual” discipline can be a source of great abuse to the soul if it is not sourced in and aimed toward love. “If you love me, you will keep my commandments,” says our Lord. (Jn.14:15 ESV). Fasting is a practice to help train our desires toward that love of Christ. Our world desperately needs witnesses for a different kind of world. Our call is to be martyrs (witnesses) to this heavenly kingdom.

Practical Considerations for Fasting

1. Fasting is a form of training for whole self: body, mind, and heart. We should ease into the practice of fasting.
2. There are options and degrees. Skipping one meal on a meal, then two, then eventually three, and then multiple days. Start small and build. A time-tested method for fasting is “sundown to sundown.”
3. You can practice just a water fast; a water and juice; a bread and water. Whatever you do, drink lots of water!
4. Some of you who are nursing mothers or who have other health conditions might not be able to do a total fast, but maybe you could find another way of denying yourself in food, drink, or something else.
5. Use the skipped meal times for prayer, used the skipped food and financial resources to fulfill the needs of others (Isaiah 58:7)
6. Read Matthew 6:16-18. Don’t call attention to yourself. Don’t be irritable (Is. 58:4)
7. Read this basic introduction to fasting from Richard Foster or listen to this sermon from Pastor Joel.

The post Fasting appeared first on GraceDC.

After reading Pastor Joel’s article, Stillness, in the latest edition of the DPP, I realized this is exactly what the Lord has been leading me toward over the past few months.

As a Licensed Graduate Professional Counselor and GMo Shepherdess, my role requires me to sit with people, listen intently, be present, and be still for others. Yet, I often struggle with doubts about my abilities, a waning desire to participate, and, at times, overwhelming fatigue. I remind myself that these could be signs of spiritual warfare and/or burnout, but even with a daily devotion routine, the internal battles persisted.

In September 2024, I accompanied my husband to Incheon, South Korea, for the 4th Lausanne Congress, a global Christian conference. While he attended sessions, I had the opportunity to be still with the Lord. During these quiet moments, I sensed Him saying: “You’re struggling because you are not making space to be still with Me. You need to be still so you can hear My voice and how I am directing you each day. You need to build in daily rest.”

Since then, I have been on a journey to create more margin in my life—space to be still, hear Him clearly and rest. What does this look like? My morning devotional time has not just continued but deepened as I learn to slow down and abide with God. I stop working after 7 PM to reflect on the day, recognize God’s hand in my life, and see how He has answered my prayers. During Lent, I am fasting from social media and binge-watching my favorite shows, replacing them with reading, listening to music, or simply enjoying quiet, and sensing God’s presence. This way of living is not easy. God continues to test my commitment, yet I press forward, trusting He will strengthen me.

At 57 years old, mortality feels more real as I watch my elders pass on. When I take my last breath, I want to be so at peace that I will not be afraid—because I have spent time cultivating stillness and dwelling in His presence.

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.” — Psalm 23:4

Kim Ince
GMO Shepherdess

The post Stillness (Reflection) appeared first on GraceDC.

Once a man has made up his mind to live his life in stillness, let him set himself in order and pass the rest of his days in the cultivation and regular practice of stillness.

Meditation

A spiritual teacher who has meant much to me over the last three years has been St. Isaac the Syrian, or, as he is sometimes called, St. Isaac of Ninevah (ca. 613–ca. 700). After rising to a prominent position in his native Syrian church, he was appointed as the bishop of Ninevah (modern-day Mosul, Iraq) in 676 CE. For reasons unknown to us, he resigned that position within six months and forsook the upward ladder of church leadership. He moved out into the desert to be a hermit and eventually became a leader in a small monastic community of people seeking the Lord. He was revered for his teaching and wisdom.

Reading ancient Christians can be quite the intellectual, emotional, and theological task, especially reading desert hermits like Isaac. The distance that exists between them and us is profound: culturally, historically, and sometimes theologically. Reading Isaac is indeed challenging at times. But I happen to think that the challenge of reading Christians of different times, places, and persuasions is a crucial discipline because it chastens us and reminds us of the vastness of the body of Christ and the limits of our own times. I have found Isaac to be a gentle and wise teacher who focuses much attention on the inner dynamics of a heart that is seeking after the love of God. One of my favorite proverbs of his is “The aim of prayer is that we should acquire from it love of God, for in prayer are to be found all sorts of reasons for loving God” (Hom. 63, B 439, from The Wisdom of St. Isaac the Syrian).

Around eighty-five of Isaac’s homilies have survived. The brief homily shared here in its entirety is given the number 13 and is introduced as an exploration of stillness, a challenging practice for ancients and moderns alike. In the prelude to the text, Isaac discusses how sometimes in our lives, “melancholy and suffocation of soul occur[s],” and “sometimes sudden joy and unaccustomed fervor.” The spiritual life is full of seasonal, weekly, and daily modulations: there is light, and then there is darkness; there is melancholy, and then there is joy; there is withdrawal, and then there is engagement. The key, Isaac says, is to cultivate the regular practice of stillness and prayer, to keep reading the scriptures and those who have come before us, and to be patient, “expect[ing] to receive help” from God. Help shall then come.

Once a man has made up his mind to live his life in stillness, let him set himself in order and pass the rest of his days in the cultivation and regular practice of stillness.

Whenever it happens to you (as is usual in the regular practice of stillness which is determined by divine grace) that your soul is enshrouded by thick darkness from within and, as with the sun’s rays when they are hidden from the earth by the mist of clouds, for a brief time she is deprived of spiritual comfort and the light of grace on account of the cloud of passions that overshadows her; and further, that the joy-producing power in your soul is curtailed for a little, and your mind is overshadowed by an unwonted mist: then do not be troubled in mind, do not lend a hand to despondency. But be patient, be engaged in reading the books of the Doctors of the Church, compel yourself in prayer, and expect to receive help. Then straightway help will come unawares.

For just as by the rays of the sun the face of the earth is unveiled from the darkness of the atmosphere that enshrouds it, even so is prayer able to dissolve and scatter the clouds of passions from our soul, and make our mind transparent to the light of gladness and comfort which, indeed, it customarily produces in our thoughts, but especially when it possesses material of succor from the divine Scriptures and vigilance, which make the mind to shine. For continual study in the writings of the saints fills the soul with incomprehensible wonder and divine gladness. To our God be glory unto the ages. Amen.*

Exploration

1. How do you notice yourself responding to the words of Isaac? What is the practice of stillness like for you?
2. Consider incorporating regular times of stillness into this Lenten season. Perhaps there is a certain place in your area that is more conducive to this kind of stillness (Isaac found a cave); consider making regular visits there.
3. Who are those teachers of the spiritual life who fill your soul with “incomprehensible wonder and divine gladness”? Consider making a regular practice of learning from them in this Lenten season.

Joel Littlepage is the associate pastor of Grace Mosaic, laboring in the areas of worship and spiritual formation. A professional musician, he lives in the beautiful Fifth Ward of Washington, DC, with his wife, three sons, and a flock of chickens.

*The Ascetical Homilies of Saint Isaac the Syrian, rev. 2nd ed., trans. Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Boston, 2011. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

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Lent at Grace Downtown

Join us for our regular Sunday worship services, as well as special services throughout the season. 

Lent 2026 (February 18 – April 4)

• February 18: Ash Wednesday Service, 12pm, Chinese Community Church (500 I St NW)
• March 29: Palm Sunday (normal 5pm service)
• April 2: Maundy Thursday Service at Grace Meridian Hill at 7:00 pm
• April 3: Good Friday Service at Grace Mosaic at 7:00 pm

If you would like to follow along with your personal worship times at home, please consider checking out the Lent Resources prepared by our sister church, Grace Mosaic.

The post What is Lent? appeared first on GraceDC.

“If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. . . Because I live, you also will live. In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.

(John 14:15–17, 19b-20)

The Holy Spirit is our vital connection to Jesus and the Father. The Helper has been sent to cultivate our life in the soil of sacred love that has always existed between the Father and the Son. As the Spirit roots our life within that love, we reciprocate that love and bear the beautiful fruit that feeds our hungry souls and blesses our hungry world. It is in this place of loving fruitfulness that Jesus says our joy “will be full,” (John 15:11). Obedience to Jesus springs from our love of Jesus and his commands, which is cultivated by the Spirit and the Spirit’s breathed-out word: holy scripture.

But this is also true: that connection that the Spirit brings about can be “quenched,” suppressing that powerful force of divine love within our lives (1 Thess. 5:19) and robbing ourselves of the vital nutrient that we creatures need to be fruitful (Gal. 5:16). Our resistance to the Spirit is constant. It is a battle between our “flesh” (human nature operating out of its own fallen power) and the Spirit (human nature transformed by God’s power). How can we continually reorient ourselves to the presence and power of the Spirit? The mothers and fathers of our faith have practiced and passed down to us a method of prayer called lectio divina (sacred reading) that facilitates this orientation.

Every day in the Daily Prayer Project, there is a portion of the liturgy called Abiding. If you’ve prayed using the DPP for a while, you’ll recognize this line: “Read. Meditate. Pray. Contemplate.” These are the four stages of lectio divina. Let’s explore them now.

EXPLORATION

Our practice of prayer and encounters with scripture can be mindless, rote, and hurried. The goal of abiding is to slow ourselves down and dwell with the Spirit, leading us–through his breathed-out word–to the Father and the Son. This method can be practiced as a group or individually. Choose a passage of scripture from the DPP Lectionary for that day and journey along this ancient path.

Prelude: Take some time to breathe in and out. Call to mind the presence of the Spirit, the breath and wind of God. As you inhale, pray: “Spirit of God, here with me now” and as you exhale: “Help me to be here with you.” Take note of one aspect of your breath (nostrils, lips, lungs, etc.) and pay attention to your whole body. Be still before the Lord. Prepare to listen.

I. Read (put the scripture on your tongue). 

A. As you first encounter scripture, simply read or listen to the passage. 

B. Study the scripture with the time and resources available to you.

C. Ponder this question: “What do these words say?”

II. Meditate (chew on scripture). 

A. As you journey upwards, seek the higher meanings of the passage.

B. Ponder this question: “What are the higher realities that the Spirit is drawing out right now? What is the essence of these words”?

III. Pray (ask for the ability to taste)

A. As you turn your attention to the Giver of the word, ask the Spirit to purify your heart so that you might see God and taste his goodness (Matt. 5:8).

B. Ask the Lord: “Will you show me myself through this passage? Will you show me yourself through this passage? I long for you; I long behold you. Purify me and help me to taste your goodness.”

IV. Contemplate (taste the goodness of God)

A. In the heights of prayer, we experience the reality that Jesus talked about: “You will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.” To contemplate is to taste the glory, love, and goodness of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. It is to commune with heaven while on earth. It is neither formulaic nor does it happen in every hour of prayer. It is a gift of the Spirit. This is what we seek in prayer: “You have said, “Seek my face.” My heart says to you, “Your face, LORD, do I seek.” (Ps. 27:8)

Postlude: Thank God for this time and cultivate a posture of gratitude. Ponder the question: “How has what I’ve experienced today going to change the way I live in the next hours?” As you inhale, pray: “Spirit of God, going with me now” and as you exhale: “Cultivate your fruit in my life.” 

READ. PRAY. MEDITATE. CONTEMPLATE. SEEK GOD’S FACE.

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Dates: Monday, January 6th, 2024 (The Epiphany) – Tuesday, March 4th (Fat Tuesday)

Colors: White and Gold

Icon: An eight-pointed star is the icon for Christmastide and Epiphany, which is a symbol of Christ being the morning star. It is also a symbol of hope and guidance, particularly among American indigenous populations.

About the Season

Praise God who sends us the light from heaven!

(This prayer is used in Indian homes at the lighting of lamps. Taken from Morning, Noon and Night)

Manifest at Jordan’s stream,

Prophet, Priest, and King supreme,

and at Cana, wedding guest,

in your Godhead manifest;

manifest in pow’r divine,

changing water into wine.

Anthems be to you addressed,

God in man made manifest.

(From the hymn “Songs of Thanksgiving and Praise” by Christopher Wordsworth (1862))

“Epiphanies” (are) events of revelation not available to human beings without an act of God. This is important, because in biblical faith, knowledge of the true God is not attainable by human effort. We cannot summon up the presence of the living Jesus by efforts of our own, however, “spiritual;” his presence is his to give. Any manifestation that reveals Jesus’ true identity occurs because the power of God is at work upon the eyes, ears, and hearts of the recipients. The unfolding of the Epiphany season is therefore a record of God’s definitive and unique actions in the One who has been born in Bethlehem.”

(Epiphany: The Season of Glory by Flemming Rutledge)

A blessed Epiphanytide to you, beloved. This season after The Epiphany of the Lord (which occurred on January 6) is the culmination of the cycle of light that began weeks ago in Advent. At that point, we entered together into the darkness of life, facing those realities that evoke our longings and laments. Now, after Christmas and Epiphany, we practice a time to rejoice in the manifestation of Christ our Lord, who has been sent as a “light to enlighten the nations and the glory of his people Israel,” as Simeon proclaimed. 

This is the “season of glory,” as Flemming Rutledge has written in her little gem of a book on Epiphany (linked below). It is the season to recognize that the full, awesome glory of God which parted the Red Sea, made the Jordan stand up on its banks, and thundered down from Sinai has now been made known to all nations and peoples in the face of Jesus Christ: For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ,” (2 Corinthians 4:6).

During this season, we journey with Jesus through his early life and ministry: the visit of the Magi, his baptism in the Jordan, the wedding at Cana, the manifestation of his healings and miracles, all the way up until his resplendent transfiguration. It is a wonderful time to read these early chapters of the gospels and become acquainted again with the Light of the World.

Below are some practices, resources, art, and music for the season. My prayer for this time is that we, beholding the glory of the Lord, would be transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. (2 Corinthians 3:18)

– Rev. Joel Littlepage

Practices for the Season

1. The Burning of the Tree (or Candles). It is a tradition for many on the day (or season) of Epiphany to burn the Christmas tree and garland (if you used real Christmas tree/greenery, that is…please don’t burn plastic). This burst of light and heat is a powerful symbol of the luminescent glory of Christ. In our family, we stand around the fire pit and throw branches in as we say one of the scriptures for Epiphany: “Arise, shine, for your light has come and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.” (Is. 60:1) If burning a tree is not possible for you, consider lighting some extra candles at the table and reciting that same scripture.
2. Blessing Your House. Another common tradition for the day (or season) of Epiphany is to bless and pray over your residence, starting at the front door and moving through every room. In some traditions, this is called the “chalking of the doors.” You can read more about this here.
3. Pray for Those Who Do Not Believe. During Epiphany, the church prays for those who have not yet experienced the manifestation of Christ. Consider what people in your life that you could pray for: family, friends, co-workers, and neighbors. Perhaps you could enact a practice to pray for them every week or every time you light a specific candle.
4. Pray for Those Who Serve as Missionaries.  During Epiphany, the church prays for all of those who seek to make Christ known across the world. Are you connected with anyone serving as a missionary? Pray for them. Also, please pray for our Domestic and Global Partners in the Grace DC Network.
5. Establish New Patterns and Practices of the New Year. As Epiphany falls at the beginning of our calendar year, it is a natural time to consider the shape and patterns of our lives. Consider establishing a “Rule of Life,” completing “The Great Annual Examen,” or simply establishing intentions for the time ahead.

Articles for the Season

Christmas & Epiphany: The Sunrise From On High by Greg Thompson

“Taken together, these seasons of light remind us of one of the central convictions of the Christian life: That in Jesus Christ, the light of God comes both to us and through us. It reminds us that the consolation of our souls and the calling of our lives is, in the end, the same: the Sunrise from on High. And our life, in this season (and in every season) is best understood as a life of receiving the light of God in Jesus Christ and bearing that light to the whole of the earth.”

Artwork for the Season

The Curator for our Daily Prayer Project, Victoria Jones, offers an amazing set of reflections and questions for our current seasonal artwork. See the 2024-25 Christmas and Epiphany edition for this content.

Music for the Season

Books for the Season

Epiphany: The Season of Glory by Flemming Rutledge

“The feast of Epiphany and its following season are not as well observed as they should be. Many of us associate Epiphany with the visit of the Magi but don’t know much more about it. In this short volume, priest and theologian Fleming Rutledge expounds the primary biblical texts and narrative arc of the season, inviting us to discover anew “the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”

Learning Evangelism from Jesus by Jerram Barrs

“As the greatest evangelist, Jesus exemplified how to attract people to the gospel. He modeled how to initiate spiritual conversations full of grace and truth. Christian evangelism, then, both in theory and practice, must be shaped by his pattern.”

Light Upon Light: A Literary Guide to Prayer Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany by Various Authors

This collection contains daily and weekly inspirational readings to help the reader prayerfully experience God through the liturgical seasons of winter. Well-loved classics by Andersen, Dickens, and Eliot join contemporary works by Frederick Buechner and Gary Schmidt. Poems by Donne, Herbert, and Rossetti are paired with newer voices: Scott Cairns, Benjamín Alire Sáenz, Susanna Childress, and Amit Majmudar. Readers are invited to experience Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany in its raw strangeness, stripped of sentiment, and to turn toward Emmanuel.

Resources for Families with Young Children

Sacred Seasons: A Family Guide to Center Your Year Around Jesus by Danielle Hitchen

The time-honored traditions of the liturgical calendar guide Christians through a year-long meditation on the life of Christ. Beyond just Christmas and Easter, each season of the church year offers special opportunities to remember and celebrate the work of God.

In Sacred Seasons, Danielle Hitchen helps you incorporate the rhythms and rituals of this ancient Christian discipline into your everyday family life. Part theology, part church history, and part practical spirituality, Sacred Seasons provides an easy-to-use guide to observing the liturgical year complete with fun activities, delicious recipes, and meaningful liturgies.

The Wingfeather Saga by Andrew Peterson

“Janner Igiby, his brother, Tink, and their disabled sister, Leeli, are gifted children as all children are, loved well by a noble mother and ex-pirate grandfather. But they will need all their gifts and all that they love to survive the evil pursuit of the venomous Fangs of Dang, who have crossed the dark sea to rule the land with malice. The Igibys hold the secret to the lost legend and jewels of good King Wingfeather of the Shining Isle of Anniera.

Andrew Peterson’s sweeping saga is full of characters rich in heart, smarts, and courage. It is a tale that children of all ages will cherish, families can read aloud, and readers’ groups are sure to enjoy discussing for its many layers of meaning.”

The post The Season of Epiphany appeared first on GraceDC.

Dates: Wednesday, December 25th, 2024 – Sunday, January 5th, 2025

Colors: Gold and White

Icon: An eight-pointed star is the icon for Christmastide and Epiphany, which is a symbol of Christ being the morning star. It is also a symbol of hope and guidance, particularly among American indigenous populations.

About the Season

Glory to Your coming, which brought humanity back to life!

Glory to Him, Who came to us by His firstborn!

Glory to the Silence, that spoke by His Voice.

Glory to the Spiritual, Who was pleased to have a Body,

that by that Body he might show mercy on our bodies.

Glory to that Hidden One,Whose Son was made manifest!

Glory to that Living One, Whose Son was made to die!

Glory to that Great One, Whose Son descended and was small!

[An excerpt of a prayer of Ephrem the Syrian (306–373 CE), adapted from his Hymns on the Nativity, nos. 3–4]

Merry Christmas to you in the name of Jesus Christ! This Jesus—Prince of Peace and Light unto the nations—has come to you and to me. Behold our King.

Before us, in ages past, others came to behold him. As with any infant brought into this world, the first to behold Jesus was his mother, Mary. Imagine this moment. Mary had been visited by angels with news that she would give birth to the Messiah. In response, likely after many months of pondering and meditating on this news, she burst into song, extolling the promises of God to her people. Deliverance was coming through her womb. That pregnant pause in redemptive history erupted in a manger, and all of creation bore witness to that holy delivery. Beholding her infant’s face was to behold salvation and glory. Imagine!

Like family and friends piling into a delivery room, many others would follow quickly after. Among them were three foreigners traveling from east of Palestine to look upon this new King in Jerusalem. A few miles away were a group of shepherds tending to their flock in the weary hours of the night. In the enveloping darkness there burst forth an angel of light with a shout of praise: “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy!” These shepherds, like those foreign men, went to behold the newborn Savior. Simeon, a devout one “waiting for the consolation of Israel,” beheld Jesus in a temple in Jerusalem. Upon holding him, Simeon broke out into worship with the words with which we end every week: “Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for the glory to your people Israel.”

Friends, our eyes, like these who saw before us, have seen God’s salvation through the light and life of Jesus Christ, and the invitation, then, is the same invitation to us today: Behold! But what does it mean to behold? It certainly means to look, but it is much more than that. The word’s etymology suggests more than a cursory glance or even an intent look; it is a considering, a possessing, and of course, a holding. It is to keep and preserve that which was seen so that one’s life is transformed by the sight.

The story of redemption we rehearse throughout the Christian year, and especially in this season of Christmas, serves as our invitation to allow this enchanted beholding to break through unbelief, to allow the light of God’s glory to illuminate every sacred and ordinary moment we encounter. When we do this, we are more fully able to sing with the hymnist, “Melt the clouds of sin and sadness; drive the dark of doubt away. Giver of immortal gladness, fill us with the light of day!”

The season of Christmas (also known as Christmastide) begins on December 25 and stretches twelve days until the Epiphany of Our Lord on January 6. This span is one of feasting, generosity, and joy that celebrates the unparalleled gift of the incarnate Son of God. In the American, commercial Christmas season, Christmas is “one and done,” but the Christian history of Christmas encourages us to lean deeply into an extended, twelve-day feast!

So, friends, let us celebrate Love’s gift and feast unto the glory of God! Merry Christmas!

-Ashley Williams and Pastor Joel, adapted from The Daily Prayer Project.

Practices for the Season

1. Feast. In the Christian practice of Christmas, we are given not one or two but twelve days to feast in remembrance of the incarnation! Consider planning a series of special meals to prepare and share with loved ones.
2. Gift. It is traditional to give and share gifts during Christmastide. Consider how gifts could be spread out during the 12 days of Christmas. If you find yourself in a season of abundance, consider how you could give gifts to the poor.
3. Sing. Christmas is one of the most abundant times of sacred music, from Handel’s Messiah to Kirk Franklin and the Family’s Christmas to the Church’s treasured collection of beloved carols. Sing and listen to beautiful music during this season and allow it to enchant your experience of this life. See the Daily Prayer Project Spotify playlist below for listening suggestions.
4. Behold. Christmas is a time for beholding beautiful, wondrous things. Consider setting aside time to watch a film, view works of art, look at Christmas lights, or read a work of fiction. These things can make us more cognizant of the manifested glory of God.
5. Rest. The scripture says that the Lord “gives to his beloved sleep,” (Ps. 127:2). Consider sinking deeply into these holy days by napping and sleeping as much as possible.

Articles for the Season

Christmas & Epiphany: The Sunrise From On High by Greg Thompson

“Taken together, these seasons of light remind us of one of the central convictions of the Christian life: That in Jesus Christ, the light of God comes both to us and through us. It reminds us that the consolation of our souls and the calling of our lives is, in the end, the same: the Sunrise from on High. And our life, in this season (and in every season) is best understood as a life of receiving the light of God in Jesus Christ and bearing that light to the whole of the earth.”

The People of the Gift by Greg Thompson

This beautiful, brief article was written for our community back in the COVID Pandemic days by our former theologian-in-residence, Dr. Greg Thompson. “Indeed, from the earliest days of the church in the Roman Empire, this work—the work of merciful giving to others— was seen as one of the most peculiar (and most dangerous) aspects of the Christian community. And throughout history, this act of giving has been both the source of good for our neighbors (providing food, shelter, medical care, and education to millions of people) and the essential validation of our witness. And correlatively, our failure to give—and our choice to hoard instead—has been one of the greatest hindrances to both the flourishing of our neighbors and the credibility of our message.”

Artwork for the Season

Art & Theology’s Advent-Christmas-Epiphany Daily Art Meditations by Victoria Jones

The Curator for our Daily Prayer Project, Victoria Jones, runs an amazing website called artandtheology.org. At the link above, you can enter your email and sign up for her daily seasonal artwork, poetry, and music meditations; they are very enriching. Also, you can enjoy Victoria’s work in the Gallery section of the Daily Prayer Project for this Christmas (and every other) season!

Music for the Season

Podcasts for the Season

Emily McGowin on Christmas with Dr. Emily Hunter McGowin (Church for the Sake of Others Podcast)

In this episode, co-hosts Mickey and Bishop Todd help us transition from Advent to Christmas with the Rev. Dr. Emily McGowin. Sometimes we struggle to see past Christmas’ cultural trappings to its timeless beauty, but Emily takes us beyond consumption to explore the “great exchange” of the incarnation. This episode caps off another year of enriching conversations with C4SO ministry leaders, church planters, authors, musicians, spiritual directors and friends. See you in 2024!

Books for the Season

Christmas: The Season of Light and Life by Emily Hunter McGowin

Of all the seasons of the church calendar, Christmas is the one most recognized and celebrated by our society at large. That means it’s the season we’re most familiar with—but that can also make it harder to see past Christmas’s many cultural trappings to its timeless beauty.

At the first Christmas, God exchanged the glories of divinity for the vulnerability of human existence, uniting himself to us in order to unite us to God. In this short volume, priest and theologian Emily Hunter McGowin invites us into the church’s celebration of that great exchange, in all its theological and liturgical splendor.

On The Incarnation by Saint Athanasius

By any standard, this is a classic of Christian theology. Composed by St Athanasius in the fourth century, it expounds with simplicity the theological vision defended at the councils of Nicaea and Constantinople: that the Son of God himself became “fully human, so that we might become god.” Its influence on all Christian theology thereafter, East and West, ensures its place as one of the few “must read” books for all who want to know more about the Christian faith. Also, be sure to read the special introduction by C.S. Lewis.

Lights a Lovely Mile: Collected Sermons of the Church Year by Eugene H. Peterson

Long before his iconic paraphrased Bible translation, The Message, Eugene H. Peterson (1932–2018) faithfully preached for decades to the small congregation of Christ Our King Presbyterian Church in Bel Air, Maryland.

As the seasons passed, along with the accompanying fasts and feasts, Peterson faithfully revealed ways to cultivate a robust, authentic life of faith, intimacy, obedience, and joy. Now you can gain new insights into Peterson’s preaching and pastoral life through this collection of his most compelling yet never-before-published sermons.

Following the calendar of the church year, from the darkness of Advent to the light of Epiphany, the wilderness of Lent to the celebration of Easter, and the fire of Pentecost to the everyday glory of ordinary time, these remarkable sermons point to the eternity beyond our experience of time.

Hosanna in Excelsis: Hymns and Devotions for the Christmas Season by David Leeman Carol

This devotional couples the lyrics and score of a new hymn daily with a devotional message about the hymn’s biblical and spiritual truths. You’ll find hymns of advent like “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” that anticipate the coming of Christ, hymns of Nativity like “O Little Town of Bethlehem” that celebrate His birth, and hymns of Epiphany like “Go Tell it on the Mountain” that marvel at His glory. Go deeper with classic Christmas favorites like “O Holy Night” and learn others that may be lesser-known like “On Jordan’s Bank the Baptist’s Cry.” Each devotional teaches you about the background of the hymn, while inviting you into worship and praise.

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens is a timeless holiday classic that has been enjoyed for generations. It tells the tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, a miserly old man who is visited by three ghosts on Christmas Eve. Through this spiritual journey, Scrooge learns to let go of his past and embrace the joys of the holiday season. This beloved story is sure to bring warmth and cheer to readers of all ages. With its timeless message of redemption and joy, A Christmas Carol is the perfect book to bring out the spirit of the holidays.

Light Upon Light: A Literary Guide to Prayer Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany by Various Authors

This collection contains daily and weekly inspirational readings to help the reader prayerfully experience God through the liturgical seasons of winter. Well-loved classics by Andersen, Dickens, and Eliot join contemporary works by Frederick Buechner and Gary Schmidt. Poems by Donne, Herbert, and Rossetti are paired with newer voices: Scott Cairns, Benjamín Alire Sáenz, Susanna Childress, and Amit Majmudar. Readers are invited to experience Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany in its raw strangeness, stripped of sentiment, and to turn toward Emmanuel.

Resources for Families with Young Children

Sacred Seasons: A Family Guide to Center Your Year Around Jesus by Danielle Hitchen

The time-honored traditions of the liturgical calendar guide Christians through a year-long meditation on the life of Christ. Beyond just Christmas and Easter, each season of the church year offers special opportunities to remember and celebrate the work of God.

In Sacred Seasons, Danielle Hitchen helps you incorporate the rhythms and rituals of this ancient Christian discipline into your everyday family life. Part theology, part church history, and part practical spirituality, Sacred Seasons provides an easy-to-use guide to observing the liturgical year complete with fun activities, delicious recipes, and meaningful liturgies.

Saint Nicholas and the Nine Gold Coins by Jim Forest

The figure of Saint Nicholas stands apart from nearly every other Christian saint: his fame spread across empires and generations to make him one of the most recognizable Christian saints in history. But the popular perception of Saint Nicholas today diverges greatly from his original veneration as a compassionate almsgiver and defender of the poor. Saint Nicholas has been reduced to the pop culture figure of Santa Claus, a jolly old man who brings presents to good little boys and girls. This book reacquaints those boys and girls with the authentic Santa Claus Nicholas, a man who found greatness not simply in spreading “good cheer,” but in being a true icon of Jesus Christ in word and deed.

The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

For over sixty years, readers of all ages have been enchanted by the magical realms, the epic battles between good and evil, and the unforgettable creatures of Narnia. This box set includes all seven titles in The Chronicles of Narnia—The Magician’s Nephew; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe; The Horse and His Boy; Prince Caspian; The Voyage of the Dawn Treader; The Silver Chair; and The Last Battle—with interior black-and-white art by Pauline Baynes, the original illustrator.

The post The Season of Christmas appeared first on GraceDC.

“For we are God’s masterpiece. He created us anew in Christ Jesus, so that we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”

“Formation into the likeness of Christ is lived out in a million little ways day after day.”

Joan Chittister

Spiritual formation is kind of having a moment in the Christian community. In the wake of an approach to Christianity that favored the retention of information and knowledge to action and service, ministries and organizations are turning their attention to the spiritual disciplines of old. Podcasts are talking about silence and solitude, encouraging you to pray as the monastics do. You may hear of folks fasting or practicing the Sabbath even though you may not have been taught how to do these things or know what place they can have in your walk with Jesus.

While the conversation around spiritual formation and spiritual practices may be new to you (and we’re certainly growing in it as well here at GMO), this tradition is grounded in the very person and work of Jesus Christ and his body, the Church. These practices are not to be mistaken for trends of the moment. The perpetual longing and quest in the life of the church and of every Christian is just this: How do we become like him? Well, by following Christ’s example, by making his habits our habits.

At Grace Mosaic, we are launching an initiative this fall called the Daily Formation Project. The DFP seeks to guide the spiritual formation of our congregants so that we are growing in love and maturity in our life with God and being equipped to participate in his kingdom mission. As our community continues to explore this nonlinear process of spiritual formation through various avenues, we hope these principles will ground us in the loving-kindness of Jesus. It is He who invites us to respond to his amazing grace by imitating him as the beloved children we are in God.

Ten Principles of Spiritual Formation

Love. The mark of Christian maturity is an ever-deepening love of the Triune God, our neighbors, and creation. (Deut. 6:5; Mk. 12:28-31, 1 Cor. 13)

Spiritual formation is not measured in the mere doing of spiritual practices. Rather, it is measured by the love that the spiritual practices are meant to foster. The practices are a means to the end and the end is love. Our maturity is tested in how we relate to others and our formation cannot be measured apart from our engagement with the world around us. As Christians become re-formed into Christ’s image, their hearts will also be reshaped to love God’s people and God’s world more deeply. 

God’s Work. Spiritual formation is the work of the Holy Spirit, by whom we are “being transformed from one degree of glory to another.” (2 Cor 3:18, Phil. 1:6; 2:13) 

Spiritual formation–our progressive sanctification into the image of Christ–is God’s ongoing commitment to make us whole and holy by the power of his Spirit at work within us. God is the one who raises us from death to life and enables us to walk in his ways. He is the one who began a good work in us and will bring it to completion.

Our Work. Spiritual formation requires our active participation. (Luke 9:23; Romans 12:1)

Spiritual formation necessitates that we present our bodies as a living sacrifice. Our participation in God’s work in our lives involves following Christ, receiving his easy yoke, taking up our cross daily, and doing what he has commanded. Formation is facilitated by a posture of “active passivity,” yielding ourselves to God’s work and learning as apprentices of Jesus. 

Communal. There is no formation into the image of Christ without the body of Christ, the Church. (1 Cor. 12:12-14; Eph. 4:15-16)

The Church is Christ’s body, as Joan Chittister says, the “one place we are sure where God dwells.” Spiritual formation into the image of Christ must happen within the Christian community because one part of the Body can’t exist without the others. We grow together into Christ.

Process. Spiritual formation is a nonlinear maturation over time that happens amid the pains, sufferings, joys, and triumphs of our everyday lives. (2 Cor 4:16; Eph. 4:13)

Our faith is lived out amidst the beauties and brokenness of life. Spiritual formation is not just for those living in monasteries, removed from the chaos and mundanity of the everyday. God invites us to work out our salvation in the realities of the life and callings he has given us. Though we might wish the process of formation to be more expedient (that we might stop struggling with a particular sin struggle or heartache), God is patient with us and will see his work through to completion.  Formation is a “Dutch oven” not a microwave. 

Inevitable. Everyone is being formed at all times and we will not be formed into the way of God accidentally. (Luke 21:34, Eph. 5:15-16)

Many forces in the world act upon us, within us, and around us to shape our affections and behaviors. The way of Jesus is counter-cultural and we will not stumble into Christlikeness without the counter-formative force of Christian worship and community.

Liturgical. The liturgy of the Church grounds us in how the world is supposed to be and how we are called to engage with it. (Acts 2:42, 1 Cor. 10:16-17)

Christian worship and the means of grace—word, sacrament, and prayer–nourish and equip us to engage the world faithfully. We rehearse the gospel in worship throughout the Christian year so that the gospel of the Kingdom seeps into our bones and pervades the way we live each day of our lives.

Practice-Based. The way of spiritual formation is guided by historical, embodied Christian practices (Phil. 2:12; 3 Jn. 11)

Our spiritual formation is not only a matter of our thoughts or insights but of our affections and our practices. We are not “brains on a stick,” but embodied beings who were created not just to think the right things about God, but to love what God loves and imitate him in our habits. As Dallas Willard has written: “True Christlikeness, true companionship with Christ, comes at the point where it is hard not to respond as he would.”

Kingdom Mission. We are formed to live on mission with the Lord, that his Kingdom may come and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. (Matt. 6:10; 28:18-20)

Spiritual formation is not about us, our egos, or our private devotional lives. The Lord desires to form us into the kind of people who can participate in his renewal of all things, the coming of his Kingdom. God has placed us in the world to be a light in the darkness and the salt of the earth.

Cross-Cultural. We are formed together to be the cross-cultural family of God.  (Ephesians 2:22, Revelation 7:9-10)

God, the Great Artist, is forming people of all different ethnicities, cultures, and backgrounds into a beautiful mosaic that demonstrates the glory of his Kingdom to the whole world. As we grow up and are fitted together as God’s cross-cultural and global family, we are formed into his manifold image.

The post Ten Principles of Spiritual Formation appeared first on GraceDC.

While we aim to be one unified body of Christ, we recognize the diversity in our unity and acknowledge that groups of people have different shared experiences and needs. 

Similar to how we have Women’s Leadership Council events designed for our women, Men’s Ministry events designed for our men, and Young Adults’ Group events designed for our young adults, we also have gatherings designed for our Black sisters and brothers and for our church family of Asian descent.

Black Gatherings: Ongoing gatherings for our church family of the African & Black Diaspora to connect with each other, enjoy a meal, grow in Christ, pray, and more. These gatherings are open to those who identify as Africans, African Americans, Black Americans, Caribbeans, and more.

Asian/AAPI Gatherings- “Around The Table”– Ongoing gatherings for our church family of Asian descent to connect with each other, enjoy a meal, grow in Christ, pray, and more. Around The Table is open to those who identify as Asian or Asian American of varying generations, including (but not limited to) the breadth of people we currently have in our church family–Koreans, Chinese, Taiwanese, Indians, Indonesians, Filipinos, Singaporeans, and more. 

Of course, each of these people groups is distinct! And this is an opportunity to honor their distinctions and similarities. 

Ultimately, these are gatherings for those who would feel blessed by them.

To join or ask about a cultural group, contact Grace Downtown’s Cultural Intelligence (CQ) Ministry at cqministry@gracedc.net or sign up here.

We look forward to the flourishing of these and future groups!

The post Cultural Affinity Groups at Grace Downtown appeared first on GraceDC.

It doesn’t have to be this way! Handel’s Messiah, Stephen Colbert’s comedy, Madeleine L’Engle or JK Rowling’s novels, Kendrick Lamar’s or Sufjan Stevens music, visual artist Makoto Fujimura, and countless others who are seeking excellence in their work who just so happen to practice Christian faith – all done at an exceptionally high level of skill and accomplishment. 

What’s the difference? For me, art that has any hope of being interesting must begin with a question. Art is about questioning and exploring our humanity. But most Christian art begins with an answer, which makes it fundamentally boring. And worse – it’s untrue. True art is neither Christian or secular. It’s just undeniably human. Is Michelangelo’s Pieta a work of Christian art? Or does it simply capture the devastating loss of a woman whose son has died? Michelangelo’s ability to sit inside of this grief allowed him to sculpt a masterpiece. Bruce Springsteen’s masterpiece “Born to Run” captures that overwhelming feeling of wanting to get out of a small town and the joyful freedom of exploration. Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun showcases the dignity and struggle for African Americans in a deeply segregated real estate market. These artists ask themselves what it is like to feel their undeniable humanity, and they create work that communicates that experience.

So how do artists practice this in their craft – and more universally relevant – how can we use the artistic process to practice our faith in a more honest way? 

We need to sit inside emotions – uncomfortably and without answers. It’s understandable that humans tend to avoid awkward and difficult emotions, favoring whatever route gets us out of that vulnerable place as quickly as possible. Because duh – Those situations are terrible to experience! But actors are different. They live to be inside the drama. As Tom Stoppard says, “We’re actors. We’re the opposite of people.” Actors are students of these terrible experiences because we know that the power of raw emotion is something that you can’t look away from. I dare you not to cry when Tom Hanks, in the moment Forrest Gump finds out he has a son, asks, “is he smart or is he like me?” We crave this emotional intensity not only as mere spectators, but if we’re honest with ourselves, we want to experience those moments in life as participants. Despite how fast we flee from ever appearing emotionally “weak” – the thing we desire most is to be intimate and vulnerable with another human. This is the very thing artists are trained to do. As artists, we sit inside the tears and the joy. We reflect humanity. 

The vast majority of Christian art, however, either represents a life that is so squeaky clean it’s unachievable or it is so overly sentimental that it refuses to engage with honest emotion. Every holiday season I nearly tear my ears off when that wretched “Sir I want to Buy these shoes” song plays on the all-holiday-music radio station. If you don’t know it, here’s the quick rundown (also Google Patton Oswalt’s comedy routine on this song for a great laugh): A poor kid wants to buy nice shoes for his DYING mother because she’s going to meet Jesus TONIGHT. Because she’s on her deathbed! And in this unrealistic piece of Christmas sentimental trash, the grade school child who is about to immediately lose his mother has no emotional response to that tragic life shaping event, but, instead,  is simply excited for her to look good on her first date with Jesus. Compare that to Jesus, when faced with the death of his friend Lazarus: “Jesus wept.” THAT sounds honest, doesn’t it? Why are we settling for anything less in the industry of “Christian art?” I think it’s largely because we are compelled (as Christians) to prescribe easy answers instead of sitting inside our difficult questions. But this is the very inauthentic element that keeps us from being human. 

Instead of cheap sentiment, we need a John 11:35 mentality – “Jesus wept.”  The smallest verse of the Bible exposes the biggest humanity of Jesus. In his book Art + Faith: A Theology of Making, acclaimed visual artist Makoto Fujimura (exceptional Christian artists do exist!) explains that he paints with Jesus’ tears. Meaning he approaches his artistic practice with the deep love of Christ. Here’s how I’d explain that concept as a theatre maker. Jesus didn’t “play the end of the scene,” knowing Lazarus would be alive again. While directing a play, sometimes actors are tempted to show the emotion of the final moment instead of the current scene they’re in – because they know the big reveal is coming and they’re excited to live in that intense emotion (opposite of people, remember?). Directors often say, “don’t play the end of the scene” – a note of instruction to actors to be emotionally present in the moment. This keeps a performance truthful. What makes Romeo and Juliet so powerful is that the play is incredibly fun, full of passion and romance, right up until the very moment tragedy strikes. If the actors were already playing the end, we’d never get swept away in their joy – and therefore never feel the tragic loss. This rule works across all genres, in fact. Ie – Jordan Peele’s horror film Us doesn’t work if the family is totally freaked out at the beginning of the film. Staying truthful to emotions throughout an entire story is what makes good endings so satisfying. Directing an actor to be emotionally present in the moment is what makes their performance so recognizably human. Anything less is distastefully unsatisfying. 

Jesus’ humanity kept him from playing the end of the scene. If he had emotionally moved ahead to the exciting plot point, predicting the feeling of joy for Lazarus’ reunion with his family, he would have never been emotionally present with his friends Mary and Martha during their immense time of grief. He would have possibly offered them any number of those thoughtless replies we often say to someone who is experiencing tragedy that we don’t have time for. As Kate Bowler shares in her book Everything Happens for a Reason, and Other Lies I’ve Loved, how many of us, during our own time of grief, have been given the cheap comfort of someone who isn’t emotionally present with us? During a breakup or end of a relationship, we are told “there are other fish in the sea” ignoring the painful truth: I DIDN’T WANT ANOTHER FISH! When we’re passed over for a new job or promotion, we’re told “God closes one door and will open a window” – I DON’T WANT TO CRAWL THROUGH THAT WINDOW! ! And even worse, the horrible cliché we’re told when a loved one dies…”Heaven needed another angel.” These thoughtless replies are from people who are afraid to dive deep into the emotion of loss. They want to move on from the bereaved. They don’t want to sit in discomfort. Can you imagine how disappointing it would have been if, in the moment Mary and Martha cried out to Jesus about the loss of their brother, he simply said, “don’t worry – you’ll see him again someday.” Nothing about that response would have been untrue – they were in fact about to see Lazarus again in just a few minutes! – and yet it would have been bitterly untrue. Because Jesus would have missed the emotional truth of the moment. For Mary and Martha, it felt like they’d never see Lazarus again. To be human with them in that moment, the appropriate response was an outburst of shared grief. 

Jesus sits with us, emotionally present in the moment. “Jesus wept.” This is the artists’ practice as well. Konstantin Stanislavsky, the Russian theatre director who founded modern realism acting, encouraged his students with the concept of “the magic IF.” “What would I do IF I were in this situation?” This practice directly leads actors to empathize with their character, which is the only way to portray someone else with integrity. Anything short is an unsatisfying stereotype. 

Most Christian art vastly misses the importance of emotional truth and thereby not only counterfeits humanity, but counterfeits God. The artistic discipline of sitting inside of a question is an aesthetic that is deeply needed to live out our faith with authenticity. Christian artists (anyone, really) looking for their work to connect with audiences shouldn’t confuse the hope of our faith with the experience of life’s moment to moment pace of living. Moment to moment is, in fact, the only way we can experience life. I only want to see art that is emotionally present, that doesn’t play the ending too early, and that lives inside of big questions. Which is a way of saying that I want all those things in my relationships with other people. 

The post Arts Blog: Let’s Talk About “Christian Art” appeared first on GraceDC.

“What may be described as the first multinational worship service in the New Testament took place on the day of Pentecost. However, the worship of God brought confusion before it brought clarity. It was a scene like none other. All of the disciples, presumably the 120 mentioned in Acts 1:15, are together in the house. The day of Pentecost has come. This is the day that Jesus told them to wait for, the day that they would be clothed with power from on high (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:8). As they are gathered, still devoted to prayer (Acts 1:14), the Holy Spirit arrives in dramatic fashion. A sound like the mighty driving of the wind fills the entire house. Individual tongues like fire appear resting on each of them. Luke says that they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, which resulted in their speaking other languages.

The coming of the Holy Spirit was not a private matter. It was a public declaration to the nations that the kingdom of God has come. How large was the crowd in Jerusalem? Luke doesn’t say, but the delegation of international representatives is unmatched: “Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians” (Acts 2:9–11). What did they hear? The sound of the disciples declaring the mighty works of God. What they experienced left them confused, astonished, amazed, and perplexed. It left them either utterly confused or certain the disciples were drunk (Acts 2:12–13). To bring clarity, conviction, and resolve, Peter rises to preach (2:14–36).

The message that these people from every nation needed to understand was that the end had come, the end that marked a new beginning. That new beginning was the lavish pouring out of the Spirit of God. Peter tells them that what they see might be new, but it’s not unexpected. He explains to his multinational audience that all of what they witnessed was rooted in God’s promise through the prophet Joel (2:17–21). The coming of the Holy Spirit was a public declaration that the kingdom of God had come. God would fill his people with his Spirit for the purpose of kingdom mission—to reverse the tragic effects of Babel. The expression of unity in humanity would be for the praise and glory of God, not for the establishment of people’s own kingdom in rebellion against his rule.

The fall destroyed union and unity with God and each other. Reunion is the story of scripture. These words we find throughout God’s word—“renewed,” “reconciled,” “united”—are the reversal of the fractures, divides, breaks, and partitions of life in this world and before God that were and are so desperately needed. We are truly stamped from the beginning for unity and union, for wholeness and shalom, for beauty. God himself is committed to knitting the human race back together in Jesus Christ. This is why, in spite of the inherent instability of the pursuit, in spite of the frustrating feeling of running hard and getting nowhere, we still press on toward the vision.

Exploration

The story of Pentecost is one of culmination where those who were previously fractured by ethnicity, language, and a host of other divisions were united again through the power of the Holy Spirit. Pentecost gives us hope and endurance to seek that unity continuously till Jesus returns. Consider the following practices to help aid in the pursuit of beautiful community: 

1. Join a community group or start a group and read a book together on unity and racial reconciliation. It can be difficult to generate conversations around reconciliation, so having a text in common helps spark and facilitate such discussions. The Beautiful Community is an excellent place to begin.
2. Simplify your calendar and schedules to make margin for community. When our days, weeks, and months are filled to the brim, we can go years without making significant progress toward fostering healthy community. Where can you make space to invite others into your home? Could you start a weekly or monthly gathering at a local spot or park? Hospitality and community always come together, but hospitality can happen anywhere.
3. Pray together when gathering in community. Unity demands difficult requirements for each of us, regardless of our own ethnic background. Renewal and reconciliation presuppose confession, repentance, and forgiveness, and without prayer, each of those evade us. Make your requests known to God together and pray for unity in diversity to be true of your community as it is of our Triune God.by Israel, will always serve as currency for our continued and increasing faith in the economy of God’s redemptive mercy.

Meditation adapted from The Beautiful Community by Irwyn L. Ince Jr. Copyright © 2020 by Irwyn L. Ince Jr. Published by InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL. www.ivpress.com.

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Dates: Pentecostide (or Ordinary Time) lasts from the Day of Pentecost until the First Sunday of Advent. At Grace Mosaic, we spend the first 14 weeks (our Summer months) of that period celebrating the theme of Pentecost before moving on to the themes of Ordinary Time in the Fall.

Color: Red

Icon: Our Pentecost seasonal icon envelops the two most common and historic images of Pentecost: flame and dove. Masterfully designed by Atlas Minor Design Studio.

A Portrait of the Season

“The coming of the Holy Spirit was a public declaration that the kingdom of God had come. God would fill his people with his Spirit for the purpose of kingdom mission—to reverse the tragic effects of Babel. The expression of unity in humanity would be for the praise and glory of God, not for the establishment of people’s own kingdom in rebellion against his rule.

We are truly stamped from the beginning for unity and union, for wholeness and shalom, for beauty. God himself is committed to knitting the human race back together in Jesus Christ. This is why, in spite of the inherent instability of the pursuit, in spite of the frustrating feeling of running hard and getting nowhere, we still press on toward the vision.”

Irwyn Ince, The Beautiful Community

But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

Titus 3:4-7

Lesslie Newbigin, the creative and courageous missionary theologian of the twentieth century, once wrote that “there are three great festivals in the Christian year, three occasions when we are invited to celebrate the great events of our salvation. They are Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost. . . . But we all know very well that it is only the first two of these festivals which are celebrated with real joy and enthusiasm in our churches. Christmas and Easter are great occasions when even the most careless Christian feels an obligation to come to church, and when there is joy and happiness in every Christian home. But the feast of Pentecost passes almost unnoticed. The outside observer of our churches would surely conclude that while it means a great deal to us that Jesus was born for us and died and rose again, the coming of the Spirit means very little or nothing.”

Although Newbigin’s observations are limited to his particular context and do not hold true across all streams of the Christian faith, they provide the opportunity for reflection for us who receive his words today. What do our lives, both communally and personally, say about the coming of the Holy Spirit?

The truth of Pentecost that ought to invoke our adoration, reverence, and profound celebration is that there is no church without the Holy Spirit. In fact, what would we be left without the Spirit? The Spirit hovered over the waters at creation, bringing the heavens and earth to form. The Spirit flowed through the tongues and pens of prophets and scribes, breathing out the divine word. Mary conceived the Messiah through the power of the Spirit. The Spirit descended upon Jesus at his baptism and empowered him for ministry, leading him to the desert, the garden, and the cross. Jesus was “declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead” (Rom. 1:4). It was that same Spirit who descended upon that nascent community of women and men living in the wake of the cross, empty tomb, and ascension, breathing life into a new creation, the Body of Christ.

And like Adam of old, this church, the body of Christ, was given its life-breath from God the Spirit. It was this Spirit that filled the church with fruit, gifts, power, prayer, and love. It is into this one Spirit that all have been baptized into one body, and all were made to drink of this one Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13). This Spirit is the one who again turns formless into form, binding together that which had been torn long ago, unifying the scattered and broken into a beautiful mosaic of faith.

It is this mosaic that we seek to piece together and display in our community of faith.

Veni, Creator Spiritus!

Come, Creator Spirit!

-Written by Rev. Joel Littlepage co-director of the Daily Prayer Project. Adapting and updated from the introduction from the 2022 Pentecost Living Prayer Periodical of the Daily Prayer Project, a publication of Grace Mosaic.

“The coming of the Holy Spirit was a public declaration that the kingdom of God had come. ”

Irwyn Ince

Practices for the Season

PRAYER

Use the season of Pentecost as a time to renew and reimagine rhythms of prayer in your life and in the life of your household. Consider joining the weekly Midweek Prayer Call with the community of Grace Mosaic. Email us at prayer@gracemosaic.org for the link or more information!

FELLOWSHIP

The story of Pentecost is one of culmination where those who were previously fractured by ethnicity, language, and a host of other divisions were united again through the power of the Holy Spirit. Pentecost gives us hope and endurance to seek that unity continuously till Jesus returns. Consider the following practices to help aid in the pursuit of beautiful community:

1. Join a community group or start a group and read a book together on unity and racial reconciliation. It can be difficult to generate conversations around reconciliation, so having a text in common helps spark and facilitate such discussions. The Beautiful Community is an excellent place to begin.
2. Simplify your calendar and schedules to make margin for community. When our days, weeks, and months are filled to the brim, we can go years without making significant progress toward fostering healthy community. Where can you make space to invite others into your home? Could you start a weekly or monthly gathering at a local spot or park? Hospitality and community always come together, but hospitality can happen anywhere.
3. Pray together when gathering in community. Unity demands difficult requirements for each of us, regardless of our own ethnic background. Renewal and reconciliation presuppose confession, repentance, and forgiveness, and without prayer, each of those evade us. Make your requests known to God together and pray for unity in diversity to be true of your community as it is of our Triune God.

CULTURAL AWARENESS

Leaning into the reality of Pentecost-al community means moving further into a deep recognition of human culture, both our own and others. Consider the following practices:

1. Take the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI), offered by staff members of Grace Mosaic. The IDI is a helpful, valid, and objective tool that allows us to see what strategies we are using to navigate cultural commonalities and differences. After years of laboring in Cross-Cultural ministry, our church staff believes strongly that this is one of the most helpful tools that we’ve ever found to build cross-cultural life and love.
2. Read Christians and Cultural Difference by David I Smith and Pennylyn Dykstra-Pruim.

GET A SPIRITUAL DIRECTOR

A spiritual director is an individual who is specially trained and equipped to help you discern the question “What is the Spirit doing in my life?” Pastors are an important part of answering that question, of course, but the tradition of spiritual direction offers a specific type of companionship that aims to provide space for listening together, noticing God’s voice and direction. Spiritual Direction seeks to tune one’s attention to God rather than focusing on a particular problem that needs to be fixed or behavior that needs to be modified. Ultimately, Spiritual Direction can help you enjoy communion with God and to discern the consequences of that communion in your ordinary, everyday life. Read more about spiritual direction here. Interested in finding a spiritual director? We recommend starting with the roster of directors at Coracle.

ESTABLISH AND NURTURE RITUALS

Keeping time through formative rituals and practices has always been at the life of the people of God. Consider establishing meaningful rituals and traditions in the life of your home. Start times of household worship using passages or prayers from the Daily Prayer Project, establish a day where you serve other people, plan annual outings, etc. Use your imagination.

“The Holy Spirit is our vital connection to Jesus and the Father. The Helper has been sent to cultivate our life in the soil of sacred love that has always existed between the Father and the Son. As the Spirit roots our life within that love, we reciprocate that love and bear the beautiful fruit that feeds our hungry souls and blesses our hungry world.”

Joel Littlepage

Music For The Season

Videos

Watch: “Holy Spirit” from the Bible Project

In this video, the Bible Project explores the original meaning of the biblical concept of “spirit” and what it means that God’s Spirit is personally present in all of creation. Ultimately, the Holy Spirit was revealed through Jesus and sent out into the lives of his followers to bring about the new creation.

Watch: “Glorifying God in a Diverse World: Next Steps in the Journey” from Sandra Maria Van Opstal

Watch this amazing plenary address and be inspired towards the vision and practice of cross-cultural worship.

Books

The Beautiful Community by Rev. Dr. Irwyn Ince

“In The Beautiful Community, pastor and theologian Irwyn Ince boldly unpacks the reasons for our divisions while gently guiding us toward our true hope for wholeness and reconciliation. God reveals himself to us in his trinitarian life as the perfection of beauty, and essential to this beauty is his work as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The gospel imperative to pursue the beautiful community―unity in diversity across lines of difference―is rooted in reflecting the beautiful community of our triune God. This book calls us into and provides tools for that pursuit.”

Creator Spirit by Steve Guthrie

“Skilled theologian, musician, and educator Steven Guthrie examines areas of overlap between spirituality, human creativity, and the arts with the goal of sharpening and refining how we speak and think about the Holy Spirit. By exploring various connections between art and spirituality, he helps Christians better understand the doctrine of the Holy Spirit and offers a clear, engaging theology of the arts.”

The Next Worship: Glorifying God in a Diverse World by Sandra Maria Van Opstal

“We live in a time of unprecedented intercultural exchange, where our communities welcome people from around the world. Music and media from every culture are easily accessible, and our worship is infused with a rich variety of musical and liturgical influences. But leading worship in multicultural contexts can be a crosscultural experience for everybody. How do we help our congregations navigate the journey?

Innovative worship leader Sandra Maria Van Opstal is known for crafting worship that embodies the global, multiethnic body of Christ. Likening diverse worship to a sumptuous banquet, she shows how worship leaders can set the table and welcome worshipers from every tribe and tongue. Van Opstal provides biblical foundations for multiethnic worship, with practical tools and resources for planning services that reflect God’s invitation for all peoples to praise him.”

Pentecost: A Day of Power for All People by Emilio Alvarez

“The power of Pentecost is inseparable from the good news of the Christ who is proclaimed in the Gospels, in accordance with the Scriptures.”

Pentecost may well be the most misconstrued day on the church calendar. A long legacy of cessationism has drained Pentecost of much of its significance, and it’s largely misunderstood in many Western churches today, if not outright ignored.

That’s not the case in Emilio Alvarez’s tradition, though. In this Fullness of Time volume, the Pentecostal bishop and theologian offers us a rich biblical and theological introduction to the day of Pentecost and sets it in its liturgical context—not only in the Protestant tradition but also in Catholic, Orthodox, and Pentecostal expressions. The result is a rich theological feast and an invitation to find afresh the power of the gospel for all peoples.”

Christians and Cultural Difference by David I Smith and Pennylyn Dykstra-Pruim

“Encountering cultural differences in the classroom, in the workplace, in the church, and in the public square is an everyday part of contemporary life. The chances that we will live our lives interacting only with those who share our cultural identity and ways of thinking are shrinking. Understanding culture and how cultural difference affects how we understand one another and live well together is no longer just for travelers. It has become a basic life skill.

Past Christian ways of thinking about cultural difference as most important for missions to far away places do not harmonize with today’s realities. This book offers a brief, critical overview of how Christians have been rethinking their relationship to cultural difference. Creation and fall, the image of God, the body/temple that is the church, neighbor ethics, the trinity, the incarnation and cross of Christ, and the call to welcome strangers – each of these offers distinct challenges to think in Christian ways about how we deal with differences.”

Resources for Families with Young Children

God Made Me AND You: Celebrating God’s Design for Ethnic Diversity by Shai Linne

This beautifully illustrated children’s book invites kids to explore God’s design for ethnic diversity and challenges readers both parents and children to learn and live out counter-cultural, biblical views, fostering a lifelong celebration of diversity for the glory of God. Designed for four to eleven-year-olds, God Made Me and You by Shai Linne is the second book in the God Made Me series, starting with God Made All of Me by Justin and Lindsey Holcomb.

God’s Very Good Idea Storybook: A True Story of God’s Delightfully Different Family by Trillia J. Newbell

God’s very good idea is to have lots of different people enjoying loving him and loving each other. This stunningly illustrated journey from the garden of Eden to God’s heavenly throne room shows how despite our sinfulness, everyone can be a part of God’s very good idea through the saving work of Christ.

This book celebrates diversity and will help children see how people from all ethnic and social backgrounds are valuable to God and how Jesus came to rescue all kinds of people. It will also excite them about being part of church – God’s delightfully different family.

The Apostles Creed: For All God’s Children by Ben Myers, Ill. Natasha Kennedy

This is a great children’s book adaptation of the creed!

Illustrated Ministries Pentecost Material

Illustrated Ministries creates coloring and craft materials for children and families for use during each season of the Christian Year. The material is lovely and cross-culturally accessible.

The post The Season of Pentecost appeared first on GraceDC.

“Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, ‘He told me all that I ever did.’” —John 4:39

“And [the angel] said to them, ‘Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples . . .’” —Mark 16:6–7a

Ever since I was a child, I have loved hearing a good story. Stories universally need at least three elements: characters, conflict, and resolution. Without characters, there is no canvas for story. Without conflict, there is no interest in story. And without resolution, there’s no point to story. The gospel is unequivocally the greatest story ever told—the main characters being a holy Triune God and sinful humanity; the conflict, humanity’s plunge into darkness; and the glorious resolution, the Resurrection we currently celebrate, which brought sinful humanity back into relationship with God. Story was a mode of communication that Jesus used often in his earthly ministry, and story continues to be a great method for Christians to practice sharing their faith.

In the Black church, sharing one’s testimony, or testifying, is a highlighted moment in the worship service. The pastor asks, “Does anyone have a testimony?” And as I remember being a young girl in those services, I knew we wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon until someone decided to testify. At that time, my attention span was too short to understand the significance of this spiritual practice, but now I mourn its widespread loss in many faith communities. The Black saints I grew up around knew intuitively what philosopher Charles Taylor suggests in his book The Ethics of Authenticity, that identity and self are not worked out “in isolation, but [negotiated] through dialogue, partly overt, partly internal, with others.” Our understanding of who we are hinges on how much we have acknowledged what God has done and continues to do in us and in others.

Testimony, then, becomes not some spotlight on us to boast of how bad and scandalous our lives used to be till “we got saved.” Rather, it is a continual recounting of the active work and presence of a real and personal God in defiance of an enemy who desperately desires for us to forget. He wants us to forget because “stories have to be told or they die, and when they die, we can’t remember who we are or why we’re here” (Sue Monk Kidd). Testimony and storytelling as spiritual practices help us worship by helping us remember how God has worked in the past, and by renewing and strengthening our faith to believe he will continue to work in the future. In this way our stories also serve as darts against the evil one, as on the final day, we see that the saints “overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony” (Rev. 12:11).

I have a story of, as the great Mahalia Jackson sang, “how I got over!” So do you. Our stories make up the countless chapters of God’s redemptive story that is told through those before us, those contemporary to us, and those long after us. They serve as anchors when the precarious waves of pain and suffering hit. They cause us to remember when temptations inside and out would have us forget. They strengthen weak knees and lift drooping heads. Let us each hear and heed the Spirit’s invitation to go as the Samaritan woman did, telling others about all this Jesus did and continues to do. His resurrection is the grand resolution that makes all our stories worth telling.

Exploration

1. Storytelling requires a familiarity and comfortability with all the ebbs and flows of our lives. Consider taking a morning or afternoon to yourself to draw out a timeline of your life until now. What were the major consolations, those events that brought you closer to the Lord and into the joy of your salvation? What were the major desolations, those events that tempted you to move away from the Lord and his presence? Use this timeline to help you develop your faith narrative.
2. Share that story with a close friend. Sharing our story is an intensely vulnerable exercise, so practice telling it with a trusted friend first, and over time, as you sense the opportunity and the desire, share it with others. Trust with hope the invitation of the author Morgan Harper Nichols: “Tell the story of the mountain you climbed. Your words could become a page in someone else’s survival guide.”
3. Consider incorporating storytelling into your various faith communities. Many have largely done away with the “testimony hour,” but I have indelible memories as a child of the Black church of how remarkable those moments were. My molding as a young believer in that space didn’t revolve much around the niche points of theology and orthodoxy, but rather around the testimonies of how this sister or that brother “got over.” Their stories, like the recounting throughout the scriptures by Israel, will always serve as currency for our continued and increasing faith in the economy of God’s redemptive mercy.

Ashley Williams is the co-director of the Daily Prayer Project and ministry coordinator at Grace Mosaic.

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I don’t know about you, but when I’m talking to someone and they have the bravery to answer a question with “I don’t know,” I inherently trust that person. “I don’t know” is a humble, instantly relatable reply that shows me that this person isn’t afraid to be honest. I also like it because I am someone who regularly has a lot of Doubt, so “know-it-alls” are a big turn off. 

Rachel Held Evans wrote, “on the days that I believe” in her book Inspired – referencing her struggle with her doubts of the Christian faith. When I read that line, my first thought was “oh thank God someone else feels that way!” It was a breath of fresh air for another Christian to admit that they have doubts about their faith. I grew up in an evangelical church where the evils of Doubt got a lot of air time from the pulpit and church leadership. From pastors to Sunday school teachers and even youth group interns, they all told us that Doubt was the enemy. It was for those with a weak faith. I even had a Sunday School teacher who took the middle school boys class out to the city water tower, located at the edge of the church parking lot. He read the scripture where Jesus says, “Truly I tell you that if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ and has no doubt in his heart but believes that it will happen, it will be done for him.” Then he told us if we truly believed, we could move the water tower. I THINK he was trying to offer a visual illustration on how powerful faith can be…this was central Oklahoma and since the Great Plains didn’t have any mountains to help his lesson plan, he went with the next best thing…the water tower of Moore Oklahoma. Proud Home of Toby Keith. 

But my middle school Sunday school teacher wasn’t alone. A lot of church teachings are fond of stories from scripture where doubt is proof that someone is a failure. The Israelites wandering in the desert couldn’t go 15 minutes without completely losing their religion – the fools! That super old guy whatshisname was struck mute because he didn’t believe that he would have a child. That’ll show her! And Thomas…poor Thomas – cleverly nicknamed DOUBTIN’ THOMAS  – is the subject of countless sermons because of his absolute failure as a true believer. Clearly, a total jerk! But this pile-on has always bothered me. Even when I was laughing with the boys as we body checked the water tower, praying-in-jest for it to be thrown into the (very far away) sea. We knew it wasn’t going to move. And I knew we were missing a core truth…the water tower in the room that no one seemed to admit was…we all have doubts! 

I’ve come to believe that all of these stories of doubt that are in the Bible aren’t there to prove human failure – maaaaaaaybe they are there to acknowledge that doubt is a perfectly reasonable, totally natural part of being human. 

And since doubt is a fundamental aspect of being human, then it comes as no surprise that doubt is a significant part of the artistic process. The arts are, afterall, an exploration of our humanity. Art (and science) is about asking questions – which has historically made the Church afraid of the arts (and definitely science). These questions – these doubts – are essential to our humanity. We have imaginations that spark us to wonder, “is there a better way of doing this?” and “has anyone else ever thought of this, felt this way, described falling in love with these words?” Or perhaps more dangerously – “is any of this real?” In the beautiful and complex matrix of reason and emotion that we humans are, doubt leads us to a more rigorous faith in what we do and why we do it. If we aren’t regularly questioning our faith, then are we truly engaging with it? Also in her book Inspired, Evans points out that anyone who has a child will know that “the faith of a child” isn’t blind belief. A child asks – incessantly – WHY? Why is the sky blue? Why is the Earth round? Why is the stove hot and why can’t I touch it? Why why why? My own kid doesn’t ask questions about the galaxy because he thinks it’s all a lie…he asks questions because he’s fascinated. I don’t think Jesus wants us to be mindless drones in our faith – robotically accepting some Apostles Creed without question – he wants us to be childlike in order to be fascinated with our faith. He wants us to be engaged.

So when Jesus says that faith can move mountains he wants us to think, “but wait – that’s impossible, right?” He wants us to question his words in order to understand them. Those who doubt this passage as literally impossible will interrogate the text to understand that Jesus isn’t talking about tossing actual mountains around, like some insane Superman…he’s talking about engaging with our faith. What happens when you are disappointed by what you thought God would do for you? Do you immediately give up – “well God isn’t real!” or do you still look for God? If you keep looking, you might find the mountain was a metaphor for something else. 

My parents’ marriage was on the rocks for years, and for years I prayed that God would heal their relationship, but it ended in a bitter divorce that still has difficult repercussions for my family today, 21 years later. For some time, I walked away from my faith in the goodness of God because I had asked for that mountain to be moved – and I truly believed it would be – but not only did it NOT move…it became worse than it ever was. I felt betrayed by God, and consequently disengaged from my faith. Bad theology about Doubt had led me astray. God doesn’t ask us to always believe without a shred of doubt. But he wants us to engage. Jesus, in his biggest crisis of doubt, “My God my God, why have you forsaken me?” still engaged with God. Doubt isn’t the opposite of Belief. I think the opposite of Doubt is Dis-Engagement. When we are no longer curious about something, we’ve fallen out of wonder. 

This is true of the artistic process. When rehearsing a play (or making any work of art), there is inevitably a long period where the work is embarrassingly bad, and it seems like it couldn’t possibly be saved. These periods are terrible to endure – and are often the reason you hear horror stories of ill-behaved directors or diva actors throwing spectacular tantrums. They are terrified that the show will be a failure. But the key to artistic success is to outlast this period – we can’t disengage from the work or give up. We have to remain curious in order to keep working out the idea. There’s an opening night scheduled, the audience is coming, and artists have a sacred responsibility to put forth the best work we can manage, despite the miserable doubts and fear we have along the way. American theater director Anne Bogart calls this process “exquisite pressure.” I love that term. And after years of recognizing that all of my artistic endeavors have an awful period of doubt, I’ve come to trust the process of engaging with my practice, showing up even if I don’t know all the answers, even if I fear it will end in failure, in order for transformation to occur. 

Madeleine L’Engle, in her book Walking on Water, shares that she, 

“…had yet to learn of the faithfulness of doubt. This is often assumed by the judgmental to be faithlessness, but it is not; it is a prerequisite for a living faith.

Francis Bacon writes in De Augmentis, ‘If we begin with certainties, we will end in doubt. But if we begin with doubts and bear them patiently, we may end in certainty.’”

(Walking on Water, page 108)

I’ve learned to love my doubts because they are the fuel that helps me find something beautiful. And consequently, BECAUSE of going through those awful periods of rigorous doubt, I find I am more confidently proud of what I’ve created on the other side. For instance, after I’ve truly put my artistic ideas to the test, I’m less likely to be shaken when a theater critic writes a negative comment or bad review (speaking of exquisite pressure – having your job’s performance evaluation publicly shared in The Washington Post for the world to read can fill you with sinking doubt!). 

Despite the pressure, it would be a great tragedy to avoid doubt, which is why I have a soft spot for poor Thomas. I can’t help it – I AM DOUBTIN’ THOMAS…Confession – There are times when I doubt the whole kit and kaboodle of any religion. I know, I know! I’m supposed to be a believer! But there are moments when my Doubts are as big as “all of it.” Sometimes I just can’t bring myself to sing “Blessed Assurance” and I feel a drowning wave of loneliness because everyone else seems so certain of their faith. I can’t always say my belief is rock solid. I’m not Peter, the rock on which Jesus built the church. I’m Doubtin’ Thomas. 

But also…I don’t think Jesus made a mistake when he chose Thomas as one of his 12 disciples. I think he picked him not to make an example of his failure, not to get a bad rap from preachers on Sunday mornings – but to include his doubts, his questions, and his full humanity in the gospel story. I wonder if Jesus chose Thomas to make the point that our doubts should be included in the very foundation of the Church because it’s an important part of being human. We have hymns that celebrate our Blessed Assurance but I would dance in the aisle if there was a hymn for our Blessed Doubt! 

You may not personally struggle with doubt as much as I do – that’s okay. You might be a Peter. Or a Mary. I’m not here to say everyone needs more doubt in their faith. But just as Thomas needed the other disciples to encourage his belief, I think the church would do well to make more room for those of us who doubt our faith. Jesus made room for Thomas in the 12 people he chose to start the Christian church with, not in spite of his doubts but because of them. The disciples needed Thomas. Look what his doubts do for the disciples in John 14: at the Last Supper, when Jesus tells them that he is about to leave them, going away to prepare a place for them, they are all confounded, unsure of how to respond. But Thomas – with his Blessed Doubt – asks the first question. He basically says, “What do you mean? Lord, I don’t know…” And it’s his doubt that unlocks the conversation for the rest of the group, allowing them to engage with Jesus. Because of Thomas’s inquisitive heart, Philip is emboldened to ask a question, and then Judas (not Iscariot) is brave enough to speak up, and later on all of the disciples are fully engaged in a lively discussion – all because of Doubtin’ Thomas. 

During my time as artist in residence, I read a lot of books written by artists who are also believers. And in every book that explored their faith and work, these artists wrote about their doubts. I found so much comfort in that. I believe God created me as an artist. And an artist is a professional doubter. Artists can’t help but to ask questions. And their questions can inspire us all to dig deeper, to question the status quo. Doubt helps us wonder – what else is out there? Doubt helps us bravely explore our big, unknowable questions. If we never wondered if there was anything more to this life, we’d never know eternity. In other words, Doubt leads us to God. 

The biggest thought that I want to leave you with at the end of my time as artist in residence is not “go see more theatre” – though I think you should. Or “make sure you pay artists a fair wage for their work,” though I think it’s necessary – the biggest idea I want to leave you with is the artists’ approach to creating, which is to make room for your doubts and the doubts of others. After all, it’s only human.

“Lord I believe, help me with my unbelief.”

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In Scripture, God uses earthly metaphors to help us understand heavenly realities. This is true of the Church. When the church is called the Body of Christ we’re reminded that our spiritual life is not only bound to God through Jesus Christ but to every believer. When the church is called the Bride of Christ it reminds us that we together are the object of God’s affection. When the church is called the Priesthood of Believers we comprehend that we have been set apart for God’s purposes. But, of all the identifiers given for the church the most fundamental and primary is Family or Household of God.  

For some of us it’s hard to identify with the metaphor. Maybe it reminds us of the brokenness of our own biological family or some creepy religious cult? Scripture reveals a vision of family which is whole, transparent and redeeming. As part of the family of God we begin to understand that we are favored sons and daughters with the full rights of heirs. Just when we think God would or should leave us to the pigsty of our own foolishness or receive us as a lesser family member or place us on emotional probation, we find the Father does the opposite: he runs full speed ahead, hugs the breath out of us, wets us with his tears, dresses us with his righteousness, gives us his platinum card, declares that we are fully accepted children and then throws a feast so everybody knows it. Why? He sees us in the same light as Jesus, the only and always faithful Son, whose praise and blessings become ours.

Family of God not only means we gain a Father, but also brothers, sisters, mothers and fathers. The families in which we grow up play a foundational and fundamental role, yet even the best of them falls short and is incomplete. No one family can impart or express the depth and diversity of God’s family. Maybe you grew up as an only child or with strained sibling relationships, yet in the family of God you learn what it’s like to have close brothers or sisters. Maybe you grew up with little connection to your father or mother, yet in the family of God you find yourself fathered or mothered in a healing way. Maybe you have no children of your own, but in the family of God your spiritual mothering or fathering changes the life of a child. Maybe you grew up in a family with very few other-culture friendships, but in the family of God you meet believers of every race, culture and class. This is what was so striking about the New Testament church.  The surrounding culture couldn’t fathom a family of Jew/Gentile, widow, orphan, married, single, rich, poor, religious, pagan, zealots, imperialists! The same is true today. When someone from outside the church walks into this kind of family they conclude: “This isn’t natural, so it must be supernatural!”  

What a household God is building! And, what an opportunity we have before us devoting the year to the theme Family of God!

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The more intellectual or academic a church tradition is the more tempted it will be to minimize spiritual practice. Maybe by believing spiritual growth is mostly about correct theology or equating obedience with apprehension. The reformed presbyterian faith has this tendency. And, when it adds the suspicion that spiritual disciplines are “works in disguise”, spiritual practice is easily dismissed. But, that belief is not only detrimental to our growth, it’s also poor biblical anthropology (what it means to be human).

Jesus tells us the first and greatest commandment is to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” This means that faith which is bobble-headed (all mind), Valentine (all heart), or Arm & Hammer (all strength) is malformed spirituality. Most of us tend toward one. Some who love to read and talk theology may believe the problem with the church is ‘feeling’ Christians. Others who value worship and prayer, may see the problem as full minds and dead faith. And, others believe both are all talk and we need to get busy serving God!  But, proper spiritual formation results in an integration of all three.

At the center of the Christian call toward God and neighbor is love. As the Apostle Paul wrote, the only thing that counts is “faith working through love” (Galatians 5.6). So, then a good and necessary practice for Christians is to ask: what do I love? James K. A. Smith puts it this way, 

“Jesus is a teacher who doesn’t just inform our intellect but forms our very loves. He isn’t content to simply deposit new ideas into your mind; he is after nothing less than your wants, your loves, your longings. His ‘teaching’ doesn’t just touch the calm, cool, collected space of reflection and contemplation; he is a teacher who invades the heated, passionate regions of the heart. He is the Word who ‘penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit’; he ‘judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart’ (Heb. 4:12).  (You Are What You Love: The Spiritual Power of Habit, p. 2)”

Smith then goes on to say the best way to discover what you love is to look at what you do–your habits and practices. Our actions bubble up from the heart. Our desires can often be hidden in the most everyday, taken-for-granted habits. For example, it may be the primary goal which drives your weekly schedule is the desire not to be interrupted and to always have an ‘out’ for potential ‘asks’–to retain control over your time. Or, it may be the primary goal that drives your career is the desire to be better than everybody else. But, as we come to know Christ and his sacrificial love for us, we find ourselves desiring to serve the very people we formerly wanted to avoid or best.

How does this occur? When, in faith, our spiritual practice is shaped by Holy Scripture, Prayer, and Sacraments they become waterfalls and wells, rich food and drink, sunshine and shade, mountain top and quiet waters. Sacred spaces where we meet and commune with the Lord; knowing and being known; wooed by his grace and conformed to his likeness. It’s in these moments we experience his Presence and are changed into his Glory. These practices must include both private and corporate times with weekly worship at the center. We must show up where Jesus has promised to show up! When we do this the practice becomes communion and fellowship. And, the great desire of God is fulfilled: “My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” (Ezekiel 37.27)

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In the New Testament, the Church is qualified in one of two ways, either “of God” or of a place: “to the churches of Galatia”, “to the church of the Thessalonians”, etc. This shouldn’t surprise any reader of the Bible because it’s filled with all those hard to pronounce places! The scriptures are just full of references to real places. Why does God bother to mention that he appeared to Abraham at the oaks of Mamre or that David was anointed at Hebron or that Jesus was crucified on Golgotha or that the Church began in Antioch? It is because God cares about Place. He created the place as a habitat for us to develop and cultivate. When sin enters the place we see it through things like pollution or stripping of resources. As God acts in redemption it includes the place, “You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate, but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her, and your land Married; for the Lord delights in you” (Isaiah 62). And when Christ returns he will restore the place, “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And then I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man'” (Revelation 21).  

In other faiths there may be a sacred place (or two) but often little emphasis upon place. The spirituality is disembodied and dis-placed. The Christian faith is a real world religion, so much so that God himself, in the person of Jesus Christ, entered the place. The late theologian Eugene Peterson said, “God’s great love and purposes for us are all worked out in messes in our kitchens and backyards, in storms and sins, blue skies, the daily work and dreams of our common lives.”* Amen. Aside from what theologians refer to as the intermediate state (when believers die and their spirit goes to dwell with the Lord) we will always be “placed”. Either on earth or for all eternity on the New Heavens and Earth.

This is why Christians should be thoughtful and missional concerning where God has placed them. Why we at Grace Downtown should bother to learn the story of our place (D.C), care for it and not use it and actively seek it’s prosperity: “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare” (Jeremiah 29.7).  Fulfilling the two great commandments to love God and neighbor means loving our place. When my neighbor sweeps or shovels my sidewalk I feel loved. I’m reminded of something one of our founding elders, Bob Baldwin, wrote, “A  mobile population produces people (1) less focused on long-term problems of their community (“I will be gone soon so why bother?”), (2) less inclined to invest the time to cultivate new relationships (“It takes too long to develop really good friends.”), and (3) more consumer oriented (“How can I benefit from my current situation?”). The Church emphasizes the opposite: the importance of relationships, God and neighbor, and Place.

—

*quoted from Eugene Peterson’s Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places: A Conversation in Spiritual Theology

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Leaders charged to oversee the spiritual health of a church can commit the same well-intentioned error. There are so many areas for growth! So many good ideas for classes and programs! So many wonderful resources!  But, in reality churches and members are limited because humans are limited. There is only so much we can or should focus upon. Unlimited access to good information isn’t always good!

This is why we seek to make our ministry goal brief and clear. Our goal at Grace Downtown is to be “Inwardly Growing and Outwardly Serving.” It describes the dynamic cycle of Christian spirituality. But, what does it include? We sought to answer that question by answering another: How does who we are (community demographic) and where we are (city demographic) impact our goal? When you read a Bible commentary there is often a section entitled “Occasion.” In other words, what event or problem prompted the letter to be written? Theology is applied in context. As the elders reflected over many years of ministry three emphases arose: Family of God, Living in Place, Spiritual Practice. Whether you are in D.C. for two years or ten years we believe understanding and experiencing these three will result in wonderful growth and service.

Over the next few weeks I’ll unpack each one.  But, in the meantime I encourage you to commit them to heart and mind.

Grateful to be on the journey with you!

Glenn

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Finding “Cosmos in Chaos”: How Supporting Artists Strengthens Community & Furthers the Vision of the Kingdom – Acacia Danielsson

As an artist, I can’t seem to stop thinking and talking about money all the time. “Why?” I ask myself. “Shouldn’t I be thinking about The Art???!!” Maybe you’ve been wondering this, too, even if you’re a lover and supporter of the arts. Creativity and Capital seem to have a mercurial relationship, one that can never seem to find a satisfactory resolution. And yet, if we are to *invest* in an artistic culture for the sake of the Kingdom (like creating an artist-in-residence program at church!) we need to reframe what the role of money is in the relationship between artists and non-artists. Because it is this relationship that determines whether an artistic endeavor holds the promise of life or death, hope or despair, for its intended audience.

This is a sticky subject and has as many nuances as there are people. Our individual relationships to money are deep and varied, and if we’re not careful the idea of “funding the arts” starts to feel like a government bailout of a bankrupt business when, in fact, it’s about tilling the soil for a more flourishing garden. I hope that in this small space, graciously lent by Rex Daugherty, we can journey closer to a new vision for artistic life and community harmony. 

Here’s my premise, in a nutshell: The artist is the perpetual stranger among us. They see things from the outside and can offer rich perspectives based on years of training, observation, and sensitivity to the human condition. Money, in its best application, is a relational tool, one that validates certain ways of seeing, believing, and behaving, and can encourage or discourage narratives about the world from developing. When we start to close the divide between art-makers and art-sustainers* we start to close other important gaps in our community and learn how to collectively remember our role as sub-creators and stewards of Creation, our neighbor, and ourselves. I’ll speak mostly to the art-sustainers in this piece, but I hope this blesses everyone.

*I’d like to use the terms “art-makers” and “art-sustainers” to describe the roles of “artists” and “non-artists”, respectively. This places Art as something outside of all of us, a gift given both to those who shape it and to those who support the shaping. Something no one can exclusively possess. Every human soul is creative; some practice it as a profession, some do not.

In this short spce, I’d like to ask:

1. Who are art-makers and why is the work that they do necessary for us all?
2. How do art-sustainers fit into the artistic ecosystem and why is their work necessary?
3. What does supporting art-makers look like practically?

The Art Makers and their Work

Art-makers seek the unseen and weave disconnected stories, people, and elements into a meaningful image.

Art-makers have and/or seek access to the in-between spaces of the world. The obscure, the non-obvious, the subtle, the hidden, the lesser-known, the deep secrets of the earth. We hunt for gems in a world of pebbles. We scour the details of our lives or the lives of others for the tiny wonders that might ignite illumination. Kehinde Wiley re-envisioning dignity in portraiture. Mozart relishing in the glory of variations on a theme. When all the world rushes by harried pedestrians on a sidewalk, Brandon Stanton of Humans of New York stops to take a picture and record a story. As Madeleine L’Engle would say, art-makers find or make “cosmos in chaos.”

Art-makers are the weavers. We take the tangled threads of the world and connect them into cohesive, living images. We take components and give them anatomy, a living relationship to one another and to the world. This is hard work. It takes years of discipline and skill; of investing time, money, and resources to go deeper into the vision; of choosing to create an alternative life plan because the traditional routes have no flexibility for inspiration. 

This work is important for all of us. The work art-makers do is both priceless (so valuable it cannot be expressed in monetary terms) and useless (so necessary it cannot be expressed in utilitarian terms). 

We all need art. Some of us make it, some of us sustain it. All of us enjoy and are nourished by it. Andrew Peterson writes in Adorning the Dark: 

“…the aim [of art-making] ought to be for the thing to draw attention, ultimately, to something other than the Self. For a Christian, that means accepting this paradox in the knowledge, or at least in the hope, that my expression, even if it is of the most intimate chambers of my heart, can lead the audience beyond me and to the Ultimate Self, the Word that made the world. In that grand chamber alone will art find its best end, as an avenue to lead the audience home.” 

The artistic compulsion to receive and express a vision of beauty and truth can be overwhelming and inescapable, especially for those art-makers who choose to listen and respond. Madeleine L’Engle puts it perfectly in Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith & Art: 

“Perhaps the artist longs to sleep well every night, to eat anything without indigestion; to feel no moral qualms; to turn off the television news and make a bologna sandwich after seeing the devastation and death caused by famine and drought and earthquake and flood. But the artist cannot manage this normalcy. Vision keeps breaking through, and must find means of expression.” **

When we take in a skillfully and generously made piece of art, whether it is dance, music, poetry, theatre, cinema, or visual, our bodies and souls rise to the level of that piece. We dance with the dancer, we sing with the singer, we see with the painter. Art-makers mediate the vision and help us enter into it. 

Because no society has come up with a perfect system for supporting artistic endeavor (we can talk about state vs. privately funded art models later, my friends), it is essential to support art-makers in direct and indirect ways. When you buy a piece of art, you’re not really purchasing an object. You’re supporting an artistic infrastructure. A view of the world, a value system that says, “This is important. In a world of  practical and productive things, this beautiful thing is worth protecting. I believe in stopping and attending to the voice of the Spirit however He moves, especially if it’s from an unexpected place.” 

The Art-Sustainers and Their Work

How do art-sustainers function in this artistic ecosystem? What is their essential role in art-making?

Artistic life isn’t just for art-makers. In the best world, art-makers awaken us to our collective creativity and artistic sensibility. As we’ve seen, an artistic way of life is one that intentionally looks beyond the surface, beyond the obvious, searching for clues to eternity and the enchanting, indescribable Meaning and Beauty we all long to know and be known by in our small, brief lives. We play different roles in this Artistic Expedition. You are essential to the process. Your stories, your life, your work are all a part of the tapestry. If you spin the threads, the art-maker can weave the story. We create together. But too often the spinners and the weavers are cut off from each other, so their respective work feels pointless and meaningless. It is only when we join forces that the story can be told. One body, different functions. “An artist is a nourisher and a creator who knows that during the act of creation there is collaboration. We do not create alone” (Madeleine L’Engle, again).

An art-maker without a community is dead. We need other creators to bounce ideas off of, to support and encourage us. One of my best friends is a fellow actor I met in grad school. When we hang out, it’s not just catching up, it’s spurring each other on to greatness. Validating the vision. Exchanging information and ideas. Buoying the spirit. But we also need those outside of our artistic community. Those we do life with. You. Whether it’s a church or a soccer league, or a volunteer group, or a biological/chosen family, we need portals to the world outside of our studios. We need to hear your stories and perspectives so we can better reflect human experience in the given time and place of our lives. 

In addition to your presence and perspective, you are essential to providing a level of security and shelter to an art-maker in an otherwise tumultuous and uncertain lifestyle. Art-makers live on the margins and are often on the edge of financial and social stability. (Now, there are many ways for art-makers to live flourishing lives, but that path often takes time to carve since each artistic life is as unique as each human soul.) You’re saying, “I see what you’re doing. For us. For the world. And I want to be a part of that work.” I used to work in fundraising and before I was a Development officer I thought raising donations was kinda yucky. Like a necessary yet shameful transaction for the creation of good things. Now, after having spent time with donors and fundraisers, I see the value in this sharing of burdens. Some are gifted to create, some are gifted to support. And both are collaborators in the making of art. 

We presume art-makers are money-grabbing dilettantes who spend all their cash on artisan coffee and wine. And while that does sometimes happen (can we talk about substance abuse in the artistic community at some point?), art-makers most often need help covering rent and utilities because their artistic work is insufficient for sustaining life and their multiple day jobs have exhausted them to their core. A little cash infusion can create a margin, even if it’s a brief respite, for a soul wearied by the protracted vulnerability of awareness in a broken, beating-hearted world. So when that art-maker in your life says, “I need money!” It’s not because they’re fiscally irresponsible. It’s because they are weary of living outside the system for the benefit of all. They need a little shelter from the storm they’ve been writing a ballad about; a ballad that shelters others’ souls. They are generous with you. Be generous with them.

Supporting an art-maker is also a way of entering into culture-making and taking an active role in the narrative of your community. We are story-driven creatures, and often the most lucratively backed story franchises are the ones that write cultural standards of behavior and belief, for better or worse (e.g. Harry Potter, Star Wars, Squid Game, etc.). If you feel powerless about the state of civic discourse or want to open a nuanced conversation about a prevalent issue, partner with an art-maker and make something together. We shouldn’t be living in a world where there is a division between the storytellers and the audience. Both come together to make a story happen. Both are necessary. 

What Supporting an Art-Maker Can Look Like

This is why I love the idea of residencies. Art-makers reside in larger communities. Through cultivating their own creativity they remind us of the creativity in all of us. 

Art-makers do vital work, but they can only thrive when connected to others, to you. An Artist in Residence is an art-maker called to listen closely to a specific community for a time and create something of mutual artistic nourishment. Or to present something original that is a unique vision they’ve been given of the world, themselves, or a particular subject.

So how can you help the art-maker in your life? Here are some practical things you can do that would be a huge blessing to a creative soul:

• Offer housing. Freelance life is tough on credit and cash flow. Even a short term stay in a guest room can work wonders for an art-maker between living situations.
• Offer studio space. Creative space is the most necessary and most expensive commodity for a working artist. Art-makers often live in shared housing or cramped quarters. Having dedicated space to paint, dance, or rehearse is a luxury few can afford but all need in order to grow and advance as an art-maker. If you have an empty garage, consider letting an art-maker work there on occasion.
• Offer skill/resource trades. Are you a dentist? A tax preparer? Offer an art-maker a free cleaning or tax prep services in exchange for a painting, a performance, or even a secondary skill (like childcare, or house cleaning, etc.). Trading is a fantastic way to bypass a cash-based economy.
• Buy them lunch. Take your art-maker out to lunch and get to know them. They’ll be grateful for the meal but even more for the opportunity to see and be seen by you. We’re often lonely and want to connect. But normal social connection points like grabbing brunch or drinks on the weekend either conflict with our work schedule or add up financially. Better yet, take them a meal during a busy week. One of the most loving things a church friend did for me was bring me a healthy and delicious meal during tech week. I felt so seen and supported.
• Support their art. Go see a show. Buy a print. Donate to their production costs. It’s not just about spending the money, it’s accepting their invitation to see the world a little more deeply through the lens of their creativity.
• Send them an encouraging note. I keep a folder of encouraging notes I’ve received from people because those demons of doubt can yell real loud.
• Slip them some cash. It’s not gross. It’s an act of love. If you don’t know how else to begin entering into the artistic ecosystem, start here.
• Encourage your community to support the art-maker(s) in your midst. Whether you’re part of an HOA or the PCA, identify the artistic souls in your community and find a way to bring them into your lives. Invite them to dinner, to game nights, on vacations. Encourage your church leadership to create an Artist in Residency program.  We all need art. Help your other non-artist friends see their need for it, too. Do it as a group.

In Conclusion

I hope this was helpful. I hope you feel encouraged, and blessed, and welcomed into Art-Making as a way of life and mission. For the art-sustainers out there, I hope you see your vital role in this way of life not as a sidelined ATM, but as an essential collaborator for bringing artistic vision into the world. We worship a God of abundance and beauty and truth, and I know of no other way to proclaim this to the world than through the heart-enchanting nature of Story. 

I’ll close with one final, beautiful word from Andrew Peterson’s Adorning the Dark:

“I want you, dear reader, to remember that one holy way of mending the world is to sing, to write, to paint, to weave new worlds. Because the seed of your feeble-yet-faithful work fell to the ground, died, and rose again, what Christ has done through you will call forth praise from lonesome travelers long after your name is forgotten. They will know someone lived and loved here. Whoever they were, they will think, they belonged to God. It’s clear that they believed the stories of Jesus were true, and it gave them a hope that made their lives beautiful in ways that will unfold for ages among the linnea that shimmers in the moonlit woods.” (p. 98)

____________________________________

**If you want a tangible expression of this, I recommend listening to Florence + The Machine’s newest single, “Free” (I also love the music video). She sings not only of her personal relationship with anxiety and art-making, but of the overwhelming need to create and share music in the face of suffering and death: 

“Is this how it is? / Is this how it’s always been? / To exist in the face of suffering and death / And somehow still keep singing? / Oh, like Christ up on a cross / Who died for us, who died for what? / Oh, don’t you wanna call it off? / But there is nothing else that I know how to do / But to open up my arms and give it all to you / ‘Cause I hear the music, I feel the beat / And for a moment, when I’m dancing / I am free.” 

Sources & Suggested Reading

• Walking on Water, Madeleine L’Engle
• Adorning the Dark, Andrew Peterson
• Culture Care, Makoto Fujimura
• Art + Faith, Makoto Fujimura
• Rainbows for the Fallen World, Calvin Seerveld
• Habits of Being, Flannery O’Connor

The post Arts Blog: Guest Post “Finding ‘Cosmos in Chaos’” appeared first on GraceDC.

In 2013 I received a call from a committed member in our church. A single woman and working professional. She was in distress–reeling, terrified, and burdened with anxiety (and shame).
“Glenn–I have some news. I’m pregnant”.  

The unplanned pregnancy came while she was between jobs. The father wanted nothing to do with the child and advocated for an abortion. Some in her inner circle insisted if she did have the child there was no way she should consider raising it. Understandably, she felt alone and overwhelmed. We talked about God being present in chaos, his unwavering love and acceptance and our church’s support.

Over the next months, as the shock wore off, the intensity increased. The father was consistent and clear that he would not be a parent. Pressure increased from others to choose adoption. Those of us who were confidants did our best to listen, honor her conscience, and offer support. After a few months of praying, as well as visiting an adoption agency, she decided to parent the child.

A few months later a beautiful, covenant baby boy was born. Our community, mostly singles and married without kids celebrated. We sought to be a surrogate family and jumped into action providing meals and childcare. It was a lifeline to our sister and her son. But, for all the sincere efforts there were inevitable gaps. Amidst the joy and delight of this new life, she faced the loneliness and fatigue of being a single parent. It finally made sense to return to her home so her parents could assist, which also meant returning to her childhood church. Being a more established church there were families with kids but few (if any) single, working moms. The programs of the church were robust but designed for stay-at-home moms. How could she make it to a Bible study or meet at the park for playdates during the workday? Later evening fellowship times were difficult facing busy mornings. Yet, this was the path to which God called her and with it came his promised provision. Each year she persevered, and when we talked I perceived her growing in strength and joy. Birthdays and milestones in the life of her son appearing on Facebook led to praise and prayers.

Last year, I received another call about a decade after the first, “Glenn, I’m now engaged. I want to get married in D.C., would you do it?”  So, just over a year ago, outside the Jefferson Memorial, we celebrated a wedding (and a forthcoming adoption).  

This experience illustrates two things, which I think are especially important to remember at this moment. First, commitment to life is costly. As countless parents will testify–children are a blessing!  “Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward” (Ps. 127.3). Parenting yields a reward of love, joy, purpose, and transformation, yet, that heritage is costly! The cost of independence, being on call 24/7, delayed gratification, and heartbreak (“and, a sword will pierce through your own soul also”). At its core, parenting is a call to die for the sake of life. Our member, this single mother, is a living testimony of that call. But, more importantly, a testimony of the Christian gospel. For what every faithful parent does imperfectly, our faithful God does perfectly. At the heart of the Christian faith is the story of God Himself, in the person of Jesus Christ, literally dying so we can live. Dying the death we deserve so we might possess the life he deserves–abundant and eternal. The entire reason the Father sent Jesus was loving self-sacrifice. Jesus’ life mission was to serve and sacrifice fully and finally. Christian commitment to the sanctity of life is motivated by this as much as protecting defenseless divine image bearers. And, it reaches further. For it means a Christian commitment to life, while beginning at the womb, only begins there. A genuine cost-bearing commitment is evident as Christ’s followers serve single parents (and their children) for the long journey. 

The second thing illustrated is unconditional compassion. No one could enter into this dear sister’s story without feeling both inspiration and compassion. Compassion for the experience of  abandonment, shame, exhaustion, and anxiety. All of us would want nothing less. Jesus was the King of compassion. His heart overflowed with compassion to undeserving sinners (again, all of us). While the Supreme Court ruling has been received with controversy the call for compassion is without controversy. Whether someone feels outraged or afraid, Christians can be compassionate. There is no conflict or falseness in both a commitment to life and compassion. One can praise God and celebrate victory for life and also have sincere compassion on our neighbor. The virtues of Christ live in harmony.

Let our commitment to life and our compassion dwell side by side.

The post Pastors Blog: On Dobbs appeared first on GraceDC.

I asked artists to share what it COSTS to pursue their career in the arts. Here’s what they said:

• missing friends’ weddings, baby showers, birthdays due to show schedules. 
• giving up opportunities for career advancement in my day job in favor of flexibility [for artistic work]
• turning down roles (and by extension, career advancement in theatre) in order to show up for my loved ones [read: the dehumanizing cost of losing out on relationships in order to pursue the arts]
• Your friendships; your time
• Art can cost a person aging with dignity (lack of financial security)
• Live performing arts might be the most demanding on your lifestyle, because you are making inflexible high-stakes work commitments during everyone else’s leisure time
• Expect to always be struggling – financially and often emotionally. And don’t expect anyone who isn’t an artist to understand that what you do isn’t a hobby but your life’s work.
• You are a small business. It costs what many people take for granted at their 9-5’s: supplies for making art, specialized equipment, space rental, marketing the product (you), health benefits, 401k, paid leave…

Being an artist costs time. Missed holidays, vacations, and family gatherings like weddings and even funerals. Time spent working menial “day jobs” because too many arts institutions do not pay living wages. Time putting off starting a family because of the same financial restrictions, lack of childcare infrastructure, long days, and irregular hours. Time with family, if you do decide to start one. Time at the doctor’s/therapist’s office because obtaining and maintaining adequate health insurance is a struggle for even moderately successful artists. Time on the planet due to inadequate, irregular sleep, consistently high stress levels, and a high incidence of substance abuse. 

Madeline L’Engle, in her book Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith & Art, shares:

“an artist is someone who cannot rest, who can never rest as long as there is one suffering creature in this world…perhaps the artist longs to sleep well every night, to eat anything without indigestion, to feel no moral qualms, to turn off the television news and make a bologna sandwich after seeing the devastation and death caused by famine and drought and earthquake and flood. But the artist cannot manage this normalcy. Vision keeps breaking through and must find means of expression.”

My own pursuit of the arts has cost me more than sleepless nights. 

There have been times in my life that all I could afford to eat were peanut butter sandwiches. And not the good peanut butter with the oil separated when you open the jar. I’ve worked a lot of jobs I didn’t want to do in order to afford the arts career I wanted. I drove for Lyft until my back was messed up. I taught after school drama to 1st graders – with no qualification of teaching that age group – so that I could act in plays at night…plays that would pay me $350 for 2 months of work (30 hours a week – that’s just over $1 an hour) And one of those shows was Helen Hayes nominated! 

There is a financial, mental, and emotional cost to being an artist. It’s not easy. 

And yet…there’s a deeper joy that I find similar to what the Apostle Paul describes in Philippians 3: “For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.”

I also asked artists to share what they have GAINED because of their life in the arts. Here’s what they said:

• A sense of connection to my true purpose
• A purpose drive life. As long as I have worked in the arts, I have never questioned why I’m doing what I’m doing or whether it was worth it.
• More empathy. Broader imagination. Meeting and working with great people.
• Empathy. I believe acting traing is empathy training.
• Beautiful friends all over the world. More patience.
• Perspective, patience, the community that I was always searching for and joy in collaborative creativity.
• A different benchmark [of success] than the one I was supposed to have. A better example for my children. A desire to never retire. 
• Confidence, a world of friends, a voice that lets me influence the future of our city, freedom, a purpose, joy, accomplishment.
• Purpose and a circle of friends that continues to grow
• Joy. Meaning. Understanding. Great excitement. Such happiness and great friends.
• Knowing that my work makes a difference in immeasurable ways. Creative colleagues that speak my language, fond memories, wild stories, and the best photos.
• A way of living that makes me feel alive, that makes life joyful and deep, that makes me feel like myself, a path through pain and difficult life experiences. 
• Some awesome friends.

Notice how many times they USED the word PURPOSE.

That is a gold you cannot buy. Also note how many times “good friends or people” are mentioned. Aren’t we all looking for a sense of purpose and a sense of belonging? 

What are you willing to give up to find your calling? 

What will it cost you? What will you gain? 

The post Arts Blog: What it Costs appeared first on GraceDC.

To be a Christian is, perhaps above all things, to be a person whose life is anchored in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Indeed, the Christian life is unintelligible apart from this resurrection. We pray believing that He hears. We weep believing that He cares. We struggle believing that He helps. We live this life, in other words, because we believe that Jesus lives. And the work of such a life—its very meaning—is to bear witness to the reality of this resurrection in who we are and what we do.

This witness expresses itself in an almost infinite number of ways: In the renewal of our minds, in the confession of our mouths, the formation of our bodies, the labor our days, the stewardship of our goods, and the intimacy of our relationships. But curiously, the resurrection narratives in the gospels suggests that one of the most important acts of witness is found in something unexpected: in the breaking of bread. Indeed a careful reading of the resurrection narratives suggests that it is in this context that Christ is, perhaps most especially known.

The gospel of Mark, for example, makes it explicit that Jesus revealed himself to his disciples while “they were reclined at the table.” The gospel of Luke makes this even more explicit in two extraordinary accounts. In the first, Luke tells us that Jesus made himself known to two of his followers “in the breaking of bread.” In the second, as his disciples stand gaping at him in disbelief, Jesus asks them for something to eat and then, when given a fish, he eats it in front of them. Likewise, the gospel of John shows us that Jesus reveals himself to Peter in the context of a meal. Calling Peter to the shore, Jesus tells him to “come and have breakfast.” These are not incidental details; to the contrary, they are critical parts of the story of resurrection. For in them, Jesus demonstrates to all who behold Him that He has come to welcome the wandering, feed the hungry, and fill the empty. In other words, the gospel writers want us to see that the truth about Jesus’ resurrection is perhaps most clearly beheld in the context of the table, in the presence of food.

Exploration

In considering this reality, two important invitations emerge. The first is an invitation to be the guest. In each of these gospel accounts, Jesus invites his people into the fullness of His resurrection life. Every time I read these accounts it strikes me again: Jesus cleans the fish, lights the fire, sets the table, breaks the bread, and invites His people—in hunger, in doubt, in fear, in shame—to come to Him. And He promises that in coming to Him, we will not only find Him in fullness, but also find fullness in Him. This is the first invitation of Easter: the invitation to come from the fasting of Lenten longing and to fill ourselves with the undying bounty of Jesus’ resurrection life.

But the second invitation is the invitation to be the host. For in each of these stories, the disciples, having been gathered in, are also sent out. And as they go, they go not simply as beneficiaries of the resurrection feast, but also as bearers of it. Consider Peter’s encounter with the resurrected Christ in the gospel of John. Having been fed by Jesus from the coals and from the sea, Jesus now sends Peter to go and do likewise, saying to him—not once, but three times—“Feed my sheep.” And as the story of the church of the risen Christ unfolds, we see that this is exactly what Jesus’ disciples do. They provide food for the hungry, contend for table fellowship between enemies, and bear the table of the Lord into the cities of the world. And so do we. We too are called to take on the role of Host in the name and power of the risen Jesus. And there is no better time to do this than the high feast of the Christian year: Easter.

So this season, as you celebrate Easter, celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, give renewed and delighted attention to the table. Hold your ingredients with joy. Prepare them with care. Offer them with thanks. Pass them with generosity. And taste them with hope. They bear witness to the fullness to come. For as you do, you—and those with you—will encounter the very risen Christ in the breaking of the bread.

Gregory Thompson (PhD, University of Virginia) is a pastor, scholar, artist, and producer whose work focuses on race and equity in the United States. He is the co-creator of Union: The Musical, a soul- and hip-hop-based musical about the 1968 Sanitation Workers’ Strike, and the co-author, with Duke L. Kwon, of Reparations: A Christian Call to Repentance and Repair (Brazos, 2021).

The post In the Breaking of Bread appeared first on GraceDC.

Painted mural, 74 13/16 × 78 3/4 in. (190 × 200 cm). Centro de Formación de Animadores, Gatun Lake, Panama

Meditation

Since its early days the church has made images, gathering the raw materials of God’s creation and combining and fashioning them into new forms. Frescoes, mosaics, illuminated manuscripts, wooden relief carvings, marble sculptures—these are just some of the many media historically used to call people into the grand narrative of scripture, helping them to experience it sensorily.

The purpose of religious images in the Middle Ages was threefold: to imprint the memory, to shape understanding, and to enkindle the affections and the will. Paintings as “books for the illiterate” is the oft-quoted line from Pope Gregory I, but didacticism wasn’t the only or even the primary function of art, as if those who could read had no need of it. In the same letter, Gregory says images train us in what to love and what to imitate. As we’re visually reminded of the ways God has acted in history, especially in the person of Christ but also through the saints, we are often moved to a deeper love of God and neighbor.

I’m focusing here on biblical art, by which I mean art that depicts people or events described in the Bible. I’m not saying artists who are Christian must create work of this kind, or that Christians should enjoy only biblical art. Christ is Lord over all of life, and art with any subject matter, of any style, has the potential to reveal beauty, goodness, and truth, regardless of the faith commitments of its maker. But I want to challenge the view that all biblical art is irrelevant, boring, kitschy, or merely illustrative. Besides the many fascinating historical art objects that are part of our heritage as Christians (whose riches we should be mining just as much as we do the theological literature and hymnody bequeathed to us by our predecessors in the faith), there are quite a few artists today, inside and outside the church, making art that responds to the Bible in fresh ways. 

In my own devotional life, I’ve found that the visual arts can be potent stimuli to prayer. Contemplative engagement with images is sometimes referred to as visio divina, or sacred seeing, adapted from the practice of lectio divina, sacred reading. As you gaze attentively on an image, you open yourself up to receive the gift it holds, usually by dwelling with a particular detail that resonates most. Visio divina is not about trying to interpret art or place it in context but about opening the eyes of the heart. More being present to, less dissecting. Some call it praying with the eyes, a form of silent, receptive prayer.

My practice marries this kind of prayerful approach with a more analytical one, informed by the disciplines of art history and theology. (That sounds more academic than intended; I don’t have degrees in either.) Personal encounter with God is something I’m ready for, but I’m also interested in how artists play upon what came before and how art serves as a form of theology or biblical exegesis. Some Christians find it helpful, when looking at art, to separate spiritual and aesthetic modes of contemplation; I prefer integration. Whatever works best for you is perfectly fine. The important thing is slow looking and an openness to discovery.  

Exploration

Let’s practice prayerful looking with the Emmaus painting by Maximino Cerezo Barredo above. (For help interpreting it, you can consult its source text, Luke 24:13–35.)

• Notice the arrangement of figures and objects (called “composition”), clothing, framing, and light and shadow. 
• What is the focal point, and how do you know? (That is, what techniques does the artist use to draw your attention there?)
• What does the gaze of Christ communicate to you? 
• What does each gesture convey?
• Consider the following themes: Thresholds. Communion. Veiling/unveiling. 
• Does anything surprise or confuse you about the image? If you’ve seen other visualizations of the Emmaus story, how does this one compare?
• In art, a “surrogate figure” is a person meant to stand in for the viewer. Imagine yourself present in the scene as one of the two pilgrims. What are you feeling? 
• Have you ever had a similar experience—in which Christ was made known to you in a sudden, illuminating way?
• Murals, being painted onto walls, are inextricable from their settings (even though they can in a more limited sense, through photography, be enjoyed apart from that context). This painting was made for the dining room of a center for the training of Christian lay leaders in Panama, where it continues to shape those who eat under it. How might it influence these trainees’ (and their teachers’) sense of call?
• Emmaus has an invitational quality. Whatever invitation you perceive in it, respond—inwardly, outwardly.

Victoria Emily Jones blogs at ArtandTheology.org, exploring ways in which the arts can stimulate renewed engagement with the Bible. She serves as curator of the Daily Prayer Project and board member of the Eliot Society and has contributed to ArtWay, the Visual Commentary on Scripture, and the Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception. Follow her on Instagram @art_and_theology.

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After graduating from college, I worked for Emmaus Ministries, a nonprofit that serves men living on the streets of Chicago. One day I was staffing our drop-in ministry center when a former regular, now on his way to recovery, came in to spend time with our staff. Deshawn was his usual self, constantly joking around and teasing. He had recently gotten sober and was finally working a regular job. He decided to drop by for our usual family-style meal, to spend time with friends who had helped him on his journey.

“How about church? You been going to church recently?” one of my colleagues asked over lunch. “Ah, don’t ask me about church,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Church ain’t for me.”

Emmaus works with some of the poorest of the poor: men in survival prostitution. These men are despised even within the homeless community, and all of them have unbelievably tragic stories, marred by abuse, systemic poverty, racism (most are racial or ethnic minorities), mental illness, and substance abuse.

In my two years there, I counted it a true privilege to hear the stories of men like Deshawn and to be a small part of sharing Christ’s love with them. As a staff, we faced the continual challenge of introducing these men to churches where they can continue their healing journeys outside the walls of Emmaus. For many of them, the church is not a place of welcome but one of judgment, where they face rejection particularly for their sexual behavior. Most echo Deshawn’s stark assessment: “Church ain’t for me.”

This struck me as entirely backwards. I believe we can find true healing in the church through an encounter with Christ. Yet if his invitation is for everyone, why do the most destitute feel excluded?

Since our conversation, I keep wondering what it might look like for our churches to become home for the Deshawns—people on the margins of society. What might it mean to reimagine our faith through a marginal lens, reintegrating into the heart of the church a regard for the most rejected members of society? This question transforms who we are and how we worship, realigning our hearts.

Many of the practices we already use to remember our Savior are key to this realignment process. Our Lord who lived alongside society’s outcasts and died on a criminal’s cross lives in us and should animate all that we do. Our celebration of the Lord’s Table is particularly pivotal for realigning our hearts toward our neighbors like Deshawn, calling us again to do life with them as we embody the lifestyle of Emmanuel, “God with us.”

The Lord’s Table

It is no accident that Jesus came to earth in the humblest of circumstances. No stranger to poverty or oppression, he became a refugee (Matt. 2:13–15) who narrowly avoided death at the hands of Herod. He grew up in the obscure town of Nazareth, an obscure town of backward country folk, in a nation under harsh Roman rule. His ministry testified to his deep affection for those on the margins—for example, Jesus called a man from the despised profession of tax collecting to be one of his closest partners in ministry. His love for everyone, including those on the bottom of society (socioecomically and/or reputationally), drew thousands to him, who were mesmerized not only by his teachings and miracles but also by his willingness to walk with them when others wouldn’t.

Jesus died a criminal’s death, crucified on a Roman cross. In this ultimate act, he canceled sin and proclaimed ultimate solidarity with us, especially victims of injustice, through his unjust death. Human in every way, Christ was very familiar with the harshness of society’s margins. We celebrate our marginalized Messiah at the Lord’s Table. 

Yet the Lord’s Table also calls us together to a particular way of living. On the cross, as in his life, our Lord showed radical unity with the poor and the lowly, and he calls us to remember together this part of his ministry at the Table. After all, the word “communion” literally means “union together”; here we acknowledge a radical unity in the body of Christ. This unity is a participatory one, in which we take on together the fullness of Christ’s continuing ministry and fulfill his promise: “Whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do” (John 14:12). We are to reflect the life of Christ, not letting our faith be confined within the walls of the church.

Christ wants to nourish us to enter a world that is dying of spiritual thirst and hunger. He invites us to use his Table as a place where his story becomes alive again in each of our lives. We retell the story to ourselves as we both receive his forgiveness and take on the manner of life that he lived.

He has already invited the Deshawns of the world into full communion with him. His Table, spread out in each of our churches, is open wide not only to us but to any who would come, no matter their background. As my time at Emmaus taught me, breaking bread in a shared meal breaks down the walls that divide us. The Lord’s Table allows the love of Christ to shatter our world anew and piece it together again. When we enter into deepening, self-denying communion with one another in this way, true shalom becomes possible as never before.

Exploration

Ask the Lord to lead your imagination. 

1. How would God have you walk with the poor in some way this week or this month? Perhaps it is through a conversation with someone who is experiencing homelessness, or a visit to a nursing home resident who receives few visitors. Maybe it means opening your home to a new immigrant family. As you participate in the feast at the Lord’s Table, remember the people around you who are also invited to the coming feast in the kingdom of God.

2. How can we begin to see our time now as a dress rehearsal for the wedding supper of the Lamb, when the rich and poor really will feast together as we proclaim the unity won through his shed blood?

At the Lord’s Table, we remember the marks of suffering on Christ’s body, recalling also those who carry on their bodies and in the unseen places of their souls the marks of pain and sin. Let us live in the world as people of Good Friday, in active remembrance of the Lord who lived and died on the margins. In our rehearsal for his feast, let us welcome the Easter reality of the coming kingdom of God. Here at last, all parts of our broken societies will be made truly one body of Christ, fully united to celebrate with him.

Joel Brown is a lay pastor serving with Greenhouse Movement, an Anglican mission society in Chicago. He leads Cornerstone Anglican Church–Edgewater, a congregation planted in a nursing home on the city’s north side.

The post Celebrating Beyond The Lord’s Table: A Communal Invitation to Solidarity appeared first on GraceDC.

If you haven’t heard already, Pastor Andrew and the church leadership have asked me to be the Artist-in-Residence at Grace Downtown, and I was amazed by this offer. In my experience, the church at large and the arts are often at odds, and the two rarely celebrate each other, much less learn from one another. So it’s personally touching to get involved with Grace Downtown in this way. My wife, Lee, and I are long time members, and we’re so thankful for this opportunity.

The first thing we know about God is that he is an artist. A creator. “In the beginning God created…” The primacy of this aspect of God is powerful for me as an artist because I think what it means to be made in his image is that we are made as creative beings, and we are called to use our creativity in our relationships, our vocation, our work places, and just for fun! Creativity makes life beautiful.

Furthermore, God reveals himself to us through the arts – through storytelling. The ability to tell stories, particularly ones that aren’t real – and yet learn from them, even be emotionally moved by them, is an incredible feature of humanity. In fact, it’s a primal feature of humanity – we make sense of our world through storytelling. It’s no surprise then that Jesus was a storyteller. What are parables but tiny pieces of theatre?! They have dialogue, characters, plot, a clear beginning, middle, and end. All the essentials of good drama. My career as a theatre artist is being a professional storyteller – so to understand the significance of storytelling is to understand the channel by which God speaks to us. He reveals himself in narrative because it’s foundational to who we are – “In the beginning” is the same 5 syllables as “Once Upon a Time.” Or as many parables began, “There once was a man…” Storytelling is essential to our humanity.

Many theatre artists I know, when speaking about our profession, will comment “well, I’m not saving lives…” comparing their career to a doctor or other healthcare worker. Yet throughout the year, how many times do you see a doctor? Your dentist? Compare that to how many times you engage with the arts. Whether it’s listening to music, a podcast, watching a show, reading a book, taking in a museum or catching a live performance, I’d venture to say most of us don’t go a single day without the arts playing a vital role in our lives. The pandemic has only heightened our need for many professions in our society: we need doctors and medical scientists to keep us safe; we need teachers and educators to keep our kids thriving, and we need the arts to keep us human. The 2014 sci-fi novel Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel features a troupe of travelling actors and musicians in an imagined apocalypse where a pandemic has altered humanity. The traveling artists’ motto, taken from a Star Trek episode, is “ because survival is insufficient.” As we isolated in the early days of the pandemic, and as we are forced back into quarantine during covid exposures now, we turn to the arts to keep hold of our mental and emotional health. Storytelling matters because we are created to respond to stories. We need stories “because survival is insufficient.”

What art have you turned to during the pandemic to keep you sane? What recent story has impacted you in a meaningful way or made you feel more deeply?

The post Arts Blog: Why Story Matters appeared first on GraceDC.

Before a word is on our tongue you know it completely, where 2 or more are gathered you are in their midst, you welcome us to come before you as we are, empty-handed, spread thin, having nothing together, to find an audience with you. Thank you that in you we can find grace and mercy in our time of need. 

We are in need.

God, we pray for the brokenness in the world, for what seems like the unchecked spread of evil. It can be hard to see you at work in our world, and yet we know that you sustain all things and nothing takes place outside your view. We pray for unrest and every place that does not know your shalom, for the situation in Ukraine, the aftermath of coups in Burkina Faso and Myanmar, the genocide in Xinjiang, and Taliban rule in Afghanistan. God, the hearts of kings are in your hands; please stay the tide of evil across your creation and frustrate the plans of the wicked. Raise up in all corners of the world those who love justice and righteousness. We pray for the persecuted church, that you would help them persevere amidst mounting restrictions, hostility, and abuse.

God we also pray for the brokenness in our country: where there is division and tribalism bring understanding and a spirit of unity; where there is loneliness bring community and companionship, where there is fatigue bring relief, where there is othering and neglect of those on the margins raise up allies and advocates who will tirelessly stand for the cause of the most vulnerable, where there are those who hold to a form of godliness but deny its power bring your Spirit, where there is rising secularism and pursuit of false gods that run counter to your kingdom bring repentance and turning to you for life. Let us, your people, not sit idly by, but let us be a light in the darkness. May those who claim your name in this country reflect your glory rather than obscure it. 

God, we pray for the brokenness in our city. Car-jackings are becoming a daily occurrence, there’s a rise in gun violence, our neighbors experience homelessness. We lift up to you those whose hearts are moved by scarcity, hate, instability, or pleasure to choose wrong paths. Have mercy on them that they might come to know you, have enough, forgive, and hate evil. We pray for the peace and prosperity of DC and for your church here to make a felt difference in countering its brokenness.

Finally, Father, we lift to you the brokenness in our lives. Broken relationships, the death of dreams, isolation, constant comparison, chronic illness, and suffocating anxiety. We know that with you there is no such thing as unseen pain. Our sighing is not hidden from you and you collect our tears in a bottle. Your invitation to the weary and heavy-laden is always good so we come seeking rest. We seek rest from our striving, insecurities, and disappointments, from the unrelenting toll of the pandemic on our energy and relationships, from burnout and busyness. Fill from your grace that which we seek apart from you. And for those of us who have lost our way without knowing it or simply cannot seem to overcome inertia to return, we seek your rescue. We ask all these things knowing you are able. In Christ we pray. Amen.

The post We are in Need – Prayer for Our World, City, and Church appeared first on GraceDC.

We thank you that you invite us to come to you and that even the smallest bit of faith is enough (Matt 17:2). Thank you for working and listening as we pray.

God, you say that your eyes look down from heaven and see us (Ps 11:4). And so we pray for those of us who feel unseen.

We pray for those of us who feel unseen in our pain. We pray for the physically ill for whom it takes everything in us just to get through this week, this day, this service, and who feel deeply alone and trapped in a body that just won’t work. We pray for those who feel pain in mind and heart, who are experiencing anguish, anxiety, depression, and despair in ways that make us feel alienated from you and from others (Ps 88:8-9). We may feel that darkness and sickness hide us and yet somehow are our only company (Ps 88:18). 

Lord, you say that whether we soar with the wings of the morning or find ourselves in the depths of the grave, you are with us (Ps 139:7-12). Bring your peace and relief to those who are hurting (Ps 34:18). And help us, as your people, to carry one another’s burdens and hold out hope for each other in faith and in gentleness (Gal 6:2). 

We pray for those who feel unseen in our grief, especially for those who have lost loved ones to death or are losing them slowly to terminal illness, degenerative disease, or memory loss. Our grief has left us in shock, and our hearts cry out in agony. It seems that for us time has stopped and trapped us in the moments that shattered our lives, but the world keeps on moving ahead, maybe even leaving us behind.  

Jesus, you call yourself a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief and familiar with our sadness (Isa 53:3). Be with those who feel crushed under the weight of loss. Help us to be a community that rejoices with those who rejoice, mourns with those who mourn, and doesn’t turn away from each other’s sorrow (Rom 12:15). Comfort us so that we can both receive and reflect comfort to one another (2 Cor 1:3-4).

We pray for those who feel unseen in an absence, who feel eclipsed by a big blank space or missing piece in our lives. Perhaps it’s an absence of power, safety, or stability. Maybe it’s the absence of affection from family or from a spouse, or the absence of friendships or romantic relationship or children that are deeply desired and just not here. Maybe it’s the distance and disconnection from this pandemic.

God, you say that you defend the defenseless, that you love the loveless, and that you give the lonely a home (Ps 72:4, Ps 40:17, Ps 68:6a). You say that you provide (Ps 23:1). Help us, Lord, to see one another’s needs and to serve one another in love and tenderness (Gal 5:13). Provide for us through our gifts and experiences, and yes even our weaknesses, as we care for one another (Rom 12:4-8, 2 Cor 12:19, 2 Cor 4:7). 

We pray for those who feel unseen in our labors, our work, our toil. Since humanity sinned and fell from glory, and the world with us, we experience the frustration and futility that comes with fighting against disease, against decay, against disorder, against darkness even as we fight for light, for life, for beauty. Whether it’s at work, home, or in relationships, many of us feel tired and spent, that we just can’t do this anymore. We wonder if we are doing this all in vain even as we struggle to trust that every good deed done in your name has eternal, unshakable significance.

Father, you say you work in us to will and to work according to your good pleasure (Phil 2:12-13). Restore us and encourage us with the knowledge that we are seen by you in our service to you, our neighbors, and this world (Heb 6:10). Help us to spur one another on toward love and good works as we trust that the seeds we plant in this broken earth will bloom in your perfect time (Heb 10:24, Ecc 3:11).

And lastly, we pray for those who feel unseen in the fog of shame. We pray for those who feel the weight of the wrongs we have committed and the pain of wrongs that others have committed against us. We pray for those of us who feel ashamed by the things that tempt us and the ways we wish we didn’t have to feel pulled away from you and your truth.

God, help us to see that you are the one who speaks a final word on our identity, our worth, and our being. Our sin, our suffering, and our temptations do not (Rom 5:16, Rom 8:1, 1 Cor 10:13). You say that we are forgiven, cleansed, healed, and precious in your sight through the grace of Jesus Christ (Eph 5:26, 1 Pet 2:9-10, 1 Pet 2:24). God, help us not to hide from you (Gen 3:9, Ps 139:7). Woo us gently by your kind and careful love (Hos 2:14). Build our community to be a place where instead of hiding from each other we can live in the safety of truth and grace (Rom 12:9-13). May your glory, healing, and hope shine victorious where shame’s shadow now lingers (Eph 5:1-21).

So, God, whether we are up here on this stage or at home livestreaming the service, whether we are practicing our toddling steps downstairs in the nursery or sitting in the back pew hoping to sneak out unnoticed, thank you that you see us and know us.

You see us as we are, and through Christ you see us with love (John 17:24-26). Help us to see you, too. 

In the precious name of Jesus we pray these things, Amen.

The post Gracious God – Prayer for the Broken in Spirt, Mind, and Body appeared first on GraceDC.

Unity According to Scripture

Unity. I wonder what images come to your mind when you hear that word. Maybe it’s the picture of a sports team working together in pursuit a championship. Or kids in a playground dressed in their school uniform. Or co-workers successfully working on a project together. Or some other image of individuals coming together with a shared identity or for a common purpose. Unity. 

And even if we might prefer different words to describe the same basic idea (words like solidarity, inclusion, solidarity, collaboration, interdependency) few would object that unity is a good thing—although fewer and fewer these days seem to believe it’s a realistic thing. Is it possible to achieve? Is it worth fighting for? What’s more, sadly, “unity” is sometimes invoked in order to stifle difference or dissent. 

Despite these challenges and mixed feelings, the Bible invites us to care deeply about unity. According to today’s passage, unity among followers of Christ, and in the church, is not just a good thing. It’s a glorious thing. An essential thing. And it’s at once a blessing and a work of the Holy Spirit—something he does for us, in us, and through us. We are called, as verse 3 says, to be “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” 

But what is unity according to scripture? And why does it matter? And how do we do it? To answer questions like these, I want to run through this morning’s reading from Ephesians 4 and draw out eight lessons about unity—eight truths. And then we’ll close with one important application.

Eight Lessons about Unity

The first thing we learn is that unity is a Christian priority. Paul addresses the subject while urging the Ephesian Christians to “walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called” (v. 1). Unity is central to our Christian calling—a vital way we embody the gospel. This, of course, reflects the very heart of Jesus. In John 17:11, he prayed for his followers using these words: “Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.” Keep in mind, Jesus prayed this on the eve of his crucifixion; he knew he was about to die. Consider: In this moment, of all the things Jesus could have prayed on behalf of his disciples, what does he pray for? Oneness. Indeed, this was not a coincidence; Christ died to make us one. Unity is not optional for followers of Christ; it is a Christian priority. 

Another thing we learn is that unity is a mark of maturity. We’re told in verses 12-14 that as the church is built up in the unity of the faith, it will attain full-grown “maturity.” It will no longer be “children, tossed to and fro.” A splintered and divided church is an immature church. It is also a vulnerable church, a community that will be “tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming.” Friends, we are more easily misled and manipulated by false teachers and their teaching when we’re divided into warring parties. We need each other if we are to become spiritually mature. 

The third lesson is that unity is a human impossibility. Notice that verse 3 refers to the “the unity of the Spirit.” It’s something the Holy Spirit gives, produces, instills. It is supernatural. So, Christian unity is fundamentally different from natural affinity, that is, getting along with people you’d already naturally be friends with. Consider these words by biblical scholar Don Carson: 

What binds us together is not common education, common race, common income levels, common politics, common nationality, common accents, common jobs, or anything of the sort. Christians come together, not because they form a natural collocation, but because they have been saved by Jesus Christ and owe him a common allegiance. In the light of this common allegiance, in light of the fact that they have all been loved by Jesus himself, they commit themselves to doing what he says—and he commands them to love one another. In this light, they are a band of natural enemies who love one another for Jesus’ sake.

If it’s true that the church consists of those who are saved by grace and not by any other human qualification or commonality, then perhaps our expectations of relationships in the church should be a bit different. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised if the church doesn’t feel like your college sorority. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised when relationships in the church are sometimes awkward, or even occasionally afflicted by conflict and difficulties. After all, by God’s grace, we’re natural enemies now turned family. And if that’s a transformation that sounds humanly impossible to achieve, well, that’s the point.

But if Christian unity is not personal affinity, what, then, is it properly based upon? Here’s the fourth lesson: Unity is grounded in Christian identity. What’s the most frequently repeated word in verses 4-6? It’s one. Seven times the apostle uses that word not only to amplify the theme of Christian oneness, but also to link together different dimensions of Christian identity and to present them as the foundation of the oneness we share. 

We share “one faith.” Our lives are shaped by the same story of the world—why we’re here, how we should live, where we’re heading—and anchored by the same ultimate trust. We share “one hope.” Our confidence before an uncertain and threatening future in a broken world—indeed, even in the face of disease, depravity, and death—is grounded in the resurrection of Christ. We share “one baptism,” which is to say, we share the peculiar conviction that the true answer to the question, “What can wash away my sins?” is, as we often sing, “Nothing but the blood of Jesus!” And we “wear” our baptism as a sacramental badge that publicly sets us apart in the world as those belonging to Christ. We share “one Father” as adopted members of God’s eternal family. And that means we can affectionately address a total stranger as “sister” or “brother” upon discovering that they, too, have put their trust in Christ.

Our relationships with one another are defined by these spiritual realities—these “ones.” Even those who appear to be separated by astronomical chasms of social difference can share an irrevocable, unbreakable “bond” in the gospel (v. 3). The point is not that we should glibly paint over real differences. Paul is not naïve; few societies were more socially stratified, and few churches more diverse, than the Ephesian world and church into which the apostle was writing. The point, rather, is that even ostensibly different people can share ultimate things in common. We are one precisely because of the one faith, one hope, and one family—and one God—that powerfully redefine who we are. 

Speaking of God, there is in our passage one more reality that frames our Christian unity. It’s mentioned implicitly in verses 4-6—it’s the Trinity. According to the Christian faith, God is three persons one eternal being—a divine embodiment of unity. Notice how Paul relates our oneness to God’s triune nature: “one Spirit … one Lord [i.e., Jesus, the Son of God] … one Father.” The God is who is three-in-one is the one into whose image we are being conformed. Unity is a communal project of becoming more like God. 

This brings us to our fifth point about unity. With all this talk about oneness and togetherness, it may be easy to misconstrue biblical unity as a denial of difference. So, we must promptly consider this next lesson, that unity is not the enemy of diversity. As we just saw, Paul stresses our oneness in verses 4-6, but immediately afterwards he clarifies in verse 7 that oneness does not mean sameness: “But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift.” The point is established further with a quotation from Psalm 68, which portrays Christ as a victorious king who generously shares his spoils with his people. In doing so, God blesses and reinforces our differences, gifting and empowering “each one of us” to build up the body in different ways. In fact, the point made earlier about trinitarian identity leads to the same conclusion: God is one (being), yet he is also three (persons). He is unity and diversity—and so must we be also. 

Sometimes the notion of “unity” is used to erase difference or shut down dissent in the church. But this only reveals a misunderstanding of scripture. Biblical unity is not uniformity. It does not demand homogeneity of personality, politics, or cultural preference. In fact, true unity entails a call to appreciate and embrace, rather than erase, difference across our community.

Clearly, then, unity is not easily won. This is a simple but important lesson to be learn: Unity must be built diligently. This is indicated by the apostle’s use of the language of building. Oneness is achieved by “building up the body of Christ” (v. 12); the body “builds itself up in love” (v. 16). Paul even says in verse 3 that we should “make every effort” (or be “eager”) to do so. He uses a word that refers to diligent labor. Beloved, we need to build and preserve the unity of the Spirit with painstaking effort. Unity doesn’t happen easily or automatically, nor can it be demanded or presumed. And if it is to be “thick” rather than superficial and enduring rather than fleeting, it will take time and endurance to build. At times things will need to get messier and noisier on the path to true unity. Not all things uncomfortable are divisive, but there are times the way to unity will feel like disunity. It takes work—and more often than not, tears—to become one. 

And whose responsibility is it to take up this demanding task? Our seventh lesson: Unity is everyone’s responsibility. As Paul calls us to “attain to the unity of the faith” (v. 12), he also tells us who’s responsible for achieving it. In the first half of the long sentence that begins in verse 11, he explains that Christ gave gifted leaders (apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, teachers) not to do all unity-building by themselves, but “to equip” (who?) “the saints” (that is, all of God’s holy and beloved people) “for the work of ministry, for the building up the body of Christ.” And he explains again in verse 16 that this is the job of “the whole body,” as “each part” works properly and makes the body grow. So whose responsibility is unity? Not just the leaders. Not the designated Unity Specialists in the church. Not even those alone who are being especially divisive. Everyone. And that also means that unity is something fostered in everyday life, mundane moments, and ordinary interactions with each other. At your Neighborhood Group meetings. Over the meals you share. In the words you exchange (gossipy and judgy or kind and forgiving?). Even in the unspoken thoughts that you nurse in your heart.   

What, then, are we to do once we we are persuaded of this shared responsibility to seek the church’s unity? Consider the final lesson of this passage: Unity is forged by truth-telling in love and humility. Recently, I’ve been working on a few projects in our backyard, so there have been a variety of tools scattered across the yard: a chisel, a tape-measure, hammer, caulking gun, level. And all of them were essential to the completion of various tasks. Now, surely the call to Christian unity is far more complex and demanding than the challenges I faced in my backyard. And yet, curiously, Paul seems to offer us only one tool for the project of unity-building. He mentions it in verse 15: “Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ.” To grow in unity, we must speak to one another. We must speak the truth in love. What does this mean? 

We must speak “the truth.” Throughout Ephesians, the truth refers primarily the truth of the gospel and the truth of God’s word. We must regularly remind each other of the ultimate things that unite us—the faith, hope, baptism, family, and triune God that make us irrevocably one. “Truth” also refers (as it does in Ephesians 4:25) to speaking forthrightly and honestly—telling the truth in opposition to lies. 

And we must speak “in love.” The apostle gives a few other words in verse 2 to explain what love looks like: “with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love.” Now, there are times when a stern word is needed. Just look at the example of Jesus’ (and the apostles’) ministry. But don’t be mistaken: Public rebuke is not an everyday ministry in the church. Neither is the turning over of tables. And even then, it must be done in love, which is to say, for the person’s good.  

So we must speak. And we must speak in love. Unity is forged among followers of Christ not by denying differences or avoiding the messes, but by engaging them—speaking about them.  

Those are eight lessons about unity from Ephesians 4:1-16. They might be summarized by these key words: Priority, Impossibility, Maturity, Identity, Diversity, Diligently, Responsibility, and Truth-telling Humility.  

So, brothers and sisters, what shall we do with this vision of Christian unity? In what way is it relevant to us today?  

The Relevance of Unity

The American church is fractured and divided, besieged as of late by all kinds of division: political, racial, denominational, cultural. The fault lines that have been recently exposed—in many ways, painfully and dramatically—have long been present, of course. But national events over the past few years (the past year, in particular) have shaken the church, widened these fault lines, and exacerbated strife and disunity in the church. 

Pandemic pressures have caused anxiety to skyrocket; we are collectively traumatized, as Dr. Curt Thompson gave us permission to name. Confronting conflict requires mental and emotional bandwidth—energy and resources. But everyone’s simply out of gas. (I am. Aren’t you?) Physical distance has eroded trust. And sometimes, the most basic forms of social trust are fostered at potlucks and picnics and playgrounds. But those opportunities, too, have been taken from us. We’ve become increasingly isolated and ghettoized into opposing tribes and factions both online and in real life—locked away in so-called “echo chambers” where you’re surrounded only by people who agree with you, and where it’s far easier to caricature and demonize those who don’t.

As a result, disagreement and disdain is more pronounced than ever. People are leaving churches. Pastors, embattled by conflict and caught in culture-war crossfire, are leaving professional ministry at an alarming rate. These wider, cultural trends undoubtedly relate to our church—we are not insulated from them—yet not always in the way we might think.

I have had conversations with some of you over the last year or so, when you have brought complaints about the church and its failures. I value those exchanges and learn a lot from them. But at times, I have stopped you and asked, “Hold on, who and what are you actually talking about? ‘The Church’ out there, or this church right here, Grace Meridian Hill? ‘Those people’ out there, or these people whom you and I know by name?” Because in the age of social media, it’s become all too easy to take up frustrations we feel toward broad categories of people we encounter in the virtual ether and to transfer those feelings onto the real people we encounter on Sunday morning. Indeed, we must be careful not to privilege ideas about people over actual flesh-and-blood brothers and sisters—their personal stories, convictions, and experiences—who are standing, and indeed worshipping, right in front of us. I’ve stumbled into this transference of judgment and frustration. Have you? 

But we must also be clear about this: Our local congregation, Grace Meridian Hill (and the Grace DC network as a whole), is not exempt from this threat of division. We have emerging fault lines in our own local community, and we must vigilant about them—fissures related to questions around politics and culture, questions around gender and sexuality, questions around race and racial history, questions around the pandemic and our responses to it (which inevitably brings us back to politics and culture). In the last year, some have left our church because, to them, our church is too “conservative.” And others have left because it is too “progressive.” Sometimes division doesn’t result  only in discomfort, but sadly, also in departure. 

So these are not theoretical concerns. What shall we do as a local family in our pursuit of “thick” Christian unity? 

Beloved, we must make use of that one tool, that core spiritual practice that the apostle commends to us. We must learn to speak to one another. What does this speaking look like? And how must we do it?  

First, the how. We must speak “in love.” Make no mistake, Paul’s emphasis in this passage is on love. He repeats the word three times. Love means moving toward each other, not away from each other, especially in the face of conflict. Love means making room for those unlike yourself—culturally, politically—and learning to embrace difference, valuing the person as an expression of Christ’s gift. Love means venturing beyond your echo chamber, cultural comfort zone, and regular circle of likeminded friends, and inviting someone into a genuine conversation over a lovely meal. Love means speaking in a manner that’s beneficial to the other person, not beneficial to your sense of being right or your chances of emerging victorious in a heated debate. Love means saturating our words with the qualities listed in verse 2—humility, gentleness, patience, forbearance. And there is, of course, no speaking in this manner that does not also lead to more humble, gentle, patient, and burden-bearing listening. Friends, we must learn to speak in love. 

We must also learn to speak “the truth.”  Remember, “speaking the truth” doesn’t mean bombarding others with your personal opinions. (And let’s be honest, as members of a church in Washington, DC, we have a few opinions!) Rather, “speaking the truth” means, in the first place, reminding each other on the regular about the truth of the gospel. It means helping to nurture the inward convictions about the gospel-grounds of our unity. Regularly remind each other of the ultimate things that unite us—the faith, hope, baptism, family, and triune God that make us irrevocably one. And to to become one, we must be aware of the truth about our inward oneness more than we’re aware of our outward difference.  

Speaking truth also means, as we saw earlier, speaking forthrightly and honestly. It means telling the truth in opposition to falsehoods. It means telling the truth about your hurts and fears. It means resisting passive-aggressiveness coexistence (which is no unity at all), and instead repenting truthfully, forgiving truly, and embracing courageously those whom you are most tempted to roll your eyes at. (Whom are you rolling your eyes at right now?) 

Beloved, our invitation today is to talk more, not less, about the things that threaten to divide us. Because unity is not achieved through silence and passivity. (Who and what are you avoiding?) Someone asks: Are you telling us to fight and argue more? Well, not exactly. Verbal violence, just like physical violence, is the epitome of passivity—evidence of an unwilling to do the hard, messy work of working things out. Communicating. It’s passive just to start swinging proverbial fists. In this age of division and disdain, unity is not achieved through conflict-avoidance, the surface peace that allows sin, wounds, and injustice to fester unacknowledged. Neither is unity achieved through wrath and coercion. Unity is built and forged by speaking the truth in love.

And as we do so—dare we imagine, dare we hope—we will begin to see the glory of Christ’s united body. We will begin to see the beauty of God’s tri-unity in our very midst. And not only we ourselves, but the watching world, too, will witness this beauty. Our neighbors will testify to the wild improbability (impossibility?) that natural enemies such as us could somehow become a family—become one. And they shall, and we shall, see God. 

Beloved, dare we believe that we are one? Dare we speak the truth in love in order to become one? Dear Church, do you hear the call to the unity of the Holy Spirit?

The post Unity of the Spirit appeared first on GraceDC.

Meditation

The story that Christianity tells is a story that is at once rooted in and consummate in a gift. It begins as the Trinity, in an overflow of love, gives the gift of the world. “All this I give you,” God says (Gen. 1:29). And it ends as the Trinity, in an ingathering of love, gives the gift of re-creation. “Behold, I make all things new” (Rev. 21:5).

And between this gratuitous beginning and ending, there are—like little packages on our doorsteps—gifts scattered along the way. Forgiveness and clothing to Adam and Eve, a son to the aged Abraham and Sarah, food to the famished sons of Jacob, strength to the stammering Moses, water from the rock to the thirsting Israelites, strength to the young David, wholeness to the broken Job, and the promise of home to an exiled people. Each of these, each of them, gifts from the very hand of God to creatures in need.

But above all, there is the most miraculous of God’s gifts: the gift of himself in Jesus. Jesus, who is the gift: announced by angels, nurtured by a young girl, marveled over by shepherds, received by the brokenhearted. Jesus who gives the gift: the gift of faithfulness in the wilderness, the gift of calling to the fishermen, the gift of bread and fish to the hungry, the gift of sight to the blind, the gift of compassion to the cast off, the gift of crucifixion to the sinner, the gift of resurrection to the doomed, the gift of bread and wine to the pilgrim, and the gift of assurance to the weary. And, perhaps most mysteriously, Jesus who receives the gift: the gift of milk from his mother’s breast; the gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh from the magi (gifts not simply of worship, but of support for a poor family); the gift of blessing from Simeon; the gift of food from a boy; the gift of perfumed tears from a woman; the gift of cross-bearing from Simon of Cyrene; the gift of a tomb from Joseph; the gift of burial spices from Mary. The mystery of mysteries—this One who gives all things, himself gladly receives from our own fragile hands. Alleluia.

Naturally, this story of the gift creates a people of a gift. Having received, we give. Indeed, the act of giving is one of the fundamentally definitional acts of the Christian church. And while this giving takes many shapes, one of the most traditional and consistent is that of the giving of alms. It’s a strange word, “alms,” one not often used today in our circles. Even so, the work of alms, which (in Greek) simply means “mercy,” is—and always has been—at the heart of what it means to live as the people of God in the world.

Indeed, from the earliest days of the church in the Roman Empire, this work—the work of merciful giving to others— was seen as one of the most peculiar (and most dangerous) aspects of the Christian community. And throughout history, this act of giving has been both the source of good for our neighbors (providing food, shelter, medical care, and education to millions of people) and the essential validation of our witness. And correlatively, our failure to give—and our choice to hoard instead—has been one of the greatest hindrances to both the flourishing of our neighbors and the credibility of our message.

This historical truth is, perhaps, more relevant than ever in our own contemporary moment. After all, we live in the time of the greatest income inequality in the history of the world, a time when millions and millions of our fellow human beings do not have the resources necessary to create the conditions of well-being for either themselves or their children. And this situation has only been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, an event that has brought profound and lasting economic devastation to people all over the world. In this time it is deeply important that the Christian church make a clear, sacrificial, and sustained return to the practice of giving alms. For in this way, not only will we become a gift to our neighbors, we will also bear witness—concrete and material witness—to the Triune giving heart that stands at the heart of the world.

Exploration

Take Stock. What have you received from God your provider? Take stock of your money, possessions, and time. Count the sum of it and be able to articulate how much it is.

Release. Out of that total of what God has given you, prayerfully discern with your community what ought to be given up for the good of others (and for your own good). Release those things, trusting in the eternal abundance found in the kingdom of God.

Enjoy. Jesus said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). That word “blessed” can also be rendered “happy.” It is a deep joy to give, much more so than to gather for ourselves, for it is there that we experience the heart of Jesus.

Take Stock. Release. Enjoy.

Gregory Thompson (PhD, University of Virginia) is a pastor, scholar, artist, and producer whose work focuses on race and equity in the United States. He is the co-creator of Union: The Musical, a soul-and hip-hop-based musical about the 1968 Sanitation Workers’ Strike, and the co-author Reparations: A Christian Call to Repentance and Repair (Brazos, 2021).

The post The People of the Gift appeared first on GraceDC.

Artwork: Messiah by He Qui, 2004.

“Because of the tender mercy of our God…the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet in the way of peace.” – Luke 1:78-79

Just a month or so ago Christians began our yearly pilgrimage through the church calendar, marking our days by the birth, ministry, suffering, death, resurrection, ascension, and Pentecost of Jesus. In one of my favorite phrases, the liturgical theologian Gregory Dix refers to this process as “the sanctification of time.”

All of this began, you will remember, with Advent—the season of darkness, of longing, of the quiet, hidden growth of the life of Christ within and among us. This is precisely the place where all Christian things, indeed, all true things, begin.

In a deeply Christian movement, however, we have now moved from this season of darkness into a season—two seasons, in fact—of light. The first of these is Christmas. This song of this season, a song taken from the first songs of Mary and Zechariah, is that in Jesus, the light has come to us. Do not rush over this too quickly, familiar though it is. For what it proclaims is that those of us who dwell in darkness—the darkness of loneliness, grief, disappointment, addiction, and fear—are not alone. To the contrary, that it is precisely these places of darkness to which God has come. Because of this, even when the world feels to be closing in upon us (as it seems daily to do) it is, in fact, never closed. Always the light comes in, stays in, and is not overcome. In Jesus, the light of the living God has come to us. This is the essence of our consolation. Alleluia.

This light, however, cannot be contained to one season. And so we pass immediately into the next season: Epiphany. The song of this season, built not only on the songs of Mary and Zechariah, but also on the songs of the shepherds and the Magi (that is, those who are live at the margins of the story) is that the light that has come to us in Jesus, also goes out from us in love. Epiphany is, in other words, a season of mission, a season that celebrates the ministry of Jesus going to the “least of these.” Again, do not rush over this too quickly. For what it proclaims is that the light that has come into our darkness also seeks to come into our neighbor’s darkness, our enemies’ darkness as well. In this respect, the light of Jesus is best understood not as the light that merely illumines our own personal shadows (though it does that), but as a light that—by its very nature—illumines the shadows of the entire world. It is, as Zechariah so beautifully put it, like a sunrise. The message of Epiphany, then, is that in Jesus, the light has God has come to the entire world. And bearing this light is the essence of our vocation. Again, alleluia.

Taken together, these seasons of light remind us of one of the central convictions of the Christian life: That in Jesus Christ, the light of God comes both to us and through us. It reminds us that the consolation of our souls and the calling of our lives is, in the end, the same: the Sunrise from on High. And our life, in this season (and in every season) is best understood as a life of receiving the light of God in Jesus Christ and bearing that light to the whole of the earth. 

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“And Mary said to the angel, ‘How Can this be, since I am a virgin?’” And the angel answered her…‘Nothing will be impossible with God.’”

-Luke 1:34, 37

by Dr. Gregory Thompson

It is one of the central claims of the Christian scripture, the central humiliations of the Christian gospel, and the central consolations of the Christian faith: That God brings something out of nothing.  And not just something, but everything. And not just everything, but the thing—the making new of all things in Jesus Christ.

Remember. Our story begins with the nothing that—by God’s love and through God’s power—became the manifold glories of the universe. But this was, so to speak, just the beginning. The people of Israel first took shape in the barren and aged womb of Sarah, bringing forth not only a child from her body, but laughter from her heart. The era of Moses began in the murder of children, and yet flowered into a nation. The kingdom of David began with a young shepherd in a Bethlehem field, and yet grew into a light for the nations. We are, the Bible says, a people whose nothing is transformed into everything.

The clearest expression of this is, of course, the story of Mary. Like Sarah before her she bears a lifeless womb. Like Moses before her, she witnesses the murder of children. Like David, she finds herself on the forsaken outskirts of Bethlehem. In Mary, all of the ancient stories of nothingness converge.

And yet, like each of them she finds not only that God is present in the nothingness, but that He is at work there, bringing His very life into being in its midst. In God, her spirit-hovered darkness becomes light. In God, her silent wonder becomes song. In God her new shepherd friends become attendants of the King. Mary, in all of her ordinary and emptiness, stands as an eternal and shining witness to the glorious truth that our God brings something, again, everything, out of nothing.

Which is good news for me, for you, for all of us. Especially at this time of year, and at this time of this year, when we all feel like we have been reduced to nothing. In a time like this, a time when we have nothing for God, nothing for our families, nothing for our co-workers, and nothing for ourselves, it is tempting to quietly give up on this season, to simply get through it, and to hope that next year can be better. As strong (and understandable) as that impulse is, however, I want to urge you to see this nothingness not as the enemy to a fruitful Advent, but rather as its precondition. To see that here, HERE, in this emptiness is where God is present.  And not only present but knitting together His own glory within us. This is the story of the Bible. This is the story of Mary. This is the story of your life. And it is true. Alleluia.   

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–Luke 1:28

The season of Advent can, for many of us, have a contradictory feel to it.  On one hand, we are told that it is a season of waiting; a season of contemplative silence and penitential stillness in anticipation of the Christmas celebration that is to come.  And we try.  We light Advent candles.  We play Advent music.  We pray Advent prayers.  And we try, oh how we try, to settle ourselves into an Advent frame of heart.  On another hand, we know from experience that it is one of the most frantic and exhausting seasons of the year; a season of distracting noise and endless motion in preparation for the Christmas celebration that is to come. We help children with school.  We buy presents.  We decorate rooms.  We send cards. We finish year-end work projects.  And we fall into bed, desperate to settle into a few hours of forgetful sleep.   In my own life, both of these are true.   And not only true, but necessary; each is given to me by God.  As a result, I have spent the better part of every Advent of my adult life with the frustrating sense of being pulled apart; pulled inward into silence even as I am pulled outward into a life of noise.  And so every year a question arises within me: How can I learn to live both lives at once?   How can I live in stillness and in motion at the same time?   

In thinking of this this week I turned, as I do every year, to Mary.  Apart from our Lord, she is my absolute favorite person in the Bible.  The first to welcome Christ.  Faithful in nurturing His life within her.  Confused and broken-hearted, and yet present with him from beginning to end.  She is the first and perhaps loveliest of Jesus’ followers.  What we see most of her, however, takes place in that mysterious and holy time between the Annunciation (the time when she first learns of the hidden life growing within her) and the Nativity.  And it is in this space—the space of Mary’s own personal Advent—where we can learn about how to live our own Advent.

On one hand, her life is—by any measure—out of control.  Consider: She is a young woman, betrothed to a man, and yet pregnant (it seems) from another man.  She takes refuge for several months in her aunt Elizabeth’s house who, as you may remember, is in the midst of her own crisis of an unexpected pregnancy and a newly-mute husband. She then has to travel while “great with child” to the distant city of Bethlehem with her husband and is unable to find a place to stay.  During the stay, while lodging in a stable, she gives birth to her child, attended only by her husband. Shortly thereafter she finds herself playing host to a group of local shepherds and foreign princes who drop in for an impromptu baby shower.  Oh, and don’t forget that after the shower is over, an angel warns her husband that a murderous king is after them, and tells them to flee to Egypt.  She, in other words, understands what it means to have a stressful Advent.

And yet on the other hand, in the midst of all this, Mary quietly nurtures the life of Christ within her.  She dreams of motherhood.  She lays in bed and watches her tummy grow.  She puts Elizabeth’s hand on her womb to feel the baby move.  She adjusts her posture on the way to Bethlehem to give the baby room.  She steps into the stable and begins to rearrange the place in anticipation.  She looks at Joseph and says, “It’s time.” She makes room for her visitors.  She prepares for the flight to Egypt.  And each of these acts of attending to the presence of Christ takes place not apart from, but within the burdens of her life. 

I love this for two reasons.  First, because it reminds us that our experience of Advent—the frustrating and embarrassing experience of struggling between contemplation and action—is actually original to Advent, fundamental to its very meaning; that this struggle, this longing, this weight is its essence.  And as I enter into that struggle, seeking to hold the life of Christ within me and my life within the world together, I am actually doing Advent’s essential work. And secondly, I love Mary’s story because it reminds me that this work of Advent is within our reach.  It is possible to live our ordinary, harried, and burdened lives and to experience the hidden life of Christ not elsewhere, but precisely there. And this means that it is in the midst of our lives—doing our jobs, tending our children, caring for our bodies, welcoming our neighbors, remembering our loved ones—and not in some idealized contemplative space, that Christ is present with us.  It is here that the Angel of the Lord says to us, as he said to Mary, The Lord is with you.” It is here that the mystery of Christ grew.  It is here that God sends blessed guests, and necessary help.  It is here that we will see the very face of Christ.

As we enter into this Advent life together, let’s do so remembering that the Lord is with us, pondering and treasuring this presence, and rejoicing in the secret knowledge that the hidden work that we do now will, in time, bear the holiest of fruit.

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Meditation

The joy of the feast is a central practice in the Christian faith, but this radiant jewel is most properly set upon the heart that has prepared for the feast with the fast.

The “elephant in the room” in a conversation on fasting is often, well, fasting. Many of us modern Christians don’t practice fasting and don’t exactly know why we would. We know that Jesus fasted and said, “When you fast . . .” in his Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 6:16), that the Israelites fasted (2 Sam. 1:12; Zech. 7:5), that Anna the Prophetess fasted (Luke 2:37), that the apostles fasted (Acts 13:2). Fasting is in our Bibles and in the global and historical tradition of the faith, but it is not in many of our lives. Why is that?

“American Christians don’t know how to be hungry.” That’s what Rev. Howard John Wesley, pastor of the historic Alfred Street Baptist Church in Alexandria, Virginia, preached recently. It’s a compelling explanation for our curious lack of fasting. Could it be that our faith has not been formed to seek the love of God and neighbor through fasting from food (or other material goods) because we are “too full” from the crowded surplus of our lives? Lent is a time to practice a different way of being.

Fasting has rich purposes in scripture and tradition: (1) it deepens the life of prayer through teaching our whole selves—body and soul—what it means to long, to hunger for God’s kingdom; (2)it humbles us into a repentant posture to seek God’s will in a situation where guidance, help, or forgiveness is needed; and (3) it teaches us to go without so that others may be filled, a central aspect of love in the way of Jesus.

This same Jesus who “took the form of a servant, so that He, our Bread, might hunger; that He, our Fulfillment, might thirst; that He, our Strength, might be weakened; that He, our Health, might be injured; that He, our Life, might die. . . . And all this he did to satisfy our hunger, to moisten our dryness, to soothe our infirmity, to wipe out our iniquity, to enkindle our love” (St. Augustine, Third Homily on the Lenten Season).

Exploration

PREPARE. Fasting is a form of training for the whole self and is a practice that one should ease into if just beginning. There are options and degrees of fasting: skipping one meal on a day, then two meals, then eventually three, and then multiple days. Start small and build. You can practice a water fast; a water and juice fast; a bread and water fast, etc. Whatever you do, drink lots of water! Some who are nursing mothers or who have other health conditions might not be able to do a total fast but can find another way of denying themselves in food, drink, or something else. Know what day that you will attempt to fast and prepare for that time, logistically and spiritually. Establish a rhythm, assigning certain days to be fast days during this season of Lent. One practice to consider is to begin to bake and cook in advance for the feast of Easter, getting as much of it ready beforehand so that you are prepared to rest and feast when the time comes. Preparing for the feast during the fast will deepen your understanding of both fast and feast.

PRAY. Fasting is a practice that is meant to humble us and draw us into God’s presence through intensified prayer (e.g., Ps. 35:13; Joel 2:12). It does so by showing us our emptiness, longing, and deep neediness as human creatures, which is meant to lead us to deep dependence upon the Lord and “every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Deut. 8:3). Use the mealtimes of your fast to pray and dwell in the holy presence and word of God. What particular needs—both your own and those of your neighbors—can you bring to God during your fast? Is there a particular sin in your life for which you need to seek forgiveness and repentance? Jesus said, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work” (John 4:34).

PRIORITIZE OTHERS. Fasting can be wonderful, but the scriptures also warn of its abuses: it can make us proud, irritable, and even violent (Isa. 58; Matt. 6:16-18). Do not call attention to yourself when fasting and let as few people know as possible. Serve others with your fast. Give to the poor the money you would have spent on food. Work to address the needs of hunger in your community as you get a taste of the experience of hunger in your own body. Fasting is connected to our doing of justice because God chooses this kind of fast: “to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free . . . to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house . . .” (Isa. 58:6–7). Jesus fasted so that we may feast. We fast so that others may feast. And by doing so, we become like him. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Matt. 5:6).

PREPARE. PRAY. PRIORITIZE OTHERS.

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When we begin to understand what God’s unmerited kindness means for us personally, the result is a powerful hope in the face of our struggles and failures. But the gospel message doesn’t stop there: This personal renewal leads to a change in the way we live our lives and relate to the people and city around us.

A natural result of living in light of the promises of the gospel is a growing desire to see peace and healing come to the brokenness of our city. Grace Downtown works with partner organizations throughout the District that are working to see God’s love, justice and mercy renew the District spiritually, culturally and socially.  Partnerships with organizations that are primarily focused on issues of mercy and justice are overseen by the diaconate.

We partner with ministries that are Christ-centered, in and for the city, accountable (with systems in place for checks and balances), good stewards of their resources, offer opportunities for our congregation to get involved, and have an impact in our city.  Organizations that have been invited to join as partner ministries have had significant involvement from Grace Downtown members as board members, volunteers, and/or donors.  

Grace Downtown currently has four partner ministries:

• Capitol Hill Pregnancy Center
• Christian Legal Aid of DC
• DC127
• Little Lights

This November is Partner Ministry Month. In November, when we are still separated physically by COVID-19, it is more important than ever to share the work of our partner ministries and ask that you consider praying for them and potentially supporting them with your time or resources.  The virus has impacted us all, but it especially eroded the social networks and resources available to the individuals served by these ministries.  We pray that Grace DC would have the desire to give whatever we are able (time, money, prayer) out of the abundance God has provided us.  

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Even so, this life of mission—a life that we all share—is not without its travails.  And given that we are a congregation whose very identity is shaped by a shared mission, it is important that we understand these travails and support one another in the work of journeying through them as they come.  For they will come.

Of these travails, one of the most feared is the experience of rejection; of being told that who we are and what we offer is unwelcome, of being exiled from the very communities we seek to love.  And yet even as this experience is one of the most feared, it is also one of the least avoidable.  Our Lord, the man of exile, testifies to this reality in both his life and his death.  And so do the millions who have followed him throughout history and across the earth.  And so will we.

In our own time, this experience of rejection is not only elevated but ensured by the strange space that Christian mission in American culture requires us to inhabit. And what is this space?  It is a space that lies neither fully in the world nor fully in the church, but in a space between the two, a space oriented toward both but fully at home in neither.  And this space, our space, is a space bound to the experience of rejection.

Here’s what I mean.  

On one hand, we live in a culture that is, in many ways, suspicious of any claims that might be called normative, claims that presume to tell a comprehensive story about the world.  Such claims, such stories, are seen merely to be expressions of a will to power, a will to distort reality in our own interest.  There are good reasons for this view, of course.  Indeed, one of the sad realities of both our cultural history and our current moment is the manifest ways in which cultural leaders—political, intellectual, economic, and religious—are transparently willing to do just this.  Because of this, any community that seeks either to express or to embody normative convictions about the world is seen as a threat, as a community to be held in suspicion.

And this will be so for us.  Why?  Because we believe in God, the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and earth.  We believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord: incarnate, crucified, resurrected, ascended, and expected.  We believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the dead, and the life everlasting.  And we believe that each of these is true both for ourselves and for our neighbors—human beings loved by the living God.  Yes, we hold these convictions with doubts and tears, with dim knowledge and broken wisdom, but we do hold them.  Indeed, we are held by them.

That this is so invites the concern that we are dangerous, oppressive, and fundamentally self-interested.  In invites, in other words, rejection.  And more than this, under the logic of contemporary discourse, any attempt to defend ourselves against these claims is taken only as evidence of their truthfulness.  In such a world, it is only by bearing this rejection and yet continuing to love that we can bear witness to a different world, a world that is surely to come.

On the other hand, we are a part of a larger church culture—namely the evangelical church in America—that is, in many ways, just as obstructive to faithful Christian mission.  Fueled by centuries of mythology about American exceptionalism, the rightness of our empowerment, and the danger of our neighbors, many in the evangelical church are terrified of the dramatically different culture in which they find themselves.  In response, many in this community are increasingly characterized by narratives of victimization, by deep suspicion of our neighbors and all who associate with them, and with an almost pathological impulse toward self-protection.  Because of this, any community that seeks to honestly understand our neighbors, to learn from them, to dwell with them, and, when necessary, to defend them, is a community to be held in suspicion.  

And this will be true of us too.  Why?  Because we believe that God loves the world.  We believe that the nation we share is not theologically exceptional but is, like all nations, a mixture of beauty and shadow.  We believe that control is an illusion that makes fools and villains of those who seek it.  We believe that our neighbors, made in his image, are beings of glory, wisdom, and goodness with whom it is a blessing to live and from whom it is a gift to learn. We believe that narratives of victimization and grasps for power are a disgrace for those who follow the risen and ascended Christ. And, perhaps above all, we believe that we are not called to win, but to love.

That this is so again invites the concern—this time from the church—that we are dangerous, without conviction, and fundamentally obstructive to the coming of the kingdom of God.  In invites, in other words, rejection.  And because this rejection is so imbued with the blinding glow of self-righteousness and embedded in a community of relative isolation, it is largely impervious to correction.  Again, it must simply be born in faith, hope, and love.

Because of the pain of rejection, the temptation to escape such a situation is ever before us.  At times, we may wish to take refuge into hardened identities of victimization, to wear our rejection as a martyr’s badge.  At other times, we may wish to avoid it by simply conceding to the terms forced upon us by either the scorn of the culture or the rage of the church.  But each of these, consoling as they may appear, are actually enemies to Christian mission.  Why?  Because they tempt us to imagine that our lives are about ourselves.  But our lives are not about ourselves.  Our lives are about the living God and the living neighbor; about loving each with all that we are and all that we have.

Our work together at Mosaic is to strengthen one another to remain in the space between. To help one another bear the rejection that this entails.  Yet to do so, not in the defeated spirit of victimized resignation, but in the joyful spirit of missional hope.  A spirit that, even as it suffers, looks for the day when love, as it surely will, dissolves the boundaries between these spaces and reconciles all things in the light of the glory of God.

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Thank you so much for the kind welcome you’ve shown to me in my new role as Visiting Theologian for Mission.  I’m grateful to be among you and hopeful that my presence here will support you in your various labors to see love made flesh in the streets of the city.

As my title suggests, my particular role among you is to support you in the work of mission; to further equip you for the work of loving your neighbors and blessing your communities in the name and in the manner of our Lord.  It is exciting work for all of us, and I’m thrilled to be a part of it.

In thinking about how best to do this, my mind ranged (as it often does, as you will soon see) to the faith-animated civil rights work that took place in America in the 1950’s and 1960’s.  In particular, my mind turned to the Reverend James Lawson.

In case you don’t know him, James Lawson has one of the most impressive Civil Rights resumes of anyone out there.  He was imprisoned as a conscientious objector during the Korean War.  He was a missionary in India where he gave himself to the deep study of Gandhian non-violent direct action.  He was one of the architects of the Nashville sit-in movements of 1960.  He was directly involved in the Freedom Rides the following year.  He helped to develop the philosophy of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), the student organization which led voter registration initiatives across the South. And he was the leader of the Memphis Sanitation Worker’s Strike in 1968 (famous for the I AM A MAN signs) in which his friend Martin Luther King was murdered.  His impact (and he’s still going at 90!) is incredible.

At the heart of his impact, indeed the center of his ministry, was the conviction that people needed to be trained for mission; that the work we do in the world is the direct fruit of who we are.  As a result, most of Lawson’s work in the Civil Rights movement was the work of formation—of gathering small communities of people and helping them grow into the kinds of people that could bear love into the world.

Over the past years, as I’ve labored to understand Lawson’s vocation of missionary formation, I’ve come to see that his goal through these trainings was to provide those under his care with several things:

First, eyes for our world.  He wanted to help them see the complexity of their current moment and the implications of that moment for themselves and their neighbors.

Second, honesty about ourselves.  He wanted to help them come to terms with the ways in which they—in both their hearts and their behaviors—contribute to the complexity and violence of the world and obstruct its healing.

Third, practices for our growth.  He wanted to provide them not simply with insights, but with patterns of behavior that, if embraced and embodied, could transform them into people with, in King’s words, “the strength to love.”

Lastly, models for action. He wanted to give them—both through examples and through experiences—a vision for what they could actually do in this world.

While I’m no James Lawson (I’m sorry to say), I see my work among you in just this way: I am coming alongside your leaders, and alongside each of you, to support you in the work of understanding your world, discerning your hearts, transforming your practices, and enlarging your imagination for what might be possible in your community.  

Your leaders and I are still talking about the exact shape my work will take among you, especially under the conditions of COVID.  And no doubt, this shape will change and mature as I learn more of what you need.  That said, we do have a few initial ideas, and I want to invite you into them.

First, and of relevance to some of you, I will regularly meet with Russ, the staff, the elders, and the deacons in order to learn their hopes and, in time, resource them as best I can.

Second, and of relevance to all of you, I will be offering an online Fall lecture series for the church (and any of your friends and neighbors) in October.  We’ll be looking at the faith-based civil rights movement (see, I told you!) in more detail and learning what they have to teach us. Please be on the lookout for information about time and dates in future communications.

Third, and most immediately, I will be writing a weekly post for you directly related to Lawson’s themes above.  Sometimes these posts will be oriented toward helping you understand the context in which we live and labor.  At other times they will be oriented toward helping you identify and engage with the reality of our inner lives.  At still other times they will be oriented toward specific practices that we can engage together.  

And lastly, at other times they will be oriented toward providing you with models for action, inspiring examples of possibility.  But in all things, they will be oriented toward supporting you in the work of Christian mission in the world as we find it.  

As I learn more of you and as the world begins to take on some sense of normalcy (whenever that is) my work will certainly change shape—not least in my ability to join you on some Sunday mornings.  But for now, this is the plan.

And what will be the fruit of our work together?  I don’t know, of course.  But I have hopes; hopes best summarized by something James Lawson once said to me.  It was March of 2019 and I was in Memphis.  I was standing inside Historic Clayborn Temple, the site of the Sanitation Worker’s Strike, waiting for him to arrive for a training with our small staff.  Looking nervously through the window, I saw him make his way up the stairs and through those historic doors.  Straightening my tie and extending my hand, I awkwardly told him who I was and how grateful I was to meet him.  After shaking my hand, he put both of his hands on my shoulders and, after looking me in the eye for a moment, he said to me, “Young man, I hope that you will do things here that astonish the earth.”  

That is my hope, for myself, for you, and for our life together: to astonish the earth.

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Everyday in daily prayer, we begin our day by praying The Lord’s Prayer together. Everyday we say this: “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Think about that. What a bold, enchanted prayer! A prayer for the veil between heaven and earth to become thinner and thinner, for this world to mirror the divine: perfect love, shalom, justice, and righteousness under the reign of The King of the ages (1 Tim. 1:17). It is a prayer that is anything but complacent with the death-dealing orders of the world we find ourselves in; it is a prayer of protest and humble reliance.

We have been living through extra-ordinary times: a global pandemic, uprisings, and whatever else 2020 has in store for us. But the call upon our lives is always this: live like God’s extraordinary Kingdom has and is coming into our ordinary world and pray like you believe that. We hope that this list will aid you in this journey.

• Take a Liturgical Audit Of Your Life. An audit is an inspection of an account. We typically use that word to describe the process of looking into individual or corporate financial records to see where and how money has been spent or received. A liturgical audit is the inspection of one’s own account of time. How do you spend your time? What are the “receipts” of your life? What are the “investments” of your life? And how are these “transactions” forming your life and loves? The Audit has many questions to help you asses the patterns of your life, see if those patterns are facilitating cross-cultural love and justice, and where there is room for growth. See our Members section of the website to access this tool.
• Take Responsibility to learn, read, watch, and listen (See our Resources for Cross-Cultural Learning) or ask your friends of a different cultural background to recommend resources for learning and enjoying. 
• Create a Parental Plan for Discipling Your Children Holistically (if applicable). Formulate a plan to teach the children of our community about race, culture, injustice, economics, history, and the church (see age-appropriate resources on our Resource List). 
• Practice Seeing. Who lives on your block, in your neighborhood, etc.? What are the gifts of your place? What are the needs of your place? Practice seeing and meeting needs, yes, but also practice recognizing the gifts of other people and giving thanks to God. Go on a neighborhood walk by yourself or with your household. Practice seeing the gifts and the needs of your place. This commitment to neighboring is simple, but it is transformative and is at the heart of following Jesus. We live in a society—in in a city—that has both outlandish abundance and cruel poverty. We are called to “repairers of the breach,”(Is. 58:12) so look for that “breach” and fill it. Challenge yourself and your household to live more radical lives of hospitality.
• Connect With Local, Community-Based Organizations that are helping promote justice, mercy, and human flourishing in our city. We have partner organizations that we work with as a congregation, but there are many doing this work in our city. Some of this will depend on your own commitments and philosophy. One important principle is to work in regular rhythms (weekly, bi-weekly, monthly) of serving with these organizations.
• Do Justice With Your Budget. If budgets are “moral documents” (a phrase attributed to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.), then what does your personal or household budget say about what you value? Allocate your budget and watch your heart follow, for Jesus taught us “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matt. 6:21). Challenge yourself to give more and more away as the years go on. What can we live without so that others may simply live?
• Vote With Intentionality. Think about how you utilize your civic responsibility of voting. As you examine the local and national candidates that you vote for, what do these candidates and their policies say about what you value and want to see in our city?
• Support The Work Of Cultural Intelligence. If you are looking to help fight racism, promote cultural intelligence, and develop future leaders in the Church, we strongly suggest supporting the work of: (1) Our Network’s Institute for Cross-Cultural Mission. This work is not done in the span of weeks but of years. That’s why the ICCM leads congregations through a 3-year long Cohort Program; (2) RUF Howard.
• Assess Your Unique Resources and Gifts. Take stock of who you are and the gifts that could be especially useful to your neighbors. The diagnostic questions of the Liturgical Audit can be a good place to start.
• Pray Without Ceasing (1 Thess. 5:17). Again, the call upon our lives is always this: live like God’s extraordinary Kingdom has and is coming into our ordinary world and pray like you believe that. What would our neighborhoods look like if all your prayers were granted? How would your life be different? At Mosaic, we developed The Daily Prayer Project to facilitate rhythms of prayer that facilitate cross-cultural life and love. Access that resource and tune into our daily prayer videos every Monday-Friday.
• Let Us Know What You See. What do you see as opportunities for neighbor love for our congregation to engage in? Share those opportunities with us and with the rest of the church.
  

The work of spiritual formation is “low and slow.” The formation of our cross-cultural intelligence and love is no different. Changing the mundane, regular patterns of our lives now is what produces great change later. All of this happens by God’s gracious work and his mission to restore all things in Christ. 

The post Resources For Cross-Cultural Living appeared first on GraceDC.

Articles & Reports

• Dr. Kenny Gibbs, ICCM Blog Series Advancing Gopsel Reconciliation
• Frederick Douglass, The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro , July 5th, 1852
• Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Letter From Birmingham Jail
• Charles Marsh, The Civil Rights Movement As Theological Drama, Modern Theology 18:2 April 2002
• Esau McCaulley, What the Bible Has to Say About Black Anger
• Ekemini Uwan, There’s No Going Back to ‘Normal’
• Mychal Denzel Smith, White Millennials are products of a failed lesson in colorblindness
• Ta-Nehisi Coates, “The Case for Reparations”, Atlantic Monthly , June 2014
• PCA Position Paper on Racism & Racial Reconciliation (2018)

Church History & Theology

• Mark A. Noll, From Every Tribe and Nation (Turning South: Christian Scholars in an Age of World Christianity): A Historian’s Discovery of the Global Christian Story
• Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity
• Justo L. Gonzalez, Mañana: Christian Theology from a Hispanic Perspective
• Justo L. Gonzalez, The Mestizo Augustine: A Theologian Between Two Cultures
• Charles Marsh, God’s Long Summer: Stories of Faith and Civil Rights
• Charles Marsh, Strange Glory: A Life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer
• Michael Emerson and Christian Smith, Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America
• Mary Beth Swetnam Mathews, Doctrine and Race: African American Evangelicals and Fundamentalism Between the Wars
• Rita Roberts, Evangelicalism and the Politics of Reform in Northern Black Thought
• Brian Bantum, The Death of Race: Building a New Christianity in a Racial World
• Doug Serven, Russ Whitfield,  Irwyn Ince, Duke Kwon, et al, Heal Us, Emmanuel (written by PCA pastors and elders in reflection on our denomination)
• Leon Brown, Irwyn Ince, Russ Whitfield, et al, All Are Welcome: Toward A Multi-Everything Church
• David Swanson, Rediscipling the White Church
• Jemar Tisby, Color of Compromise
• Irwyn L. Ince Jr., The Beautiful Community: Unity, Diversity, and the Church At Its Best (Forthcoming)
• Duke L. Kwon and Gregory Thompson, Reparations: A Christian Call for Repentance and Repair (Forthcoming)

Books

• David R. Roediger, Working Toward Whiteness: How America’s Immigrants Became White
• W.E.B. DuBois, The Souls of Black Folk
• James Forman Jr, Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America
• Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow
• Douglas A Blackmon, Slavery By Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II
• Erika Lee, America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States
• Ed. John Kuo Wei Tchen and Dylan Yeats, “Yellow Peril!: An Archive of Anti-Asian Fear
• Cathy Park Hong, Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning
• Bryan Stevenson, Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption
• Beverly Daniel Tatum, Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together In The Cafeteria
• Daniel Hill, White Awake: An Honest Look At What It Means to Be White
• Isabel Wilkerson, The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration
• Juan Gonzalez and Joseph Torres, News for All the People: The Epic Story of Race and the American Media
• Edward Flannery, The Anguish of the Jews: Twenty-Three Centuries of Anti-Semitism
• Nancy Isenberg, White Trash: The 400-year Untold History of Class in America
• Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert, When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor…and Yourself
• Richard Rothstein, The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America
• Kamal Al-Solaylee, Brown: What Being Brown in the World Today Means (to everyone)
• Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt, The Coddling of the American Mind

For Children & Families

• The Gospel in Color For Parents: A Theology of Racial Reconciliation for Parents by Curtis A. Woods and Jarvis J. Williams
• The Gospel in Color For Kids: A Theology of Racial Reconciliation for Kids by Curtis A. Woods and Jarvis J. Williams
• God’s Very Good Idea by Trillia Newbell
• God Made Me AND You: Celebrating God’s Design for Ethnic Diversity by Shai Linne
• The Day You Begin by Jacqueline Woodson
• Viola Desmond Won’t Be Budged! by Jody Nyasha Warner and Richard Rudnicki
• Preaching to the Chickens: The Story of Young John Lewis by Jabari Asi
• Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History by Vashti Harrison
• Black, White and Tan by Nicole C. Mullen

Websites/Blogs

• The Witness: A Black Christian Collective
• Talking About Race from the National Museum of African American History & Culture

Watch, Listen, & Think

• Film directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, Just Mercy 
• Documentary Film Directed by Raoul Peck, “I Am Not Your Negro”
• Grace, Justice, & Mercy: An evening with Bryan Stevenson & Tim Keller
• Documentary film, Latino Americans
• Documentary film, Asian Americans
• Documentary film by Ken Burns, The West.
• Documentary film by Blackside, Eyes On the Prize

Organizations

• The Grace DC Institute for Cross-Cultural Mission
• And Campaign
• Be The Bridge
• Equal Justice Initiative

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In America, we know you’re not supposed to be “racist.” It’s not just bad – it’s basically the worst thing you can be. Our history – from slavery to the continuing fight for full civil rights – tells us that “good people” should not have biases against others “based on the color of their skin.” This type of thinking is so deeply ingrained that even people like Richard Spencer, the organizer of the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville that killed Heather Heyer and two police officers, doesn’t call himself a racist, but refers himself as a “civil and human rights advocate.” As a result, in conversations about race or racial injustice, I have often found that the focus, especially among my White brothers and sisters, is primarily on making sure they are not seen as a racist, instead of the more important task of dismantling the systems of racial hierarchy and oppression which mar the Imago Dei and stifle the flourishing of fellow image bearers.

Despite the cultural norm that “good people” don’t have bias based on skin color, social science tells us that to be human is to have bias. Further, to be American (or influenced by American culture) often means having pro-European and anti-Black bias.  Yes – even Black people have this too.  However, if a person’s idea of him- or herself as a “good person” requires they not be a “racist,” or to be a person without any known or unknown bias against another person based on their race, then he or she will not confront their biases and tear them down.  We do not repent of the sins we don’t believe or admit exist.

The story of the gospel is that we are not “good people.” As Paul writes:

There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”  Romans 3:10-12

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The point of justice, defined by the Reverend Dr. Mika Edmonson at a recent church retreat as “protecting and restoring the rights of God’s image bearers, especially the most vulnerable,” is justice – across all lines. This includes racial justice.  Our goal as followers of Jesus is not to divine the motives of the party carrying out the injustice, but to name the injustice and then participate in the work of repair.

A core challenge we have as Americans and as the church in America in talking about race or racism is that we approach the topic from different lived realities, and use the same terminology in wildly different manors. Is racism about personal hatred or a system rooted in history that privileges one group above others?   One of the more helpful definitions I’ve found comes from the Reverend Duke Kwon, who stated:

Racism is the sinful devaluation (or overvaluation), subordination (or supraordination), and exclusion (or preferential inclusion) of God’s image-bearers on the basis of ethnicity, culture or race.  It is an idolatrous ecosystem of beliefs, behaviors and social structures that assigns value or advantage based on ethnicity, culture or race.  Racism is individual and systemic, behavioral and attitudinal, conscious and subconscious, explicit and implicit, active and passive.

The post Advancing Gospel Reconciliation – Stop Missing the Point on Racial Justice, Part 3 appeared first on GraceDC.

1. Similar = same.
2. Same action = equal impact.
3. Single causality.

Here, I continue to identify and address discourses or ways of thinking that would stand in the way of gospel reconciliation.

4. Presence of good = absence of bad 

Let’s say there is a couple where the husband yells at and demeans the wife 20% of the time, but also takes the wife on nice dates quarterly and publicly praises her monthly.   Even though it’s the case that the husband does not yell at his wife 80% of the time and regularly praises her, we would still say that this couple has a problem. That is, despite the fact that there is good in the relationship, and that the majority of the time he’s not yelling, the negatives occur with enough regularity that it’s a truthful statement to say that  husband yells at and demeans his wife.

Now extrapolate to racial dynamics in the U.S. Black people have made real progress in this country.  Barack Obama was twice elected President.  Oprah Winfrey is a billionaire whose rise was supported by the millions of White families who watched her every day for decades. I received a Ph.D. from Stanford at 27, despite my paternal grandfather having a 4th grade education in the Jim Crow South.  The presence of all of these positive facts does not mean there aren’t real and serious problems that continue to happen across lines of race.  Just as the wife would be on guard for whatever might trigger the yelling husband, Black people are often on guard due to both the systematic and seemingly random ways in which race can operate in America to our detriment.

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God’s mission is one of reconciliation.  In Christ, God reconciled us to Himself.  He’s taken us from death to life, and from being His enemies to His children. Further, Christ is in the process of reconciling all things to Himself.  Thus to be people of Jesus is to be a people of gospel reconciliation – bringing things to their proper kingdom order and fullness.

At the same time, I don’t generally believe in American conversations about “racial reconciliation.” Racial categories in America were created for the purpose of  “deconciling” (i.e. breaking apart) people from various ethnic backgrounds, and to subjugate Black and Indigenous peoples to those of European ancestry. Sadly, American churches remain largely segregated, and a significant proportion of Americans who identify as Christian support public policies that are harsh and exclusionary toward fellow image bearers (especially those with brown skin) seeking to come to the U.S. from other nations.

My heart is burdened that so many people who call on the name of Jesus support dialogues, policies and practices that mar the image of God – especially (but not exclusively) in ethnic minority populations.   In Christ, God has broken down the dividing wall of hostility between the various peoples who make up the church, making former enemies brothers and sisters. Further, God is calling people from every nation, tribe, people group and language unto Himself. Thus, I press on for the gospel reconciliation that God won for us.

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We lament the unjust killings of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and too many others. This deeply painful moment – when our attention is once again drawn to the long-standing injustice against Black people in America – has resulted in widespread unrest and joins a legacy of righteous protest. Though we are particularly saddened where there is violence and further loss of life, we do not distance ourselves from or remain unaffected by these uprisings. Jesus himself entered into the darkness and violence of our world to be the light of our world. We follow him into this pain as a Black-led, multiracial, ecumenical organization committed to equipping current and future Christian leaders for cross-cultural ministry.

The post A Statement on Anti-Black Violence, Righteous Anger, and Gospel Hope appeared first on GraceDC.

You may be having a difficult time understanding the reactions of many people of color (and White allies) to the news of Black people dying at the hands of law enforcement. Maybe you are even a little bit frustrated with the emotional response and the cries of injustice against “the system.”

Perhaps, you’re on the other side of these events. You are angry, heartbroken, and feeling hopeless because you can’t help but see injustice every time one of these all-too-familiar scenarios appears in news headlines. Either way, if you identify as a Christian, you have been called to be a reconciler, a peacemaker, and a light in this current darkness. It is imperative that you work through this distinctly Christian calling with wisdom, courage, and a mind to new obedience. The love of God constrains you. The grace of God teaches you. The Spirit of God empowers you to live an altogether different kind of life in light of the new age that has dawned in the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ.

The issues at hand deeply affect the lives of real people within your local church and real people outside of your local church whom you have been called to love faithfully. This is to say that our engagement or disengagement with these issues will shape the dynamics of our life together, along with our missionary encounter with the world. On these issues, our local churches will either testify to the glory of the risen Christ through mutual love and humble repentance, or we will obscure the glory of the risen Christ through hardness of heart and indifference.

One thing, however, must be made absolutely clear: passivity has never been a viable Christian response to divisive and destructive social dynamics, especially within the church. Most of us are already convinced of this. But we feel like we’re stuck. We’re unsure of how to participate in bringing the healing that is needed.

Story As Guide

So how might we begin to proactively engage these issues? How can we begin to chart a course forward? I would invite you to consider the theme of story as a guiding paradigm for progress. All sides in this racial struggle tend to live within their own separate stories. These cultural narratives predetermine who our friends should be, who we can trust, and how we should relate to the world. These cultural narratives encourage us to find our deepest identities and alliances within our own ethnic, racial, and socioeconomic groups. However, I would propose that if we are to move forward together, then we must situate these tensions, our community, and our very lives within the same story—the story of God. No matter what truths may be found within these smaller cultural stories, we must give the greatest weight and the final say in our lives to God’s story. To put it another way, the story of God must be our “true north,” our greatest orienting factor. The story of God must dispel the cultural myths in which we have been living for far too long.

I’m intentionally resisting the typical “to-do” list, for real problems are rarely solved by checking the boxes. Rather, I’m proposing what I think will be a fruitful trajectory of thought as we try to move forward in mutual love and understanding. Admittedly, it takes much prayerful, humble, and communal reflection to figure out what this might look like in your context. The specifics will take different shape in different places. However, I would propose that if we are to be built up together in love (Eph. 4:16), then we must stay attuned to God’s macro-level narrative for perspective.

Let’s start with some important ideas. Each tragic, racialized event tends to take on a life that is much bigger than itself. Each of these events tap into a broader, more tragic, and more painful story for people of color. If this does not register for you, then the effect of all your preaching, Scripture quoting, and #praying tweets will be muted, at best. Please understand that every act of racial injustice, every episode of racism and race-based mistreatment takes on a symbolic status that brings to mind an entire network of historic injustices, sufferings, and the dehumanization of African Americans and other people of color. In the minds of many Black people, each racialized event serves as a heart-rending cipher for chattel slavery, Jim Crow, historic church bombings, Klan terrorism, redlining, and many other wounds received personally, and by living family members of former generations. Each event reads like another chapter in America’s running commentary on my Blackness—my worth, my status, my place in society—and it’s not a hopeful picture.

At one time, I did ministry in an affluent area in another part of the country, and I was often invited to large parties that were held in the beautiful homes of friends and church members. I was usually the only person of color in the place, except for “the help,” of course. On more than one occasion, a fellow party-goer would come up to me and put their trash or empty glass on my plate, assuming I was “the help.” I was clearly not expected to be in attendance as an equal or a friend. On another occasion, as I stood at the front of the house chatting with a friend and taking in the beautiful weather, a fellow party-goer tossed their car keys to me upon their arrival, assuming that I was the valet. Why did he toss the keys to me rather than my White friend? On each of these occasions, I heard America’s commentary clearly: “We’ve already assigned a social role for people who look like you, and that role is beneath us.”

Based on your current life situation, these events can carry slightly different, but equally painful messages. If I’m a Black achiever, I get the message that no matter how many letters I have behind my name (MDiv, PhD, JD), no matter how much money I have in the bank, no matter what gifts, talents, or job titles I hold, I will forever and always be subservient, even expendable. The dark clouds of stereotype, racialization, and essentialism will never lift.

I will never be able to walk through the world with the freedom and security of my White counterparts. The media stereotypes, fear-filled glances of passersby, and constant pressures to prove my virtue, decency, and value are a regular reminder that I don’t get the benefit of the doubt so I must work that much harder to diffuse the doubts and fears. In certain situations, it could mean the difference between life and death. Each tragic episode tells me that I will be on the social treadmill indefinitely: The reality of motion with the illusion of progress.

If I’m a Black non-achiever, I get the message that if I ever entertained even the smallest notion of rising from my current situation, I should probably just forget about it. It’s not worth the effort. I’m stuck and might as well stay put. If I try to rise, anyone with cultural power can put me back in my place of subjugation without any repercussions. Each racialized incident sounds like a ringing confirmation of the nihilistic chorus of voices that continually dance in my head. Sadly, many succumb to this bleak outlook.

If at this point you want to say, “Well just follow the law, and you don’t have to worry about these things happening. You can take responsibility for your actions—look at Barack Obama!” I understand how this makes sense to you, and it is true that personal responsibility must be taken, but try to consider the countless Emmett Tills of America (and if you don’t know who Emmett Till is—Google him!) For every Barack Obama, there have been thousands of Emmett Tills in American history. In addition, each incident is a reminder of the flood of personal experiences of racism and injustice that the particular individual has endured. Like that time when I was called a racial slur and that time when people expressed shock at my ability to speak “the king’s English.” Add in that day when my college friends suggested that I was granted acceptance because of “affirmative action” rather than personal merit (because I could not possibly have earned it…being Black and all). We could easily produce dozens of these microaggressions that have rubbed our souls raw through repeated abrasion.

None of these incidents that I or anyone go through happen in an emotional or historical vacuum. God made us as emotive, storied people, it’s a fact of our anthropological hardwiring. So, often, when Black people experience America’s commentary, it is an experience similar to the real, lived pain of seeing a mangled car on the roadside after having lost a dear loved one in an auto accident. Viewing that singular image on the side of the road instantly creates a tidal wave of emotions. Then, after this wave hits you, the rip tide of grief carries you out into the sea of anguish. You remember first hearing the news of the loss. You remember watching your surrounding loved ones burst into tears. You remember the black suits and dresses at the wake. You remember the roses being thrown on the coffin as the undertaker prepared to lower your loved one six feet into the ground.

In a similar way, African Americans are reintroduced to a grief, pain, and sense of loss every time one of these tragedies occurs, and inasmuch as you refuse to acknowledge this and mourn with the mourner (Rom. 12:15), you exacerbate the pain and alienation. You stall healing and, sometimes, inflict deeper wounds.

We must realize that the optics of these events matter. Regardless of the particulars, the overriding truth, the loudest voice heard by African Americans is that another Black person’s life has been extinguished because Black lives are invested with less value.

If you are always down in the weeds arguing “the facts,” you will likely be harsh and insensitive. The worst part about this is that you may be “right” with regard to technicalities, but you will not be right with regard to Christian love. You may need to consider holding your tongue in certain moments. Many of the things that we think in our minds are not beneficial for public consumption (beware your Facebook and Twitter rants).

The question is not so simple as to ask, “Do the details of this particular case harmonize with the American justice system?” The bigger question is, “Does the American justice system harmonize with the true justice of God in this particular situation?” To conflate the American justice system with the true justice of God is naive and misguided. We have to acknowledge that the American justice system is failing Black people, brown people, White people, and law enforcement officers at any point where the American justice system departs from the principles of eternal justice. I’m not suggesting that we could or should pursue a theocracy in America. But what I am suggesting is that there must be an acknowledgment of the fallibility of our system and, at the very least, a fight to rid the American justice system of its glaring inadequacies, insofar as we are able to participate in this labor.

But it is also important for us to remember a number of other important facts as we aim to move forward.

1. First, there is a beautiful history of White people entering into solidarity and seeking justice for all. They have used their social, educational, and financial privileges to work for justice. People of color should encourage them and receive them as family and allies in this worthy struggle.
2. Second, there are many genuine, kind-hearted, White people who are doing their best to make sense of things. They do not see any injustice or why these incidents would warrant such strong reactions. They are honestly trying to work through it all. Let grace and the Golden Rule be your guide in dialogue. Try to give the same space and grace that you would need to see things from their angle, given their life experiences. If they ask you questions and the answers seem painfully obvious to you, don’t assume or project malicious intent, lest you be guilty of the same kind of thinking that contributed to these tragedies in the first place.
3. Third, there will always be people who see emotional responses of pain and frustration in such situations as “race-baiting,” “excuses,” or “playing the race card.” There will be trolls on the comment sections of digital newspapers and blogs that spew unspeakably awful, hateful things. I would simply encourage you to spend your emotional energies on your local context with real people, building real relationships of trust and honesty. Staying at the national level to the neglect of the local level will likely tend toward hopelessness and despair. Conversely, the small victories that happen around the kitchen table and in the neighborhood, born of prayer, love, and perseverance, will bless you more than you know. Celebrate this good fruit.

What’s even more important than these practical pieces of advice is the more central need that we have to share the same overarching narrative. This is the truth: We need each other if we are going to break out of the dehumanizing narratives under which we each live. If there is any truth to the notion that we are deeply affected by the narratives under which we live, then we are confronted with a question: What does a narrative of untimely death, violence, criminalization, racialization, and inferiority do to a people group? When this historical narrative of subhumanity and expendability seems to be confirmed time and again, what happens to its beleaguered characters?

It has been said before that racism and the racialization of American culture is bad, not just for people of color, but for White people as well.[1] It is not true nor healthy for people of color to live under the narrative of inferiority and dehumanization. In the same way, it is not true nor healthy for White people to live under the narrative of superiority and suprahumanization. You are in a dangerous and unhealthy position when your race, ethnicity, biology, and overall way of life is canonized and made to be anthropological holy writ. Adherence to this social orthodoxy will cloud your mind with a soul-stifling pride, which God opposes (James 4:6). No one people group should be so cast down below the rest, and no one people group should be so exalted above the rest—neither of these outlooks is a healthy way to be human. The conflicts we are witnessing result from the ways in which we have all lived out of these lesser narratives, allowing these mythologies to govern our lives and ruin our relationships.

However, there is a way in which all people can simultaneously acknowledge their lowliness, fallibility, and the vulnerability of their situation—but also the beauty, glory, and hope for their situation. This is the story of the Gospel, and it is this story that we must share together if we are to make progress in mutual love and understanding.

God’s Story

According to God’s story, every human being was designed for glory and dignity in connection with God and the people around him or her. Every human being surrendered his or her glory in walking away from God. But the hope that God gives is that his story is all about affirming these twin truths: You and I are simultaneously sinners, yet accepted in the Beloved by grace alone through faith alone. We are ruined but rescued, awful but adopted, devious but delivered. God’s story tells us that brokenness is not the sole proprietorship of any one ethnic group, and by God’s grace, glory is not the sole inheritance of any one ethnic group. This is God’s commentary on our shared identity in Christ; and it’s infinitely better than America’s commentary.

This story alone sets the stage for fruitful, healthy, restorative dialogue and true progress. This story tells me that my identity rests, not on being right, but on being loved. I am free to be wrong, to learn, and to change as I live in community with the other. I am free to acknowledge that my mind needs to be renewed, and that this renewal is possible. If what the Bible says about me is anywhere near the truth, then humility, teachability, and grace must govern the way I move forward.

Don’t politicize this issue, gospelize it. The Gospel is the only story big enough to swallow up the grief of a ruined humanity, overcoming that ruin with the glory of a renewed humanity. Build this into your local church through every means available—pulpit, programming, community groups, and neighborhood gatherings. Explore the implications of God’s story for the current racial conflicts that we are facing. In what ways do you need to embrace difficult changes personally and corporately? How does God’s story encourage me to drop my defenses? Who should I be inviting to my dinner table in light of God’s story? How should we rethink the power-dynamics of our church or organization in light of a glorious God who humbles himself in love in order to lift the other?

The story of God answers these questions and many more with life-giving and life-changing direction. But one thing is for sure, if you bury your head in the sand on important issues like these, your witness will be blunted and your missionary encounter with the world will ebb over time as America grows more diverse.

You have an opportunity to speak dignity over the disenfranchised—did not Christ do this for you (1 Pet. 2:9)? You have an opportunity to proclaim words that invite humility and gracious acceptance—did not Christ proclaim these words over you (1 Pet. 5:5)? You have an opportunity to participate in the formation of a cross-cultural community—is this not the community that God has already determined to bring to completion (Rev. 7:9)? In God’s story, the poor are made rich because the rich One was made poor (2 Cor. 8–9). In God’s story, the weak are made strong because the Almighty was pleased to enter into our weakness (Rom. 5:6, Phil. 2:5ff).

In God’s story, there is hope for the hopeless, joy for the joyless, and power for the powerless. Christ, the King, will not suffer the status quo injustice and tragedy of this world to remain in place forever.  But my question for you is this: Are you going to embrace your role as a participant in God’s story of renewal? In Christ, we have an entire treasury of resources for living up into this bigger, more meaningful, and more beautiful story. I would invite you to reimagine your relationships in light of this story. Reimagine the final chapter of this story, allowing that vision to shape your life and relationships in the present. If you do, the mile markers on the side of the road will reveal that you are actually making progress in the journey toward racial healing and social flourishing. This story, shared among us, is our hopeful way forward.

The post Moving Forward appeared first on GraceDC.

Dr. Gregory Thompson

I think that it was the day after Halloween that I heard the first Christmas music warbling happily from the speakers above the storefront. It was a bit early for me (in our house not so much as a jingling bell is heard before the start of Advent) and I wasn’t yet in the mood, and so I decided to use it as a “teaching opportunity” to remind my four children of the wisdom of the liturgical calendar, the importance of respecting the boundaries of each season, and so on. Pausing for a breath, and noticing their glazed eyes and crossed arms, I got the sneaking sensation that—for some reason—they weren’t appreciating the wisdom that I was dropping. An impression that was confirmed shortly thereafter when my 13 year old daughter said, “Hey Reverend Grinch, just let them sing. This year we can all use as much help as we can get.” 

Though it pains me to say it, my daughter was on to something important. Namely, that as we enter into the seasons of Advent and Christmas, the seasons of darkness and light, silence and song, we need one another. It is, in fact, in the presence of one another that we find strength for our own Advent songs.

This is, I think, one of the meanings of Mary’s joyful encounter with her Auntie Elizabeth. Both women, you will recall, have recently learned the joyful news of a hidden life growing within them. And yet by all appearances, each of them is largely silent. For her part, Mary is being kept largely out of view to avoid a scandal. And Elizabeth, though married, is both voiceless and married to a (temporarily) mute husband. Noise is all around them, but—in the early days—their voices are largely absent.

Until, that is, they are together. When that happens, when they come to one another, the passage is suddenly aflame with song. Upon seeing Mary, Luke tells us:

“Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.  And why is this granted to me that the mother of my lord should come to me?  For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.”  Luke 1: 41-45.

Likewise, upon seeing Elizabeth and hearing her words, Mary sings her own song:

“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name. And his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts; he has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate; he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his offspring forever.” Luke 1: 46-55.

This movement from silence to song is extraordinary. And while there are many reasons for this movement, one of them, surely, is this: When these two women carried their Advent burdens alone they were, as we all are, bound to their own secret wonder, their own silent sorrow. But when they came together, they remembered once again that they both were, to borrow from Tolkien, “sharers of a secret hope.” And in this, in one another, in the midst of a shadowed and confusing world, they found the strength they needed to sing their respective Advent songs.

In the coming days, in the midst of our own bewildering world, each of us bears a secret hope within us. But to turn this secret into song we need one another; one another’s voices, one another’s love, one another’s reminders of the blessing that is ours in Jesus. Because of this, I urge you—as you are already doing—to seek one another out, to remind one another of truth, and, in time, to join one another in the joys of redemption. For it is with one another, perhaps more than any other place, that we find the strength for our song.

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