Brian Shimer
Online Worship on Zoom
Brian Shimer
Zoom Begins this Sunday
Brian Shimer
Join Us for Online Worship
Brian Shimer
Online Worship
Brian Shimer
Worship On Sundays

Palm Sunday: Deeper Dive

We will meet together Sunday at 9 am (link here) to worship and seek God’s face together.  The scripture this week is traditionally Palm Sunday. This time we will not be waving palm branches but sitting in our homes and connecting to the story together.  I will enact part of the story for us to reflect upon together. We know the story -- we know how Jesus entered, the people rejoiced and the priests complained, but we don’t often slow down to go more deeply into the story. This week we will do that deeper dive.  Did you know this story has connections back to Daniel? And just as it connects back, it connects forward to us, today. God has a message to place in our hearts as we walk together.  

It was during troubling times that Jesus mounted that donkey and that colt of a donkey and rode into Jerusalem -- it was the week of Passover, there was an overflowing crowd of people in the city, and the Romans still occupied the area.  The Jews felt under the Roman foot. The Jewish leaders felt a need to appease their rulers.

Holy Week Schedule

Sun, Apr 5, 9:00 am: Palm Sunday

Mon, Apr 6, 5:00 pm: Daily Prayer and Worship

Tue, Apr 7, 1:00 pm: Weekly Connection

Tue, Apr 7, 5:00 pm: Daily Prayer and Worship

Wed, Apr 8, 5:00 pm: Daily Prayer and Worship

Thu, Apr 9, 5:00 pm: Daily Prayer and Worship

Fri, Apr 10, 5:00 pm: Daily Prayer and Worship

Fri, Apr 10, 7:00 pm: Seven Last Words of Christ, presented by Vermont Hills UMC

Sun, Apr 12, 7:00 am: Easter Sunrise Service live on Facebook

Sun, Apr 12, 9:00: Easter Worship Service

Good Friday Service

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Please join Pastor Bo Sanders and Vermont Hills UMC as they present “The Last Seven Words of Christ.” This powerful, moving event will be on Friday, April 10, at 7:00 pm.

Join in on Zoom at https://zoom.us/j/935164728 or by dialing 669 900 6833 on your smart phone and entering meeting ID 935 164 728. Please remember to mute your device.

If you prefer, you may view it live (or later) at https://www.facebook.com/BoCSanders

Next Steps for March 29

Here are the Next Steps, that are normally printed in the church bulletin:

1. Read a passage a day or download the app "Pray as you Go" (pray-as-you-go.org) and follow

2. Start each day turning to Jesus. How does He want you to walk through the day?

3. Give a warm smile to someone every day - online, on your socially-distanced walk, or even through a window. The fruit of the Spirit is much stronger than the fear of the virus.

4. Join our online Pray & Connect group, every Tuesday at 1:00 pm, on Zoom

Brian's Blog: Fruit

Dear Family — 

As we daily need to remember that fear is not listed among the fruit of the Spirit, we need to remember that love is.  “Love, joy, peace, patience, …”. Love is first in that list of what is titled not “fruits” but “fruit.” In other words, they all are part and parcel with the work of God’s Spirit. It is not like we have one of “them” but that we have this “fruit” and they are all there. That list in Galatians 5 is placed in contrast to the works of the flesh, which are obvious.  Notice the fruit of God’s Spirit begins within -- it is made “obvious” by how we act, how we behave in this life.  

Like Corrie Ten Boom wrote after WWII (she was a survivor of the Nazi regiem’s campaign of horror), “The world does not read the Bible -- it reads you and me. The godly man is the ungodly man’s Bible.”  (quoted from her book Each New Day).  And what people “read” is the Spirit of God in our lives.  The beauty, the presence, the peace, the resolve of God’s Holy Spirit at work in our lives is what puts on display the Gospel through our lives.  That “fruit” of God’s Spirit, that love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control, all get displayed in our character and the best time to put the fruit on display is during times of stress.  

People have commented upon the spirit of fear that is in the atmosphere.  I felt it shopping for groceries. I only found one person brave enough to say hello back to my greeting.  Fear is not the answer but it is what is being preached all around us by the purveyors of information. If you are feeling afraid then the fruit of God’s Spirit is not being given a chance.  So, today I would encourage you to: 

  1.  Stop watching the news.  Certainly you need to check in on it, maybe once a day?  But friends, there are people glued to news broadcasts in their homes. That is all they are hearing. And that is not healthy. The best way to experience fear is to keep listening only to that 24/7. Our media has mentioned the coronavirus more than 2.1 billion times since December.  That outstrips anything else in history. And a billion is like counting one number per second for 31.7 years. It is this really large number. That’s so many mentions. I know, it is a big deal, but it is also something around which there is a ton of fear. So, stop watching and pray, read Scripture, go for a walk, breathe the air, laugh, give a virtual hug INSTEAD!  

  2. Start every day turning to Jesus, giving Him your attention, asking for directions on how to walk through the day.  Prayer is so essential in times like this. Grab a verse or devotional thought and live from that. Jesus wants our hearts and our attention especially now, and the more attention we give Him the more His Spirit will be free to produce fruit through our lives.  

  3. When you are out, greet others, look at them (across that 6 foot gap) and give them sincere greetings, check in, ask how they are faring, how you could pray, what their needs are.  Just be present. 

  4. When you are home, reach out to people every day via Zoom, Skype, phone, text or email. In times when people are quarantined, we need touch points with others all the more. So, call people up from the church and from your lists of acquaintances and friends to check in.  An acquaintance wrote to me this week just to ask how I was doing in all this. We need each other.  

The thing about this quarantine is how much more people need one another because of it. All the normal means of distraction removed, people need connection.  We cannot come to the building as a group due to governmental policy from wisdom, but we are able to connect. “The coronavirus leaves over 95 percent of its victims still breathing. But it leaves virtually every member of society afraid, anxious, isolated, alone, and wondering if anyone would even notice if they’re gone. In an increasingly atomized society, the coronavirus could rapidly mutate into an epidemic of despair,” says the author of an excellent article detailing Christian responses to epidemics over history (there have been other pandemics).  Find the whole article here. 

As you start with Jesus and get outside, and breathe, may the Spirit bring forth that fruit of His Spirit in and through your life that others in looking how you are walking in this season might be tempted to ask, “How is it that you have such hope in you?” And you then can tell them. 

Join Mondays at 12 noon with our District Superintendent for a check in and prayer time: Here is the link 

Join in for Zoom prayer and connection -- Tuesdays 1 pm:  Here is the link.  Or phone in at this number: 669 900 6833.

Join in for worship on Sundays at this weekly location -- 9 am each week.  Here is the link. 

You might need to sign up with webex.com in order to download the drivers onto your computer. Some older systems need a boost.  

Join in worship during Holy Week (Monday 4/6 through Friday 4/10) each day at 5 pm for a 45-minute time: we will connect, pray, meditate on one passage of Scripture from that which happened during the last days of Jesus’ life.  Here is the link  Join in! 

Let’s stay connected and keep being the church to others around you. Throughout history this is how the church has put Jesus on display especially during plagues, epidemics and pandemics.  The church was on the front lines.

Worship On Sundays

We will continue to worship online this Sunday at 9:00 am to #StayHomeSaveLives.

To join us online, click here. You will be prompted to install the Webex application if you haven’t done so already. The link should go directly to the worship service at 9:00 am on Sunday. If the link doesn’t work for you, go to webex.com, click ‘Join’ and enter these details:

  • Meeting number (access code):  294 667 249

  • Meeting password: GodIsGood!

You may also join using a smartphone by calling 408-418-9388.

Remember to “mute” your audio when you’re not speaking, to cut down on background noise.

See you there!

Gifts and Talents Workshop

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Now’s the time! You’ve been wanting to learn more about the gifts that God gave just to you. Now you can.

Beginning Monday, March 30, from 3:00 - 4:30 pm, we’ll meet online every day to share and learn. Over just six days, you’ll explore your past, current, and future God-given passions and talents. Instructions on accessing the workshop and daily worksheets will be emailed to you. You will need a microphone and camera on your device to participate.

Register for this free workshop by Saturday, March 28, with Stephanie R or the church office.

Brian's Blog: Connection

Greetings Friends --  

What a journey we are on together. With the #StayHomeSaveLives order now given, we need to rethink church, rethink connection, rethink this journey together for a longer period of time. 

This means all our gatherings “at the building” through Easter and beyond, at this point in time, are canceled: The Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday & Good Friday service, Easter Sunrise, Easter Breakfast, Easter services and Day of Action, all are canceled. We will be offering links to events for these times. I will be offering daily prayer services during Holy Week online.  We will find ways to connect.  

There is interest in offering the Gifts and Talents Workshop again while we are trapped (aka, at home, with #StayHomeSaveLives) and perhaps need a new way to connect, think, dream and move forward. The workshop is a marvelous journey. So, more information will follow on this.  

I am offering weekly times of prayer and connection on a weekly ZOOM call every Tuesday at 1 pm. You simply put this address into your web browser or phone at this number (669 900 6833) and we can connect, pray and share together. 

You may have seen the FACEBOOK event that the church is seeking to identify those in need to help them get groceries, care for needs, transportation to the doctor, or help with income gaps.  We can begin with prayer. But if you would like to give “above and beyond giving” toward a fund at the church to help folk, designate your extra gifts to “Helping Hands.” And if you need assistance, give me a call. Let’s connect you with the resources you need. 

As we seek new ways to go about our lives, a friend’s blog reminded me of how much detail the Old Testament gave to the people journeying into and through their wilderness. 

There are an inordinate number of details given to specific worship and sacrificial practices for these displaced people who had known only slavery for some 10 generations. They didn’t know how to be a people with identity, with a government, religious practice, educational system, system of daily living for themselves. To us the many details of Exodus and Leviticus, especially, might seem tedious. But for these people, God was helping them create space, create a means to replace their slavery mindsets with a new identity; it was space in which to worship, reflect and learn. 

In this time in our wilderness, find ways to make the space for worship, reflection, and continued spiritual development. 

Here’s some ideas for how to do that in these very odd times:

  • For Sunday morning worship online at 9 am here is our weekly link . I invite you to think about how to recreate the sanctuary in your home. See if you can remove distractions, sit in the room with the least clutter and the most open space. Participate by listening to and singing along or reading the psalms and prayers, like usual. Come willing to share. I invite you to mute your own microphone when you are not speaking in conversational moments. This cuts down on background noises -- dogs, slurps, side conversations, etc. In this worship setting, we are having you download links to suggested music (found in the chat section), which then we each listen to on our own devices. I love watching you all as you sway, sing, and participate on mute. Music does not work on most of these “meeting links” that’s why we are listening to the songs ourselves while muted. We are trying to be as familiar online as in person, so it might help you to recreate the space in your home too.

  • Make a ritual of each day spending time in scripture and prayer. Continue your own lenten practice each day. Or explore this Methodist website that offers the morning prayers from the Anglican tradition. They are beautiful. 

  • Connect with each other.  On top of my weekly Tuesday Zoom call, I invite you to connect. Call, email, write one another. You can find the directory on our website. Or email Virginia at office@westsidejourney.org and she will help you connect to it. But don’t wait: call, email, or send a letter to people in your life. Make time to call someone to mind, write something, and send it as a great way to start or end your day.

God gave the people in scripture rituals and specific instructions to sustain them through so, so much -- it was a 40-year “#ObeyGodSaveLives” order as they wandered in the desert.  But God sustained and grew them even “through” that season. God demonstrated inordinate care for them, even though they rejected much of what God offered. So, for us, let’s seek to be intentional about our space and how we spend our time, and God will sustain us too. 

There is a weekly time to connect also with our District Superintendent and many clergy and other local church laity at noon on Mondays which is a great time of prayer, devotion and sharing as well. Join in that time at this link: https://greaternw.zoom.us/j/894709064  

There are ways to connect.  We will publish other means as soon as we learn of them.  And if you are planning groups, please let Virginia know so we can make those known. 

Grace to you all! This is a new season for us.

Love in Christ,

Brian  

Worship This Sunday

We will continue to worship online this Sunday, March 22, in accordance with the bishop’s directive. If you can’t join in on Sunday morning, Pastor Brian has a plan for you, outlined below.

To join us online, click here. You will be prompted to install the Webex application if you haven’t done so already. The link should go directly to the worship service at 9:00 am on Sunday. If the link doesn’t work for you, go to webex.com, click ‘Join’ and enter these details:

  • Meeting number (access code): 628 983 030

  • Meeting password: Q3fdYt4WEw3

You may also join using a smartphone by calling 408-418-9388.

Pastor Brian’s alternate plan for those unable to join on Sunday morning:

A. Listen to your favorite worship song 

B. Read Isaiah 53 and Acts 8 and think about the parallels between the experience of Philip with the Ethiopian Eunuch and the descriptions used in Isaiah 53 about this "Servant" this "Lamb."  Also, compare this to John 1:29 where John the Baptist says "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world."  Notice:  Philip preaches about Jesus based upon Isaiah 53!  Philip saw this passage as referring to Jesus and had seen Jesus go through what was described in Isaiah 53.  

C.  Answer these questions:  What do I learn about Jesus from the writing of Isaiah?  How have I let Jesus carry my sins?  What sins/guilt feel the heaviest to me today?  (make a list)

D.  Pray, uplift that list and welcome Jesus into your list. Also pray for those struggling in this season, for income loss, for difficulties. 

E.  Listen to another worship song.

Closing Thoughts from Pastor Brian: We do not know what will be happening with this virus.  We will seek to keep you informed. We have done everything we know to do to keep you safe in the building when we do get to be together again.  At this point, we plan to worship again in the building on March 29.  If that changes, we will plan alternative worship settings.  Thanks for walking in this season together. Stay connected!  Call people.  Touch base.  Show love. 

Sneak Peek for this Sunday

Some thoughts before you join the worship service online this Sunday:

It started with the word from the Lord:  “Go to the desert road.” In obedience Philip went and there and then given further instructions. The long and short of this was a conversation with a stranger who happened to be reading from this chapter in Isaiah we have been studying. Philip listening and obeying ended up in a conversation with a man from a foreign country in town just for the festival.  He probably was Jewish because of the witness centuries earlier of Queen Esther, who had visited Solomon beginning a Jewish community there. However, here he had been, and here he was perplexed reading Isaiah -- and God sent someone to explain it to him. 

I’ve wondered in life how many such appointments I have missed caught up in my own schedule or fears to take notice.  But I love the story from Acts 8. And I love this line in that passage, “Beginning with that very passage, Philip preached Jesus to him.”  Beginning with the phrase that said, “...he was led like a sheep to the slaughter.” The Ethiopian Eunuch asked what people have asked for generations:  about whom was the prophet writing? And Philip told him Jesus. Jesus described as a lamb 800 years before he was born. Jesus described dying by what could have been crucifixion (before it had been invented) and being buried in a rich man’s tomb.  Jesus described as being “marred beyond human likeness.”  

I was speaking with someone going through a really tough time, and feeling justified in his anger and defensive posture and asked this question, “It sounds like you are feeling betrayed by these people.  Do you think Jesus could relate to that feeling?” And the bravado, the pride, the attempt to deflect and defend vanished and he looked at me suddenly stymied: “Of course he could,” he replied, “he was betrayed by so many.”  “Well, then, do you think since you share that feeling, this situation might be used to help you grow closer to him?”  

Sometimes we spend lots of time saying we believe but less time applying what that means to the real, daily circumstances of our lives.  Perhaps like the Ethiopian we need to face off with the fact that Jesus really did something for us, to change us, to pull us from our own postures of defensiveness and into a place of submission and openness.  And that we too can relate to Him, indeed, can encounter him where we are.  

Don’t skip worship - join us online - but come and let Jesus encounter you in your everyday life. 

How to Worship Online

We will continue to worship online this Sunday, March 22, in accordance with the bishop’s directive.  Worship will begin at 9:00 am.  These directions will take a few minutes, so start early.  Or you may do the setup today, bookmark the page, and join us with your coffee or tea at 9:00!

To join us online, click here. You will be prompted to install the Webex application if you haven’t done so already. The link should go directly to the worship service at 9:00 am on Sunday. If the link doesn’t work for you, go to webex.com, click ‘Join’ and enter these details:

  • Meeting number (access code): 628 983 030

  • Meeting password: Q3fdYt4WEw3

You may also join using a smartphone by calling 408-418-9388.

Social distance but spiritual closeness!

Giving Continues

Dear all --

In this season of isolation from one another and from worship, it is easy to forget that our ministry still continues even when we are not there.  Certainly the building is not as busy, but we still have bills that are part of the greater work that makes it possible to have that space WHEN we get to return there. 

So, as you go about your quarantine if you could still remember to give, that would be great, whenever you normal pattern is set.  

You can use the above link to give online or can send in your support via bill pay with your bank or by the post. Since it looks like this quarantine may last for a while, thanks for remembering the ongoing ministry of our worshiping community!  

Love all around...

Brian

Day of Action 2020

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With the arrival of spring, you know Day of Action can’t be far behind!

This year, on Sunday, April 19, we will re-visit Meadow Park Middle School at 14050 SW Downing St in Beaverton. We will be weeding, planting, and spreading mulch.

We will also be assembling 100 bag lunches to deliver to houseless folks downtown. Amy Fiederowicz is organizing that effort if you would like to contribute.

We will begin with worship at Westside at 8:15 am. Our projects will be from 9:00 - noon, followed by lunch at the school. Plan to join us!

Let's Stay Connected!

The Church Council has instituted a means to try to connect with everyone in the congregation. You ought to receive a text, card, call or email from folk this week to check in on you. If you have needs we could help with, please let us know.

  • Pastor Brian: 503-522-1426, shimer7@gmail.com

  • Wendy Fedderly: 503-475-8526, wendy.fedderly@comcast.net

  • Kari Suppes, 503-381-3292, gobeavs_kari@yahoo.com

If you need a phone number, visit westsidejourney.com/directory.

Thanks for walking in this season together. Stay connected!  Call people.  Touch base.  Show love.