Two Events Forthcoming

 Friends, 

 

There are two things coming soon that I will write about today. 

 

First, the Orange County Pride Parade is scheduled for September 27 at the OC Fairgrounds. The Parade begins at 11:00, followed by a Festival at noon. For the second year, some churches from the Presbytery of Los Ranchos are joining together as “the Affirming Churches of Los Ranchos” for the march. Please consider marching with us. And this year, for the first time, we will have a booth at the Festival. We are trying to dramatically shift the narrative in our country, where too many loud churches call anti-discriminatory practices “woke,” and are pushing agendas to take away the rights of the LGBTQIA community to be legally married or adopt children, not to mention the imposition of discriminatory practices against non-binary and transgender persons. 

 

St. Mark “fought the good fight” many years ago when the State of California was facing “Prop 8” and the PCUSA was facing “Amendment B.” That work is not done. If you are willing to march with or work the booth for the Affirming Churches (or both), please visit this registration page. 

 

Second, the St. Mark worship commission asked me if we could have a “Saturday worship service” on a Sunday, in order to enable the larger congregation to see how the Saturday service expands our worship repertoire. That’s what we will do this weekend. As many of you who have experienced both services know, there are many similarities and some differences between our Saturday and Sunday worship. On Saturday, the “Evening Prayer” is contemplative, a deliberate mixture of music, silence, and words. One key to contemplative worship is that someone can detach from a responsive or unison reading and allow oneself simply to “be” in the moment. Another difference is the musical style, which is sometimes jazz, but better described as more intentionally improvisational on Saturdays. I find improvisation to be one way of participating in God’s activity and creativity in worship, and while it happens in many ways on Sundays, it is more deliberately worked into the music on Saturdays. 

 

The Sunday service has its own creative voice, with excellent organ accompaniment, an excellent choir, a time for the Young Church, a Handbell Ensemble, and some approaches to worship that work more effectively for a larger gathering than a smaller one. What makes us one, even with two services, is that the Scripture, sermon, call to worship, prayers, announcements, and most of the songs are the same on Saturday and Sunday. The presentation is different, but the core identity and message are the same. 

 

When we first studied and decided to initiate the Saturday service, I invited Rich Messenger, who was our Music Director at the time, to be as much a part of it as he wanted. Rich said that he thought it would be better to use his talents on Sunday and to let Saturday take on its own worship personality. One thing I committed to was not to try to build up the Saturday service at the expense of the Sunday service. That is one reason why I often may refer to both services, but try to err on the side of not promoting one at the expense of the other. I cannot tell you how deeply I appreciate both the Saturday and the Sunday worship services – the people, the music, the style, the repertoire, and especially the different ways that the Holy Spirit works in each. 

 

So, this Sunday, we’ll have “Saturday on Sunday.” It seemed like a good weekend to do so, since we have ended “The Well” and the choir will reboot the first Sunday of September. 

 

See you in worship,

Mark of St. Mark

Winding Down and Gearing Up

 Friends, 

 

Thank you all for the warm reception that you gave our guest preacher Kathy Kipp, as well as her family and friends who were visiting, last weekend. Back when I was interviewing here many years ago, one of the references that I contacted said, “St. Mark loves its pastors very well.” That has been true in my experience, and it seems to be true for guest preachers also. Thanks again.

 

This weekend is full of good. On Saturday is our Meet Me at Muldoon’s following worship. Come worship, come listen, come eat, come dance … just come! And, Sunday, we have three things for you. At 8:30 the Lectio Divina group will meet in the Conference Room of the Administration Building. Then, this is the last Summer Choir opportunity. If you show up at 8:30 promptly, you’ll be all ready to lead worship by 9:30. Our Choir Director, Ryan Yoder, is kind of magical like that. And finally, on Sunday, our older children will leave for Eco Club after our Young Church time. As I said, this weekend is full of good. 

 

Then, next Sunday, August 31, we will have a unique worship experience. You’ll love it. (That’s a teaser, folks!) 

 

Now, to gear up for our post-summer church life. I hope you’ve been reading the Faith in Action weeklies, and marking your calendars. You’ve got our “Text Study” series that begins the first week of September on your calendar, right? And the Choir Retreat for September 6^th, followed by the All Church Picnic for September 7? Then, on Monday, September 8, St. Mark has invited the Presbytery of Los Ranchos to join us in a four-week online study of the book, Disarming Leviathan: Loving Your Christian Nationalist Neighbor, from 7:00 – 7:45. Please contact SueJeanne Koh If you have questions. My goodness, the good just keeps on happening. 

 

And there are other things happening in our area among our ministry partners in Orange County. 

-              On Saturday, September 6, the Orange County United Way is having a “kickoff walk” from 8:00 - 9:30am to introduce a new community-wide, 5-year plan to serve Orange County together. A two-mile walk is planned for each of the 34 cities of Orange County. Click here for more information and to register.  

-              On Thursday, September 18, the Presbytery of Los Ranchos will host Rev. CeCe Armstrong and Rev. Tony Larsen as guests. They will also lead the Presbytery worship service at 7:00 PM, at Orange Canaan Presbyterian Church (right across the street from Glenn Martin Elementary!) Click here for more information. 

-              The OC Pride Parade and Festival will take place September 27 at the OC Fairgrounds. St. Mark is joining several other churches in the presbytery to enter the parade. If you would like to be part of the planning, please contact me here and I will send you a zoom link for a planning meeting, Monday, August 25, at 7:00 PM. 

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So much good to do – good things, good trouble, and good work. 

 

Be blessed,

Mark of St. Mark

 Friends, 

 

Last Sunday, we baptized a baby as an act of initiation and welcome into the church. Tomorrow, we will have a memorial for a long-time member and usher here at St. Mark. Between the baby's age, measured in months, and the member's 95 years, we can see the span of what a baptismal journey looks like. So, let’s talk about baptism for a moment. 

 

One of the things that I loved most dearly when leaving my Pentecostal Holiness roots and joining the Presbyterian Church was the practice of infant baptism. To be sure, Presbyterians baptize confirmands and adults when appropriate, and do so joyfully. But infant baptism was a strange thing to me, growing up in a church that exclusively practiced “believer’s baptism.” We would ask, “How do we know this baby will grow up and accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior?” We would wonder if those crazy Presbyterians (Lutherans, Catholics, and other hydrophobic types) imagined there was some kind of magic quality to the water or the ritual, that would affect the baby’s future life. We heard stories of parents whose children were born with life-threatening challenges, frantically searching for a chaplain who could come and baptize the baby to ensure that it could go to heaven. (I remember being taught that the thief on the cross wasn’t baptized, but Jesus assured him he would be in heaven.) Baptizing a child seemed a strange thing when growing up in a tradition that put all of its eggs in the “come to Jesus” basket. 

 

Then, I actually talked to Presbyterians. The water was not magic; neither was the ritual. The baptized infant would – at least this was the intended process – grow up in the church, surrounded by those who had participated in the baptism (never a private event for Presbyterians!), taught in Sunday School, held in prayers, greeted by name even by those whom the child thought was just another ancient person, loved by the community, and one day offered a chance to study and confirm the vows that were made on their behalf when they were infants. And the reason for this process was key: Long before we are capable or willing to confess our faith, God’s grace is present. If Presbyterian theology can be boiled down to anything it is this: God goes first. God’s love is not contingent on our love, God’s grace is not a response to our faith, God is not waiting for us to make the first move. That’s what infant baptism means most of all, and it is exactly why I fell in love with the practice. Even knowing that most biblical narratives about baptism involve adults, it struck me as more biblical than anything else to see baptism as a declaration of God’s grace, not a sign of our decision-making. 

 

Many of us did not grow up in traditions that baptize infants. Still, it is true about our journeys that God’s grace was there all along, and long before we had any say in the matter. I was declared a beloved child of God without any say in the matter, just like I was named Donald Mark without my consent. Whether we are months old or almost a century old, what graces our lives from beginning to end is God’s love. That’s why I have always gravitated toward the song that says, “When we are living, it is in Christ Jesus. And when we’re dying, it is in the Lord. Both in our living and in our dying, we belong to God.” 

 

Amen. 

Mark of St. Mark