Gathering In Light (Page 28)

A Full Weekend Ahead

I had the best intentions of writing a post about yesterday, but I was just too exhausted and went to bed after watching my favorite “fake news” shows. This morning I’m headed out to our Mid-Year Boards for the Yearly Meeting where I have been put on our leadership

Blog Entries

Homeless in Our Town?

Since high school I have been drawn to ministry among the poor. Part of it was because we grew up poor (at least compared to those around us, we weren’t on the street or anything). And part of it was because I felt like I could identify with people

Blog Entries

Conversion(s) b

Just as I was heading to bed last night I learned that Howard Zinn, history professor and author at Boston University, had passed away yesterday from a heart attack. When I think about the conversions that have taken place throughout my life Zinn is someone who plays a role. I

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Decompressing

Yesterday was a day on the run. My feet didn’t stop moving until sometime after 9pm last night and L was finally asleep. When I sat down, I felt like I was still moving, and my mind was jogging at a pace I couldn’t keep up with (which

The Pastorate

The Final Word?

I got into an interesting discussion today with a gentleman after our meeting for worship about unprogrammed Quakers. He said he had heard “Silent” worship described by someone (a non-Quaker) as similar to a séance and wondered if the practice really is non-Christian. I think it’s a fair question.

Community

Living as a contrasting/inspiring/beautiful Community (Romans 12:14-17)

Here’s my sermon from today. Its true that sometimes community doesnt always work out right. Emily and I were a part of a small house church a few years back that used the word community as a kind of buzz word but it became rather oppressive because

Blog Entries

Reader Poll: Sermon Texts on the Blog?

[crowdsignal poll=2580078] Would you like for Wess’ sermon texts to be posted on the blog so you can read them? (polling)

Six Months Quaker Preacher

An Unexpected Turn (in Antwerp)

It’s been a hectic week so today was the day for sermon writing. I often like to have it written on Thursday so I can use Friday as a day to rework and tweak what I’ve written or as a day for meetings, and working on other articles

Conversion

Conversion(s) a

As of late, I’ve been wrestling with the whole idea of conversion. I grew up going to Catholic mass, going to Catholic schools, learning the Catholic way. I never spent much time thinking about conversion in this context, partially because I was young (I stopped attending Catholic-everything after 8th

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Take Thought for What is Noble/Beautiful in The Sight of All

Today was somewhat of a typical day for me. I did a bunch of office work this morning, answering emails, going through mail, organizing paperwork and I also watched a number of tutorials on the Bible software I use for working on my sermons. Later in the day I spent

The Theological

The Power (and Difficulty) of Forgiveness

Of the many things to be considered today the thing that stands out to me as I sit down to write this is the film we watched this evening called “The Power of Forgiveness.” Four of us from our meeting traveled to St. Luke’s Episcopal in downtown Vancouver to

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Bookface and The Internet Cafe

Today we had our meeting for worship and I spoke on Hospitality based in Romans 12:9-13. Afterward we did a our second “Internet Cafe,” something I made sure to name in a way that would signal my favorite things: the web, food and coffee. This is something we started

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Meeting People Is Easy

One thing I love about my job is meeting new people, and subsequently, meeting with people. I love hearing other people’s stories, their ideas and convictions. And, as is fairly obvious, I love to share my own ideas and passions with people too. Every meeting invites the opportunity to

Caput

The Call of Hospitality (Doesn’t Need to be long)

This Sunday we’re talking about hospitality and peace. I’m pulling from Romans 12:3-13 but especially the very last line from v. 13 “extend hospitality to strangers.” Hospitality is not only one of my favorite themes in Scripture, but in theological and philosophical writings as well. While I

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Being Educated in Life and Death

I was way too tired last night to post about the day, so here’s for Wednesday. I don’t remember if I’ve mentioned it here or not but I’ve been meeting with a woman in hospice for the past few months. I met her back in the

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Second Tuesdays With the Elders

This evening we had our elder’s meeting. We have five elders, three women and two men, plus myself and the clerk of the meeting, who usually attends but doesn’t have to. We have a great age range, swath of life experiences, different experiences of God and a panorama

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Mondays are For Practicing Taking Time Off

I have a hard time winding down. My mind is usually juggling a number of things all at once: replaying a conversation over here, working on my sermon over there, considering this or that idea for school on this side, and thinking about what needs done at home over on

Six Months Quaker Preacher

Six Months With a Quaker Preacher Project

As you may have noticed it’s been quite a while since I’ve blogged with much passion, or interest. This isn’t necessarily a problem, things like this come and go, and in the grand scheme of things this blog is inconsequential. Where it becomes a concern for me

Six Months Quaker Preacher

A Memorial Service

Today I did my second memorial service as the pastor at Camas Friends. The first was just a couple months ago and was for a lady I’d never met. But this time it was different. It was for the husband of one of our long-time attenders. He himself hadn’

Featured

What is the Quaker Peace Testimony?

Here are my notes from Sunday’s sermon. This month we are discussing what is now known as the Quaker peace testimony, but was, interestingly, called the testimony against war, up until about the turn of the 20th century. This morning were going to have a small group discussion

Featured

One Take On the Importance of the Quaker Practice of “Open Worship”

Adrian Halverstadt, a Quaker pastor, asks this question on the QuakerQuaker forum boards: I have been thinking a lot about open worship these days. Many of the larger evangelical Friends churches no longer practice open worship in their big venues for many reasons. I guess I am searching for a

Featured

Advent Message “Come Be Born in Us” (Luke 1:39-55)

Today we are three weeks into the advent season preparing for Christs coming. Christmas, for Christians, is not simply a remembrance and celebration of history (though it is certainly that), it is more importantly a proclamation of reality. The father of Quakerism, George Fox, wrote in his journal of

Church in Mission

A Thought for Quakers on Change

I am preparing my discussion for our Sunday morning meeting for worship and am thinking a lot about what Kester Brewin calls “wombs of the divine,” and creating the necessary space for something new to be born over time (See his book Signs of Emergence) It’s kind of a

The Cultural

Favorite Music of 2009

Here’s a list of my favorite, or at least most listened to, albums from this past year. Elvis Perkins In Dearland Elvis Perkins in Dearland’s self-titled, second album arrived this year and it has been in constant rotation on the record player since it’s arrived. It is

Featured

Let’s have an Amazon.com-free Christmas this year

Recently on twitter I said something I’m sure lost me a few followers, “Let’s make it an amazon free Christmas.” (Though I don’t doubt I say plenty of things on any given day that make people wonder why they associate with me!). But in either case, it’