January 12, 2025. AFFIRMED BY LOVE
Our gospel lesson for this Sunday is from St. Luke 3: 15-17, 21-22, it is the story of Jesus’ baptism. As Jesus used this event to understand his ministry - his mission among us. The first lesson from Isaiah 43: 1-7, and the second reading from Acts 8: 4-17, are a commentary on the life of Jesus as he was seen as the servant of God among the people calling them into righteousness and hope. The Baptism of the Lord reminds us to be faithful to his calling. In Jesus’ ministry, he calls all people into a relationship with him. He calls them as equals into a fellowship of brothers and sisters in Christ, and then asks each one to live responsibly as they seek to love Him and their neighbor.
We are going to see what it means to be in the baptized community of faith, what it means to be brothers and sisters in Christ. As baptized children of God, we can say about ourselves that God has included all people as his children. Each of us are in God’s picture of salvation, not by our merits but by his request, his claiming us in baptism.
After this event, our lives are a response to God’s saving grace in baptism. A response, not an insurance policy. Baptism brings us into God’s picture of salvation, but unlike real paintings, we can take ourselves out of the picture by living a life, which does not respond to God’s act of grace. God brought us into salvation by His power through our baptism. It is a picture of beauty however we can make salvation something less than beautiful if we remove ourselves from it by rejecting God, his word, his supper, his grace by removing ourselves from the community of faith.
Baptism is not an insurance policy to heaven, but baptism is our boarding pass to a lifetime with Jesus. Baptism begins a relationship with Jesus, which is nourished, fed, strengthened, enriched, and kept alive by faithfully availing oneself to God’s means of grace, the word and the sacraments, especially communion. Our journey through life with Jesus needs the encouragement, the strength, and the lasting power of a faithful presence in and with the community of believers.
Along with being included and wanted in God’s family, baptism allows us equal access to God’s grace. The good news of God through Christ, God is no respecter of persons. In God’s eyes all are equal.
Because we are brothers and sisters equally in Christ, as the faithful community of Christ we care, help, pray for, support, those brothers, and sisters in the community as if they are indeed "blood relatives." Also, we pray for, minister to, and evangelize those who are not members of the body so they might know the love and grace we have experienced in Christ. We do not hoard the good news of Christ but give it freely to others.
We are in the Epiphany season where we emphasize the light of Christ, the light, which shines in the darkness. Christ is a light which shines in our individual lives and at the same time a light, which is spread to others. Think about a candle for a moment. A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle. In fact, it gains, because there are now two candles in which to see in the darkness. Instead of one light piercing the darkness, now there are two. Each light gives strength and courage to the other. Each soul, each person in the body of Christ gives strength, courage, faith, and hope, to the others as they walk together in the darkness of this world.
Our light does shine in the darkness of this world. Our baptism which we have seen includes each person and is equally given to us to be responsible to each other as we walk the journey of faith. The body of Christ, the church, the community of faith is God’s gift to us through Baptism. Because it is a gift, we have no right to limit God’s gift, or restrict it, or somehow believe that it is ours. The body of Christ, the church knows no bounds. It is the gift of God to those who have experienced God’s grace in Baptism as our faith and trust in God’s grace might grow and mature. Join us in our worship on Sunday at 11:00 AM.
Peace!
Rev. Dr. Christopher Ponnuraj
Minister
West Center Congregational Church
101 Pondfield Road West
Bronxville, NY 10708
Our gospel lesson for this Sunday is from St. Luke 3: 15-17, 21-22, it is the story of Jesus’ baptism. As Jesus used this event to understand his ministry - his mission among us. The first lesson from Isaiah 43: 1-7, and the second reading from Acts 8: 4-17, are a commentary on the life of Jesus as he was seen as the servant of God among the people calling them into righteousness and hope. The Baptism of the Lord reminds us to be faithful to his calling. In Jesus’ ministry, he calls all people into a relationship with him. He calls them as equals into a fellowship of brothers and sisters in Christ, and then asks each one to live responsibly as they seek to love Him and their neighbor.
We are going to see what it means to be in the baptized community of faith, what it means to be brothers and sisters in Christ. As baptized children of God, we can say about ourselves that God has included all people as his children. Each of us are in God’s picture of salvation, not by our merits but by his request, his claiming us in baptism.
After this event, our lives are a response to God’s saving grace in baptism. A response, not an insurance policy. Baptism brings us into God’s picture of salvation, but unlike real paintings, we can take ourselves out of the picture by living a life, which does not respond to God’s act of grace. God brought us into salvation by His power through our baptism. It is a picture of beauty however we can make salvation something less than beautiful if we remove ourselves from it by rejecting God, his word, his supper, his grace by removing ourselves from the community of faith.
Baptism is not an insurance policy to heaven, but baptism is our boarding pass to a lifetime with Jesus. Baptism begins a relationship with Jesus, which is nourished, fed, strengthened, enriched, and kept alive by faithfully availing oneself to God’s means of grace, the word and the sacraments, especially communion. Our journey through life with Jesus needs the encouragement, the strength, and the lasting power of a faithful presence in and with the community of believers.
Along with being included and wanted in God’s family, baptism allows us equal access to God’s grace. The good news of God through Christ, God is no respecter of persons. In God’s eyes all are equal.
Because we are brothers and sisters equally in Christ, as the faithful community of Christ we care, help, pray for, support, those brothers, and sisters in the community as if they are indeed "blood relatives." Also, we pray for, minister to, and evangelize those who are not members of the body so they might know the love and grace we have experienced in Christ. We do not hoard the good news of Christ but give it freely to others.
We are in the Epiphany season where we emphasize the light of Christ, the light, which shines in the darkness. Christ is a light which shines in our individual lives and at the same time a light, which is spread to others. Think about a candle for a moment. A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle. In fact, it gains, because there are now two candles in which to see in the darkness. Instead of one light piercing the darkness, now there are two. Each light gives strength and courage to the other. Each soul, each person in the body of Christ gives strength, courage, faith, and hope, to the others as they walk together in the darkness of this world.
Our light does shine in the darkness of this world. Our baptism which we have seen includes each person and is equally given to us to be responsible to each other as we walk the journey of faith. The body of Christ, the church, the community of faith is God’s gift to us through Baptism. Because it is a gift, we have no right to limit God’s gift, or restrict it, or somehow believe that it is ours. The body of Christ, the church knows no bounds. It is the gift of God to those who have experienced God’s grace in Baptism as our faith and trust in God’s grace might grow and mature. Join us in our worship on Sunday at 11:00 AM.
Peace!
Rev. Dr. Christopher Ponnuraj
Minister
West Center Congregational Church
101 Pondfield Road West
Bronxville, NY 10708
January 5, 2025 ANOTHER ROAD
On this Epiphany Sunday, we see the promise fulfilled in the story of the Wise men. The Wise men are our examples of discernment. They believed the promise from Isaiah 60:1"Arise, shine, for your light has come." They saw the star and followed it. They went first to Jerusalem, where they were disappointed. The newborn king was not in the capital city.
Epiphany is the Gentile feast of faith. We celebrate not only the faith of the Gentiles, as symbolized by the Wise men; we also celebrate the mission to the Gentiles. But who are the Gentiles today, now that the church is a Gentile church? The Gentiles are the ones on the outside looking in, the ones who are powerless, the ones who are shunned and scorned. If our light has come, it is a light to be shared, not hidden.
We are to stand in solidarity with people who are poor, powerless, and excluded, to dispel the thick darkness, which covers their lives. We are to fulfill our baptismal promise as we read in Matthews 5:16: "Let your light so shine before others that they may see your good works and glorify your father who is in heaven." Nowhere is the truth of Epiphany more evident than in the Eucharist. We gather around the Lord's Table as members of the same body of Christ, heirs together of the promises of the gospel. We see the faces of our fellow Christians, and we see the light of Christ.
The festival of the Epiphany of Our Lord is a celebration that has reminded Christians since the second century that the light has already reached us. The light has already come in Jesus Christ. His light has vanquished the dark nightmares in our souls. "Arise, shine;" declares Isaiah, "for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you". Nightmares exist. Evil lurks around darkened corners of our lives, "but the Lord will arise upon you and his glory will appear over you". Did you catch the language of both Christmas and Easter here? The Light has come. The Glory of the Lord has risen.
It is no coincidence that early Christians selected this text to be read on Epiphany Day, the day on which the appearance of the Light of Christ is celebrated. The Light, born in Bethlehem, rises and shines brilliantly from the empty tomb outside Jerusalem. Epiphany, the Day of Light, connects birth, passion, and resurrection in the Church year. The Light has reached us. The Light shines in our lives today and everyday.
One of the things I love about Christmas is that it is traditionally a time of celebration. For some reason, at Christmas time, people suddenly start thinking about family and friends and love and peace, about giving and sharing and helping those in need. I am not sure why we wait until December to begin being this way, but that’s the way it is. When you go to the stores and restaurants, it seems that people in general are friendlier and more cheerful. When I think of all of it, I cannot help but wish that people were like that all year round.
The gospel passage we are going to read this Sunday, is a passage of celebration and a passage of worship. We are going to follow the journey of the wise men as they seek this newborn King of the Jews. As we follow them, there are some lessons I think we can learn from their experience, and the result should be the same as theirs.
God will lead those who are truly seeking Christ: The gospel lesson St. Matthews 2: 1, of our text says that there were wise men who had traveled from the east. The word from which we get wise men is the word magi, from which we get the word magician. Most people assume there were three of them, an idea that probably came from the fact that there are only three gifts mentioned, but the fact is that we don’t know how many of these wise men there actually were. There could have been two, a dozen, or several dozen.
These Wise men had come from the east, from the area in or around Babylon, which is present day Iraq. While we do not really know where they got their information, I think it is safe to speculate that they had the writings of Daniel as a guide. Remember that Daniel had been in Babylonian captivity most of his life, first as a servant of the king, but as the Lord blessed and prospered him, he became one of the wise men of Babylon – one of the magi. As Daniel wrote and studied, he left important information that would later, several hundred years later, guide these magi to the King of the Jews! In fact, Daniel’s prophecies practically told them when the Messiah would be born – it just didn’t tell them where. If you like to learn more please join us in our worship on Sundays at 11:00 AM.
Peace!
Rev. Dr. Christopher Ponnuraj
Minister
On this Epiphany Sunday, we see the promise fulfilled in the story of the Wise men. The Wise men are our examples of discernment. They believed the promise from Isaiah 60:1"Arise, shine, for your light has come." They saw the star and followed it. They went first to Jerusalem, where they were disappointed. The newborn king was not in the capital city.
Epiphany is the Gentile feast of faith. We celebrate not only the faith of the Gentiles, as symbolized by the Wise men; we also celebrate the mission to the Gentiles. But who are the Gentiles today, now that the church is a Gentile church? The Gentiles are the ones on the outside looking in, the ones who are powerless, the ones who are shunned and scorned. If our light has come, it is a light to be shared, not hidden.
We are to stand in solidarity with people who are poor, powerless, and excluded, to dispel the thick darkness, which covers their lives. We are to fulfill our baptismal promise as we read in Matthews 5:16: "Let your light so shine before others that they may see your good works and glorify your father who is in heaven." Nowhere is the truth of Epiphany more evident than in the Eucharist. We gather around the Lord's Table as members of the same body of Christ, heirs together of the promises of the gospel. We see the faces of our fellow Christians, and we see the light of Christ.
The festival of the Epiphany of Our Lord is a celebration that has reminded Christians since the second century that the light has already reached us. The light has already come in Jesus Christ. His light has vanquished the dark nightmares in our souls. "Arise, shine;" declares Isaiah, "for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you". Nightmares exist. Evil lurks around darkened corners of our lives, "but the Lord will arise upon you and his glory will appear over you". Did you catch the language of both Christmas and Easter here? The Light has come. The Glory of the Lord has risen.
It is no coincidence that early Christians selected this text to be read on Epiphany Day, the day on which the appearance of the Light of Christ is celebrated. The Light, born in Bethlehem, rises and shines brilliantly from the empty tomb outside Jerusalem. Epiphany, the Day of Light, connects birth, passion, and resurrection in the Church year. The Light has reached us. The Light shines in our lives today and everyday.
One of the things I love about Christmas is that it is traditionally a time of celebration. For some reason, at Christmas time, people suddenly start thinking about family and friends and love and peace, about giving and sharing and helping those in need. I am not sure why we wait until December to begin being this way, but that’s the way it is. When you go to the stores and restaurants, it seems that people in general are friendlier and more cheerful. When I think of all of it, I cannot help but wish that people were like that all year round.
The gospel passage we are going to read this Sunday, is a passage of celebration and a passage of worship. We are going to follow the journey of the wise men as they seek this newborn King of the Jews. As we follow them, there are some lessons I think we can learn from their experience, and the result should be the same as theirs.
God will lead those who are truly seeking Christ: The gospel lesson St. Matthews 2: 1, of our text says that there were wise men who had traveled from the east. The word from which we get wise men is the word magi, from which we get the word magician. Most people assume there were three of them, an idea that probably came from the fact that there are only three gifts mentioned, but the fact is that we don’t know how many of these wise men there actually were. There could have been two, a dozen, or several dozen.
These Wise men had come from the east, from the area in or around Babylon, which is present day Iraq. While we do not really know where they got their information, I think it is safe to speculate that they had the writings of Daniel as a guide. Remember that Daniel had been in Babylonian captivity most of his life, first as a servant of the king, but as the Lord blessed and prospered him, he became one of the wise men of Babylon – one of the magi. As Daniel wrote and studied, he left important information that would later, several hundred years later, guide these magi to the King of the Jews! In fact, Daniel’s prophecies practically told them when the Messiah would be born – it just didn’t tell them where. If you like to learn more please join us in our worship on Sundays at 11:00 AM.
Peace!
Rev. Dr. Christopher Ponnuraj
Minister