Pastor's Ponderings: Monday Bible Study on Acts of the Apostles 8:5-13 (November 10, 2025)

November 10, 2025:  Monday Bible Study on Acts 8:5-13

Good morning my dear friends in Christ.  I was shocked this AM when I saw the news that indicated that Chicago, and the eastern shore of Lake Michigan were receiving some rather large snowfalls today.  Around Chicago maybe as much as 18".  Both Melody and I remember all too well what it was like to have 36 inches of snow with 40 - 50 MPH wind when we lived just a couple of miles off Lake Michigan at our farmhouse.  We were literally buried, with cars stuck in the yard surrounded by 6–8-foot drifts.  Roads were closed for at least a week, and if you were caught driving you got a hefty ticket.  That was if you could even get your car out of the yard.  We have really felt blessed to live now in the warmth of our desert winters, and though we may complain about summers, not having winter and other kinds of stormy weather more than make up for those hot desert summer days.   Yesterday we blessed and prayed for pets at our worship service.  We had hands on blessing for several dogs, and one bearded dragon lizard who was about 18 inches long.  She was dressed for the cool morning in a stocking cap and cape.  Please keep Sue O Kelly's daughter in your prayers as she has now moved to rehab for her badly broken knee after a fall.  We have only two Sundays left in this church year, with the last Sunday being Christ the King Sunday on November 23rd.  Our bell choir has a new anthem to present at that worship service.  The 30th of November is Advent One and we will have coffee and donut fellowship hour at 9AM.  Sign up at church to bring some snacks or donuts.  NOTE: tomorrow is Veteran’s Day.  There will be no Bible Study tomorrow.

Tomorrow, November 11 is the anniversary of my Dad's death at age 90 in 2012.  My brother Rick served in the Navy in the Vietnam War.  He died in December of last year.  Let's all be thankful for the courage and commitment of the soldiers who served and lost their lives, and for those who served and came home to live on.

Today we continue our conversation about the nature and actions of the early Christian believers who were being persecuted and prosecuted for their belief in Jesus Christ as the Son of God and the Messiah, Lord, and Savior.  Philip, one of the seven selected to serve with grace and passion in the work of serving in the Jerusalem community, but the Jews were determined to displace any, and all, of the people who were perceived as threatening to the Jewish religious leaders.  Let's look at a little of the history that brings us to an ironic period as the new Christians were leaving Jerusalem into other communities and nations.  Philip was going to go into Samaria, a part of the Middle East long felt to be at odds with the "real" Jews in Jerusalem.

The animosity had its beginnings at the time when the 12 tribes of Israel were finally getting settled in to the promised land.  The older tribes were helped in their settlement of the part of today's Palestine by the younger tribes. but when the younger tribes began their settlement into the northern areas of Palestine, the older tribes refused to help them because they were too settled in their new territory already.  Judah, with Jerusalem as its worship center, and the northern tribes in Samaria with their worship center in Bethel would finally come to odds after the Northern kingdom, which was Israel, was taken into exile some 100 years prior to the Southern kingdom being taken into exile.  In the unfolding of this process, the northerners were dispersed more widely after getting conquered by Assyrians than were the southerners after they were conquered by the Babylonians.  They were taken as a large group to Babylon, where they maintained their Jewish heritage much more closely than the Jews who had been dispersed more widely from the north.  So, when the Persian King, Cyrus, sent the southern Jews back to reestablish the city of Jerusalem, and the Temple, under the oversight of Ezra and Nehemiah, they remained cohesive while the northern Jews wandered back into Samaria slowly, and in the process, had absorbed many people whose religious traditions were very non-Jewish.  Hence, the animosity between Jews and Samaritans that was so prevalent in Jesus’ time, and Samaria seems to have been the sight of greater successes in Jesus' own ministry.  So, then we arrive with Philip who has left Jerusalem and headed into Samaria, where he has had great success preaching, teaching, and healing.  In this passage we see an interesting story about a magician who was well respected for the amazing acts of magic that he performed, but when Philip came along, it didn't take very long for this man to be converted to Christianity because of having witnessed real healings that were not just acts of some magic being performed.  The successes of Christianity in the north happened because:

1. The Christians told and retold the miraculous story of Jesus, His ministry, His death, and His resurrection before many still alive witnesses. 

2. The Christians brought authentic healing to people who were hungry to help with their illnesses and health issues.

3. The consequence of the presence of the stories, and the healings, was that for the first time, the people of Samaria knew JOY in their lives.  That joy should still be filling our lives every time we pray, sing, and gather for worship to receive the Lord's Holy meal.  Christ's promise of eternal life is ours every bit as much as it was for the people of His own time, and the times of the early Christian Church.  The authentic Christian Church will never leave us filled with gloom!

There will be no study tomorrow due to the national holiday, and I will be back with you on Thursday as we cover the second half of Psalm 37.  

With love in Christ, Pastor Kim

Pastor's Ponderings: Old Testament bible study of Psalm 37:1-20 (November 6, 2025)

November 6, 2025:  Thursday Bible Study on Old Testament of Psalm 37:1-20

May the heart of Christ's love for you sustain you and keep you throughout this day, and always!

Good morning my dear friends. I hope that you will continue to offer prayers as I bring to you the prayers that the prayer chain has been praying for during the week. This week we have had two. One is for a member's grandchild, Lucio, who is being treated for pneumonia. Please pray for his comfort and that the antibiotics that are being used to treat him will be successful. The second is for Aden who is a child. He has been diagnosed with leukemia and is hospitalized having a rough time right now. Pray for treatment options that will work for Aden, and that his family will find comfort in the LORD'S presence which surrounds them with courage and peace. There is hardly anything worse than feeling that things are so out of control when your children are ill.

Just a couple more prayers friends. Pray for Becky Prasek as she finds help for the extreme weakness with which she has been suffering, and for Teri Hardy who continues her healing process after her major surgery for a new style hip replacement. Her healing is on track for what her doctors expect from this major surgery. Another reminder: This Sunday is our blessing of the animals Sunday. So, bring your pets to church, and we will offer prayers for each one of them. If your pets are unable to be with us, please bring a photo to place on the altar table on the main floor level in the front of the nave. (the floor area where the congregation sits for worship)

This morning, we are doing the first part of Psalm 37:1-20. As I read this Psalm passage, I became acutely aware of what a great Psalm this would be for us to reread every morning at the beginning of our day. At a time in our nation and world which can be so frustrating and filled with angst, it becomes even more important for us to understand how God loves and cares for His faithful children. It must be that David was really faced with such difficult times with people in his own nation/community that it became necessary for him to remind himself, and his citizen community about the great importance of believing in, and living in, the presence of YHWH, knowing that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. (Did you catch my error with historic parentage in my Bible Study comments?  Melody did!)

David even indicates for us what it means to live faithfully:

1. Trust the LORD

2. Do good.

3. Feed on God's truthfulness

4. Be appreciative of the LORD!

5. Commit your way to the LORD, and He will act on your behalf.

6. Know that the LORD will bring out His own faithfulness to you, and it will be a bright shining light in your life.

7. DON'T FRET ABOUT WHAT EVIL PEOPLE DO. BEFORE THE LORD THEY WILL WITHER LIKE THE GRASS QUICKLY!

8. Be still and wait patiently before the LORD.

9. Don't fret about the success of those who do evil,

10. Don't be angry, abandon rage, because being caught in it may cause you to do evil yourself.

11. Look to the LORD with humility and certainty, and you will inherit the land in which you live.

David tells the listener that those who do evil will draw their sword and bring violence upon those who they see as little, but their sword will pierce their own heart. It is the meek who will inherit, not the extremely wealthy and powerful whose god is themselves, and the power that they wield which is no power at all in the face of the LORD! The weapons which those who look down on the poor and humble, will see their armaments break!

12. Live life with integrity before the LORD

13. Those who live with integrity will not be ashamed. They shall inherit that which has belonged to the faithless ones. In famine they will be full. Wait on the LORD, His benefits will come to the faithful, and the faithless will perish and be destroyed in the face of God's judgement.

In this time of great tribulation on God's earth, David reminds us of what it really means to live with faith in our God who is always faithful to His children. I know that when we read a Psalm like this it is easy to go on, and to not be able to focus on each point that David is making. On Sunday, our Gospel was the Beatitudes from the Gospel of Luke. Think about them, and the ones in Matthew as well, and you will be amazed at the parallels between this Psalm and those passages. I hope that you found this helpful today. As we get ready for next Thursday's study, it is good to know that David continues to guide his people, and us as well, about how we all should look to the LORD constantly to deal with our frustrations and anger when we see the worldly success, and abusive attitudes, with which those faithless people surround themselves.  This Psalm is our humble, and godly answer. It can and should be our daily guide.

Thanks for being with me this morning.

In Christ's love, Pastor Kim

Pastor's Ponderings: Tuesday Bible Study on Acts of the Apostles 8:1-4 (November 4, 2025)

November 4, 2025:  Tuesday Bible Study on Acts 8:1-4

Dear Bible Study folks, I hope that this passage today is a reminder of the power of the world to seek to undo the work of the Gospel that has been the mission of the Church now for nearly 2000 years. Though we are reading about Stephen's death by stoning, and, in today's passage, the outrage of the Jews at Christians in Jerusalem, and the Jews willingness to chase them down, enter their homes, and begin an early first century diaspora of Christians in the Middle East.  It seems that Rome saw this as a hands-off issue. After all they certainly did not want to encourage the belief of the Christians in the Savior and King, Jesus Christ. However, in our reading today, as short as it is, we discover the upheaval of all people who came to believe in Jesus as the Savior and Messiah. At the time of all this happening in Jerusalem, there were about 200 + new Christians in Jerusalem. This must have been a very frightening time for them as they were actively being sought to be imprisoned or killed. As we know from recent news, there are nations where Christians are still being persecuted with violence by governments and other religious groups in those nations. So, what is the path that Christians should take when this kind of hatred is aimed at them. Let's look at our reading for some clues.

1. The leaders, the Apostles stood fast, not leaving Jerusalem, while others fled to other communities outside of Jerusalem, with some of them going to other nations.

   1. This was possible for the leaders because they were people of courage. Really interesting when we consider how they had, at one time, hidden themselves away.

   2. They were also men and women of the highest repute in their communities, acting out of the love they had first experienced from Jesus in their own lives. There was little question about their character.

2. Scripture indicates to us that Saul was like a wild boar rooting out and destroying anyone who was found to be a Christian. There was a great, easy to see, difference in the character of Saul vs the character of the Apostles who were people of kindness, gentleness, and passion for the good of all people, even their enemies.

There is another thing here that is written between the lines, at least at this time. It will become more obvious as we read on in the Acts. The intent of the Apostles was to maintain and grow the new Church in Jerusalem, but because of the rampant persecution of the new believers, the enemies of the Church inadvertently caused the "Good News" to spread across the Middle East, and even into Asia Minor.  The people who have been chased away by the actions of those persecutors shared what they had come to know about the grace and power of Jesus Christ, and also about His death on the cross, and His Resurrection, when he was beheld by Mary, and later by Peter, and eventually by all of them many times.  The communities to which they traveled to find safety were just like Jerusalem, filled with corruption, hatred, and the seemingly ever-present Roman army. These communities hungered for the refreshing stories, and Word about this Jesus who changed everything for those who believed.

We who are in the Church understand and know that our Savior is always with us through the presence of His Spirit. It changes the life of everyone who comes to believe. What we do know is that this is not a non-participatory relationship. Once our hearts have been transformed by Christ's Love for us, things should be different. We too become those who share our faith, perhaps not so easily in words, but through our acts of grace and love for the people we encounter in our lives.

Thanks for being with me today.

Please remember that this Sunday we will be blessing the animals at worship. If your pet cannot come, please bring us a photo that can be placed on the table in front of the Altar on the main floor.

God bless you on this day, and always. With Love in Christ, Pastor Kim