Discipling Life

I confess that I have always been time conscious during worship. I see to it that there is a clock I can always look at during worship. This started at the very beginning of my ministry when a served a three-point charge (in Methodist lingo that just means I had three churches). I had to make sure I finished one service with enough time to start the next. Be honest: we like our worship to begin and end on time, our prayers to feel familiar, and our sense of God to remain comfortably within reach. And then we open Acts 2 , and everything we thought we knew about how God works gets blown wide open. Quite literally. When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, ...

As we get ready celebrate Pentecost in our worship this Sunday, I wanted to take a look at a few verses from John’s Gospel. 14:15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. 17 This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him because he abides with you, and he will be in you. … 25 ”I have said these things to you while I am still with you. 26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all that I have said to you. ... 16:13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. (John 14:15-17, 25-26; 16:13, NRSVue) On the night before the cross, Jesus spoke words of comfort and promise to his disciples: “I w...

This was one of those Sundays that I ended up skipping my prepared sermon outline and going in a different direction . I ran the audio recording through a transcriber to produce this manuscript of the sermon as I preached it: May 17, 2026, Seventh Sunday after Easter (Year A), at Ebenezer UMC and Black Creek UMC. This is the text of the sermon as preached at Black Creek.   Next Sunday is Pentecost. We sometimes refer to that day as the birthday of the church because that is when the Holy Spirit was poured out on the people gathered in Jerusalem at the temple for the Jewish festival of Pentecost. Part of the celebration of that festival was to commemorate the giving of the law through Moses. And so, here people were gathered to hear the preaching of the apostles, and they received the word of God through that preaching as the Holy Spirit was poured upon them. Today, this Sunday before Pentecost, we look at what took plac e just before that, when Jesus met with his disciples for for...

I mentioned earlier that Wesley said that there is not such thing as solitary religion. You can’t be a Christian by yourself. Life is not meant to be lived in isolation. We need people to serve and people to serve with. Our faith must be more that “me and Jesus” we are called in community to be sent forth as “the Body of Christ, redeemed by his blood” (from the Great Thanksgiving). We are created for connection, for belonging, for a shared purpose that is bigger than any one of us. Paul speaks to this deep truth in 1 Corinthians 12:3-13. He writes that “no one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit.” In other words, even our first steps toward Christ are stirred by grace that reaches for us before we ever reach back. The Holy Spirit draws us into the life of God and into the life of the community. Paul goes on to say that “there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit” (v. 4) and that “to each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” (v. 7) The Sp...

There is so much contained in Acts 2:14, 36-41 . People hearing Peter’s words are “cut to the heart” and want to know what they must do. They are told to repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of sins. But what does it mean to repent? The word metanoia (μετάνοια) is usually translated as repentance. Some translations use the expression “change of heart and life” (e.g. Common English Bible) and others include the expression “a change of mind.” When we hear the word repent, we tend to think about a feeling of remorse, but it must be more than that. Repentance is indeed a change of mind, heart, and life. Is is a “turning back to God event.” Scriptures speak of the need for the “fruit of repentance.” In other words, true repentance is evidenced by a change of mind, heart, and life, that demonstrates a desire to live a life pleasing to God and is expressed in tangible evidence of loving God with all our heart, mind, and strength, and loving our neighbors as ourselves. Peter’s answ...

Since my retirement from full-time ministry, I have been doing about one wedding a year. One thing that is common to all weddings is the celebration of a new connection. People, friends and family, gather to celebrate these two people and their decision. When the wedding service ends, those gathered celebrate with joy. It is a clear, unmistakable point of entry into a brand-new shared story, rooted in love. Just like at a wedding where a new family is announced, on the day of Pentecost, Peter announced something new: the life of Jesus was for  all people. This announcement, fueled by God’s grace set off a ripple effect that we’re still feeling today. 22  “Fellow Israelites, listen to what I have to say: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with deeds of power, wonders, and signs that God did through him among you, as you yourselves know—  23  this man, handed over to you according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified an...