Category: Posts

Dear Friends,

Your conference Board of Directors is undertaking a strategic planning process that we hope will culminate in February of 2023 in a refreshed understanding of our shared vision and values in the Florida Conference. This will help the board know how best to serve the churches and authorized ministers here, how best to staff the conference to meet those needs, and how to strategically fund the conference for best outcomes in bringing vitality to our local churches.

I have been invited to reach out to the churches with an invitation for interested parties to be considered as facilitators for a broad based listening project across the life of the church. If you know of someone in your congregation who has experience in strategic long range planning, please let them know of this possibility and invite them to reach out to me at their earliest convenience. This offering will be made as a fee based contract to be negotiated with board leadership and to end in early 2023.

Thank you for considering this opportunity to offer leadership to our shared ministry.

Blessings,

John Vertigan
Conference Minister
jvertigan@uccfla.org

The vast majority of people in the United States are concerned about climate change, but 81% of us say they rarely or never discuss climate change in their daily lives. It can be hard to know how to bring up with friends and family, even if we want to!

On Monday, May 23, at 4 PT/7 ET, you’re invited to a workshop where you’ll learn how to use your own experiences to shift the climate narrative in the spaces you’re already in, and use storytelling to help build a more just climate future. This training is hosted by volunteer leaders like you organizing to pass bold legislation for climate, care, jobs, and justice.

Join us on May 23 to strengthen our ability to create a livable planet and safe, healthy communities through storytelling? (Or sign up to get the recording!)

I’ll be there!

---

If you’re reading this email, you’re likely concerned about climate change, the state of our democracy, the injustice of corporations poisoning our most vulnerable communities, and much more.

But a lot of us (myself included!) struggle to know how to talk about these issues with friends and family, even if we think they’ll agree with us politically.

What holds us back from speaking up about climate? How can we be more effective in having these climate conversations and invite our communities into action?

According to a poll from Pew Research Center, 81 percent of people in the United States say they rarely or never discuss climate change in their daily lives. Another 74 percent say they’ve never been engaged to take climate action by a friend or family member.^1,2

Yet the vast majority of people in the United States are concerned about climate change. Building and supporting resilient communities and the planet that sustains us must start by communicating the challenges, which we know is powerful in moving the opinions and inciting action in people who care about us.

You are the best messenger to influence your friends and families. The stories you share with the people around you are far more powerful than anything media institutions, governments, and even organizations like the Sierra Club could ever say or do. Especially in today’s polarized world, the best way to get more people engaged is to start the conversation by sharing our own stories and coming from a place of values and personal experience.

Join us for a deeper look at how to develop your story, and how to connect it to the causes you want to champion.

What: Storytelling Workshop
Where: On Zoom. Sign up to get the link here!
When: Monday, May 23, 4-6 pm PT/ 7-9 pm ET.

Can’t make that time? Sign up anyway to get the recording and stay in the loop about future opportunities to build your storytelling skills for climate conversations.

In order for us to pass bold policies, force corporations to act, or create the other kinds of transformative change we need right now, first we need to change the story about what is possible. By getting our stories and experiences out there, we can help shift the dominant societal and cultural narratives that shape what is or isn’t politically feasible.

Stories impact people more than facts. They create space for us to resonate and see a path for hopeful action. They allow the person viewing, listening to, or reading a story to connect more deeply with the situation and see themselves as a part of a meaningful solution.

In the workshop, you’ll:

• Hear from expert storytellers on best practices
• Learn a sample structure for telling your story and incorporating climate conversation into everyday moments with friends and family.
• Hear example stories from other volunteers.
• Identify challenges you have faced, what accomplishments you’ve helped achieve, and practice crafting a story from those experiences.
• Build community with other changemakers from across the nation working to build a more just and livable future.
• Walk away with resources to continue practicing together.

I’m excited to see you soon!

Hillary Larson
Senior Digital Campaigner, Sierra Club

Dear DECF Members and Friends,

Our Pinellas Chapter DECF General Membership Meeting for May will not be held on Wednesday, May18th.  Instead, we are co-hosting the Statewide Gubernatorial Forum on Sunday, May 15th at 6:30pm.

Please join us for a virtual conversation about the vital environmental issues facing Florida today with Gubernatorial Candidates Charlie Crist, NIkki Fried and Annette Taddeo on Sunday, May 15th from 6:30-8:00pm.  We’ll ask our Democratic candidates about policies, issues, and positions on environment and conservation issues that affect the life and future of Florida.  Pre-registration is required so please use this link to register in advance for this event and confirm your attendance:

https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZEtde-orDkqHdOme2ImXkvjYVTY-eimk0xi

We encourage you and your organization(s) to share this important, statewide event and to.sign up for Mobilize – an important organizing tool for all of us  Use this Mobilize link to sign up and share the Forum: http://bit.ly/DECFForum

State elections have never been so critical to our future. If you haven’t yet renewed your chapter dues for 2022 you can do so here:  
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/2021b

State of Florida Caucus membership can be completed or renewed here::
https://forms.gle/qwA4kUF39x7JHtsF9

Please send your questions to: 
PinellasDECF@gmail.com

Thank you and please SHARE WIDELY!

Date: May 8, 2022 Mother’s Day
Scripture Lesson: Acts 9:36-43
Sermon: The Mothering Love of Jesus
Pastor: Rev. Kim P. Wells

Ok. Let’s face it. Peter was a screw up. Yes, the disciple. He drops everything to follow Jesus and then just doesn’t seem to get what Jesus is about – what he is showing people, teaching people, embodying. Jesus is offering an alternative reality, the realm of God, values and relationships that reflect the intentions of Divine Love for all people and all of Creation. And Peter misses the point again, and again, and again, and again.

There are numerous teachers in the congregation. You know what this is like. You have a student, even eager perhaps, and you just don’t seem to be able to get through. You try different approaches and learning modalities, to no avail. Parents, mothers and fathers, you know what this is like. You try to bring your child up with solid values and ethics and teach them what they need to know to be caring and compassionate and constructive human beings, and they just seem to be orbiting another star. Caught in some kind of web of self-destruction, perhaps related to alcohol or drugs. You did all you could. And many of us have worked with people who just didn’t seem to be able to catch on to what was supposed to be going on to function effectively and collegially in the work place. We know what this is like. Sometimes, people just don’t get it.

Peter is in that camp. He just doesn’t get it even with all of his ardor. Here are a few highlights-

Jesus teaches that the greatest is the one who serves. And Peter is among those discussing which one of them is the greatest. Jesus tells about his death and Peter rejects the idea that Jesus must die. And there is the Get behind me, Satan, line. Peter, asleep at the transfiguration, then wanting to build booths for Moses and Elijah. Wrong, again.

Peter, asleep at Gethsemane when Jesus asks him to pray, three times. And, of course, even with warning, Peter denies Jesus three times and deserts him at the crucifixion.

I mean, Peter was a screw up. He just doesn’t seem to get it.

Now we turn to today’s story. The beautiful story of Tabitha. Here is Peter, of all people, called upon to heal Tabitha, a wonderful saint in her community. The women come to display all the clothing she has made for them. But Tabitha has died. It’s too late for healing. And Peter goes into the room alone and brings her back to life, repeating the crowning sign associated with Jesus’ earthly ministry, the raising of Lazarus. As Jesus raised Lazarus, so we are told of Peter raising Tabitha from the dead. Yes, Peter.

A scan through the stories of the book of Acts, shows that once Jesus has been crucified, risen from the dead, and ascended into heaven, the holy spirit comes and infuses the believers, among them, Peter. From then on, we see a changed Peter. We see Peter begin by teaching in the Temple precincts. Then he heals a beggar at the Temple gate. Peter goes on to heal someone that is paralyzed in Lydda. Here is Peter, going from place to place, as Jesus did, even into Samaria, enemy territory, as Jesus did, facing off with the religious authorities, as Jesus did. Healing and teaching as Jesus did. And now we are told of Peter raising Tabitha from the dead as Jesus raised Lazarus.

It really is an amazing transformation. It’s a turn around story. And tradition has it that Peter was eventually arrested and faced crucifixion, as Jesus did. But the story goes that Peter insisted on being crucified upside down because he did not feel worthy to be crucified as Jesus was. So, Peter is even remembered for dying by crucifixion as Jesus did.

Peter ends up being remembered as an exemplary follower of Jesus, right down to raising someone from the dead and being crucified. How did that happen?

Well, simply said, I think it is because we are shown that Jesus never gives up on Peter. After Peter’s three fold denial, we are told of the risen Jesus offering a three fold opportunity to re-commit. Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep. Feed my sheep. Jesus restores and re-commissions Peter. Then Jesus entrusts to all of the disciples their sacred mission to go into all the world sharing the love of God and the dream of God that they have learned from Jesus. That ragged bunch. Jesus never stops believing in them. And their potential for good. He never gives up on them. Just like a mother who never gives up on her child. Jesus extends mothering love to his followers and never gives up on them.

And, as Hyun Kyung Chung, who was a classmate of ours at Union Seminary, reminds us, Jesus probably learned this from his mother! Who never gave up on the mothering love of God for ALL people especially those made poor and those who are downtrodden and forgotten. That’s the legacy she gives to Jesus. The vision of persistent Divine Love that never gives up on the capacity for transformation and for justice.

Just like Jesus never gives up on Peter and the disciples, the message of Christianity is about the mothering love of God that never gives up on us. No matter what we have done. No matter what we have not done. No matter where we have been. No matter what we have mistaken or confused. No matter who we have hurt, including ourselves. We are embraced by divine mothering love that NEVER gives up on us. No matter how we have screwed up, we are eternally beloved and precious. And so is every person, every child of God. There is no sibling rivalry in God’s reality. Everyone is beloved. No matter what!

And in our context, we see the need for that love to be shared freely in the world. In our world of competition and rivalry, bitterness and hatred. In our world of violence and war. In our world of perceived scarcity and evident greed, the power of the mothering love of God in Christ is inviting us to new life, to a new reality.

And at this moment, we want to recognize that the vision of the mothering love ofGod for all people is under attack. There are those who want to deny women their full humanity. Who do not trust women to have the ability to exercise their agency and judgment in ways that foster the well being of themselves and society. Despite the legacy of Mary and her impact upon the life of Jesus and upon the world, there are those who do not feel that women are capable of bearing the divine image as full human beings. They are believed to be lesser beings. The Roe v Wade situation is just one manifestation of this. There are many, many others.

Jesus learned from his mother to treat women as full human beings and we must be committed to that as well. So we must be dogged in upholding the rights and dignity of women as full human beings. Like Jesus, we must not give up or give in. We must cling to the persistence and power of mothering love.

We are told of the beautiful story of Peter, of all people, bringing back Tabitha from the dead. Tabitha. A woman. We too must trust the mothering love of God and Jesus to work in us, to work on us, to empower us, to do whatever it takes to protect the full humanity of each person and to protect life in all of its forms, and to preserve life on this planet as we know it. It is the work of mothering love. It is our work. To birth the reality of God. This Mother’s day and every day. Amen.

A reasonable effort has been made to appropriately cite materials referenced in this sermon. For additional information, please contact Lakewood United Church of Christ

WELCOME and ANNOUNCEMENTS

LIGHTING THE PEACE CANDLE                                                     Sally Purvis, liturgist

Arise, all women who have hearts, whether your baptism be that of water or of tears! Say firmly: “We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies, our husbands shall not come to us, reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause.

“Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience. We women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.”

From the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own. It says, “Disarm, disarm! The sword is not the balance of justice.” Blood does not wipe out dishonor nor violence indicate possession.

The original Mother’s Day Proclamation, 1870
Julia Ward Howe, 1819-1910

PRELUDE                              Mary, Did You Know                                    Lowry & Greene 

*OPENING READING    Mary Oliver, 1935-2019 from “Mornings at Blackwater”

What I want to say is
that the past is the past,
and the present is what your life is,
and you are capable
of choosing what that will be,
darling citizen.
So come to the pond,
or the river of your imagination,
or the harbor of your longing,
and put your lips to the world.
And live
your life.

*HYMN                             Bring Many Names                                               11

NAMING OF MOTHERS

One: On this Mother’s Day, let us lift up the names of women in our own lives who have mothered us and made manifest to us the power of Divine Love.

Naming of Mothers

ALL: May daughters prophesy justice and sons dream peace!

*HYMN                   God Made from One Blood                                      427

CONTEMPORARY READING- “Who Is Mary?”          Chung Hyun Kyung, b. 1956

MUSIC                                      Minuet                                               Boccherini

SCRIPTURE LESSON
Let us prepare ourselves for the word of God as it comes to us in the reading of Holy Scripture. Our hearts and minds are open.

Acts 9:36-43

For the word of God in scripture, for the word of God among us, for the word of God within us. Thanks be to God.

SERMON                 The Mothering Love of Jesus                 Rev. Kim P. Wells

*HYMN                      Just as a Nursing Mother                          HKJ, see insert

MISSION STATEMENT
The mission of Lakewood United Church of Christ, as part of the Church Universal is to:

• Celebrate the presence and power of God in our lives & in our world.
• Offer the hospitality and inclusive love of Christ to all people.
• Work for God’s peace and justice throughout creation.

MORNING OFFERING

Morning offerings may be brought forward and placed in the plates on the altar. You are invited to write your prayer requests on the sheets provided in the bulletin and bring them forward and place them in the basket on the altar. If you would like assistance, please turn to someone seated near you.

Offertory                                             Mama Liked the Roses                                              Elvis

*Time of Dedication                                 Hildegard of Bingen, 1098-1179

Be not lax
In celebrating,
Be not lazy
in the festive service of God.

Be ablaze with enthusiasm
Let us be an alive,
burning offering
before the altar of God!

*PREPARATION FOR PRAYER        Guide My Feet                               497

MORNING PRAYERS- SAVIOR’S PRAYER

Our Father-Mother, who is in the heavens, may your name be made holy. May your dominion come, may your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us today, the bread we need; and forgive us our debts, as we have forgiven our debtors; and do not put us to the test, but rescue us from evil. For yours is the dominion, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.

* BENEDICTION                                         Julian of Norwich, around 1343-after 1416

Never does love’s compassionate eye turn from us. Amen.

*SUNG RESPONSE (please form a circle)

Weave, weave, weave us together;
Weave us together in unity and love.
Weave, weave, weave us together,
Weave us together, together in love.         

*POSTLUDE                    Baby Elephant Walk                                        Mancini

For the safety and comfort of all, please wear a mask. Thank you!

Circle of Concern: Joyce Lee, Michelle Cloutier, Christopher and Dana, Ann Quinn who is under Hospice Care, William Owen-Cowan, Jen Degroot, Carolyn Moore, Maggie Brizendine, Janet Hall, Yoko Nogami walking the Appalachian Trail, All those suffering from COVID-19 and all healthcare workers, Schools: Students, families, teachers, and staff.

Announcements

Facebook Live The 10:30 a.m. service is being streamed on Facebook Live.

Support for Ukraine To find more ways to support Ukraine please visit our website and look at the Weekly update for 5/4/2022.

Water Petitions Petitions are available to sign to get the Right to Clean and Healthy Waters on the ballot as a proposed amendment to the Florida Constitution. You are welcome to get others to fill out these petitions and then bring them back to church to be sent in.

Sunflowers If you would like to bring sunflowers for the altar, please inform Rev. Wells or the Church Office.

Advisors Meet Today There will be an advisors meeting after church today. All are welcome. Please let an advisor know if there is something you would like on the agenda: Malcolm Wells, Barbara Donohue, Lucille Ruga, and Christy Martin.

Book Talk Ahead This month’s Book Talk will be on Thursday May 12 from 6:30- 7:30 on Zoom. The link is https://us02web.zoom.us/j/2700683648 .  All are welcome to this engaging conversation about what you are reading.

Congratulations, Graduate! Many congratulations to Zach Blair-Andrews who graduated from USF yesterday. There is a card to sign for Zach this morning.

Operation Attack OA needs donations of cereal/oatmeal, mac and cheese, pasta sauce, peanut butter, canned meat, fruit, soup, and vegetables. Donations may be placed on the shelf in the hallway at church.

Toiletries for Celebrate Outreach Celebration Outreach has an ongoing need for men’s and women’s underwear. (Men sizes 30, 32,34 and Women’s sizes 5,6, 7,8.) Also in high demand are socks of all kinds /sizes for both men & women.  Other needed items are Deodorant & disposable razors.

CHURCH STAFF

Pastor- Kim Wells
Music Director- Hilton Jones
Nursery Attendant-Claudia Rodriguez

Lakewood United Church of Christ 2601 54th Ave. S. St. Petersburg, FL 33712
727-867-7961 lakewooducc@gmail.com Lakewooducc.org
On land originally inhabited by the Tocabaga