Advent – it’s a wake up call.

“Your God’s not big enough!” Preachers always like to say junk like that.  Certainly it’s true, but I never hear anyone say, “Your God’s not small enough!” And I suspect that our God really is too big, especially for Christmas.  The huge God who is older than time, who is before the creation of matter, who makes billions [...]

Joan Osborne’s song “One of Us” has almost become cliche, but I remember when it first came out… I remember the outrage of so many pastors, calling it blasphemy and saying, ‘God is not just a slob on a bus!’  I didn’t really get what everyone was so offended about.  Were they offended that Joan [...]

Christmas One ’09 Body Imago (Written by Gloria Stubitsch, Paula Best and Ryan Marsh) INTRODUCTION: PAULA: Welcome to Christmas at Church of the Beloved.  Yes, I know, you thought Christmas was over and life could finally go back to normal.  But in the Christian calendar the Season of Christmas begins on Christmas day and continues [...]

ONE: Henri Nouwen, the patron saint of Church of the Beloved, wrote: “People who wait have received a promise that allows them to wait. We can only really wait if what we are waiting for has already begun for us. So waiting is never a movement from nothing to something. It is always a movement [...]