Wednesday Words for June 18, 2014
From Interim Senior Pastor Len Hoffmann
Scroll down to find the link to your Bethany Weekly Newsletter!
Thought for the Day:
And even the hairs of your head are counted.
So do not be afraid; your are of more value than many sparrows.
Matthew 10:30-31
***
Confirmation Campers will be sent off with a special blessing this Sunday.
This Week: Register for VBS on the Bethany Website (use the Sunday School Registration Link). If you desire to have your child(ren) have a VBS T-Shirt please register by June 25.
Sunday at Bethany: This is my first Sunday with you as your interim senior pastor. I have already received a warm welcome from the staff and council and from some of you. I look forward to meeting many of you this Sunday at worship and coffee hour. Please feel free to introduce yourself and don’t hesitate to remind me of your name over the next weeks..
As I shared with the council, although my official title is interim senior pastor, I believe a more appropriate title is transitional pastor. I have been a pastor for 39 years in November and nearly all of my ministry settings have involved some form of transition or another. Transitions provide both opportunities and challenges. Some transitions are joyful (birth of a child; graduation; a new job). Some transitions are sorrowful (the progression of a chronic disease; the sale of the family home; the death of a beloved). Some transitions are both joyful and sorrowful. One thing that is common to all transitions is that it brings anxiety and fear. What will come next? How will the transition benefit me, my family, my friends, or will it? Our Gospel reading reminds us that we are not to be afraid and during communion distribution on Sunday we will sing “Have No Fear Little Flock”. The reason is that we have been called, claimed and sent by the risen Christ who holds the present and future.
My primary goal as your transitional pastor is to preach and teach among you. I will work with the council to be as transparent as possible and I will seek to involve all who wish to be engaged in preparing the ground for the next pastoral leader. My hope and prayer for all of you during this in-between time is this: for you to faithfully worship and learn, and to practice hospitality, service, and stewardship. Parents it is my hope and prayer that you will keep the vows made at baptism where you promised to faithfully bring your children to the services of God’s house, teach them the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, the Ten Commandments, place in their hands the Holy Scriptures and provide for their instruction in the Christian faith. All of us working together will keep Bethany’s mission strong in Gathering People Together for Renewal and Service in Christ’s Name.
Pastor Len
This Week’s Texts: Lectionary 12
Proper 7
Second Sunday after Pentecost
Prayer of The Day
Teach us, good Lord God,
to serve you as you deserve,
to give and not to count the cost,
to fight and not to heed the wounds,
to toil and not to seek for rest,
to labor and not to ask for reward,
except that of knowing that we do your will,
through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.
FIRST READING Jeremiah 20:7-13
Jeremiah accuses God of forcing him into a ministry that brings him only contempt and persecution. Yet Jeremiah is confident that God will be a strong protector against his enemies and commits his life into God's hands.
7O LORD, you have enticed me,
and I was enticed;
you have overpowered me,
and you have prevailed.
I have become a laughingstock all day long;
everyone mocks me.
8For whenever I speak, I must cry out,
I must shout, "Violence and destruction!"
For the word of the LORD has become for me
a reproach and derision all day long.
9If I say, "I will not mention him,
or speak any more in his name,"
then within me there is something like a burning fire
shut up in my bones;
I am weary with holding it in,
and I cannot.
10For I hear many whispering:
"Terror is all around!
Denounce him! Let us denounce him!"
All my close friends
are watching for me to stumble.
"Perhaps he can be enticed,
and we can prevail against him,
and take our revenge on him."
11But the LORD is with me like a dread warrior;
therefore my persecutors will stumble,
and they will not prevail.
They will be greatly shamed,
for they will not succeed.
Their eternal dishonor
will never be forgotten.
12O LORD of hosts, you test the righteous,
you see the heart and the mind;
let me see your retribution upon them,
for to you I have committed my cause.
13Sing to the LORD;
praise the LORD!
For he has delivered the life of the needy
from the hands of evildoers.
SECOND READING Romans6:1b-11
In baptism we were incorporated into the reality of Christ's death. Our lives in the present are marked and shaped by his crucifixion, just as our lives in the future will be marked and shaped by his resurrection.
bShould we continue in sin in order that grace may abound? 2By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it? 3Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.
5For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. 7For whoever has died is freed from sin. 8But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. 10The death he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. 11So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
GOSPEL Matthew 10: 24-39
Jesus warns his disciples that their ministry in his name will meet with opposition, requiring absolute trust in God and an unswerving commitment to their Lord.
24A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the master; 25it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the slave like the master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household!
26So have no fear of them; for nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known. 27What I say to you in the dark, tell in the light; and what you hear whispered, proclaim from the housetops. 28Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. 29Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. 30And even the hairs of your head are all counted. 31So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.
32Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven; 33but whoever denies me before others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven.
34Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
35For I have come to set a man against his father,
and a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
36and one's foes will be members of one's own household.
37Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; 38and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.
