All are invited to join us for church on Sunday, September 15.  Sunday school runs during the service.  Coffee is served in the Fellowship Hall after church.  We hope that you can join us!

Here are Rev. Marlene’s notes on the upcoming service.

Marlene’s Rev. Notes:

“He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.” Mark 8:29

In Johannes David’s Orbita Probitatis Ad Christi Imitationem (“The Path of Integrity to the Imitation of Christ”) published in Antwerp in 1601, there is a plate depicting Christ carrying the cross over Golgotha, surrounded by nine painters at their easels.

Each painter is depicting the event from a unique perspective.  Even in our Christian scriptures, there are four distinct books and versions of Jesus’ story.  It could be argued that they do not depict a single Jesus Christ, but rather multiple dimensions of the same Christ. Hence the question: “Who do you say I am?”

If Jesus is another prophet, they could be loyal from a distance and avoid potential suffering.  But; if Jesus is the Christ – God’s anointed – then following him at a distance is not a real option since Jesus would be the supreme authority in the cosmos. Wherever they go, loyally following such a force would inevitably mean facing conflicts with potentially competing powers.  To say that Jesus is the Christ is to state where one’s fundamental loyalties will lie: with God or somewhere else.