Towards the summer sermons 2017

Sermon and Worship series for summer 2017

I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

(You, Too?)

Recently we celebrated and gave thanks for the safe arrival of the Assad family, refugees from Syria.  We are happy to have helped sponsor them, and to be able to help them find their way in their new home.  We hope that here they will find what they are looking for.

Their arrival got me thinking of my father -- a refugee from Russia in 1918 when he was only a few months old and his family was part of the wave of German families that had to flee for their lives after the Revolution, with only what they could carry with them, and then 11 years later an immigrant from Germany, where the family found a temporary home, to Canada where they settled for the rest of their life.  Looking back, I think I can say he and his family found what they were looking for -- which was mainly a safe and hopeful place to raise all of us who have come from them.

It does get me thinking, though.  Gets me wondering if I have found what I am looking for -- that is, most deeply looking for, in my life.

Have you?

The Bible is full of stories of people looking for something -- all kinds of things, things they have lost, things that have been taken away from them, things they've never had but that their hearts long for -- the kinds of things that make life whole and good, the way it's meant to be.

Their stories are our story as well, so this summer we'll spend a little time with some of them, with the deeper longings of our own hearts, and with God's care for us and what our hearts are still looking for.

Coincidentally ... and maybe reading about this got me started on this theme ... this summer U2 is on a 25th-anniversary tour of their landmark album, "The Joshua Tree" and one of the huge songs on it is "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For."  Just to refresh your memory, here's a link to an old video of U2 singing the song with a Harlem Gospel Choir, with the choir absolutely taking the song over.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MprgIton-W8&list=RDMprgIton-W8#t=16

And here's a tentative schedule for our summer worship and sermons:

July 2     Adam and Eve: looking for the garden
July 9     Abraham: looking to be a blessing (even though such a poor choice)
July 16   Ruth: looking for love, home and family
July 23   Joseph: looking for God and God's purpose in the chaos of his life
July 30   to be determined - a special treat
Aug 6     Jacob: looking (aching) to be forgiven, reconciled and at peace
Aug 13    David: looking and longing for a chance to do God's will
Aug 20    the exiles: looking for a 2nd (or 3rd or 4th?) chance
Aug 27    child Jesus: looking for a safe little place in the world to grow
Sept 3    John on Patmos: looking for a reason to believe

So I wonder, this summer can we get in touch with our own refugee nature?  With what our hearts are really looking for?  And with how God leads and helps us to find it?