March 2023 at the United Methodist Church of Santa Cruz

Welcome to the United Methodist Church of Santa Cruz, as we seek to be faithful to God by being fully inclusive.  We have open hearts, open minds, and open doors.  Join us as we deepen our resolve to share love generously.  This is a time for sharing the love of Jesus Christ with our neighbors and the world as we grow deeply in our faith.    Join us as we seek to build relationships with spiritual depth, reaching out to the world.   We remain committed to offering a healthy and safe ministry in the midst of this COVID Pandemic, offering Hybrid Worship and Hybrid/Zoom Small Groups.  Check out our website for the latest information, and “Like Us” on Facebook!   

Whoever you are and wherever you are on your spiritual journey, you are welcome to grow with us!

Zoom participants, remember your ‘holy snack’!  As the Season of Lent continues, Nicodemus comes to Jesus by nightfall to protect his identity from his faith community.  Nicodemus is asking Jesus the deep spiritual questions that are on his heart.  What are those deep spiritual questions that call to us in the night?  Are they questions about prayer, the ‘end times’, how do we live faithfully in a world filled with violence, struggle, and a lack of spiritual insight?  We might ask, why is God allowing me a ‘Do-Over’?!

John 4:5-42 shares the story of an unnamed woman who has a conversation, midday, in the heat of the desert!  She is ostracized by her community; Jesus welcomes her … and invites her to believe that God is available to everyone!  God’s grace is sufficient!  What do we struggle with in our lives that others condemn in us?  Maybe we also condemn those same aspects about ourselves!  And yet, Jesus reminds us that God welcomes us; we are free to live a sacred, faithful life!  We might ask, why is God speaking through me?!

In John 9:1-41, Jesus is faced with multiple issues of people not willing to take responsibility.  There is a man born blind, and no one … not the learned authorities, the family, or the community … is willing to affirm anything about this blind man … not how he became blind or how he was blessed with sight once again!  Like the Samaritan woman last week, we can easily ask, ‘why is God working through me’?!  Am I needing ‘new eyes to see’?!  What am I not seeing that needs to be responded to?!  Am I fully and faithfully responding to Jesus?!

John 11:1-45 invites us to ponder the death of Lazarus, the brother of Mary and Martha, intimates of Jesus.  The ‘resurrection of Lazarus is a reminder that in the midst of life, we are in death.  In this last service before Palm Sunday, we can be asking ourselves, ‘what are we living for, God?!’  Why give us life, only to die in the end; what is the point?  Ponder this season, ‘what is the point of your life?!’   Are you living the kind of life that empowers you to make a difference?

(Our visuals this month come from our Stained Glass Windows.)