Prison Letters Series: Grace

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This sermon examines the beginning and ending of every letter in the New Testament writen by Paul … and all in just over 15 minutes. You can’t go wrong.

Albert Josephson

  
This is Albert Josephson, Neil’s (see below) father. He was a Covenant pastor in Canada for a very long time and even though he doesn’t have a church now he acts as an unofficial pastor to pastors. He was one of the first Canadian Covenanters that I met; he made me want to stay. Albert is also responsible to planting 4 or 5 church in Canada. The man always smiles.

Jim and Judy Nelson

 
I know it's hard to see Judy in this picture ... she is behind the camera. I forgot to take my camera to the ordination ceremony, so Judy kindly took a few pictures of me. Jim and Judy are members at Norquay Covenant Church, the church Mark Anderson grew up in. Jim is also on the denominational executive board. These are great people. When I mentioned to them that I was thinking about a backdrop for the cross on Sunday morning Judy came up with the fabric for me and droped it off "on there way" to Edmonton. Like I said, these are great people. 

Neil Josephson

This is Neil Josephson. People often are amazed that Neil had not been ordained before now. He has been working in the Covenant for over twenty years. But, he was just ordained this last year. It's about time Neil. I think he was waiting for a stole design (that's the scarf) that he liked. 

Prison Letters Series: Philemon

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This is the first sermon in the Prison Letters Series.

New paper on human sexuality

The Evangelical Covenant Church has released a study paper on human sexuality. It’s long. I’m working my way through the paper this week and next. If you make it all the way through and would like to talk about it I’m willing. Here it is. The Covenant also pasted a resolution on sexuality at the Annual Meeting in 1996. It’s much shorter and to the point, but doesn’t cover the theological ground that the paper does. Here is the resolution.

Other Voices Sermon Series: Rob Bell

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This is a sermon “taken” from Rob Bell of Mars Hill Church in Grand Rapids Michigan. This was part of his Lenten series and focus’ on the healing images in scripture. It includes an image that Rob uses quite a bit, that is the image of tassels on the edge of a prayer shawl. You can find audio sermons by Rob at the Mars Hill website and you can read about this “tassels” idea in his book VELVET ELVIS. I really appreciate Rob’s focus on how first century Jewish practice influences the way we read the New Testament. I needed to work through this sermon a bit more before I delivered it … it’s too long and muddled in a couple of place. But, here it is anyway. Enjoy.

Other Voices Sermon Series: Scot McKnight

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Here is the fourth sermon in my Other Voices Series. This sermon is taken from Scot McKnight’s presentation at the National Pastor’s Convention 2006. You can find Scot’s talk here. You’ll have to download the mp3 file to listen to it. It is titled "Emergent Podcast 008"

Scot McKnight is a New Testament professor at North Park University and author of THE JESUS CREED and most recently PRAYING WITH THE CHURCH. Many of the ideas in his talk (and my sermon) come from his book EMBRACING GRACE. Scot also blogs at www.jesuscreed.org (I read his posts every day).

Next week we continue the Other Voice Series with a sermon taken from Rob Bell of Mars Hill Church in Michigan.

Kichen Talk

This will be a regular feature of this site and our church. A kitchen talk is an update on our financial status.

Why is it called a kitchen talk? Imagine you have a student graduating from High School and your family is throwing a party for the student. At some point in the party while everyone is sitting around the table eating, talking, and congratulating the graduate the “black sheep” uncle pipes up and say, “Hey, how are you going to pay for all of these grand plans you have for the future.” In the middle of a party that comment is totally inappropriate. It’s not a bad question, just inappropriate. So when is any appropriate time to talk about “paying for all your grand plans”? Sometime later, maybe while you’re cleaning up after the party, maybe when you’re in the kitchen washing the dishes. That’s when you start that conversation. So we’re going to have a kitchen talk every now and then. How are we doing in paying for this thing we’ve begun? Are we moving forward toward our goals? That’s what a kitchen talk is all about.

So…How are we doing? We’re doing well. At our last Leadership Team meeting we reviewed our financial status. Three good things arose from that discussion.

First, Steve’s trip to Grand Rapids Michigan cost around $1700. That’s just the cost of the flight. Steve called the conference office and asked for help and they sent a check for $400. Then Steve called the denominational office in Chicago and they sent check for $700 (USD). So the cost of Steve’s trip to Grand Rapids will be around $500. That’s great news.

Second, Shoreline Covenant Church in Seattle has budgeted around $2500 to Blackstrap Covenant Church for this year. Well…already they’ve given us around $2600 and the year is only half over. The extra money is coming from personal donations within Shoreline Covenant Church that are over and above the budgeted money that they’ve set aside for our church plant. God is good.

And finally, the Leadership Team set a goal cover $35,000 of our budget with local giving. This means that our local given (that’s what comes in the offering plate on Sunday morning) would have to grow by $10,000 this year. And at the half way point it looks like we are on track to meet that goal. Thank you for committing your time and money to this church

Well that’s the kitchen talk. Things look good. Thank you for being the people that God has called you to be.

Highlights from the Executive Board Meeting

Hey everyone. Here are some highlights from the Executive Board Meeting that was held on June 11. Notice that our very own Juanita Anderson is now on the Executive Board. Way to go Juanita. Anyway here are the highlights:

The Evangelical Covenant Church of Canada (ECCC) held its regular board meeting on Saturday June 11th at Covenant Bible College (CBC) in Strathmore Alberta.

The board welcomed Juanita Anderson to her first meeting and returning Superintendent Jeff Anderson who was re-elected for a second four year term.

We spent some time jointly with the CBC board brainstorming and discussing ways in which we can jointly move forward our shared mission of equipping men and women as Disciples of Christ.

One of the board’s four priorities is leadership development and this was reflected in a motion that authorizes the Superintendent to negotiate with the Department and Board of Ordered Ministry for a Canadian Based Orientation Program.

The board also authorized $5,000 for the creation of an award for CBC students in the name of Neil Josephson. In honor of Neil’s long and effective leadership we hope this fund will grow and the interest used for this purpose.

Another of the board’s priorities is compassion and justice, this resulted in the ECCC partnering with the Canadian Food Grains Bank in a fund raising effort for the civil war torn country of Liberia called “Kernel’s of Hope.” Our goal this year was to raise support for 120 acres and we are currently at 156 acres and rising. Thank you to all who have given so generously to this worthy cause. For details visit www.canadacovenantchurch.org.

The board reviewed feedback from the AGM where delegates were broken into groups and asked to reflect on the boards four priorities; Leadership development, Church planting, Church renewal and revitalization, and compassion and justice. The AGM discussion was facilitated by the Next Steps Task Force which is an ad hoc committee struck by the board to explore what it means to “live fully into our kingdom purposes and potential”. Further work needs to be done to determine where this feedback will lead us.

Other Voices Sermon Series: Donald Miller

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I got it to work. This recording is a little noisy, but I've got an idea to fix that. Stay tuned.

During the summer months I'll be taking ideas from some of my favorite writers and thinkers and sharing them with you through my sermons. These sermons will all be based on texts (like all my sermons) but manyof the ideas will come from books I've read or sermons/talks that I've listened to. This will be fun for me. I hope you enjoy it too.

Many of the ideas in this sermon come from Donald Miller and his most recent book TO OWN A DRAGON.