Now. Here. This.
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Now. Here. This.
So Ready, and Still So Unprepared
You can prepare but still it will come to you by surprise, crossing through your doorway calling your name in greeting, turning like a child who quickens suddenly within you. it will astonish you how wide your heart will open in welcome for the...
Giving Thanks
Since 2015, the central part of our Thanksgiving celebration here at the church has been to gather with our friends and neighbors from the First Baptist Church on New St. for a potluck. Perhaps more than any other activity or event we have shared, this annual meal has...
A Last Beatitude
A Last Beatitude And blessèd are the ones we overlook; The faithful servers on the coffee rota, The ones who hold no candle, bell or book But keep the books and tally up the quota, The gentle souls who come to ‘do the flowers’, The quiet ones who organise the...
In Gratitude for the Seekers
It was on a Sunday in March of 1984 that a group of seven church members gathered to create a new Sunday School class to be called “The Seekers.” Joan Godsey, who would go on to become the central leader of the class for the next nearly 40 years, wrote in the original...
Reflections from Children’s Worship Arts Workshops
This semester the children of FBCX have the opportunity on Wednesday afternoons to participate in Worship Arts Workshops. Creative people from our church have shared or will share with us about their creative outlets. This a chance to connect with our own creativity...
From the Place Where We Are Right
From the place where we are right Flowers will never grow In the spring. The place where we are right Is hard and trampled Like a yard. But doubts and loves Dig up the world Like a mole, a plow. And a whisper will be heard in the place Where the ruined House once...
This Do in Remembrance
One of the things we know for sure about the earliest celebrations of the Lord’s Supper is that it was an actual supper. Paul indicates as much in the eleventh chapter of 1 Corinthians when he scolds the church for not waiting for everyone to get there before they...
Different Bodies, Same Christ
Post by Kelsey Stillwell, Associate Pastor for Youth and Missions “Bali is my body. Christ is my life.” -Nyoman Darsane We would drive out to Darsane’s studio at least once a week with Tina and Jonathan Bailey to meet everyone for gamelan practice. Gamelan is...
Uncommon Prayer
From time to time I’m asked for recommendations for daily devotionals. I often wince because recommending devotionals is like buying art for other people: it’s very personal, hard to get just right, and potentially awkward when you get it wrong. And yet a friend...
Never Forget
I was a freshman in college. We had been in classes for just a few weeks. I had a 9:00 am intro-level Music class with Dr. Gorlick. I woke up, threw some clothes on, and headed across campus. As I remember it, when I arrived in the classroom, a few students were...
A Theology of a Sufferer
Daybreak until nightfall, he sat by his wife at the hospital while chemotherapy dripped through the catheter into her heart. He drank coffee and read the Globe. He paced; he worked on poems; he rubbed her back and read aloud. Overcome with dread, they wept and...
What We Didn’t Read
I hope you have enjoyed this extended look at Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians as much as I have. If conversations and exchanges I’ve had with many of you are any indication, this great “love letter to the church” has been just what we’ve needed over the past month as...
A Place to Be
I have had the opportunity to serve as a Ministry Intern with the youth group for the past two school years, and three summers. The FBCX community experienced a shift this summer back towards gathering in ways that used to feel familiar and comfortable. This shift, of...
(End of) Summer Reading
It’s true that reading lists usually come out at the beginning of summer, but as this pandemic persists, time, too, continues to be fluid. In that spirit, enjoy these book recommendations from the church staff for the end of summer, or wherever and whenever your...
The Sacred Schoolhouse
Two Sundays ago we celebrated one of the High Holy Days on our own local church calendar in “Back to School Sunday.” As I shared last week in worship, this is one of my favorite Sundays each year, and a beautiful expression of congregational life. Yet, there’s a...
Love Letters
When Audrey and I were dating in college she studied abroad for a semester in Italy. We were committed to trying out a temporarily “long distance relationship,” but I remember having some real fears about how it would work. I think we both did. This was the fall of...