It may seem strange that on a Christian Holy day where many disciples will walk around with a smudge of ash on their foreheads for all to see, we have a scripture passage that tells us to pray and fast privately in our “closet.” Why don’t we wear the smudge of ash in a place…

We all have those special places where we’ve experienced God’s presence (the Holy Spirit), and for some reason we let ourselves believe that we need to return to that place to find God again. It’s in those places that we want to “pitch our tent” so to speak.  If we’ve learned nothing else in this…

We sing about it, we talk about, we say that it is at the heart of God, but when it comes to sharing it with those we find undeserving, we have second thoughts. “It,” of course, is LOVE. In this week’s Coffee to Go, hosts Karin Peter and Blake Smith return to the Gospel of…

There’s no better place to give a sermon about community than on a plain (aka a level field). All communities may not put everyone on the same level, but in God’s Kingdom, every field is a level playing field. The blessings and woes of such a community ought to be felt by all.  In today’s…

There are other ways to determine your abundance than just by counting what’s in your “net.” Sometimes our abundance lies in the gifts and skills with which God has blessed us. In today’s Gospel passage from Luke, the disciples end up with enough fish to fill two nets and sink their boats, only to have…

We tell ourselves ‘It’s just not fair!’ … when someone gets something they don’t deserve, especially when we think it ought to be given to us … you know, the righteous ones!  But Jesus was famous for turning things on their head, rather than doing things the way they “ought” to be done. It is,…

We don’t need a sermon, we need a call to action… and that’s what we get in the fourth chapter of Luke. And, it’s at the heart of the Community of Christ Mission Initiatives. In this episode of Coffee to God, hosts Karin Peter and Blake Smith talk about Christ’s brief appearance in the synagogue…

How many 30-year-olds still do what their mother tells them to do?  Well, maybe it depends on whether or not the mom is the “Holy Mother.” This week at Coffee to Go, hosts Karin Peter and Blake Smith take a dive into the Wedding at Cana, the story from the Gospel According to John that…

Today marks the celebration of the day in which the light of the world was revealed to all people … when God’s presence was made manifest among us. One might expect such a special occasion to be attended by religious leaders … at least the ones close by.  But that’s not the way the story…