Greetings!

When you are out meeting new people in the course of your regular life, does your connection to your church community or faith practice ever come up? Have you ever experienced someone responding to your religious involvement with a negative comment or attitude?

It would be easy to reject that person’s response as being rude or ignorant. But there might also be reasons why many in our current North American context feel opposed to organized religion. It may be that our forms and practices have had negative impacts on the lives of many, and it might be that all the good we intend to do hasn’t really led to the positive transformation that we intend.

What are we supposed to do, then? Well, when Jesus spoke to his disciples about the time when they would have to practice their faith without him, he spoke about the coming of an advocate—a divine spirit to empower their work and faithfulness. What if that same Spirit is available to us? What might we do, by its power? I hope you’ll come and consider that question with all of us on Sunday.

Faithfully,

Hardy

P.S. This Sunday we will also rededicate the stained glass windows in our sanctuary - join us for this special celebration!

Theme for Sunday

“People who ask for the Holy Spirit to come to us—into our hearts, into the community we live in, and to our earth—don’t want to flee to heaven or to be snatched away into the next world. They have hope for their hearts, their community and this earth. We don’t pray ‘Let us come into your kingdom’ either. We pray ‘Your kingdom come on earth as in heaven.’ The petition for the coming of the divine Spirit to us frail earthly people implies a great, unbroken affirmation of life.”

—Jürgen Moltmann, The Source of Life: The Holy Spirit and the Theology of Life

John 14:23-29

Jesus answered him, “Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Father who sent me.

“I have said these things to you while I am still with you. 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. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.

You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I am coming to you.’ If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you this before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe.”