Pastoral Letter for a Distributed Church March 26, 2020 Dear friends, The above watercolor hangs in our church office and it's a good reminder of the promises of God during our troubled times. This is the third pastoral letter of the coronavirus pandemic and I hope it finds you both healthy and safe. Well, we're all starting to get settled into the new routine, which,...

Back when we put together the schedule for Mark, this week was supposed to be a communion Sunday. Since Easter is in a few weeks, the plan for this week was to skip forward to the institution of the Lord's Supper in Mark 14. Then next week, we'll be looking at the Triumphal Entry on Palm Sunday, and then the Resurrection on Easter. After that, we'll return to our regularly...

This week we're continuing our sermon series on The Gospel of Mark. We'll be in a famous text this Sunday, Mark 9:2-13, where we'll see what's commonly known as the Transfiguration. It would be easy to think that this has nothing to do with our world today. Or that it was just another cool miracle, but one that has little meaning for us now, maybe in the future, but not no...

Pastoral Letter for a Distributed Church March 18, 2020 Dear friends, I hope this finds you well. With the rising concern over the coronavirus pandemic, we thought it would be important to reach out to you with another communication from your church, both with information and encouragement. My intent is to write a pastoral letter on a weekly basis (we'll see how that go...

Addressing the Coronavirus Outbreak at PHPC March 12, 2020 Dear friends, I hope this finds you well. With the rising concern over the coronavirus, we thought it would beimportant to reach out to you with communication from your church, both with information and encouragement. This is intended to be a pastoral letter on how we, as Christians, should respond to the Coro...

This week we're continuing our sermon series on The Gospel of Mark. I'm looking forward to being back in the pulpit after having been on sabbatical. We'll be in Mark 8:31 to 9:1 this Sunday and Jesus will tell the disciples that He's going to die and rise again. Peter reacts, well, poorly. And so Jesus goes on to teach them how to face suffering in a godly manner. It shoul...

Well, that was an amazing send-off last Sunday. Kath and I were floored by the wonderful tributes, memories, letters, song, and hugs we received. I had some great church experiences growing up and as a teenager/college student, but I never dreamed that I would work for a church that is as supportive, loving, caring, and all-around wonderful to me and my family as you all h...

First, a quick thought on the weekly heart prep. Most weeks, I give a quick summary or teaser of what I'm planning on preaching. But this week is a little different. This week, the passage not only has words that point us to the Lord, but its point also is instructive in how we prepare our hearts to come to worship. There's a lot happening this Sunday, and I wanted to prea...

Are you a dog person or a cat person? I'm neither, they're way too much work and I have enough to do and plenty of kids to take care of. But there are certain families that always need a dog or a cat. And the irony is, of course, that my family has had one or the other for almost the past decade. I have fond memories of our dog, Dixie, sitting under our dining room table w...

How many of you have seen the recent movieA Beautiful Day in the Neighborhoodstarring Tom Hanks and Matthew Rhys? The main character, Lloyd, is an Esquiremagazine writer assigned to interview Mr. Rogers. When they first meet, Lloyd has a black eye, which Mr. Rogers asks him about. He tells him that it was a softball injury "I made the play at the plate."But it wasn't a so...