A Message from Pastor Kaji

This week is Homecoming Sunday, our annual celebration of the community God is building amongst us. I hope that you will set aside the time to come and join us in the sanctuary for this special hour of worship. Our Homecoming team has worked hard to make the worship experience special for you in every way. In gratitude to them and, especially, to God for bringing you to this special place, I pray that you will join us! And bring a friend or two, too. 

I can’t help but read our text for this week with the backdrop of bombs colliding in the skies above the suburbs of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. The writer of John’s Revelation, believe it or not, is familiar with this kind of violence, in its much earlier forms. And so that writer presents a different vision – a vision of a peaceful Jerusalem. My invitation to you is to read that vision and read it closely. What does it require? What are the markers of that peace? In her commentary on this passage, Dr. Gafney notes the significance of “the temple in Israelite religion and Second Temple Judaism and its losses…along with the forced evolution of Judaism in response to that devastating loss.”* As you read this, I invite you to ask this: in this peaceful vision: what is wiped away? And what remains?

I can’t wait to welcome you to your Homecoming on Sunday! 

Pax Christi,

Pastor Kaji

*Gafney, Wilda C.. A Women’s Lectionary for the Whole Church Year B (p. 282-284). Church Publishing Incorporated. Kindle Edition. 

SCRIPTURE
Revelation 21:10 (Year B, p. 283):
 
10 Now the angel carried me away in the spirit to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down from the heavens, from God.