“There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love.” -1 John 4:18

Fear can be a terrible paralyzing emotion to live with. There is the fear of an illness making your family bankrupt due to the high cost of medical care. There is the fear of losing your job and not being able to support your family. All these fears, if realized, will bring a “punishment” to those involved whether ostracization, bankruptcy and/or homelessness.

We, as Christians, can put our trust in God and feel the perfect love from Him that casts out the fear and allows us to live above the fear surrounding us. We also have the opportunity through an organization such as Family Promise, to provide a safe environment for those families who have lost their home due to a family illness, a loss of a job or both. St. Paul’s participates in Family Promise along with Trinity Lutheran Church in providing our clients with a free place to stay, meals provided by church members and the support of the church community while they save their money for their rent deposits.

When we provide the meals or chaperone our clients through the night, we have an opportunity to hear their stories. I will never forget the young couple a year ago New Year’s Eve, that shared their story about being pregnant and living in their car. They were so appreciative of the Family Promise program that was giving them that second chance to rise above the fear and shame of their situation. Hopefully, they realize that there are Christians who care and want to share His love with others. What a small inconvenience we experience having to sleep on a cot for one night when there are those who live with the fear of not knowing where they will sleep tonight or how they will ever be able to provide for their family.

Lord, help me to be a beacon of God’s love and hope to those who live in fear. Amen.
-Marilyn Allen

“No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.” -1 John 4:12

I make it a habit to engage, complement, and encourage strangers in public places. I don’t go out of my way to do so, but don’t let an opportunity pass by. In line at the post office. Waiting for a light to change at a street corner. In passing on a dock or in the aisles of the grocery store. At the very least, I make eye contact and smile or nod. I don’t do this for any ulterior motive or for self-aggrandizement. It comes from somewhere deep within, a soul-to-soul connection, even if we never see that person again. And often the blessing bounces back to me.

Two examples stand out in my memory of being particularly touching. And neither of them involved words.

The first was on an airplane trip to New York from Seattle on a hot, muggy August day in the late 1980s seven months pregnant with my third child with my four-year-old son in the seat adjacent to me, and my two-year-old daughter on my lap. Seated in the bulkhead row for more room, we shared the space with a Muslim woman in full traditional dress, only her eyes showing. She, too, was pregnant with two small children. Although we didn’t speak the same language or adhere to the same religion, we shared a mother moment (for five and half hours!) Although I couldn’t see her mouth, her eyes smiled. I smiled back, mother to mother.

The second instance occurred this past fall while visiting the Sistine Chapel at The Vatican. In the utter silence and pressed on all sides with a sea of humanity, a toddler in a stroller next to me dropped her bottle on the marble floor. I bent to pick it up, tapped her mother on the shoulder, and handed the bottle back. The mother smiled and nodded her thanks. Not five minutes later, I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was the same woman. In her hands was a sweater that had dropped from my arm. Now it was my turn to thank her with a smile and a nod.

Whether we rely on words or not, it’s touching one another’s humanity that speaks volumes.

Dear Lord, help us to see the humanity in everyone we meet, regardless of gender or religion or political persuasion. Amen.
-Ashley Sweeney

It was January 12, 1997. A few weeks earlier, my friend Kyle had asked if I wanted to go to church with him at the Episcopal Church in Almaden. Having accepted Christ into my heart a few years earlier and not having a church of my own, I said “yes”. It terrified me to walk into the church that morning because I am incredibly shy, but I knew in my heart that I needed to be there.

Over the next few weeks, my shyness started dissipating and I started getting to know more and more people. I was welcomed as a member of the church on May 18, 1997, which happened to be the day before my 17th birthday, and I was invited to join the choir that fall. Margaret Kvamme, the choir director, was a professor of music at UC Santa Cruz, and I ended up singing under her baton as a member of the Women’s Chorale during part of my time there. Andy Kerr, the director of the Folk Choir, recruited me as a member and even invited me to play special music at one of the Christmas services when he discovered that I was a classical pianist.

Perhaps the person who had the biggest influence on me was Winnie Jackman, one of the sopranos in the choir. I stood next to her every Sunday morning and I learned the liturgy by heart from hearing it spoken in my ear every Sunday. She and her husband Jack would sometimes give me a ride home from choir practice, and I would occasionally run into Jack when I was walking home from school. They were at my wedding at the church in March 2002, and Winnie remarked that she had not cried at her daughter’s wedding, but she had cried at mine.

In June 2014, I received an email from Margaret. Winnie had passed away after a ten-year fight with dementia, and her funeral was to be at the church that Saturday. I was living in central California at the time and was in the process of moving down to southern California with my former husband and my son Daniel, but I knew I needed to be there. My mom offered to watch Daniel for me, and I walked into the building for the first time in 11 years. The funeral was all familiar music, and it was good to see many of the people again.

As I was walking out the door to head back to my parents’ house, I heard Andy’s voice behind me.

“Jen, I expect you to be at folk choir practice tomorrow morning.”

I smiled. It was good to be home again.

Thank you, Lord, for churches that adopt 17 year olds and welcome them back with open arms. Amen.
-Jen McCabe

“In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.” -1 John 4:10

I could write you a very lengthy list of all the ways that my love falls short of the Gospel message, should you have the time and inclination to read it. Out of everything on that list, however, the expression of love that I cannot imagine, let alone emulate, is sending my children (or grandchildren) into the world as an atoning sacrifice for my sins. But seeing as how the sins of the fathers are visited upon the sons (and daughters), isn’t this essentially what we do as parents?

The hard truth is that if we ever hope to bring about the kingdom of God on Earth, what choice do we have? And what choice do our children have if not to atone in some way for the sins of their parents’ generation? It’s either that or learn to live with those sins — and I hope for the sake of my children’s children that they don’t make that choice. Rather than dwell on the sacrificial nature of this passage from 1 John in an Abrahamic sense, I find greater comfort and hope in a line passage from a pop culture icon of my youth, Khalil Gibran:

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.

Lord, thank you for the blessings that are my children and grandchildren. Keep me ever mindful that our children come through us, but not from us. That they are with us, but do not belong to us. They are in your hands, as are all things , and we ask your blessing upon them. Amen.
-Michael Boss

“God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.” -1 John 4:9

One of my favorite lines from the 1896 Book of Common Prayer reads:

If … the Minister shall know any to be an open and notorious evil liver … he shall advertise him …

I don’t know of anyone who considers themselves to be an “evil liver” – notorious or otherwise – but the command to advertise them as such seems a bit much. I am glad we are past the age of naming and shaming those who do wrong, for the temptation (for me) in doing such a thing is to think that would make me a better liver. Well, I’m not. I tromp the same mud each day as the rest of us, and I come to church by God’s gracious invitation and not by my capacity to clean up the outside all nice and spiffy.

When I was conceived, I lay in my mother’s womb for a spell. I was nourished by her and kept safe by her so that in the fullness of time I would be born – a new creature. I believe this life finds us, through the miracle of baptism, gestating within the divine womb of God until the day God delivers us from the womb, through the tomb, and on to new life. We will be transformed from being evil livers to being holy livers. That’s why we pray: Good Lord, de-liver us!

God, you know us all so well. You conceived us, nurtured us, tended to us through thick and thin, and despite all we do that may frustrate you to no end, you hang onto us and call us your beloved children. Help me to believe you believe that about me, and help me live into the reality towards which you are leading me and guiding me. I ask this in the Name of the One who has delivered me from evil. Amen.
-Keith Axberg

“Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.” -1 John 4:7-8

People show love in so many ways. Those who serve others, with love for them and love for the work that they do, seem to be the happiest people that I know. In every ministry, affiliation and career, we are reminded that we are to love one another. As I look at people who really love their jobs, I see that they really love the people they serve as well as the work that they do to serve their customers or clients. In my work as a teacher, I have to take actions sometimes that look a bit unloving and harsh from the outside. These actions are really taken out of love. The students need to be held to a high standard, and I believe that having a high standard for the students and knowing that they can reach this standard shows that I love them and want them to be all they wish to be. Children need us to love them and believe in them, even when they don’t believe in themselves or love themselves. If I did not love the students, I would not care for them so much. It would make my job so much easier if love for the students was not there. I could teach a science lesson, give assignments, grade them and not worry about how they perform. I could leave school at the end of the day and not think about my job until I returned in the morning. I wouldn’t wonder whether my students ate breakfast, were well-rested, or if their homes were safe. I wouldn’t be sad when the end of the year came, and they moved out of my class. I don’t know any teachers that can do their jobs well without love first.

Gracious God, thank you for all the teachers in our lives and the ways in which they do small things with great love. Amen.
-Bonnie Schuh