WARMing of the church

This coming Sunday, Feb. 2, 2014, begins a 5-week focus for us at Ft. Collins First United Methodist Church on what it might look like to "WARM the church".  Two things are important here: (1) WARM and (2) church (with lower case "c").

First, WARM is an acronym as well as an intentional play on words.  It stands for "Welcoming, Affirming, Reconciling Methodists".  It names a group of persons at our Church interested in and committed to enhancing our environment to make it more hospitable to all persons, regardless of what labels are often attached that can make for separation and segregation among us: age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, political or theological commitments, etc.  [Click here (http://www.fcfumc.net/ministries/crosswalk) to go to the CrossWalk page on our Church's website that gives a beautiful statement of inclusivity that our CrossWalk community endorsed in July of last year.]  This is not meant to be exclusive; rather, invitational - anyone is invited to contribute to this ethos and/or serve on the ministry team that seeks to enhance it.

Second, "church" refers to the Christian church at large, the universal Christian church that crosses denominational and local lines - what John Wesley had in mind when he said, "The world is my parish."  As such, our worship focus isn't intended to isolate us at Ft. Collins First UMC but include us in the larger body committed to following Jesus' ways as best we can.  That being said, it is crucial that we take to heart Jesus' admonition to his hearers in Matthew's "Sermon on the Mount" that we tend to "the log in our own eye before we attempt to take the speck out of our neighbor's eye."  So, we'll be looking at how our United Methodist Church, and our local congregation in particular, might embrace more fully the way of Jesus, which is the way of love.

This coming Sunday, we'll be using the story of Ruth and Naomi in the Biblical book of Ruth to demonstrate how "welcome" and "covenant love" can change the future.  We also celebrate communion, a fitting liturgical reflection of this "WARMing of the church" theme where Jesus' invitation to share in his culture and religion's most prominent expression of hospitality - a meal around a table - is made to all, with no distinctions or conditions.  Please join us!

Pastor Steve
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