This is a Day of New Beginnings

This is a day of new beginnings,
time to remember and move on,
time to believe what love is bringing,
laying to rest the pain that’s gone.

-383 in the Hymnal

We often mistake the present for the future and the way things are for the only way they can be. It’s understandable, of course: we receive the world as it is when we are born and stories, even pictures, of a different past can seem implausible. 

Yet God is not in the business of maintaining the status quo, especially when the status quo includes racial segregation, multigenerational poverty, and infant mortality. The way things have been in many American cities since the 1960s, in this particular case Trenton, is not something we can tolerate as is.

The hymn continues:

For by the life and death of Jesus,
God’s mighty Spirit, now as then,
can make to us a world of difference,
as faith and hope are born again.

Then let us with the Spirit’s daring,
step from the past, and leave behind,
our disappointment, guilt, and grieving,
seeking new paths and sure to find.

Rev. Michael Reed is beginning his second year under appointment to the city of Trenton. His mission there is to bless the people of the city and also to connect area United Methodist churches to one another in mission and service. He’s got a great story to tell that starts with diapers and ends with partnerships, fresh free produce, and it’s truly only the beginning. He will share with us this Sunday – I hope you can make it!

Christ is alive, and goes before us
to show and share what love can do.
This is a day of new beginnings,
our God is making all things new!

Grace and Peace, 
Pastor Ben