The Weekly View

Sunday, February 10, 2019

This Sunday 

Dear St. Luke Community,

This Sunday we welcome the Reverend David Slorpe back to St Luke. For those who may not know, Dave was my first mentor at Mt Tam United Methodist Church. We worked together there and I learned more from him in that time about what it means to be a Pastor than I did in 3 years of Seminary. Dave’s heart is one of the biggest you’ll ever have the pleasure being in the company of. And I trust always that the St Luke community will welcome Dave and his wife Jan with all the same warmth. 

Dave will be preaching on Luke 5:1-11. Jesus performs a miracle by supplying an abundance of fish. Simon is so overwhelmed he falls to his knees and says “Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man.” 

Debie Thomas writes;
“I love the abundance at the heart of this story.  In Jesus’s day, the fishing industry in Palestine was fully under the control of the Roman Empire.  Caesar owned every body of water, and all fishing was state-regulated for the benefit of the urban elite.  Fishermen couldn’t obtain licenses to fish without joining a syndicate, most of what they caught was exported — leaving local communities impoverished and hungry — and the Romans collected exorbitant taxes, levies, and tolls each time fish were sold.  To catch even one fish outside of this exploitative system was considered illegal.  

How amazing (given this historical context), is an image of boats so laden with fish that even a weathered fisherman like Simon Peter finds the catch overwhelming.  This is extravagant, excessive, bountiful generosity.  Food for all, food security for all, justice for all, nurture for all.  In this eucharistic image of plenitude, Jesus shows Simon what God’s kingdom will look like when it’s fully established.  God’s kingdom will suffer no empty nets, no empty tables, and no economic exploitation of any kind.  God’s kingdom will mean good news for all.  Meaning that if whatever we profess as Christians is not good news for all — it’s not God.” 

Yours in Christ,
Nicole

Deacons and Committees ~ Tuesday, Feb. 12th, 5:00 PM and 6:30 PM

Bible Study Series ~ Wednesday, Feb. 13th, 9:30 AM 

Morning Women's Spirituality Group ~ Thursday, Feb. 14th, 9:00 AM

St. Luke Women’s Bridge Group ~ Monday, Feb. 18th & Tuesday, Feb. 26th, 10:30 AM

Pizza and Theology ~ DATE CHANGE - Monday, Feb. 18th, 6:30 PM Creekside, SA

Acoustic Sunday ~ February 24th

Session ~ Tuesday, Feb. 26th 7:00 PM

Sunday, February 3, 2019

This Sunday 

Dear St. Luke Community,

This is a big Sunday. All Sundays are big as we worship God, but we will also be gifted with the enjoyment of receiving five new members. We are most grateful to God for the presence of the entire St Luke community and our hearts sing with thanksgiving as people feel called to deepen their commitment through membership or make official what they've already been experiencing at St Luke. To do so on a Sunday when we celebrate the Lord’s Supper makes it all the more meaningful as we remember and affirm our experience as one body in Christ.

Following worship, we gather for our Annual Congregational Meeting. All are welcome to attend. Members will vote on our annual budget, the election of new Elders and Deacons as we listen to reports from committees and chairpersons. There will be a light lunch provided.

In Worship, we hear part two of last week’s scripture. Jesus came home to preach in the synagogue. It was his inaugural moment and he read from the beloved prophet Isaiah. All went well and this week we pick up from where we left off. By the end of the reading, the crowd wants to throw Jesus from a cliff. (Luke 4:21-30) What happened? How did we go from “All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth.”(vs 22) to “…all in the synagogue were filled with rage. They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built so that they might hurl him off the cliff” (27,28) in just 5 verses? 

We’ll explore the answer to that and more this Sunday.

Yours in Christ,
Nicole

Bible Study Series ~ Wednesday, Feb. 6th, 9:30 AM 

Morning Women's Spirituality Group ~ Thursday, Feb. 7th, 9:00 AM

Deacons and Committees ~ Tuesday, Feb. 12th, 5:00 PM and 6:30 PM

St. Luke Women’s Bridge Group ~ Monday, Feb. 18th & Tuesday, Feb. 26th, 10:30 AM

Pizza and Theology ~ Tuesday, Feb. 19th, 6:30 PM Creekside, SA

Acoustic Sunday ~ February TBD

Session ~ Tuesday, Feb. 26th 7:00 PM

Sunday, January 27, 2019

This Sunday 

Dear St. Luke Community,

Our two scriptures for this Sunday place importance on the tradition of reading from “books.”

Nehemiah 8:1-10 and Luke 4:14-21. 

Our Bible is a collection containing many books within it. What is our relationship with these books? While some of us read from the Bible daily, others don't have one. If we were honest about it, we might find everything from love to skepticism to caution around its writings. 

And yet the Bible lives as the center of our faith. Especially for the reformers who placed their primary focus on the “the Word.” In Protestant churches, you'll often find the pulpit front, center and elevated because of the reformers elevated importance placed on the written Word. This came to be in conjunction with the invention of the printing press. Gone was the stained glass to allow more light for reading.

Our Protestant tradition holds slogans, one of which is; sola scriptura (Lat. “Scripture alone”). A slogan of the Protestant Reformation indicating that the church’s authority is only the Holy Scriptures and not ecclesiastical traditions or human opinions. This was called the “formal principle” of the Reformation, or the “Scripture principle.” 

Did you know that Presbyterians have a reputation for being intellectual in their approach to faith? 

Intellectually approaching the Bible is one way to read. And that can be fun. But so can reading with the heart. Placing yourself in the story, as you would any good book. Asking what it must have been like to be them, to live like them, to feel like them. And the more we do that the more we realize with new eyes that we are them. In the particulars of their experiences live a universal truth for all of us.

That is something to celebrate this Sunday Sunday as we worship God and hear The Word. 

See you Sunday,
Nicole