That Church (1 Thessalonians 1: 1-10) When I first got introduced to the church leadership ten and a half years ago, I was asked what my vision for the church was. I’ll admit the question caught me off guard as I had not anticipated it but, much to my surprise and the surprise of [...]
Thinking Positively (Philippians 4: 1-9) In 1952 the Rev. Norman Vincent Peale, a Methodist minister, wrote his best-selling book: The Power of Positive Thinking: A Practical Guide to Mastering the Problems of Everyday Living. It was on the New York Times’ bestsellers list for 186 weeks, 48 of which were spent in the No. [...]
Good morning, Community UMC family! Happy Sunday! Let me begin with a simple question: How many languages can you say “thank you” in? English: Thank you, Gracias in Spanish, merci in French, danke in German, or arigatou gozaimasu in Japanese. I am so thankful for your presence here today. So I want to ask you a question: If you could describe “following Christ [...]
Getting Your Mind Right (Philippians 2: 1-16) I know I’ve mentioned this before, but one of my favorite movies is Cool Hand Luke starring Paul Newman as Luke. Luke is a petty criminal, and not a very good one, as he got caught cutting the heads of parking meters in order to steal the [...]
Church vs. State (Romans 13: 1-7) I guess that if there is anything positive you can say about our political cycles is that they often call into question where we stand as Followers of the Way of Jesus Christ when it comes to deciding who will represent us in a government of the people, [...]
Look Up, Not Down Romans 14: 1-12 After being voted out of office the first time, Teresa and I moved three hours away to Tyler, Texas where I landed a job as an Assistant District Attorney for Smith County. We were pretty excited and lucked into a cute little pre-war two-bedroom, one bath house [...]
Gospel Loopholes Romans 13: 8-14 Back when I practiced law, I would have the occasional client come in with a problem wanting me to see if there was a way around the law, and it didn’t matter if it was a civil case or a criminal case. They were looking for a way around [...]
No Strings Attached (Romans 12: 1-8) In the world of social media, it’s called: Click Bait. Something pops up on your Facebook feed that looks interesting, tempting and possibly too good to be true. For me, it’s usually some quick and easy way to improve my guitar playing short of going down to the [...]
Speaking Truth to Power (Matthew 15: 1-20) One thing that took me a while to learn about the Houston Police Department was that the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. An organization that lives and dies upon maintaining the status quo will do whatever it can to resist change, especially if [...]
Sink or Swim (Matthew 14: 22-33) When my granddaughter was little, before she got into kindergarten, one of my duties was to travel over to Edmonds and take her to swimming lessons. It was an organized chaos to say the least and I have to give credit to her instructor, a woman with an [...]