This Sunday.

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”   –John 20.19-23

•   Are you a confident person, or is finding your voice to speak or power to act difficult for you?
• What would you like to do or accomplish if you only had the power?
• What exactly does the Holy Spirit empower disciples to do?
• I wonder what it would look like if we could gather together in a common mission.

The day of Pentecost; wind, fire, speaking in other languages.  It sounds hard to imagine and yet the gift of the Spirit is what connects the past to the future.  If the Ascension, Jesus’ leaving earth to go to be with God, is an ending then what keeps the story going; what keeps us going?  The Spirit is the power of God, the presence of God, and the strength for us to flourish in the absence of Jesus.  That’s why we gather as a people of God, to remember that God hasn’t left us, to remember the stories of God’s saving acts of the past, and to remember the power is in us as we go to love and serve the Lord.  That’s for today and tomorrow; we’re meant for today and tomorrow.

But also Sunday; join us Sunday at 6 pm on Zoom (Download Bulletin) to remember the power we have when we work together.  We’ve missed being together and this is the best we can do for now.  But it’s all we need to connect, laugh, pray, sing, and share in the power of God given to us and for us to name that power we have to be the change for today and tomorrow the world needs.

–Thomas