Your Faith Journey

By: Faith Lutheran Church Okemos MI
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  • Summary

  • All of us are on a journey of faith in our lives. At Faith Lutheran in Okemos, Michigan we bring people one a journey of faith each week and share that journey with the world.
    2024
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Ministry & Evangelism Spirituality
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Episodes
  • Special Music - Days of Elijah

    Special Music - Days of Elijah
    Nov 10 2024

    This is a special musical presentation of Days of Elijah with the Chancel Choir at Faith Lutheran Church in Okemos, Michigan.
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    4 mins
  • Sermon - 11-10-24

    Sermon - 11-10-24
    Nov 10 2024
    Have No Fear, Little Flock Have no fear, little flock; have no fear little flock, for the Father has chosen to give you the kingdom; have no fear, little flock! ELW 764 For many of us, though not all of us, this has been a very hard week. For many of us, though not all of us, the path ahead looks frightening. For many of us it looks especially frightening for the lives of the poor and marginalized. In Jesus’ day, this included widows, orphans, strangers, lepers, and anyone else considered unclean. In our day for those of us who are worried, it is hard not to believe that many, many people will experience greater suffering, except for those who like the rich man in the text from Luke 12 will do well, at least for a time…though the story is clear about a day of reckoning… Hear again the soliloquy of the rich man: I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.” We may wonder about the fate ahead for those we serve through the food pantry; or about the fate of supplemental government programs meant to help the poor: single parents with children, working married parents living below the poverty line; or about the fate of pregnant women, who for many except for relatively wealthy, face serious health crises. We may wonder about the fate of non-citizens like the six young men living in our parish house; or about up to estimated 20 million undocumented folks who may be deported. We may wonder about the future for the LGBTQ community…All of these people above are, we confess, like us, children of our heavenly Father. If these wonderings, these worries soon do come to pass, then if ever there was a time for us to be supportive of the ministries of the food pantry and the parish house, it is now. If ever there was a time for us to be supportive of the ministry of Faith, this little flock, this Reconciling in Christ congregation, it is now. Jesus says to us, do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms…For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. We together are that little flock, that little flock cared for, loved, and protected by Jesus, who is the good shepherd. Before we can seriously think about selling our possessions, we need to know, we need to believe and trust that we are loved, that we will be protected, that we will be led beside still waters, that our souls will be restored…our souls and the souls of our children and our grandchildren. “Have no fear, little flock... for the Father has chosen to give you the kingdom….” [Please sing it with me, ELW 764] Jesus is saying to us,” I understand your fear, but do not be afraid. Absolutely nothing can separate you from my love. No matter how awful the future might be, especially for the least of these, my sisters and brothers, I who suffered and died and rose again will be with you and with them. Little flock, Faith Lutheran Church in Okemos Michigan, I will be with you.” Do not be afraid…sell your possessions, and give alms. This word is from the lips of Jesus who elsewhere also said to the worried and the weary, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” But his words here in Luke’s gospel about selling possessions and giving alms seem anything but easy or light. This is a hard saying, to be sure. But I wonder if Jesus is not speaking here so much about earthly possessions as about making room for the creation of a very rich heart, about a heart that is not afraid, a heart that knows it is deeply loved, a heart set free from defining our worth by our numerous possessions. That heart is a very rich heart. It is a heart content with simple things. It is a very generous heart. God knows we need food and clothing. God knows we need a shelter for ourselves and for our families…as does every person on earth. And God wills that all should have not only adequate food and clothing and a place to call home, but also a just government, access to health care, and good and trustworthy friends. Our true worth is not how much of those things we have. Our true and lasting treasure is measured by the priceless, unfathomable love God has so richly poured into our hearts, hearts so full of love that we cannot help but give it forward to both friend and stranger. Do not be afraid…sell your possessions and give alms…for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Hear again these words from Psalm 146 we read responsively this morning: Happy are they who have the God of Jacob for their ...
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    29 mins
  • Sermon - 11-3-24

    Sermon - 11-3-24
    Nov 4 2024
    Jesus Cries with Us, Jesus Cries Out for Us Last Sunday afternoon Jamie, Laurie, Phylis and I sitting at a large round table visited with Anna, Ashley, Alison (from Panama), Fatima (from Venezuela), three little people, and a faithful member of St. Christopher Episcopal Church. St. Christopher is a sanctuary church in El Paso, Texas, a safe place for migrant people to live until they can travel on to a more permanent safe and caring community in which they could live and work and thrive. Many take dangerous and often illegal risks. Many are filled with great anxiety and uncertainty, exacerbated by antiquated immigration laws and processes that can mean months and even many years of waiting. Many are filled with fear both of countries they have fled and of our country because they know we are a deeply divided nation given to fear and even hatred of these aliens, these sojourners, these strangers. But Sunday we all were in this safe and sacred place. Except for the little ones we introduced ourselves, shared little bits of our life stories, either in Spanish or English or both. All of us children of God, all of us on a journey, though for Alison and Fatima, a much more dangerous and harrowing one. We talked together, prayed together, sang a little together, ate a meal together, held babies (the best part!) and hugged one another… A couple thousand years ago, Jesus too was on a dangerous journey. In John 11 we read of his crossing the Jordan River, going to Judea where he knowingly faced threats of stoning, persecution, and death. On the way there he received a message from beloved friends, Mary and Martha, that their brother Lazarus was ill. Jesus, the Son of God, knew that Lazarus’ illness was terminal. In fact, Jesus knew, he had already died. Yet Jesus stayed where he was for two more days… And then came the account from the Gospel of John for this All Saints Sunday. In it we learn what God is like when we suffer, when we die. We know what God, is like, revealed most fully to us in Jesus, when Bob and Joy and Walter and Dale and Chip and David, whom we remember this morning, died during this past year. Jesus, the Son of God, wept with and for their families and friends. Jesus cried with them. Jamie and Laurie and Phylis and I spent five days with Border Servant Corps guides, mostly with Ashley, a young woman about to graduate from college and then after a gap year on to law school. With her we visited border patrol folk, spent time with “guests,” always these migrant people were called guests, in processing centers and shelters on both sides of the Rio Grande River, talked with criminal court Judge Ritter presiding over cases against those crossing the border between legal points of entry. Perhaps most moving for us was our visit with Amanda, a federal public defender. With all of them we could see Jesus. We could see Jesus “greatly disturbed’ and crying with these guests and with those so committed to accompanying them on their journeys toward some semblance of mercy and justice. We saw Jesus in Gracias, a feisty, self-proclaimed activist who is the shepherd of the shelter we visited in Juarez, Mexico. In, I think, more than a coincidence for us sojourners from Faith, Okemos, her call to this ministry came years agowhen she mourned the killing of two LGBT people at the border. At times Gracias has provided a safe haven for as many as 370 guests in a clean but very dilapidated five-story building. Last Monday we prepared and served a meal for 60 men, women, and children currently living there. We saw Jesus in Gracias and in Cesi with us that day, who translated my mini-sermon proclaiming God’s watchful care for these his beloved children. Cesi walks step by step with guests when they are able to fly or take a bus from El Paso to a new home somewhere in our country. We saw Jesus in the guarded but gently smiling faces of these guests, perhaps especially in the faces of the children. But the gospel for today is not only about people for whom and with whom Jesus wept, for Martha and Mary and their friends. It is that, Jesus, the Son of God, the incarnation of God, was also for them the resurrection and the life. Jesus was and is God making of death only a transitory experience. Jesus, the resurrection and the life, cried out, now not with tears, but with a loud voice, to a man dead for four stinky days, “Lazarus, come out!” To Walter and Dale and Bob and Chip and Joy and David, Jesus said, perhaps more gently, “Come, dwell with me now in my Father’s house. There you be forever safe, forever free, forever whole, forever loved and in love with all the children of God from Michigan and Texas and Mexico and Panama and Venezuela, from Sudan and Ghana and Mauritania, from Palestine and Lebanon and Israel, from Ukraine and Russia…” On this All Saints Sunday remember. Remember that Jesus cries with you and Jesus...
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    21 mins

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