August in Washington. It’s hot. The politicians finally leave and return to wherever they came from. People take vacations and we at Riverside resign ourselves to a less complicated schedule of things to do. No deacon or trustees meetings. No Koinonia lunch. Even bible study takes a break in August. That said, we do continue [...]
We have all seen the movie or television show where someone is in a coma. Maybe the character was in a car accident or suffered a stroke. These shows can be quite intense as we empathize with the family surrounding the hospital bed of their loved one, waiting to see if they will ever talk [...]
Who am I? That’s a question all of us ask throughout out lives. It is a fundamental question, is it not? It’s right up there with Who are you? and Who are we? It is a question that also goes hand-in-hand with, Are we alone in the cosmos? If Shakespeare was right and all the [...]
The challenges of air conditioning maintenance have got me thinking about the Ark of the Covenant. What challenges about HVAC (Heating Venting And Air Conditioning), you ask? The fact that our main unit has some bad switches that must be replaced so that for a few weeks now we have been trying to trouble shoot [...]
Baseball is a beautiful game, if you can see through the throngs of people streaming in the aisle to and from the concession stands. “Did you come here to eat or watch baseball!?” is what I wanted to shout. I had taken Kirsten to her first major league game and my first trip to the [...]
I’m naming this past Sunday “Murphy’s Law Sunday.” Why? Because when I turned on the air conditioner for the sanctuary at about 7 am, it would not run past a minute or two. Forty minutes later, I still could not solve the problem. So I set up the Foster Room for worship. Many of you [...]
Please play the beautiful film above by Jenni Olson which features Harvey Milk’s own words and a beautiful recreation of his camera store. When I march on June 12 in the Gay Pride parade in Washington, it will not be the first time I’ve marched. But it will be the first time since D.C. passed the [...]
The act of Christian proclamation is, from a Baptist perspective at least, sacramental. With Luther, we would agree that there are two sacraments (what we call “ordinances” in that Christ commanded these): Baptism and Communion. But the proclamation of the Gospel or the preaching moment is that moment when the Holy Spirit breaks through into [...]
Imagine my surprise when I was told, on a Sunday with my sermon entitled, “Everyone, Off The Ark!” that the basement in the church was flooded (not severely) by water. I spent forty-five minutes and half of the Bible Study hour mopping and trying to clear the storm drain in the stair well that led [...]
The church is a warehouse of self-less acts. Acts of devotion done for no other reason than to be kind and generous abound in our congregation. I know a trustee who got up very early on Sunday to go to Home Depot to secure a toilet seat for the women’s restroom, the day after he [...]
