“As the Father loved me, I too have loved you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy will be in you and your joy will be complete. This is my commandment: love each other just as I have loved you.” –John 15:9-12

Okay friends, so this is exciting (well, in the “lemons to lemonade” category)! Since we have temporarily closed our campus at WFPC, we’re experimenting with ways to effectively communicate and to help keep people engaged.

First is the more intimate, conversational worship experience led by Rebekah, John and Katherine. It is being broadcast (was broadcast) via Facebook Live at 10:00 AM, from Rebekah’s office. After that it will be available to view anytime. It’s going to be interesting to see what kind of response we get (story in my next post).

Sunday-school?

Then there’s the challenge of Adult-education classes. Yesterday evening I “taught” directly into my iPhone video camera, then saved the movie on YouTube. It’s not interactive, of course, but I did follow through on my promise to present the lesson in one take, no do-overs, without trying to make it a polished presentation. The only blatant error (misspeak) is when I talk about “The Court of the Gentiles” at the Temple in Jerusalem – I refer to “God-fearing Jews” when of course I should have said, “God-fearing Gentiles.”

I hope the result is an authentic representation of me teaching.

Here’s the link.

A little commentary:

Additionally, I’m going to offer a few thoughts built around the following idea from the Entering The Passion of Jesus book we’re reading: “As a church we have to stop ‘business as usual’ during Lent.”

How cool is that! The author of our text had no idea we would find ourselves forced into such a radical stepping outside of our status quo, a group of 750 Presbyterians “coloring outside of the lines.” It’s unheard of, but here we are, completely unable to do business as usual even if we wanted to (which we do, because change is always more than we want to deal with).

But here we are, and my big question is this, “Given the facts as they are, the situation on the ground, how do we respond to the challenge?”

This isn’t just a question for the church it is a question for all of us. This huge, unavoidable circuit-breaker can be our opportunity to hit “reset” on so many things. Thank God that we do not have to be overwhelmed and defeated when instead we can be re-tooled and re-equipped to live more faithful and purposeful lives as disciples of Jesus!

I will be interested to see how this strengthens our faith – and most of all our living – as Followers of the Living Way of Jesus.

In love, and because of love – DEREK