Arlington United Methodist Church

The most important jobs in the Kingdom of God are the least glamorous in the eyes of the world. Thoughts for the week: What work do you feel called to participate in? What work to you feel called to give to?

The many different Christian denominations came out of legitimate disagreements with one another, but we tend to focus on the disagreements and forget how much we have in common. Thoughts for the week: How do you get along with Christians who have different beliefs? What is preventing us from working together to make the world a better place?

We live out our discipleship daily by constantly being open to how we can be part of God’s redeeming work in this world. Thoughts for the week: What opportunities do you have to do God’s work every day? How can you become more aware of those opportunities?

God speaks to us in many ways that can include voices from the sky, but are often less subtle. Thoughts for the week: Have you ever felt like God was speaking to you? What form did it come in? Did you realize it at the time or after the fact?

God judges us by the extent to which we embraced and lived the reality of the Kingdom in our own time and place. Our internal beliefs and external works mutually influence one another in the way we live our lives. The experience of the afterlife is a reflection of the life we have cultivated in the pure, unmediated presence of a holy, just, and righteous God. Thoughts for the week: What do the concepts of Heaven and Hell mean to you? Do you find them comforting or disturbing? Why?

The Bible is a collection of writings reflecting people’s experiences and understanding of God in the times and places in which they lived. The Holy Spirit continues to speak through these texts calling us into a lifelong relationship with a living God. Thoughts for the week: What does the Bible mean to you? How do you experience God through reading and meditating on scripture?

God’s presence is experienced in the midst of the ordinary, everyday circumstances of life, not just the “special” moments.

Our response to things that make us uncomfortable is to push them to the margins. Jesus’ response is to embrace, heal, and invite us to join him. Thoughts for the week: Are there people or things in your life that you keep at arm’s length because they make you uncomfortable? What would it mean to let Jesus in to heal those things?

Both action and contemplation are equally important parts of the spiritual life, but we must be willing to set action aside for a moment and listen when God is speaking to us. Thoughts for the week: Do you ever find yourself being busy for the sake of being busy? What is one way you can slow down to become aware of God’s presence?

We have to root our emotional well-being in the opportunity to do the work of the Kingdom of God instead of the results of that work. Thoughts for the week: What brings you joy? What things do you let affect how you feel? Are those things worthy of having authority in your life?

Passing leadership from one generation to another over time is how we celebrate what God has done and declare our trust in God’s continuing faithfulness. Thoughts for the week: How did/do you see God working in the generation that came before you? How do you see God working in your generation? How do you imagine God might work in those that come after you?

Lay delegate Kathy Campbell reports on the recent meeting of the Tennessee Annual Conference and share about how hard times come and go, but Jesus' promise of faithfulness remains with us and will carry us through.

The Bible frequently uses parental metaphors for God because, like a parent sees their child, God is able to love us while simultaneously being upset disappointed at certain actions. Thoughts for the week: How does the image of God as a parent affect your relationship with God? Are there other images that are more helpful to you?

We celebrate the sacraments because encounter God in them, and we grow in our knowledge and love of God by our participation. Thoughts for the week: What does Holy Communion mean to you? What do you experience when you receive it?

We “offer” Christ to hurting places in our world through actions that embody the loving presence of Jesus and proclaim that God is already present. Thoughts for the week: Where do you see God’s presence in painful situations? How do your words and actions embody the presence of Christ?

The Holy Spirit empowers us to speak multiple “languages” faith to give fresh expression to the old story of God’s redeeming grace. Thoughts for the week: What is your “language” of faith? How could God be leading us to find new ways to tell the story of Jesus?

Jesus calls us to trust fully and follow his will for our lives.

God matches our gifts and talents with the needs around us to accomplish something we never thought possible. Thoughts for the week: Who are the people around you who are forgotten by the rest of the world? How might you demonstrate God’s love to them?

Whether we see immediate results or gradually over time, God’s grace is constantly at work on all of us, Thoughts for the week: Do you get impatient and look for instant gratification? Can you look back over your life and see God working in ways you didn’t notice at the time?

During this last week we have been confronted once again with the reality of evil in our world. In the face of terror and senseless violence, followers of Jesus witness to the God who enters into our suffering and breaks the power of death, claiming "Resurrection" as the last word.

True gratitude is found when we experience moments of grace as unexpected gifts and not simply part of God's "job description".

Faith in the God who raised Jesus from the dead is not something we can ever fully understand- we simply stand in awe of the mystery. Thoughts for the week: What do you place your faith in? Is it something you can fully understand or control, or something much bigger?

We always live in the tension between the joy of life and the sorrow of death, but God's promise is that death will ultimately defeated by life. We celebrate Holy Communion to renew and strengthen our faith in this promise.

Our actions should demonstrate the love of God so clearly that words are unnecessary. Thoughts for the week: How do your actions demonstrate the love of God to those around you?

When we are able to forgive others, we are set free from the prison of anger and resentment. Thoughts for the week: What are the healthy relationships in your life? What are the difficult relationships? What would it take to find forgiveness in those difficult relationships?

When we faithfully give from what little we think we have, God uses it to bless many more people than we ever thought possible. Thoughts for the week: What do you have to share with the world? Could God use what you think is very little to bless a large number of people?

Lent is a time for us to focus on our own mortality, embrace simplicity in our lives, and open ourselves to ways that God can use us as part of his work of redemption in this world. Thoughts for the week: Where is there excess in your own life? What would it mean for you to remove the excess and embrace simplicity in those areas?

God brings life out of places that seem completely overrun by the powers of death and destruction.

The bodily Resurrection of Jesus demonstrates that the ultimate power of our world, death, does not have the last word in creation. That last word belongs to God, who continues to redeem and shape this world to the Kingdom that Jesus proclaimed. Thoughts for the week: Where do you see the power of death ruling in the world? How do you experience God breaking that power? What would it mean for you to live as a citizen of the Kingdom of God?

God offers us free grace and forgiveness that is beyond our ability to comprehend or grasp by our own power. We repent and begin to allow God to change our life in response to the grace we have already been given. The person who truly grasps the depths to which they have been forgiven then extends it to others who may not understand their need for it or unwilling to repent, trusting that God’s grace will work through us and be made known to them. What do you need to be forgiven for? What do you need to forgive someone for?

The church is called together and empowered by Jesus to carry on his ministry in the world. We do this through our example of freely sharing all we have with whomever has need, just as the three persons of the Trinity fully share of themselves with one another. Through that example, we demonstrate that discipleship is a way of living. What does the church mean to you? Does church make a noticeable difference in your life? How?

After Jesus gave the Great Commission, died and returned, Jesus shared that He would be departing forever, so that the Holy Spirit, the Counselor, could come and live with people forever, if they invite the Holy Spirit into their hearts.  Peter, John and others had invited the Holy Spirit to live within and were able, by the power of the indwelling of Christ’s Holy Spirit, to perform with boldness, miracles and healings. The people expressed amazement at the changes in the Apostles. Peter and others explained that if the people could profess their belief in Jesus Christ and confess their sins, then they could ask for and receive the gift of the Holy Spirit as well.  The bold new style of Peter that Peter received as a gift from the Holy Spirit continues to encourage people to this day as people seek to live spirit-filled lives for Jesus Christ. Also, in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. day, Ed Owens gives a tribute to Dr. King

How is it that Jesus can be fully God and fully human? Isn’t impossible to be 200%? We often think of those two things as being contradictory, separated by a wide gulf because of our sin. But God created human beings in God’s own image, and nothing can change that. The Word that was present with God from the beginning is able to be made flesh because our flesh was already made in that image. In the incarnation of Jesus Christ, God shows us just how close we are to one another and demonstrates the full potential that God created in each of us. How do you see Jesus? What does your understanding of him say about who God created you to be?

Week 1 of our six week journey through the Apostles' Creed We affirm that God is the “creator of heaven and earth”, and yet the way we articulate who God is to the world often communicates a vision that falls short of God’s greatness and ultimacy. Like the parable of the blind men feeling the elephant, each describing their own experience but making the mistake of assuming there can be no other experience or something beyond the reach of their senses, we, too, paint a picture of God that is far too small. We must recognize our own limitations and not be too quick to cram God into a box in the shape of our own prejudices or keep God on a shelf, to be taken down only when we need it. Who do you understand God to be? Does your image of God help you realize God’s greatness or hold you back because it’s too small?

When we encounter the living Christ, we walk away changed.

The most powerful gift God ever gave the world came in the form of a human baby- the weakest and most dependent creature there is.

We truly experience God’s love when we open ourselves up to radical forgiveness and then practice it.

God’s idea of perfection is very different than ours- correcting imbalances and healing deep wounds.

God’s greatest blessings don’t always look like blessings at first.

The authority we grant to Jesus in our lives is demonstrated through our actions.

God's blessings evoke in us a profound sense of gratitude.

Our worries about the future are eased by our awareness of God's presence with us in every moment of our lives.

The greatest heroes of the faith are those who we do the work we don’t know about.

The story we tell about our lives dictates how we allocate our resources.

We are called to reach out to those whom Jesus reached out to.

God wants us to rejoice in giving the best of what we have to the work of the Kingdom, not to compare whose gifts are “best” in God’s eyes

Every person has to choose what kind of world they want to be a part of and invest in making that world a reality.

World Communion Sunday worship with Arlington United Methodist Church and Sudanese Community Church. Scriptures are read in both Arabic and English, and Pastor Martin preaches on the importance of reconciliation to God and to one another.

We are called to follow in the example of Jesus in sharing the burden with those who are suffering and carrying the hope of Resurrection for others when they can't carry it themselves.

How we understand who God is (not what we say, but what we actually believe) profoundly affects the way we go about our daily lives.

No person or group is unworthy of God’s mercy (and therefore ours), no matter how distasteful we may find them.