What’s Your Story?
Since my first Sunday at Aldersgate UMC, I have been talking to our congregation about the importance of knowing and telling your story. In our last sermon on the Gospel of Luke I brought this back around trying it into when the resurrected Jesus said to his followers, “you are witnesses of these things” (Luke 24:48). More than a few told me afterward that they simply don’t know where to begin. So I developed a journal of sorts to help bring some form and guidance for people to connect to, put words to, and ultimately share their story. Here it is: whats your story
I don’t do graphics. Well I do, but any actual graphic designer would (rightly) say that I’m a hack. That being said, when you’re a pastor at a small church, with a tight budget, you gotta do what you gotta do. Here’s a graphic I put together for our latest sermon series at Aldersgate UMC in St. Louis Park, MN called “Growth Spurt”:
Wandering Through the Gospels:
In 2013 at the church where I was the associate pastor we decided to take a “Journey through Matthew”. We had received feedback that the congregation wanted to go more deeply into the scriptures, so we carved out a 3 month sermon series going from the New Year to Easter working through Matthew. Additionally I committed to setting up a daily reading schedule and blogging on each reading. It was all well received, so the next winter we decided to do John. Then we did Mark, and then over the last year I was moved to a new church, but decided I had to round this out, and this winter I did so with Luke.
Below are links to each Gospel’s blog and my journey wandering through the Gospels. I use the word “wandering” intentionally, as these blogs are in no way academic or didactic. I did not have the time research every reading, so it is very much me simply wandering through.
2013: Journey Through Matthew
2014, Dwelling Among Us (John)
2015, Opening Mark
2016, A Look at Luke
When I was appointed as the Associate Pastor at Rosemount UMC in Rosemount, MN, for the Summer of 2015 I had an idea for a “Kingdom of Rock” sermon series, where we had members of our congregation vote on Rolling Stone Magazine’s top 100 songs and we chose the top five to preach on. I was called upon to preach on Billy Joel’s “Piano Man”, and being a lifelong Billy fan, that was just fine. For each sermon we worked in a live cover of at least part of that week’s message. I’m trying to track down the sermon, but here’s me and our contemporary worship band doing “Piano Man” in its entirely. It was a ton of fun, albeit a moment of total self indulgence. Also, the graphic for this series is my all time favorite. Kudos to my friend Julie for a great series graphic design.
The BelgianFriar 