Sunday, September 24th, 2023 at 10:00 AM in the Church and Zoom Sanctuaries
Worship Gathering
Patient Persistence
Recently, I took the blue and pink trans flag down from the inside of our sanctuary and hung it on a pole at the right end of our banner at the front of the church. Last Sunday morning, I discovered it had been stolen.
This isn’t the first time that such vandalism has happened with our signage in front of the church. I’ve put up other signage indicating our commitment to LGBTQ+ full affirmation, and on a couple of occasions it has been knocked over.
It is my prayerful hope that whoever did this will look deeper within themselves, over time, and observe what motivated them to do such a thing. Fear? Hatred? Anger? A combination of all three? Conversion from hate to love and acceptance often takes time…. but it happens. Think of how relatively quickly Americans came to accept same-sex marriage overwhelmingly – when only a few years before, legalization seemed unimaginable!
I count this vandalism as a cost of our discipleship, a price we pay for changing hearts and minds… which requires patience and persistence.
The sign is back up, by the way – and we’ll put out more flags soon!
On Sunday, our guest Rev. Andrew Kovalev will speak on “A Great God: Our Journey From Russia”.
—Jim
See you at Church!
PS: If you’d like to subscribe to my weekly blog, “musings”, email me at jtburklo@yahoo.com and I’ll put you on the list!
P.S.S.: In addition to being your pastor, I’m also the (volunteer) Executive Director of ProgressiveChristiansUniting.org . I’m leading its main project, a new global network of progressive Christian ministries at colleges and universities called ZOE… zoeoncampus.org .
See you on Sunday!
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Here is the Zoom Information:
Worship begins at 10:00 AM.
Topic: Sunday Morning Worship Gathering in the Midst
Time: Sundays 9:30 AM Pacific Time (US and Canada)
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Meeting ID: 898 1487 4542
Passcode: 223180
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