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Transformative Christianity (Pt 3): The Bridge to Eden

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We come to the climax of this sermon series. We’ve discussed who we are – created in God’s divine image. We’ve discussed how this divine image is covered over with the baggage of our humanness. Now we turn to the one who removes that baggage and returns us to our original state as God’s divine image. We turn to the one who finds us east of Eden, gathers us, shepherds us, and lays down his life to be a bridge back to Eden. Imagine a huge bridge over troubled waters. A huge flow of people walk that bridge from east of Eden into Eden. For each individual in that stream of people, Christ is their personal bridge to God, a bridge to the garden of their hearts, a bridge to a relationship with God, a bridge back to our original nature, our divine image. Christ through his work on the cross removes the baggage covering that divine image, allowing us to begin again. We can say Jesus wipes the slate clean, getting us back to square one where we are at-one with God. Christ and the Cross at-on
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4 Songs / 1 Theme - Yom Kippur

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The highest Jewish holiday is Yom Kippur, a day of atonement, a day of starting again. Think about this, you Christians reading this - Jesus honored Yom Kippur. Atonement is a universal theme. There is a need in us to be reconciled with those we're disconnected from for whatever reason. We see this theme in music often. Who doesn't love a good apology song? Anyway, here are 4 songs that loosely tap into the meaning of Yom Kippur (some less loosely than others, I might add). <
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Transformative Christianity (Pt 2): Our Baggage, God's Image

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Before we get into our discussion of what the Christian tradition has come to call the Fall, I want to begin with a refresher of last Sunday’s big takeaway. That we, being created in God’s image, are God’s self-portrait to the world and in the world. I’d like to add something to this before we move on. I John 4 reminds us more than once that God is Love. God is not just loving. God not only loves the world. God is love itself. This has really wonderful applications. I encourage you sometimes when you’re reading the Bible, insert the word Love with a capital L whenever you see God or Lord. It often gives a new, beautiful meaning to the text.   Here’s an example, Genesis 1:26a, 27. Then Love said,  “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness…”      So Love created humans in his image,     in the image of Love were they created;     male and female Love created them. If we are created in God’s image, and God is love, then we are created in Divine Love’s image
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Transformative Christianity (Pt 1): God's Self-Portrait

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Not too long ago, Corey and I were discussing his childhood. He mentioned something fascinating to me. He said he remembers the moment he became self-aware. He talked about how when he was 3 years old he woke up from a nap while we were driving in our 1998 Subaru Forester and sort of woke up to the realization that he was who he was, an individual with a mind, with thoughts, and feelings. This blew me away. Still does. I don’t have this kind of memory. In some ways, the story of humanity’s creation in Genesis 1, that poetic narrative amounts to a discovering and a revealing of the truth about who we human beings are. The writer, inspired by God, wakes up to the realization that God created us in a special way, unique to the rest of creation, God created human beings in his divine image. Have you ever looked at a famous painter’s self-portrait. Van Gogh’s famous self-portrait comes to mind. Now, we have all of Van Gogh’s other beautiful paintings. You see something of Van Gogh in th
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God's Self Portrait

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Not too long ago, Corey and I were discussing his childhood. He mentioned something fascinating to me. He said he remembers the moment he became self-aware. He talked about how when he was 3 years old he woke up from a nap while we were driving in our 1998 Subaru Forester and sort of woke up to the realization that he was who he was, an individual with a mind, with thoughts, and feelings. This blew me away. Still does. I don’t have this kind of memory. In some ways, the story of humanity’s creation in Genesis 1, that poetic narrative amounts to a discovering and a revealing of the truth about who we human beings are. The writer, inspired by God, wakes up to the realization that God created us in a special way, unique to the rest of creation, God created human beings in his divine image. Have you ever looked at a famous painter’s self-portrait. Van Gogh’s famous self-portrait comes to mind. Now, we have all of Van Gogh’s other beautiful paintings. You see something of Van Gogh in th
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"Wholy Holy"

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Columbia Memorial Hospital faced the Catskills in the distance and stood just a half mile from the first living room I remember. The apartment possessed only two bedrooms, already too small for my father, mother, two older sisters, and newborn me. In a couple years, when my dad got a better job, we’d move. If child-bearing wasn’t what it was (and remains), I imagine my mom might have walked me home that week. But childbirth, rightly called labor, exhausts thoroughly. And with three kids all under five years of age and with a husband often working, parenthood never stopped exhausting my mother. April 10 th  of 1971 brought unseasonably wintry weather, a pointed, probing wind across the river and our city of the same name. And the alley off of Worth Avenue in downtown Hudson, New York included a steep hill up. My mom didn’t walk me home.   1971, historically speaking, isn’t notorious or notable for things like military or terrorist attacks, political assassinations, or the ending of wa
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Living In the Name Of...

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  In whose name are you here? If someone were to ask you that question, what would your answer be? Are you here in the name of your ancestors, representing those family members who once walked this earth and sought to better themselves and their loved ones? Are you here in the name of your kids, wanting to be the caring, supportive, consistent presence they need you to be? Are you here in the name of this church community, doing your part to see this community and faith thrive? Maybe you’re here in the name of Christ, wanting to be the body of Christ here and now. Or maybe you’re here in the name of righteousness itself, knowing it is right to move beyond yourself alone and treat the world around you well. Whatever the case may be, this phrase we see often in the Bible, “in the name of” points to the important truth that we do not live in isolation, as disconnected, little island-like selves. We represent not just ourselves as we show ourselves to the word and live our li
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