The second year of the Cultivating Cares Community Garden has begun. Preparation and planting began on April 28, 2022. Follow along this year, and consider volunteering your time and energy to feeding our community. If you would like to volunteer at the cultivating care donation garden, please contact the Williamson County Extension Office at (618) 993-3304. Volunteer Tasks: Visit 3-4 times times…
At our March Session meeting (3/9/2022), we had some significant discussion around masking and not masking, that probably reflects the congregation as a whole. There are some who will come back if we made masking optional, and some who would stay away longer. Depending on the individual risk factors, people will make individual decisions about masking, as they have been doing already…
An update about our worship – Session has determined that we will resume worship in person, with masks and distancing as requirements for our worship together. We are shifting back to lifting our voices in song, while we stay masked and distanced. We will continue to have Zoom as an option, and encourage you to make the best decision for yourself and your family about how you will be worshiping.
We got a call on March 9th to see if we would be willing to provide space for a Community Garden to provide fresh food to local food pantries. Fresh food is expensive, and often too expensive for those who are food insecure or the agencies that provide aid to the food insecure. Session was excited about the idea, and since that…
We gather again this year for Lent, and to gather as the community of God gathered in mission, service, and worship together in Marion. This year, our worship will be online, and shared with our community in a prerecorded format. Videos will be posted to premiere at 6 pm on Tuesday evenings in Lent, as woudl be our time if we were…
Friends, The Session wanted to relay to you some of our discussions about worship as we head into the fall and Advent and Christmas. We have been worshiping via Zoom for 7 months now, and we have begun to have a small group of people back in the worship space. In the short term, we will continue holding a hybrid worship service.…
For the foreseeable future, our worship will be based online. We are using Zoom as our worship platform. You can download Zoom from https://zoom.us/download or from your mobile platform app store. For the connection information please contact the church office. If you’d like to follow along in worship later, then we have two options: You can find our online worship recordings on…
Exodus 14:5-7, 10-14, 21-29 (30-31?) The sea parts, God’s deliverance We’ve moved forward generations again. We’ve moved from Joseph to Moses, to a Pharoah who did not know Joseph. And yet the people are imprisoned as Joseph was when we left him. Now they are running away, as Joseph ran from Potiphar’s wife, and the authority, the Pharoah and the people of…
Genesis 39:1-23 Joseph in Prison We’ve jumped forward several (4) generations by the time we get to this story. Joseph is down In Egypt, sold by his brothers to his cousins, and then sold to Potiphar. And things seem to be turning around for Joseph. He gains respect and responsibility in the household, becoming the overseer of the house. It seems like…
Genesis 12:1-9 Call of Abraham This seems like a one on one conversation. It seems like this is just God and Abram plotting together, striking a deal and going forth. We talk about the covenant of God with Abram (or Abraham). We talk about this God being the God of Abraham, and Judaism, Christianity, and Islam being Abrahamic religions. And then verse…
Genesis 6:5-22; 8:6-12; 9:8-17 Noah, flood, rainbow This story is in all the children’s Bibles. We can buy carved Noah’s arks at the wood market in Lilongwe, Malawi. It is easily portrayed in art, and everyone I know gleefully smiles and points when they see a rainbow. However, this is not really a children’s story. God sees wickedness on the earth, and…
Genesis 5:1-32 Lineage How did we get here? That’s often a question in the church, in society, in our personal lives. It is a plot line feature in TV, movies, and books. The backstory sets the stage for the next chapter of the story. This backstory comes in following the narrative of Adam and Eve’s family and children, and then serves to…
John 15:12- 17, 26-27 ,21:20-25 John’s gospel starts talking about the beginning, going into the Word and light, and then John the Baptist. Jesus tells the disciples that they are to testify to him, because they have been with him from the beginning. Jesus wants us to love one another – that is to be our testimony – as he has loved…
John 15:26 -16:18 Confusion about the days after Christ Jesus is looking ahead and the disciples aren’t up to where he was, let alone where he’s going. Jesus points to the future, when he will not be present, but the Advocate (Spirit) will be. This looking ahead, this preparation, is intended to comfort the disciples, yet it doesn’t. If anything, it makes…
John 5:19-46 Very Truly We have heard from Jesus about Jesus in the “I am statements” over the past few weeks. This passage comes before those statements, and right after Jesus heals a man on the Sabbath. This passage starts by Jesus connecting himself to the Father. There is love, there is life, there is judgment, there is honor, and there is…
1 John 4:7-21, John 15:1-17 Dan Selock brings a word about “I am the vine.”
John 11:14-27, Mark 12:18-27