New Blog

New Website - New Blog

First United Methodist Church of Bangor has a new blog page and will no longer be posting to this Blogspot site. We invite you to visit our new blog (click here ) and to subscribe to our RSS feed. 

Looking Toward Sunday

"While It Was Still Dark"

Easter Sunday

March 27, 2016

This Sunday we will hear once again the story of Mary Magdalene's early morning visit to the burial place of Jesus. (John 20:1-18 - You can read it by clicking here.) Of course, she discovers that the tomb is empty and Jesus is alive. His death was merely the prelude to new life.

Can the figurative "deaths" that we experience throughout a lifetime also be understood as preludes to new life? Could it be that in the midst of pain, loss, or failure God is preparing us for resurrection - bringing forth new life? Join us as we reflect on what the Spirit might be up to in us "while it is still dark".

See you on Sunday!

Lent at Bangor First

Lenten Worship Series

"Gifts of the Dark Wood"

Guided by Eric Elnes’ book, Gifts of the Dark Wood and inspired by the liturgy of Marcia McFee’s Worship Design Studio, this Lent we’ll reflect on the spiritual awakening and unexpected gifts that can come out of the unsettling times in our lives known famously (or infamously) as "the Dark Wood". 

Though commonly understood as a place to be avoided, the Dark Wood can actually bear blessings. It can be a place of revelation – a place where you discover God – a place where you gain greater clarity about the relationship between you and God, and you and others – a place where you can discern your sense of God’s call for your life – a place of personal and spiritual growth.

Join us on Sundays at 10:30 for worship and 9:15 for small group discussion (see details below) as we explore how the gift s of the Dark Wood can be assets on our journey.

Worship Schedule

February 10: Ash Wednesday at 6 PM

“Where We Find Ourselves”

Matthew 14:22-33

Service with imposition of ashes

February 14: The First Sunday in Lent

“The Gift of Uncertainty”

1 Corinthians 13:11-12

February 21: The Second Sunday in Lent

“The Gift of Emptiness”

Mark 15:22-38

February 28: The Third Sunday in Lent

“The Gift of Being Thunderstruck”

Job 37:1-5

March 6: The Fourth Sunday in Lent

“The Gift of Getting Lost”

Psalm 42; 1 Samuel 3:2-10

March 13: The Fifth Sunday in Lent

“The Gift of Temptation”

2 Corinthians 5:16-19; Luke 4:1-13

March 20: Palm Sunday

“The Gift of Misfits”

Luke 19:29-42a

Small Group Discussion

This DVD discussion series hosted by Rev. Eric Elnes Ph.D (author of Gifts of the Dark Wood) features a special guest each week, with pause points for questions and discussion. While the series stands alone, it is a perfect accompaniment for reading Gifts of the Dark Wood.

February 14—“The Gift of Uncertainty”

Featured guest: Brian McLaren

February 21 – “The Gift of Emptiness”

Featured guest: Chuck Marohnic

February 28 – “The Gift of Being Thunderstruck”

Featured guest: Melvin Bray

March 6 – “The Gift of Getting Lost”

Featured guest: Diana Butler Bass

March 13 – “The Gift of Temptation”

Featured guest: Parker Palmer

March 20 – “The Gift of Misfits”

Featured guest: Lillian Daniel

Looking Toward Sunday

"Waiting for the Christmas Guest"

Fourth Sunday in Advent
Sunday, December 20, 2015

Join us this Sunday for a festive worship service. We'll sing Christmas carols, the Agape Ringers will perform "Deck the Halls", and our drama team will present "Waiting for the Christmas Guest" - a one act play (written by Janet Micli and directed by Roz Fisher). Conrad the cobbler is told in a dream that Jesus will come to pay him a Christmas visit. A number of people show up on Conrad's doorstep, but none of them is Jesus. Or are they...?

See you on Sunday!

Looking Toward Sunday

"The Christmas Story's Supporting Cast" Sermon Series

During Advent our Sunday morning worship will focus on the minor characters in the Christmas story as told in the opening chapters of The Gospel of Luke.

November 29 – “Zechariah’s Time Out”   

Zechariah's story invites us into Advent waiting, reflection, and preparation. It’s a story that invites us to look for God breaking into our lives. It’s a story that invites us to live with expectation.

Luke 1:5-15a; 18-23

December 6 – “Elizabeth’s Long Obedience in the Same Direction”

Elizabeth is a model of patience and perseverance in the face of unanswered prayer. Her story is a lesson in maintaining a posture of hope and staying faithful when the fulfillment of God's promises is delayed.

Luke 1:24-25, 39-45, 57-58

December 13 – “Shepherd Dance”

Each Advent the church invites us to prepare to hear the “good news of great joy for all the people” once again. Along with the shepherds, we're called to gaze into the manger and be overwhelmed by joy. 

Luke 2:8-20           

December 20 – A Christmas Drama: “Waiting for the Christmas Guest”

A retelling of the Tolstoy story, "Papa Panov's Special Day". Conrad the cobbler is told in a dream that Jesus will come to pay him a Christmas visit. A number of people show up on Conrad's doorstep, but none of them is Jesus. Or are they...?

Luke 1:46-56

Looking Toward Sunday

"The Five Practices of Fruitful Living" Sermon Series

How do I cultivate a life that is purposeful, deep, and fruitful? What are the commitments and personal practices that open me to God’s grace? How can I discover the spiritual life and the difference that God intends for me to make in the world? 

In his book, Five Practices of Fruitful Living, United Methodist bishop Robert Schnase shares his answer to these question – the five essential practices that he says are critical for spiritual growth: 

• Radical Hospitality 
• Passionate Worship 
• Intentional Faith Development 
• Risk-Taking Mission and Service 
• Extravagant Generosity 

Join us on Sunday mornings beginning September 20 for this five-week series about how the Five Practices of Fruitful Living can help shape and sustain our life in Christ. 

Looking Toward Sunday

"Room at the Table"

Who is welcome at the table of God's grace? 

That's the question that this week's scripture reading poses. We're focusing on the first part of a passage from Mark's gospel (you can read it by clicking here). It's the uncomfortable story of Jesus' encounter with a tenacious Gentile Syrophoenician woman who comes begging for healing for her daughter. The woman is about as religiously unclean as first-century Jews like Jesus and his disciples could possibly imagine. But in spite of the fact that Jesus seems to initially resist her request, she's not taking "no" for an answer! 

Are there people with whom we resist sharing God's grace? People we think God would (or at least should) turn away? Who are our Syrophoenicians? And are we willing to make room for them at the table? Join us this week as we wrestle with those questions.

See you on Sunday!

P.S. - Check out Julie Stecker's slam-style poem based on the Syrophoenician woman's story. 

Looking Toward Sunday

August Sermon Series

"The Four Things That Matter Most"

“Please forgive me.”

“I forgive you.”

“Thank you.”

“I love you.”

These are four simple statements with enormous power.  In many ways, they are the most powerful words in our language.  In his book The Four Things That Matter Most, Dr. Ira Byock (an international leader in palliative care) takes the experiences of people who were forced by serious illness to face the impending end of their relationships and distills those experiences into practical wisdom that can help any person at any time say and do the things that really matter most in their own life. 

Join us during the month of August as we focus on the “four things” and how practicing those life-affirming words of forgiveness, gratitude and love can mend, tend and nurture relationships.  

See you on Sunday!

Looking Toward Sunday

"Our True Identity"

Seventh Sunday after Pentecost

July 12, 2015

Names are important. The names that we’re given and the names we take for ourselves define us. They form our identities and shape our actions. Some names we choose; others have been given to us (or forced on us). Some names build us up, others hold us down. Our labels become the lens through which we view ourselves and are viewed by others.

What is the name that most identifies you?

In the scripture reading we'll be using this Sunday (you can read it here), Paul reminds us of our real name, our real identity. No matter how powerful our earthly names may be, this is the name that ultimately defines us. This is the name given to us by God: "Beloved". 

What might be the impact if we were to truly claim that name? How might our lives be different if we embraced our primary identity as God's beloved child? How might it change how we see others if we were to acknowledge that their primary identity is also God's beloved child? Join us as we reflect on the power of names and the "love that makes us whole and holy".

See you on Sunday!

"Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, 

had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love."

Ephesians 1:4 (The Message)

Looking Toward Sunday

"Unwrapping Our Gifts" Sermon Series

May 31 - June 14, 2015

Have you ever wondered what sort of ministry God is calling you to do? How you can contribute to a purpose greater than yourself and make a meaningful difference in the world? How you have been uniquely gifted to serve as the heart and hands and feet of Christ?

This Sunday we begin a 3-week spiritual gifts exploration series that will begin to answer those questions. We'll learn more about what "spiritual gifts" are, where they come from, and what their purpose is. On Sunday, June 7 you're invited to a luncheon sponsored by the Lay Leadership Team during which you'll have the opportunity to complete a "Spiritual Gifts Inventory". This inventory will identify the gifts with which the Spirit has equipped and empowered you. (If you can't make it on the 7th, don't worry! You can take the inventory another time.) We'll even have special age-appropriate surveys for the kids who wish to do one.

We hope you'll join us as we discover what our gifts are and begin to discern how God is calling us to use them.

Looking Toward Sunday

"And How Is It That We Hear...?"

Pentecost Sunday

May 24, 2015

This week we're taking a look at the Pentecost story in the Book of Acts. (You can read it here.) It's a dramatic narrative about the Holy Spirit falling on a gathering of the earliest Christians. Filled with the Spirit, they went into the streets of Jerusalem praising God in languages that were foreign to them. Thousands of pilgrims from every country who were in the city to observe the Jewish festival of Pentecost were astonished when they heard the sound of their own native tongue being spoken. The Spirit's Pentecost miracle enabled very diverse people to hear and be heard. The walls of language that separated and divided were dismantled, making genuine communication possible. 

Are we Christians utilizing that particular gift nowadays? In our contentious contemporary culture, could we be doing a better job of communicating with those who speak a different language, figuratively speaking? How can we begin to practice communicating in ways that transcend barriers and lead to reconciliation? 

Join us as we celebrate Pentecost and look to the Spirit to empower us once again with the gift of genuine communication.

See you on Sunday!

Looking Toward Sunday

"Jesus Is Boss"

Transfiguration Sunday

Children's Sunday

May 17, 2015

Join us for an exciting day of worship at Bangor First! It's "Children's Sunday", which means the children and youth will be leading worship. There will be presentations of Bibles and Sunday School certificates. The children's chime choir will play. And there will be worship dance!

This week is also "Ascension Sunday". Pastor Arlene will offer a reflection on the question "What does it mean to say that Jesus is Lord?" ,We'll be looking at the opening verses of the Acts of the Apostles (click here to read) and Paul's Letter to the Ephesians (click here to read).  

See you on Sunday!

Looking Toward Sunday

"Water Is Thicker than Blood"

Fifth Sunday of Easter

May 3, 2015

This week we're taking a look at a passage from the book of Acts. (You can read it here.) It's a story about Philip's Spirit-directed encounter with an Ethiopian eunuch, and the man's subsequent baptism. 

The Ethiopian is a God seeker, but he's also an outsider. He's a gentile, a foreigner, and worst of all, a eunuch (a castrated servant). One scholar suggests that the Ethiopian's status as a eunuch makes him the ultimate outsider - someone who by design has no family, no place, no attachments, no home. But after Philip introduces him to Jesus and baptizes him into the family of faith, the eunuch finally belongs.

Join us as we take a closer look at the Ethiopian's story and reflect on Jesus' invitation to the outsiders of this world to come inside the circle of love in the family of God.

See you on Sunday!

Looking Toward Sunday

"Prisoners of Want"

Fourth Sunday of Easter

April 26, 2015

This week we're taking a look at the iconic 23rd Psalm.(Click here to read it.) We'll be paying particular attention to the very first verse: "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want..." 

There are many things we want in life - most of which have little or nothing to do with God. Our want of those things can potentially distract us from what we truly need. And if we're not careful, those wants can ultimately become a prison for us, keeping us from the genuinely abundant life we so desire. 

Join us as we think about where it is that we seek happiness, security, and meaning. In the Good Shepherd who provides all we need? Or in things that can never truly satisfy?   

See you on Sunday!

Devotion for April 12

Unless I See the Marks

by Steve Garnaas-Holmes

“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”  (John 20.25)

Oh, Thomas was no doubter.

The least naive, he trusted in the dark

the promise of our rising,

the open door of death.

He was the one, when Jesus stood

to go to Lazarus’ tomb in Bethany,

where enemies awaited him

with threats of death, who said,

“Then let us go and die with him.”

Oh, more, not less than all the rest,

Thomas believed in love, and how it bled.

He sought not proof of Jesus’ life,

but marks of what he suffered and forgave,

the scars of Thomas’ own betrayal,

to know that he had risen

not from bed, but from the depths

of hell, where Thomas needed him

to have gone, and been, and left transformed.

He didn’t ask to see his smiling face,

has famous, radiant eyes;

he didn’t hope to see him break the bread

the way he always did.

No, he asked to see his wounds,

the marks of love, the wounds of one

who weeps with those who weep,

who has walked with us through the valley

of the shadow of death.

Oh, Thomas, I’m with you:

I would not follow the safe and happy one,

the well-dressed Christ from a catalogue;

I will follow only the wounded one,

the one with most to forgive

and least reason to expect his hope.

I will follow the loving one with steady eyes,

who knows how much his love will cost.

I will follow the gentle man

with holes in his hands.

Devotion for April 11

My Confession: I Deny the Resurrection 

by Peter Rollins

Without equivocation or hesitation I fully and completely admit that I deny the resurrection of Christ. This is something that anyone who knows me could tell you, and I am not afraid to say it publicly, no matter what some people may think…

I deny the resurrection of Christ every time I do not serve at the feet of the oppressed, each day that I turn my back on the poor; I deny the resurrection of Christ when I close my ears to the cries of the downtrodden and lend my support to an unjust and corrupt system.

However there are moments when I affirm that resurrection, few and far between as they are. I affirm it when I stand up for those who are forced to live on their knees, when I speak for those who have had their tongues torn out, when I cry for those who have no more tears left to shed.

Devotion for the Friday after Easter

Easter Prayer

by Steve Garnaas-Holmes

Loving One,
you are present,

unbound by anything.

Dawning One,
you are in this moment,
not entombed in the past.

Forgiving One,
you are in the freedom of my soul,
not the stones of my surroundings,
not the grave of my deeds.

You whose glory it is to set us free,
deliver me
into the present moment.

You who give life
where there is none,
I live not by surviving
but by being raised
each moment,

with each breath
to have died,
with each breath
to be risen.

Devotion for the Thursday after Easter

We Are Baffled

by Walter Brueggemann

Christ is Risen

He is risen indeed!

We are baffled by the very Easter claim we voice.

Your new life fits none of our categories.

We wonder and stew and argue,

and add clarifying adjectives like “spiritual” and “physical.”

But we remain baffled, seeking clarity and explanation,

we who are prosperous, and full and safe and tenured.

We are baffled and want explanations.

But there are those not baffled, but stunned by the news,

stunned while at minimum wage jobs;

stunned while the body wastes in cancer;

stunned while the fabric of life rots away in fatigue and despair;

stunned while unprosperous and unfull

and unsafe and untenured…

Waiting only for you in your Easter outfit,

waiting for you to say, “Fear not, it is I.”

Deliver us from our bafflement and our many explanations.

Push us over into stunned need and show yourself to us lively.

Easter us in honesty;

Easter us in fear;

Easter us in joy,

and let us be Eastered.  Amen.

Devotion for the Wednesday after Easter

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

by Wendell Berry

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more 
of everything ready-made. Be afraid 
to know your neighbors and to die.

And you will have a window in your head. 
Not even your future will be a mystery 
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card 
and shut away in a little drawer.

When they want you to buy something 
they will call you. When they want you 
to die for profit they will let you know. 
So, friends, every day do something 
that won't compute. Love the Lord. 
Love the world. Work for nothing. 
Take all that you have and be poor. 
Love someone who does not deserve it.

Denounce the government and embrace 
the flag. Hope to live in that free 
republic for which it stands. 
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man 
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers. 
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias. 
Say that your main crop is the forest 
that you did not plant, 
that you will not live to harvest.

Say that the leaves are harvested 
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns. 
Put your faith in the two inches of humus 
that will build under the trees 
every thousand years.

Listen to carrion -- put your ear 
close, and hear the faint chattering 
of the songs that are to come. 
Expect the end of the world. Laugh. 
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful 
though you have considered all the facts. 
So long as women do not go cheap 
for power, please women more than men.

Ask yourself: Will this satisfy 
a woman satisfied to bear a child? 
Will this disturb the sleep 
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields. 
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head 
in her lap. Swear allegiance 
to what is nighest your thoughts.

As soon as the generals and the politicos 
can predict the motions of your mind, 
lose it. Leave it as a sign 
to mark the false trail, the way 
you didn't go.

Be like the fox 
who makes more tracks than necessary, 
some in the wrong direction. 
Practice resurrection.

Devotion for the Tuesday after Easter

 

Easter Morning by Ann Weems

The stirring wildness of God 
   calls brittle bones to leaping 
and stone hearts to soaring.  
Old women dance among the stars.