Just a quick reminder that we will be holding our monthly Convergent Friends Worship at Camas Friends Church this Sunday from 6:30-8pm.

1004 NE 4th Ave
Camas, WA 98607

Please spread the word far and wide. Anyone who wants to join us is invited.

The basic structure for this coming time of worship will be:

• Scripture Reading
• Waiting Worship
• Queries and Worship Sharing

I look forward to seeing you there.

Wess

Can you believe how absolutely incredible it has been outside lately? I got the opportunity to go and see the Camas Lilies in full bloom the other day (link) and have been trying to asborb as much of this NW sun as possible. I think our girls have been at more parks in the last 2 weeks then they have been in the last 8 months combined! But I know what some of you are thinking: Some are worried this means that we will have a month of rain (we will pay for this!). Some think that this sunny weather is due to us because of all of the rain (ie. suffering) we’ve had the last couple of years. And some of you are just trying to enjoy it while we have it, waiting for it to quit at any moment. Which are you?

I am looking forward to our meeting for worship this Sunday. It’s our last Sunday in the letter of 1 John so I say we go out with a bang (not sure what that looks like just yet) and more sadly, we are going to be sending off Brad and Heather Tricola (and their lovely boys), as Brad has accepted a position at Vancouver First Friends Church. I hope you’ll be with us this Sunday as we say goodbye.

Reading for Sunday: 1 John 5:9-13

If we take human testimony at face value, how much more should we be reassured when God gives testimony as he does here, testifying concerning his Son. Whoever believes in the Son of God inwardly confirms God’s testimony. Whoever refuses to believe in effect calls God a liar, refusing to believe God’s own testimony regarding his Son. This is the testimony in essence: God gave us eternal life; the life is in his Son. So, whoever has the Son, has life; whoever rejects the Son, rejects life. (1 John 5:9–13 MSG)

Queries:

• What do you make of all of this talk about "testimony?"
• When have you experienced an inward confirmation or testimony of God?
• What is challenging for you about this passage?

In Gospel Love,
Wess

PS – If you haven’t had a chance to check out the website lately, it’s been updated some — http://camasfriends.org/
PPS – A number of you have asked to be notified when Peggy Parson’s sermon was made available online — here is the link http://camasfriends.posterous.com/god-is-love

For the past six years Camas Friends has been hosting a summer camp we call “Peace Playhouse.” It is a 3-day camp that is open kids going into grades 4-6. The focus of the camp is on peace with self, others and creation.

If you would like to register you can do so here: online registration.

For more information on peace playhouse click here.

I trust your week is going well! I look forward to seeing many of you tonight for Soup and Bread and wanted to remind you that we have childcare available (we’ll be asking for donations to help with that) and Jason Twyman is planning to work with the older kids (8 and up).

This Sunday (mother’s day!) we will continue our reflections in 1 John. Here’s our text for the week:

“Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the parent loves the child. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, for whatever is born of God conquers the world. And this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith. Who is it that conquers the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

This is the one who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ, not with the water only but with the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one that testifies, for the Spirit is the truth.” (1 John 5:1–6 NRSV)

Queries:

• What do you hear in this passage?
• How do you see this text connecting to, building on, or saying something different from what we’ve been discussing lately?
• What is challenging for you here?

In Gospel Love,
Wess

In the mix of all this exciting stuff happening this week I don’t want to overlook our gathering for worship this Sunday. I am really excited about Sunday because my good friend Peggy Parons is going to bring the message this Sunday. Peggy was the "founding" pastor of Freedom Friends Church where I just preached this past Sunday. So now we’re swapping and she’s coming up here to hang with us.

She will be continuing in 1 John with this passage:

Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.

And we have seen and do testify that the Father has sent his Son as the Savior of the world. God abides in those who confess that Jesus is the Son of God, and they abide in God. So we have known and believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.

Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. We love because he first loved us. Those who say, “I love God,” and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also. (1 John 4:7-21)

Queries:

• What strikes you about this text?
• Where do you find life in this text?
• What questions does this passage raise in you?

See you all soon!

Wess

It’s the 4th Sunday again and we’ll be gathering for our Convergent Friends Worship this month at Multnomah Monthly Meeting from 6:30-8pm:

4312 S.E. Stark Street
Portland, Oregon 97215
(503) 232-2822

The meetinghouse will be open at 6 so feel free to come a little early and hang out.

There will be childcare available for parents who would like to come.

Our worship time will consist of some bible reading, waiting worship and worship sharing.

I hope you’ll be able to join us.

Wess

PS: If you are coming from Camas and would like to carpool please let me know.

Friday May 11; 7-8:30PM

Multnomah Meetinghouse

4312 Southeast Stark Street, Portland, OR

a new documentary film by Tiroir A Films Productions

about solving our critical population dilemma

and our current social and environmental predicaments.

Discussion Following

FREE ADMISSION

Sponsored by Peace and Social Concerns Committee, Multnomah Friends

How is your week going? Things have been good here. Now that Easter is over things have calmed down so I am getting a breather myself.

Just a heads up that next week I will be out of the office from Monday through Wednesday because of the pastor’s conference out at Twin Rocks. Brad (the ‘temp’) will be in the office his normal hours if you need anything.

Also, there is no Soup and Bread tonight or for the next couple weeks. Our next Soup and Bread Meeting is on Wednesday May 2nd when we are hosting an Ice-Cream Social and kicking off two new small groups:

• A Crash Course in All Things Quaker (Wess, facilitator)
• The Spirituality of Children (Debbie Hagen, facilitator)

This Sunday we will be reflecting on this passage from 1 John 1 (this is from The Message version):

1 From the very first day, we were there, taking it all in-we heard it with our own ears, saw it with our own eyes, verified it with our own hands.2 The Word of Life appeared right before our eyes; we saw it happen! And now we’re telling you in most sober prose that what we witnessed was, incredibly, this: The infinite Life of God himself took shape before us.

3 We saw it, we heard it, and now we’re telling you so you can experience it along with us, this experience of communion with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ.4 Our motive for writing is simply this: We want you to enjoy this, too. Your joy will double our joy!

Walk in the Light

5 This, in essence, is the message we heard from Christ and are passing on to you: God is light, pure light; there’s not a trace of darkness in him.

6 If we claim that we experience a shared life with him and continue to stumble around in the dark, we’re obviously lying through our teeth-we’re not living what we claim.7 But if we walk in the light, God himself being the light, we also experience a shared life with one another, as the sacrificed blood of Jesus, God’s Son, purges all our sin.

8 If we claim that we’re free of sin, we’re only fooling ourselves. A claim like that is errant nonsense.9 On the other hand, if we admit our sins-make a clean breast of them-he won’t let us down; he’ll be true to himself. He’ll forgive our sins and purge us of all wrongdoing.10 If we claim that we’ve never sinned, we out-and-out contradict God-make a liar out of him. A claim like that only shows off our ignorance of God.

http://bible.us/1john1.1-10.msg

Queries:

• What part of this are you most drawn to?
• What part of this text do you think is the most important?
• Which part of this is the most challenging for you?

Blessings,
Wess

No, I am not at the wrong church. Having recently discovered my inner Quaker, it somehow feels right to share a secret I have held from my extended Christian family for a long time.

I am not a big fan of Easter. Oh, I love the true meaning—I just don’t like what it has become. I think my former pastor’s analogy sums up the whole shebang for me: “Easter is the Christian Super Bowl.”

Well, what if you don’t like the Super Bowl? Don’t get me wrong—I like a good party and love to eat my share of rotten-for-me-tasty-vittles, laugh at outrageous commercials and enjoy the show, but the event itself is an overdone media spectacle and a mere shadow of what it was originally meant to be. Sort of American Idol meets American Gladiators with some football thrown in somewhere for flavor.

The Super Bowl/Easter analogy got a good laugh, but it also got me thinking (a foreshadowing, I am now certain, of my impending Quakerness.) What should be a celebration of rebirth, renewal and resurrection, Easter now seems to be more about Cadbury bunnies, pastel Peeps, and a strange story of a dude rising from the dead, zombie style, to walk among us. Not a pretty picture. It all just strikes me as, well, weird.

Somewhere along the way, through no fault of their own, Easter and her friend Christmas got dressed up like an Elvis impersonator in Vegas. And poor Easter has been “Passioned” beyond recognition.

Now, I am a relatively young Christian (about 4 years in) but I feel that I can confidently say most Americans know Christ died to save sinners. We see it on the TV and billboards, stenciled on t-shirts, on Facebook, bumper stickers, movies, and the radio. We even see jeans with a bedazzled cross on the rear pockets, giving unintended irony to the phrase “turn the other cheek.” Cross symbolism and language infiltrate the culture at every level.

What saddens me is that because of the continual focus on Jesus’ death and our subsequent “undeserved” redemption, many do not even know what He lived for. Now, I am by no means a biblical scholar or theologian, but here’s what I can see:

1. He lived to tell us it was time to stop hiding from God and to turn to the Divine presence;
2. He lived to tell us we should let our inner light shine and live as beloved children of God;
3. He lived to tell us that we need to love each other no matter what and to leave the judgment to Someone else.

He lived and loved, taught and listened, laughed and cried. He broke bread with tax collectors and fasted like a priest. He did these things not as someone we should bow to, but rather as one we should embrace—a man and God all at once—even claiming we could do even greater things if only we could believe and have just a smidgeon of faith.

So simple. So elegant. So real.

And obviously so easy to screw up. As a species, we humans love to create Drama with a capital “D.”

And boy, do we ever like to watch a player get carried off the field on a stretcher. We want blood. We really want to see someone take the heat, the blame, the weight of our sin so that we can carry on as if nothing ever happened over and over and over. We are so busy killing the messenger that we forget He even had a message.

Symbols are important—make no mistake. There is a huge significance in the cross. Christ’s death was brutal, horrific, and terrible. So we print it on t-shirts, hang it on our living room wall, and worship His suffering, continually reminded of His sacrifice, our need to “repent,” and our status as born again Christians. But I feel like we are being asked to stop dying and instead be reborn with a new understanding. I believe this rebirth takes place in the act of repentance.

Jesus talked about repentance A LOT. Repentance has two historical meanings. There is the newer Latin paenitentia meaning to do acts of penance and contrition to receive grace. There is also the older, more accurate Greek metanoia meaning to turn around, to change one’s mind or heart about something. (I’d love to take credit for that bit of scholarship, but I found it online.) You see, when we beat ourselves up, we stay in a place of separation from God. When we see a better way, when we turn around and change
our path from a place of truth and understanding, we run full force into the arms of Love. As we walk along our path with Christ, He asks us to change a little each day, to become aware of how to love more fully, to let go, to let God take care of the worry. He asks us to be born a new creation each and every step along the way, acting out of forgiveness for self, love of others and accepting the peace of God.

This year I sat alone in my living room on Super Bowl Sunday, folding laundry and watching the game. I even allowed myself to enjoy it, though I still don’t understand why they chose the Material Girl for the halftime show. And in the spirit of repentance, I have decided it is time for me to give Easter a reconciliatory hug. We both need it. Besides, I think J.C. would want me to celebrate His re-birthday, though I think the zombie theme has got to go.

-Erin Kluka

.

True godliness don’t turn [people] out of the world, but enables them to live better in it, and excites their endeavours to mend it: not hide their candle under a bushel, but set it upon a table in a candlestick… William Penn

Our forefathers [and foremothers] did not talk about the implications of a way of life which they were not already striving to follow; neither dare we let our words outrun our striving, nor our plans our readiness to implement them. The world desperately needs men and women whose yea is yea and whose nay is nay. The testimony of our daily life still matters. We prayer that this may be our sure witness: that of us it may be said that our lives make it easier for [people] to believe in God. London Yearly Meeting, 1943

Queries:

• In what ways am I being led to open my hands to those around me?
• Is my faith turning me out into the world so that I might live better in it?
• Does the way I live put on display the gift of God in the world?