Liberty Vineyard family,
Lent is upon us! A huge THANK YOU to each of the 25 of you who were willing to read Scripture, offer a reflection, or read a prayer – I have been moved to tears while piecing together each and every track, on at least two levels – eternal gratitude for our Messiah Jesus – his life, ministry, death, and resurrection – and deep appreciation that the Lord has brought YOU to us here and now, enriching us all. God has blessed us with grace as we move toward becoming a true community at Liberty Vineyard, a place in which we are each free to be, free to grow, free to try, free to heal, free to be know and be known, free to love and be loved, and so much more. A new Lent track will be available each day, starting this Wednesday and finishing the day before Easter (or go directly to my YouTube channel if you prefer the podcast format). It’s beautiful to know we’ll be on the journey together in this way each day (please share with others, too).
There’s always a lot going on around here (Come, Holy Spirit!) … Here are some highlights from recent weeks:
JR rallied us all today to prepare 110 gifts (including hand-written notes) for each resident of Meadowbrook, to be delivered this coming Saturday @ 2pm as part of our monthly outreach (featuring Scott, who will be regaling us all with sappy beautiful Love Songs!) You won’t want to miss this!
We’ve been encouraging one another, praying together, celebrating one another, grieving together, and just sharing life as we meet together on any day of the week, formally or informally, face-to-face or on Zoom or via WhatsApp or over the phone.
I’ve been connecting with apartment managers, business owners, and others in a one-mile radius of our church building each week – it’s so exciting to see possibilities unfolding in how we can love and serve our neighbors. Please pray for me in this and give me a shout if you’d like to join me on one of these adventures!
We looked at two more of our Vineyard Values:
- Remember the Poor – Pastor Karen (this is weird writing in the 3rd person) invited us to be generous with our attention and our actions toward those who are trouble, poor, or hurting, whether it is someone in our own family, a stranger on the other side of the planet, someone who got that way through poor choices they made, someone stuck in a prison of injustice, someone who is hidden in plain sight, or someone whose situation is too complicated for us to understand. Luke 17:21 (NRSV) – “The Kingdom of God is among us.” Let’s remember the poor!
- A Healing Community – Pastor Nancy preached beautifully this morning as she invited us to heed this invitation and warning from Bonhoeffer: “The person who loves their dream of community will destroy community, but the person who loves those around them will create community.” She encouraged us to simultaneously aim our prayers with faith and focus while accepting the sovereignty of God, as we remember that sometimes when we pray for healing, it is instantaneous; sometimes it is a process; and sometimes we don’t see the healing on this side of heaven. Nancy left us with this challenge: to be a healing community, it takes courage!
Precious church family, the Lord created and designed us to live in interdependent community, as we together depend on God and become a community of pilgrims who help one another in appropriate ways to be and to become and to do all that God wants us to be and to become and to do. May we open our hearts and minds to be so thoroughly loved and embraced by God so that we can unreservedly reach out to love and embrace God and people. May we live and move and have our being in Jesus, abiding in his shalom, the place of wholeness, flourishing, and delight!
With you on the journey,
Karen Sculley
Pastor, Liberty Vineyard Church
(404) 388-0518
Recent Sunday sermons:
P.S. In case you missed it, here is the letter that went out with our annual giving statements:
As we left the old year behind, many of us probably breathed a sigh of relief, and were maybe even tempted to mutter to 2023 under our breaths, “Don’t let the door hit you where the good Lord spl…” Let’s be real – 2023 was a hard year for us all. But we also began to taste some things that we might have forgotten or maybe had never experienced before.
The Lord met us deeply when we lost Pastor John. We grieved together, remembered together, healed together.
The Lord turned our faces upward. We worshiped together, prayed together, listened together.
The Lord turned our attention inward. We studied together, conversed together, did soul care together.
The Lord turned our hearts outward. We reached out together, made music together, cleaned parks and roads together.
The Lord is breathing new life into us and energizing us and reviving us. Come, Holy Spirit!
This is your annual giving statement. I think that’s an appropriate word, because if I had to choose just one word to describe the beautiful community of love that we call Liberty Vineyard Church, “giving” hits the mark. You are so very giving, generous, gracious, and grateful in the way you lavishly share your time, talents, and treasure, your passion and prayer, your intelligence and energy! And now, dear brothers and sisters, as we start to become better acquainted with 2024, I want to encourage you to practice being present in the present in the presence of God. Let’s help one another to not give in to the anxieties of the age and keep on encouraging one another as we’ve been doing. Let’s roll up our sleeves, look 2024 square in the eye and say, “You don’t scare us – we’re focusing on the glory and majesty of God!” I love how Matthew 6:34 is rendered in The Message: “Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.”
The Kingdom of God is more than we can imagine, beloved church fam, so much more! I can’t wait to see what God does in and through Liberty Vineyard in 2024. May God, who is ever faithful, give us the grace to follow Jesus faithfully, proclaiming and demonstrating the good news of the Kingdom by the power of the Holy Spirit. All glory to God!
If you have questions about this 2023 Tax statement, please contact us. It is our desire to have an open-door policy concerning our finances. As such, if you have any concerns or questions, please share those with us. Thank you again for investing your time, energy, and finances in what God is doing through Liberty Vineyard as we love God and people.
With you on the journey,
Karen Sculley for the Pastoral Care & Leadership Team
Pastor, Liberty Vineyard Church
(404) 388-0518