Category: Kim’s Blog

With all the craziness that is going on in the world where can we turn? So many things have happened that have left us reeling. Wracked by the Pulse shooting earlier this year and what St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman referred to as the “crazy and disgusting” election of this fall where can we turn? For grounding? For sanity? For another way? For a new vision? How do we access a future that is anti-violent? Can we imagine a reality that includes respect for all people regardless of identity? Where do we look for economic arrangements that are equitable and fair? How can we envision a sustainable relationship with Earth? What can heal the alienation, violence, ignorance, greed, and self-centered myopia that pervades society?

Basically good, well-intentioned, caring people seem at a loss about how to make a difference and how to respond.

Although he was born over 2,000 years ago, and his time and culture seem distant, remote, and foreign, Jesus still speaks to today’s passionate desire for a different world. Jesus challenged the assumptions, power arrangements, ingrained habits, religious authority, and cultural mores of his day and his message is still challenging today. He is a light for the path to peace, justice, healing, and reconciliation.

“The Light Still Shines” is the theme that was selected for the Advent Season at Lakewood United Church of Christ. The season will be an exploration of how Jesus is still light for the world. These daily devotions will reflect that theme.

As part of your Advent journey, you are invited to journal or jot down a few notes each day on the themes of light and darkness. For this first week, you are invited to think about where you see darkness in the world and where you see light piercing the darkness.

You are also invited to set aside an offering each day for the Micah Center which offers an after school program with homework help, literacy, math development and mentoring free of charge for children on the free/reduced lunch program in Pinellas County schools. If you don’t live in the St. Pete area, perhaps you will want to find a program or movement close to your heart that is shining the light and set aside a donation each day during the Advent season. Then on Christmas, you will have a gift for the baby Jesus that reflects his light into the world.

Prayer: In these dark days, may I trust that the light of Christ still shines. Amen.

Posted by Rev. Kim Wells

As I woke up this morning, I asked myself, “How does our faith speak to us in the aftermath of the election?”

The story that immediately came to mind was the story of the Good Samaritan. The Good Samaritan? Yes.

In the story of the Good Samaritan, it is the most unlikely person who does what is compassionate. For anyone originally hearing the story, the Samaritan was the absolute last person who would be expected to help the victim beaten and lying by the side of the road. For us, it might be like someone from ISIS stopping to help. Yet in the story, something good comes from an extremely unlikely source. But, the Bible is like that.

Also in the story of the Good Samaritan, the responsible people of status and authority do not stop to help the person suffering in the ditch. And that person who was beaten had to accept help from one who was abhorrent. Evidently, today, too, there are many people who feel they are being passed by.

This day after the election many feel ignored, devalued, and alienated. As citizens of one country, sharing this our common home, may we be open to reaching out to one another with compassion and understanding.

by Rev. Kim Wells

Images matter. Yesterday in my daily news feed, I saw a stunning picture of a Native American man at Standing Rock. Tall. Upright. Principled. Visionary. Strong. Determined. Peaceful. These impressions were emanating from the image.

Later in the day, I was exposed to another image. My husband’s family is from Cleveland. This motivated us to take in interest in the World Series Baseball Championship between Cleveland and Chicago. As we watched the ending of the series, I felt continually assaulted by the Cleveland logo of Chief Wahoo, an offensive caricature of a Native American. The red color and the insulting cartoonish grin disgusted me.

The United Church of Christ along with other groups have been advocating for decades for the Cleveland Indians to change this horrific logo to no avail. The UCC headquarters are in Cleveland which gives the church added interest in this matter.

Seeing the juxtaposition of the person at Standing Rock and the crude Cleveland Indians logo helped me to see how truly awful the logo is. To me, it is not just entertainment, historic, and well-intentioned. Seeing the Chief Wahoo image flashed across the screen again and again and again last night gave me a feeling of revulsion. It is so disrespectful and demeaning and not just to those of Native American heritage. It is an insult to humanity in all its rich and beautiful diversity.

Today clergy from around the continent gather at Standing Rock in solidarity, respect and reverence for Native Peoples and for the Earth. This is recognition of the image of God in all people and the sacredness of Earth. It is also a reminder that Native Peoples are not treated equally in this supposed land of “liberty and justice for all.” This needs to change along with the logo of the Cleveland baseball team.

Near the end of his speech to the Democratic National Convention in July of 2016, Bill Clinton had this to say about his spouse, Hillary: “You could drop her into any trouble spot, pick one, come back in a month and somehow, some way she will have made it better. That is just who she is.” As I heard this, I found myself thinking about my mother. You could drop her down and come back a month later and, yes, things would be better. Much better, probably. Then I started thinking about the women at Lakewood UCC Church. One by one.  And as I thought about each one, I thought, yes, leave her for a month and things would be better.  And if you are a regular attender at the church, yes, I thought about you.

Now, this is NOT to say that if you dropped a man down in a trouble spot and came back in a month it would not be better. Sure, men are capable, too.

Is this statement of Bill Clinton’s an apt description of Hillary Clinton? Well, it pretty much describes every other woman I know, which just makes me wonder why the US has never had a woman president.

Who could have foreseen what a bizarre, nasty, and divided election season this would be? Not only are we bombarded with constant trash about the candidates, here in Florida  there are also persistent lies about the amendments to the Florida State Constitution especially Amendment One relating to solar energy. And even if you try to avoid it all by ignoring the paper, the radio, and the newsfeed on the internet, they are dishing it up to you on your phone with incessant robo calls.

As Christians, much as this election season may disgust us, we know that it is an opportunity to vote our values and to express our faith in a way that matters and can make a difference. And so we suppress the urge to stay home and not even bother voting.

Let’s take a moment to examine how Jesus might vote if he were an American citizen today. Jesus was devoted to a God of love for all of Creation. He showed people a God of love and care for all with no prejudice based on religion, ethnicity, or sexual identity. With that God at his center, Jesus took action on a day to day basis. He showed us how to embody the universal love of God for all by acting with compassion and mercy for individual people. This exposed the injustices of the society of his day. Jesus disrupted the social, political, religious, and economic arrangements of his time because all of those systems were set up to protect some at the expense of others. It’s no wonder he was killed.

In thinking about how to make our voting decisions, we can think about Jesus taking into consideration the big picture: All of Creation is beloved by God. So, how will our vote affect all of Creation? How will our vote impact the besieged people of Aleppo? How will our vote make a difference to the melting polar ice caps and glaciers? How will our vote influence the child who is sent on to Middle School but still cannot read? What will our vote do for the people of all the nations of the world who are all made in God’s image and beloved? I think this is how Jesus would think about who to vote for.

In the Tampa Bay Times, there was a letter to the editor this morning in which the writer shares how he will decide who to vote for: “Both presidential candidates are flawed human beings. But we must vote for one. So, which might benefit us and our families the best?” That is how Leonard Mead of Apollo Beach will decide who to vote for. To me, this perspective is not consistent with the universal vision of Jesus. To limit our concern to “us and our families” in voting is not in keeping with Jesus’ concern for all of Creation. This is far too limited a perspective for someone committed to the way of Jesus.

In another letter to the editor today, R. B. Johnson of Indian Rocks Beach gives this advice for selecting who to vote for: “Instead of obsequiously marching in lockstep to the siren blandishments of party solidarity, we should be considering ourselves human beings first, Americans second, and members of political parties a distant third.” This perspective is much closer to the vision of Jesus. The writer is encouraging us to broader horizons, to consider the well-being of the whole human family, not just our own family. This is much more in keeping with the way of Jesus.

All of Creation is the self disclosure of God. All of life is sacred. Every person is created in God’s image. Judaism, Jesus, and Christianity are about a grand vision of the common good. And that is what should guide our voting as followers of Jesus.