by Mona Marquardt | Feb 20, 2023 | Uncategorized
Lent is about looking into the mirror. Not the compact in your purse or the mirror above the bathroom sink, and not the big mirrored doors in a hotel room that show more than you might care to see. It’s not even the 360-degree mirror made famous by the TV show “What...
by Mona Marquardt | Feb 1, 2023 | Uncategorized
Why do we celebrate African-American (Black) History month in February? In 1915, Harvard-educated historian Carter G. Woodson and minister Jesse Moorland founded what’s now known as the Association for the Study of African American Life and History. That organization...
by Mona Marquardt | Jan 11, 2023 | Uncategorized
Most merciful God, your love is as constant as the shining of the sun beyond the clouds. Your ways are deeper than any ocean depths. We bow before you this new year to ask that it may be a year lived in your will and in your grace. Let your Spirit come...
by Mona Marquardt | Dec 23, 2022 | Uncategorized
The lights are dimmed, the candles are lit, and not a creature is stirring, except perhaps for a few sweet, squirmy toddlers. The sermon is ready, the choir is poised, and the organ welcomes all as the prelude begins. Whether you’re sitting...
by Mona Marquardt | Dec 11, 2022 | Uncategorized
In Advent, we pause, prepare our hearts for the coming of Jesus in Christmas, and we remind ourselves that even in the midst of an Amazon-Prime-two-day-shipping world, we are called to live in the tension of waiting and receiving. You see, not only does Advent help us...
by Mona Marquardt | Nov 13, 2022 | Uncategorized
Begin With Thanksgiving Psalm 100:4 tells us, “Enter into His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise.” Thank Him for His patience and forgiveness. Thank Him for the privilege of coming into His presence. Thank Him for what He has done in and through...