Setlist 5-1-2016

This was the sixth week of Easter (and Easter itself for the Orthodox Church).  Our songs were gathered with this in mind. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, you can find recordings from Sunday morning of a few of them, and below the recordings, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

Wandering by Jameson McGregor

Come Thou Fount

Fall Afresh by Jeremy Riddle

Heart With No Companion by Leonard Cohen

Wayward Ones by The Gladsome Light

Doxology

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

Wandering: This song is about the relentless faithfulness of God to God's commitment to be God-for-us by being God-with-us.  Throughout the Easter season, we are compelled to think seriously about the significance of Jesus' death and resurrection for the divine-human relationship.  A main theme of Wandering is our tendency to observe the movement of God and, intentionally or not, attempt to harness this movement for our own purposes.  It is no secret that Jesus' followers were fully expecting His mission to culminate in an overthrow of Roman oppression and the inauguration of the Kingdom of God.  They saw what Jesus was doing, thought it meant temporal power and deliverance, and thus thought the crucifixion was the end of the story for them--that they had gotten up their hopes for nothing.  On the other side of things, the Jewish authorities that partnered with the Romans to have Jesus eliminated thought they were protecting the movement of God as they understood it, and sought to protect what they held to be the Truth in killing Him.  In the Resurrection, we see Jesus return not with vengeance, but with love--an emphatic yes to God's creation.  God chose to be God-for-us even when we chose to be against God.  Why?  Because that's what God is like.  God is telling a story with us, but God is fully willing and able to cut back against our attempts to derail the story.

Come Thou Fount: In some ways, we might think of Easter as a season in which we devote particular attention to a story about God showing up in the midst of tragedy and transforming despair into Hope.  Come Thou Fount is a petition for the Spirit to transform our minds and hearts into faculties that know how to worship God in light of who God has been for us.  The second stanza talks about raising an Eben-ezer, which we can think of as a monument to God's faithfulness--a reminder of God's showing up for us in the past.  With this in mind, we might think of Easter as a whole as an Eben-ezer we have grafted into our Calendar.

Fall Afresh: We sang this song to look over our shoulder at last week's songs.  This is what we said about Fall Afresh then: We sang this song as a prayer, voicing together our desire for the Spirit to be with us.  In this season, it is fitting to dwell on the fact that the Spirit of the Living God is in fact the catalyst of the Resurrection.  The Spirit is the power that makes dead things live again. In the call to worship yesterday, we acknowledged that there are many kinds of death that we experience, not all of which involve our hearts ceasing to beat.  Change of all kinds is a kind of death, and change seems to be a fundamental part of life.  The Spirit is constantly working to raise us to life--life to the fullest.  So, as many of us are on the edge of new seasons of life (either because we are moving to new schools, new jobs, or because we are ready to break out of a rut we've been in), we sang this song to petition the Spirit to raise us up once again.

Heart With No Companion: This song imagines a greeting that stretches across the gulf of sorrow and despair to give hope to those who feel worthless, aimless, or simply stuck.  This greeting is comprise of a love that is "vast and shattered," which we might imagine as the kind of love that Jesus embodied; the kind of love that Jesus carried through torture, crucifixion, and death.  On Easter, I finished our series of Lent readings by talking about Jesus as a Mirror that was shattered and put back together, but with a series of cracks.  This image might help think about this song--the kind of misery that Jesus experienced allows His love to greet us in the midst of our own struggles.  Furthermore, if the shattering of Jesus means Hope for creation, this love carries with it the Hope of meaning into the most stalled-out circumstances we might face.  

Wayward Ones: We sing this song every time we take communion to remind ourselves of a couple of things.  First, we are a broken people--though we are seeking to become more like Jesus, we often fail at this.  Second, Christ has given Himself for us despite our brokenness.  We take communion to remember the sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf, even though we did not, and do not, deserve it.

Doxology: We close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.

-JM

ITLOTC 4-29-16

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Easter

Easter Peace

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid. John 14:27

Sometimes I get confused by the church calendar.  Take this week for example.  One of the alternative readings is from John 14.  This is the beginning of the priestly prayer.  Jesus is in the middle of a pretty lengthy farewell address with all kinds of good information.  But it strikes me that this should be holy week material, the kind of thing you’d read on Good Friday.  And yet here it is in Easter week six. For six weeks we’ve been doing the discipleship with the confidence the Golden State Warriors. Jesus came back from the grave, what else you got Satan? 

On the other hand we know the story.  The Ascension of the Lord takes place next Thursday followed by one last Sunday and then the Holy Spirit shows up on Pentecost.  That turns out to never be safe.  If you scan the extracanonical literature you’ll find that the tradition includes gruesome deaths for Jesus followers.  So … perhaps these words from Jesus are the right place.   He’s promising peace for his followers hours before He will be crucified.  The more I follow Jesus faithfully the more I find that the only kind of peace that will do me any good is the kind that can be promised hours before a torture death. 

Peace feels like one of those almost too-large-of-an-idea-to-put-into-a-definition topics.  So this week I decided to use one of my sophisticated research tools to help make sense of the term, namely I put it out there on Facebook.

I got all kinds of answers ranging from internal congruence, following the Lord’s will to knowing the one true ring has been destroyed and a Don Williams song.   I got a pretty sophisticated treaty on pacifism and a lot of answers that suggested some form of inner tranquility despite circumstances.  One person included this illustration, which seems to embody all those comments.

If I were to attempt some kind of intertextual exegesis, I might point myself to 1 John 4:18 where the author maintains that peace’s close cousin love casts out all fear.  It seems like regardless of the attribute, life in Christ is concerned with removing fear.   

But the pragmatic part of me always wants to ask, “yeah, but how do you do that.”  One answer I’m learning is that it means moving through the storm, not around it.  I was listening to a discussion between Rob Bell and Richard Rohr last week.  At one point Rob talked about suffering and how suffering is lessened as you move through something again and again.  So for examples, emails that used to keep up him for hours he now no longer thinks twice about.  How did he get there?  By experiencing that email over and over and eventually learning it didn’t really matter. 

This is why, in my opinion, cruciformity is such a prominent part of the discipleship.  It’s not that we are immune to pain, but rather that we are taught how to move through it by volunteering to move through it.  How are you dying today?

Meet Our Newest Finance Team Member 

Anna Tilson 

Name/Family: Anna Tilson; Husband - Adam Tilson; Dog - Bauer Tilson

What do you do?: I am a CPA and work at Jaynes, Reitmeier, Boyd & Therrell (JRBT) here in Waco

Favorite Waco Restaurant: Lula Jane's

TV show you love: Comedy - Friends; Drama - 24 (Hence the name of our dog above), House of Cards, First two seasons of Homeland (Sorry - couldn't choose just one!)

Bible Verse, Chapter, Book you love: The gospels - Again, can't choose just one :)

Something we might not know about you: I LOVE musical theatre, which actually played a role in me marrying my husband. We played opposite of each other in Little Shop of Horrors our senior year of high school and became good friends in the process. We stayed in touch, I secretly loved him, and two years later we started dating. :)

Sumer SS

Instead of having regular Sunday School classes this summer, starting June 5, we will be having Sunday Breakfasts.  These breakfasts will be potluck.  Please consider joining us each morning at 9:30 in the Backside for a time of food, company, and prayer.  Our hope is that this will be a good time for our community to form relationships with one another over the course of the summer.

Thank You To Bekah!

I would like to take a moment to say a HUGE thank you to Bekah West!  Bekah has been volunteering with the Bloom class this entire year, but she also gave of her time during the week to help in any way…and I do mean ANY way I needed!  Without her help and others like her, the UBCKids Ministry would not be possible!  Sadly, She and her husband Ben have been called to serve at another church in our area which means that this coming Sunday will be their last at UBC.  The entire community will feel their loss, but UBCKids will miss Bekah and her faithful, willing and generous heart deeply!  Thank you Bekah and Ben for giving of yourselves for the betterment of our community…especially the smallest among us!

Sincerely~ 

Emily Nance

UBCKids Pastor

Study Hall

It is that time of year again, and study hall at UBC is back.  The church will be open from 10am till midnight on Monday and Tuesday.  We will have snacks, coffee, and drinks all day.  On Tuesday at 10pm, we will have our pancake extravaganza!  If you study at UBC, you will be a #championforthelord during finals.  #yourbestfinalsnow

Work is Worship

Greeters: Blaylocks 

Coffee Makers:  Chad & Joel 

Mug Cleaners:  Madi 

Announcements:

• Sunday:  Acts 16:6-15 "Keep Moving" 
• Study Hall Days: May 2nd and 3rd 
• Trip to Franklins BBQ.  Will Knight and Rick Lhotan will be leading a trip to Franklin's BBQ on Thursday May 19th.  The trip will meat at and leave from UBC @ 6:30 A.M.  If you have questions please email Will @ will.ray.knight@gmail.com.  
• if you are interested in playing softball next fall please email will @will.ray.knight@gmail.com. The cost should be around $30.  

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

Anna Tilson: Anna_Tilson@jrbt.com

Doug McNamee: douglas_mcnamee@baylor.edu

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu

Setlist 4-24-2016

This was both the fifth week of Easter in the life of the Church calendar, and Mister Rogers Sunday in the life of ubc.  Mister Rogers Sunday is a commissioning service of sorts where we celebrate our graduates and commission them to continue to seek to be the presence of Christ to the people they encounter as they move on to new things.  Our songs were gathered with both of these themes in mind. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, you can find recordings from Sunday morning of a few of them, and below the recordings, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

Future/Past by John Mark McMillan

Fall Afresh by Jeremy Riddle

Be Thou My Vision

There by Jameson McGregor

There's A Wideness in God's Mercy by Jameson McGregor (adapted from F. Faber)

Doxology

Recordings:

From time to time, we'll post live recordings of the songs from Sunday morning.  These recordings aren't what you would call polished--sometimes guitars are out of tune, sometimes the vocals are off--but they are records of moments we've shared together.  Here are a couple from this week.

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

Future/Past: This song contrasts God's power, might, and status as Wholly Other, with the notion that God has chosen to be God-for-us and God-with-us.  The Resurrection really seals the deal for both of these ideas, and ultimately intertwines them.  And so, as we live out our stories and grapple with our own anxieties in the face of change or struggle, we can lean into the idea that, though God transcends our problems, God is taking them on with us, carrying with God the same Lordship that places God above our problems in the first place.

Fall Afresh: We sang this song as a prayer, voicing together our desire for the Spirit to be with us.  In this season, it is fitting to dwell on the fact that the Spirit of the Living God is in fact the catalyst of the Resurrection.  The Spirit is the power that makes dead things live again. In the call to worship yesterday, we acknowledged that there are many kinds of death that we experience, not all of which involve our hearts ceasing to beat.  Change of all kinds is a kind of death, and change seems to be a fundamental part of life.  The Spirit is constantly working to raise us to life--life to the fullest.  So, as many of us are on the edge of new seasons of life (either because we are moving to new schools, new jobs, or because we are ready to break out of a rut we've been in), we sang this song to petition the Spirit to raise us up once again.

Be Thou My Vision: We sang this song to close this season of life in our community by seeking guidance in the next season.  As a community who seeks to be formed in the way of Christ, to embrace beauty, and to live on mission, we are in constant need of God to be our vision, wisdom, security, and hope, because we are in constant need of transformation. 

There: This song is an exercise in perspective, noting that God was present before any of our problems, is present in the midst of them, and will be present long after they all fade away.  It is also a personal confession of the unhealthy relationship I've built with anxiety, which is somewhere between addiction and idolatry (if there's even a difference in this case).  

There's A Wideness in God's Mercy: We sang this song to look over our shoulder at last week's songs.  This is what we said about There's a Wideness in God's Mercy then: We sang this song because it is during Easter that we see just how wide God's mercy is.  We are well-versed at finding reasons why God's mercy would not apply to us, and we are perhaps even more well-versed at finding reasons why God's mercy would not apply to them.  This song shines a light at the lies at the heart of these assumption--God is wilder than we ever dreamed, and God's mercy is no different. 

Doxology: We close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.

-JM

ITLOTC 4-22-16

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Easter

On Identifying Christians

By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

-       John 13:35

The term Evangelical is under scrutiny.  Despite the best efforts of some like Truett's Roger Olson, it may be a lost cause.  Even Southern Baptist ethicist Russell Moore, a figure who traditionally has been comfortable with the word’s proximity to conservative politics, has distance himself from it.  Despite your political convictions, this is one of the dangers of language and the loss of meaning.  What a word means to one individual, might be completely different to what it means to another.  When one word is used to describe a voting block that at least in 2004 was described as 55 million strong, you’re likely to get a tent that is, well, too big.

This is not a post about the word evangelical or even politics.  That’s just my example.  This is about intended meaning.  To borrow language from Saussure, the sign may no longer point to the signified.  In Gospel of John, more than the others, Jesus prepares his disciples for his departure.  He gives all kinds of practical wisdom.  One problem Jesus seems to anticipate is the confusion about what will properly signify the people who are Christians.  So he makes a definitive statement here.  The Christian will be identifiable by love. 

C.S. Lewis wrote a book on love called The Four Loves.  In it he explores four different Greek words that get translated as love and differentiates their meanings.  My point is that perhaps Jesus has only muddied the waters in an attempt to offer clarity. 

I have good news for you.  The way Christians claim to know things transcends these potential muddy waters.  We claim to know with the aid of the Spirit.  You have been gifted by God with the ability to see beauty and compassion and I daresay love, even the love that Jesus is talking about here. 

This is important because what ends up signing Christian disciples is often less than flattering.  I have a confession.  I’m more or less suspicious of Christian t-shirts, most of the time they seem like bad advertising to me.  In so far as they represent an opportunity to edify the reader, then I think they are great.  But if they have the purpose of defending a contentious issues (like creation) or drawing boundaries or they are a bad knockoff of a popular cultural image (think Ford symbol that instead spells Lord), I think they are a bad idea.  Because more than likely you’re going to have that one moment in the day when you sin … say throw a can of tuna in the grocery store because your coupon expired, and a that exact moment an atheist walks by.  What have you done?  Confirmed his/her suspicions. 

One time I saw a t-shirt that, in my mind properly critiqued, all other t-shirts.  It read, “They Will Know We Are Christians By Our T-Shirts.”  That of course is a rebuke based on John 13:35.   I think this is a great reminder that the business of following Jesus is not easy.  At the end of the day our measuring stick is our love.  Nothing else.  We should be wary of signs that display our discipleship all too easily.  

So what about you?  How would someone know if you were a Christian? 

Pastoral Associate Applications

If you are part of our UBC community and are interested in serving a pastoral associate, you can apply by clicking here.  Applications are due by 5:00pm on Friday, May 15th. Pastoral associates serve the mission of UBC by serving along full time staff to complete pastoral work as determined by the needs of our community and the desires of the applicant.  Associates will be selected by the staff.  Associates will make a commitment from June 1, 2016 through June  30, 2017.  If you have questions for clarification please email Josh @ josh@ubcwaco.org. 

SS Update

Our last Sunday School of the semester will happen on May 1st.  Sunday summer school will begin in the first week of June. 

Leadership Team Meeting

We will have our April leadership team meeting Sunday Night.  If you were unable to make last months town hall or you would like information on what is being discussed, please email josh@ubcwaco.org.  

Work is Worship

Greeters: Will 

Coffee Makers:  Sarah & Caroline 

Mug Cleaners:  Cooleys 

Announcements:

• Sunday Sermon: Graduation Sunday: Mr. Rogers 
• Study Hall Days: May 2nd and 3rd 
• Trip to Franklins BBQ.  Will Knight and Rick Lhotan will be leading a trip to Franklin's BBQ on Thursday May 19th.  The trip will meat at and leave from UBC @ 6:30 A.M.  If you have questions please email Will @ will.ray.knight@gmail.com.  
• if you are interested in playing softball next fall please email will @will.ray.knight@gmail.com. The cost should be around $30.  

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu

ITLOTC 4-15-2016

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Easter

Picked by God

My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me.  I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand.  – John 10:27-8

My junior and senior year of college I really upped my theology game.  Actually that’s when I began my theology game.  I think we have a habit of doing theology or owning/articulating a theology when we sense it matters for our life.  Said differently, we only care about what we feel really impacts our lives.  For my 21 year old post-evangelical self, that was in the fires of the Calvinism/Arminianism debate. 

I went to a college that had previously employed two professors who became figureheads in this conversation, so Bethel felt like a hotbed of human freedom debate.  Let me take the drama out of this post.  I was then and still am a version of Arminian.  But the confession that means more now is that I just don’t care as much about this as I used to.  Retrospectively, I can now see that, like so many of the theologies that were important to me, being right about this was another form of idolatry in my life.  Now I’m much more comfortable admitting there is a motif of determinism in scripture and a motif of human culpability and freedom.  There are philosophical systems on both sides of the debate that read that last sentence and are all too eager to say “yes and that is precisely why _______________ism is true.”  It won’t surprise most people to know that at the end of the day I find the mystery of their compatibility and the kind of worship cultivated in the heart by the stories that employee both motifs much more inspiring than I do the air tight logic promised by both proposals. 

When I was a junior I had a roommate who was extremely intelligent, patient and kind.   He was also thoroughly reformed.  So we’d stay up until 2:00 AM shooting our Wells Fargo basketball into a Nerf hoop, drinking cherry coke, eating chips and salsa and chatting about the mysteries of theodicy and sovereignty.  One day I asked him to make me a Calvinist without using Paul.  “No problem,” he replied.  And for a few weeks we combed through the scriptures and he made his case. 

I remember vividly when he quoted me John 10:27-8.  Granted I didn’t care much for John at the time, I had one of those “how have I missed this?” moments.  I struggled for weeks and then months asking how Jesus himself could have been in the business not just of selecting certain sheep, but more offensively not selecting others. 

-------

What I’m going to tell you is not new at all, but then again saying something new in theology or biblical studies is like trying show the world a color it has never seen before.  It’s difficult. 

-------

At some point this last year I showed a clip from first The Lord of the Rings in which Frodo volunteers to walk the ring of power to Mordor.  I’m always struck by Gandalf’s face when he first hears Frodo volunteer for the task.  It reminds me of the face of pained parent.  The grief derived from all the trouble Frodo will face and all that it will demand of Frodo is displayed in Gandalf’s knowing expression of anguish.  I also think Gandalf’s face displays a proper reluctance. 

People who are called to do something are motivated by something more than recognition or even desire.  They are driven by a purpose, which can transcend emotion.  That’s how I understand Frodo’s task.  He was made to take the ring to Mordor.  He was elected to do so. 

------

A popular way to understand John 10:27-8 is to assume that Jesus is speaking salvation.  This is then a definitive claim that some of us are predestined for heaven and some of us for hell.  There is another way to understand these verses and that is that election is about service.  It is about task and kingdom work.  Being picked doesn’t come at the expense of everyone else going to hell, it comes at the expense of you being mapped on a discipleship trajectory by God’s grace. And if we really understood that instead of jumping up and down about having won the salvation lottery, we'd wear Gandalf's expression of reluctance and pain.  Just ask Peter, Paul, or any other martyr who followed Jesus unto death.  Election is about awesome responsibility. 

Missiologist Leslie Newbigin says: “To be chosen, to be elect, therefore does not mean that the elect are the saved and the rest are lost.  To be elect in Christ Jesus, and there is no other election, means to be incorporated into his mission to the world, to be the bearer of God's saving purpose for his whole world, to be the sign and agent and the firstfruit of his blessed kingdom which is for all.”

My thoughts.  What are yours? 

Pastoral Associate Applications

If you are part of our UBC community and are interested in serving a pastoral associate, you can apply by clicking here.  Applications are due by 5:00pm on Friday, May 15th. Pastoral associates serve the mission of UBC by serving along full time staff to complete pastoral work as determined by the needs of our community and the desires of the applicant.  Associates will be selected by the staff.  Associates will make a commitment from June 1, 2016 through June  30, 2017.  If you have questions for clarification please email Josh @ josh@ubcwaco.org. 

Last Philosophy Talk

This Wednesday evening, April 20th, Chris Tweedt will lead his final philosophy talk at UBC from 7:30-8:30 PM.  

Here's a brief description of what will be talked about: 

Who, If Anyone, Should We Trust about Religion?

Should we trust people about religious matters? If so, who should we trust? There's a lot of disagreement about religion; should that make us more hesitant to trust others about it? Should consensus make us more trusting? 

We'll discuss answers philosophers have given to these questions and others during this philosophy discussion hour.

 If you have any questions email josh@ubcwaco.org. 

UBC Finance Team

Do you love excel spread sheets?  Is April 15th your favorite day after you own birthday?  You may be the person we are looking for to serve on the UBC finance team. Interested persons should submit their name to josh@ubcwaco.org.  Here is some information taken from the bylaws about the finance team.  

(A) Purpose.  The Finance Team shall exist for the following purposes:

a.     To serve as the primary advisory group for the Leadership Team in all budgetary and financial aspects of the church. 

b.    To oversee, in coordination with the ministerial staff, yearly budgetary processes, working to create a financial ministry plan in alignment with the ethos, mission and values of UBC.

c.     To advise the staff and Leadership Team on any emergency financial matters that may arise with regards to the physical infrastructure of the church building, as well as those matters pertaining to compensation and benefits of personnel.

d.    To assess the current financial status of the church on a monthly basis and advise the staff and Leadership Team on matters concerning changes in planned ministry expenses.

e.    To advise the Human Resources/Staff Support team on all financial matters regarding new and existing personnel, including available resources concerning salaries, salary increases, insurance, taxes, etc.

f.      To advise the church body on all matters relating to stewardship, financial integrity, etc.

(C)  Qualifications.  Finance Team members shall have been an active participant in the life of UBC for at least a year, have received at least a bachelors degree level of education (or roughly an equivalent amount of experience in business or finance,) and have at least a basic understanding of financial reports and budgets.

Work is Worship

Greeters: Luke Blaylock 

Coffee Makers:   Sarah & Caroline 

Mug Cleaners:  Leigh & Stephen

Announcements:

• Sunday Sermon: Acts 9:36-43 "Ordinary Dorcas"
• Backside, April 22nd.  If you have art to display on a wall or in space or music to fill our ears, then you might be interested in the backside.  email jamie@ubcwaco.org 
• Study Hall Days: May 2nd and 3rd 
• Trip to Franklins BBQ.  Will Knight and Rick Lhotan will be leading a trip to Franklin's BBQ on Thursday May 19th.  The trip will meat at and leave from UBC @ 6:30 A.M.  If you have questions please email Will @ will.ray.knight@gmail.com.  

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Tom Haines: thomas_haines@baylor.edu

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Chris Kim: chris_kim@alumni.baylor.edu

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu

Setlist 4-10-2016

This was the third week of Easter, and our songs were gathered around that theme. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

Heart Won't Stop by John Mark McMillan

Amazing Grace by Citizens and Saints

All the Poor and Powerless by All Sons and Daughters

When Death Came Calling by Jameson McGregor

All Creatures of our God and King

Doxology

Recordings:

From time to time, we'll post live recordings of the songs from Sunday morning.  Here are a couple from this week.

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

Heart Won't Stop: This song echoes Psalm 139's sentiment that there is no place we can go to escape God; that God keeps choosing to be God for us, regardless of whether or not we are good at being people of God.  That idea is huge from the vantage point of the Psalms, but it seems like it is wholly overshadowed in light of the Resurrection--it's not just that God is God for us regardless of where we hang our hats, but rather that God has chosen to be God with us in the midst of our darkest moments, and rewrote the cycle of life and death to make this known to us.  If you've never heard the original version of this song, you should go look it up.  In the meantime, here is a video of John Mark McMillan performing it....with Stand By Me mashed in their too...

Amazing Grace: While we spent the season of Lent thinking about sin, we will spend the season of Easter thinking about grace.  This song by no means captures the fullness of what might be said of the grace revealed in the death and Resurrection of Jesus, but it's a good start.  I think most poignantly, it doesn't just speak to the effect of grace upon our salvation--that gets a lot of airtime (and, yeah, it's important)--but instead speaks to the way grace affects our lives here and now.  In choosing to be God for us by being God-with-us, God has given us a vantage point from which we can truly be alive:  the end of the human life is no longer death but resurrection.  The Resurrection wove a new kind of beauty into life that we can now embrace.  This is a grace to us.  

All the Poor and Powerless: The Resurrection is good news in too many ways to count.  Some look to the Resurrection at the moment in Jesus' life where His divinity was finally made clear, which makes sense, since even the disciples seemed to be on the fence up until the end.  So we might think of the Resurrection as the moment where all the things that people knew to be true of Jesus became things they knew to be true of God in a new way.  One of those things was that Jesus stood with the people on the bottom rung of society--with the ones other people didn't care for or think were good enough in general.  The Resurrection made it clear that this wasn't just some guy who, from some vantage points, was also worthy of very little attention, but instead was God.  That's the kind of thing you'd want to shout from a mountain--that God stands with the afflicted, the unimportant, the cast-off and unloved--and that's why we sang this song.

When Death Came Calling: This is a song about grief in light of the Resurrection.  We often hear associated with Easter that death has lost it's sting.  That's always been perplexing to me, and I didn't have to live very much life to realize that the most literal meaning of that phrase was simply not true.  Death stings.  Sometimes it's a sting that causes debilitating emotional pain.  Sometimes it's a sting that seems to carry a toxin that leaves your entire body and mind numb.  For a while, I thought I was a bad Christian for wearing grief heavily, but then I finally acquired some context to put behind the famous "Jesus wept" verse--Jesus wept because He was grieving, and He was grieving because death is grief-worthy.  And I think this is still true after the Resurrection.  The sting that death lost is a sting of a different kind, perhaps better labeled "finality."  It's a sting that we will find missing later, replaced by the beauty of creation reborn.

All Creatures of Our God and King: We sang this song to look over our shoulder at last week's songs.  This is what we said about All Creatures of Our God and King then: We sang this song to begin our time together proclaiming that the resurrection of Jesus affected more than just our personal salvation--it was an emphatic yes to life, to creation as a whole.  Now every inch of the cosmos sings a song not just proclaiming that it was created by God, but that God entered into it, took on the cycle of life and death that permeates the whole of creation, and ultimately broke through that cycle and crowned it with Resurrection.

Doxology: We close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.

-JM

ITLOTC 4-8-16

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Easter

Picking that guy?!?

I'm not preaching Sunday, but I've made it a discipline to read the lectionary texts weekly anyhow.  I'm especially intrigued by the Easter season because it usually includes something from Acts.  Acts is increasingly becoming one of my favorite books of the bible.  It is full of questions for a church without a completely formed identity asking questions about how to do stuff.  New situations are constantly thrust upon Jesus' followers without an instructional manual, but with the promise of the Spirit. 

This weeks reading is Acts 9.  You know this story even if you don't know Acts 9.  Paul is knocked to the ground by a light from heaven.  He hears and sees what everyone else can only hear.  He's temporarily blinded by what has to be the most dramatic conversion story to this day.  

There's a version of Christian theology that posits God always knew/knows from eternity past and future (both words predicated on the concept of time which officially had status after God gave it essence) what He would do.  I say that because any time you try and peer into the life of the Trinity and ask the question "what was God thinking?" you're really asking something that may be nonsensical. Still I find myself wondering what God was thinking in picking Saul/Paul.  

My curiosity is addressed in the figure Ananias.  He has the same question.  "Wait, who did you pick?  Isn't that the guy that's trying to kill all of us?"  Yes, that is the guy that God picked.  The one who was trying to kill all of us.  God sees something in Paul that we can't before Acts 9. God believes that Paul can change. 

Have you ever thought about listing an "ability to change" as an attribute?  We tend to celebrate terms like flexibility and open-mindedness, but I don't think we collective value change.  Change is often seen as weak.  

I've been eligible to vote in US political elections since 2000.  I didn't really start paying attention until 2004 when George W. Bush defended his title against John Kerry.  Here's what I remember.  I remember protestors standing outside Kerry rallies yelling "Flip, Flop" as though his amendments on positions was unforgivable.  I was naive then, I didn't know that position changes often have more to do with political expediency than they do a heartfelt shift in convictions.  Still even in the world of ethically muddy politics we see glimmers of healthy change.  Paul Ryan recently apologized for his past positions and more importantly, comments on poor people.  I suppose that this too could have been for selfish reasons, but from my limited vantage point it looked like a genuine change.  

One of my favorite theologians is Clark Pinnock.  I have several of his books on my shelf including two that he wrote on reading scripture. They represent two ends of a spectrum.  Pinnock wrote both of them with conviction and passion, but somewhere between them he changed.  

Both books are more valuable because of the visible migration within his theology.  Readers are able to see what change looks like.

One of the reasons I find change to be such an attractive feature is because it requires another kingdom characteristic—humility.  In order to change, one has to be willing to acknowledge that his/her previous convictions were wrong.  That takes large amount of maturity. But the bigger reason is because we must change.  Our sanctification is predicated on the supposition that like God believed transformation was possible in the life of Paul, transformation is also a must in our lives.  Grace makes change possible and then invites us into it. 

How might the Spirit be changing you? 

UBC Finance Team

Do you love excel spread sheets?  Is April 15th your favorite day after you own birthday?  You may be the person we are looking for to serve on the UBC finance team. Interested persons should submit their name to josh@ubcwaco.org.  Here is some information taken from the bylaws about the finance team.  

(A) Purpose.  The Finance Team shall exist for the following purposes:

a.     To serve as the primary advisory group for the Leadership Team in all budgetary and financial aspects of the church. 

b.    To oversee, in coordination with the ministerial staff, yearly budgetary processes, working to create a financial ministry plan in alignment with the ethos, mission and values of UBC.

c.     To advise the staff and Leadership Team on any emergency financial matters that may arise with regards to the physical infrastructure of the church building, as well as those matters pertaining to compensation and benefits of personnel.

d.    To assess the current financial status of the church on a monthly basis and advise the staff and Leadership Team on matters concerning changes in planned ministry expenses.

e.    To advise the Human Resources/Staff Support team on all financial matters regarding new and existing personnel, including available resources concerning salaries, salary increases, insurance, taxes, etc.

f.      To advise the church body on all matters relating to stewardship, financial integrity, etc.

(C)  Qualifications.  Finance Team members shall have been an active participant in the life of UBC for at least a year, have received at least a bachelors degree level of education (or roughly an equivalent amount of experience in business or finance,) and have at least a basic understanding of financial reports and budgets.

Families @ Baylor Soccer Fields

The UBC families will be meeting at the Baylor Soccer fields Sunday after church to throw frisbees, footballs and have fun.  Pizza and drinks will be provided.  If you are interested in Attending, please email josh@ubcwaco.org. 

Graduate Luncheon

If you are graduating in 2016 (May, August, or December), we would like you to stay for lunch on Sunday, April 24th, after church.  This is a great opportunity for and the staff to reflect on your time at UBC, and we will feed you some delicious Waco grub.  There is a sign-up sheet in the foyer the next two Sundays, please sign-up if you would like to come.  The luncheon is only for graduates and staff.  If you have any questions, please email toph@ubcwaco.org 

Thailand Shirts

If you would like to buy a Thailand mission team shirt, time is running out.  The shirt will only be one sale till April 17th, so make sure to purchase one before it’s too late.  All profits go to our team members to help them go on the trip.  If you have any questions, please email toph@ubcwaco.org   You can buy a shirt by following this link: http://www.ubcwaco.org/new-page/

Work is Worship

Greeters:  Marygale and Rick 

Coffee Makers:  Stephen & Emmy 

Mug Cleaners: Team Lee 

Announcements:

• Sunday Sermon: Revelation 5:11-14 ... please be in prayer for our friend and fellow UBCer Mick Colananni who will be preaching this Sunday. 
• Backside, April 22nd.  If you have art to display on a wall or in space or music to fill our ears, then you might be interested in the backside.  email jamie@ubcwaco.org 
• Study Hall Days: May 2nd and 3rd 
• Chris Tweedt will be leading a series of three talks about the intersection of faith and philosophy. Talks will run in the evening from 7:30-8:30 and will take place at UBC. for more information email Chris @ christweedt@gmail.com
  • Feb 24: Perceiving God or Arguing for God?
  • Mar 23: What Does God Think About Suffering?
  • April 20: Who, If Anyone, Should We Trust about Religion? 

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Tom Haines: thomas_haines@baylor.edu

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Chris Kim: chris_kim@alumni.baylor.edu

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu

Setlist 4-3-2016

This was the second week of Easter, and our songs were gathered around that theme. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

All Creatures of our God and King

Murdered Son by John Mark McMillan

Because He Lives

There's A Wideness In God's Mercy by Jameson McGregor (adapted from Frederick Faber)

Wayward Ones by The Gladsome Light

Doxology

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

All Creatures of Our God and King: We sang this song to begin our time together proclaiming that the resurrection of Jesus affected more than just our personal salvation--it was an emphatic yes to life, to creation as a whole.  Now every inch of the cosmos sings a song not just proclaiming that it was created by God, but that God entered into it, took on the cycle of life and death that permeates the whole of creation, and ultimately broke through that cycle and crowned it with Resurrection.

Murdered Son: We sang this song for a couple of reasons.  One was to reflect on what God did to and for us in the death and resurrection of Jesus.  The verses talk about God setting us up above all the stars, raising us high above our station, making us "friends" of God, hiding our faults, and breaking us out of the cycle of dust and grave.  Another reason we sang this song was to think what it took for God to do this.  The chorus praises God's "murdered son."  This language can be jarring, but it is accurate.  It serves as a reminder that what God did for us in Jesus was not simply an act of kindness done at no expense.  Instead, it meant God becoming human and enduring suffering, the one who is powerful taking on the position of one who is on the bottom end of a power differential--it meant God entering into everything God is pulling us out of.

Because He Lives:  We sang this song to look over our shoulder at last week's songs.  This is what we said about Because He Lives then: We sang this song to remind ourselves that the Resurrection has an effect on our daily lives--that it is relevant for our own outlook on life.  Everything is different because of this moment.  Everything has changed.  Every story now gets woven into a greater story, and tragedies don't triumph in the end.

There's A Wideness in God's Mercy: This song was written in 1854 by Frederick Faber.  I encountered a quote from it recently that I couldn't get of my head, so I looked it up.  I suppose we don't always choose the things that hijack out brains, so I don't know that I can offer a thorough reason for why I chose to adapt it.  I kept reading this hymn text, and eventually read it with a guitar in hand.  Shortly after, I started chopping it up.  What I ended up with is a fairly small percentage of the total song, but you can google the whole thing if you'd like.  For me, this song shines a light on the scope of the relationship between God's love and God's mercy, as revealed in the death and resurrection of Jesus, and then causes us to shine a light on ourselves and the ways we try to put stipulations on the love of God--the line of thinking that leaves us doubting whether or not God could really love us, or sometimes, them.

Wayward Ones: We sing this song every time we take communion to remind ourselves of a couple of things.  First, we are a broken people--though we are seeking to become more like Jesus, we often fail at this.  Second, Christ has given Himself for us despite our brokenness.  We take communion to remember the sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf, even though we did not, and do not, deserve it.

Doxology: We close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.

-JM

ITLOTC 4-1-16

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Easter

Easter Allegiance

“the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him.”

 – Acts 5:32 

My absolute favorite thing about my life right now is one of Wendell’s little board books titled Elmo Says.  The premise will be familiar to you.  It’s a game of Simon Says, but Simon’s name has been substituted with Elmo's.   Elmo asks readers to participate in a series of about twelve stunts that you usually come in pairs that rhyme. 

What’s astonishing to me is how eager my children are to listen to Elmo when compared to listening to me.   If I have to get my kids to take a bath or clean their rooms it’s like herding cats.   Elmo on the other hand can get them all to do the shimmy shake, fly like a plane, and waddle like a duck without as much as lifting a finger. 

We are in Easter week 1.  Having just finished the Lenten season I find myself reflecting on my pledge to give something up.  The goal, among other things, I assume was cultivate in me a greater sense of obedience.  The fidelity found in my love for God was allegedly deepened by my commitment to love Him without the comfort of (fill in the blank).  I wonder though if I am any more obedient than I was before Lent. 

 Obedience has had my attention for some time.  It’s what I spent my time thinking about during Lent and the mechanism with which I took measure of my spirituality during the same.  It strikes me that obedience is as about as popular of an idea as sin or sacrifice.  Obedience is a commitment to live a kind of life.  In the Christian tradition the contract is written on our hearts and sealed by the Spirit.  God is not into legalism, but He is into cultivation and whatever the medium is that God is using to form you, I’ve found that honoring that instinct is important for growth.

I was surprised after this Lenten season to read the alternative text from Acts for Easter 2 in the lectionary and see 5:32, “the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him.” 

I will confess something to you.  I have a theological struggle.  It doesn’t take a seminary degree or even much theological aptitude to sniff out the heresy in the health and wealth gospel.  And yet I’ve not been able to let go of the idea that Divine Relationship, though marked by grace, demands something from us.  And perhaps it’s not that God withholds something from us in response (if we are disobedient), but rather that we set ourselves up to receive something passively from God if we do what He says.  Obedience is not the prerequisite to receive grace from God, but it is the mode of the Spirit in Acts 5.

So let me ask you something.  In what way may God be demanding more allegiance from you?  What habit, routine, or behavior might the Spirit be prompting you to hand to God in exchange for something more beautiful? 

Pastoral Associate Applications

If you are part of our UBC community and are interested in serving a pastoral associate, you can apply by clicking here.  Applications are due by 5:00pm on Friday, May 15th. Pastoral associates serve the mission of UBC by serving along full time staff to complete pastoral work as determined by the needs of our community and the desires of the applicant.  Associates will be selected by the staff.  Associates will make a commitment from June 1, 2016 through June  30, 2017.  If you have questions for clarification please email Josh @ josh@ubcwaco.org. 

Lost and Found

Our lost and found is beginning to pile up! Come by and check for any missing items or call the office. Due to lack of storage space, we will be donating all lost and found items every three months to Goodwill. Our next donation will be April 30th.

Thailand Mission Team

If you would like to support our team members going on the Thailand Mission Trip in May, you can purchase a shirt by following this link:

http://www.ubcwaco.org/new-page/

EasyTithe Glitch

EasyTithe alerted us to a company-wide bug on March 28. In a few cases, reoccurring givers (who give on the 28th of each month) were charged twice. EasyTithe immediately noticed the problem and refunded the second withdrawal for all those affected by this issue. Only two UBCers were affected. We simply wanted to alert people to the recent problem with EasyTithe. 

Work is Worship

Greeters:  Walters and Evie 

Coffee Makers:  Madi 

Mug Cleaners: Carson 

Announcements:

• Sunday Sermon: John 20:19-30
• If you are graduating in May, August, or December 2016, we would love to have you stay for lunch after church on April 24th.  There will be a sign-up sheet in the foyer starting on April 3rd. Please contact toph@ubcwaco.org for more information.
• Chris Tweedt will be leading a series of three talks about the intersection of faith and philosophy. Talks will run in the evening from 7:30-8:30 and will take place at UBC. for more information email Chris @ christweedt@gmail.com
  • Feb 24: Perceiving God or Arguing for God?
  • Mar 23: What Does God Think About Suffering?
  • April 20: Who, If Anyone, Should We Trust about Religion? 

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Tom Haines: thomas_haines@baylor.edu

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Chris Kim: chris_kim@alumni.baylor.edu

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu

The Mirror in the Wilderness (Part 7)

This is the final entry in a series of readings that were shared during our Sunday morning gatherings through Lent.  You can find the other installments here: (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6)

---

During Lent, we have been looking at Jesus as a Mirror that perfectly reveals to us who we have been and who we are, in all of our brokenness. 

In the Mirror, we are known. 

That image came from a Barbara Brown Taylor reading I shared on Ash Wednesday, and again on Friday.  She says that the reaction of the Romans, the Jews, and all of us, upon seeing ourselves for who we really are in this Mirror, is to smash it every way we can.  And so, on Friday, we remembered the shattering of Jesus.  But today we are reminded that the shattering didn’t take.  The Mirror was made whole again.

Only now, this Mirror carries a network of cracks—scars of the shattering.  The cracks don’t obscure the reflection, but they do transform it in a way.  We see a different kind of self looking back at us—the kind only a broken mirror can reveal. Held in tension with the truth about who we have been, and who we are, we find reflected back at us the truth about who we can be, and about what we can do; the truth that we can be changed.

Yes, now the Mirror tells us a story about who we’ve been, who we are, and who we can be.  In the Mirror, we are known.  In the Mirror, we are loved.

And in the cracks, we see another story.  A story that makes the cracks in our own hearts ache.  A story that makes our own broken pieces cry out.  It’s a story where we see what God makes of broken pieces, and where we start to see what God might make of us. We see the cycle of birth, living, and death--the song that has been sung for ages, both through the various seasons that make up a single life, and in life itself—now crowned with Resurrection; an emphatic yes to life.  And this changes everything.  And in the midst of everything, we find it changes us.

In the Mirror, we are known. In the Mirror, we are loved. In the Mirror, we are transformed.

No longer people of the shattering, we are resurrection people. Those who mourn deeply the loss or violation of life, because we know that life is most definitely a gift.  And those who hope fiercely because we have seen just how far God is willing to go to put broken pieces back together. Freed from the finality of death that haunts us, threatens to paralyze us, we are able to embrace the fullness of the beauty that God has woven into life.

Yes, we are resurrection people.  Those who in the once-shattered Mirror of Christ are known, loved, transformed, and free.

--

JM

Setlist 3-27-2016

This week was Easter, and our songs were gathered around that theme. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

In the Night by Andrew Peterson

Death In His Grave by John Mark McMillan

How Great Thou Art

Hope by Jameson McGregor

Because He Lives

Doxology

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

In the Night: This song is a journey through the biblical narrative, cataloguing the process of struggle and victory, woundedness and healing, etc., strung together by the refrain "In the night, my hope lives on."  We've added a verse to the song each week of Lent as we made our way to this week.  This song as a whole is an exercise in looking back to look forward--looking at what God has done in dark places as a reassurance that God will not abandon us to our own darkness.  

Death In His Grave: We sang this song to proclaim the death of Death in the death and resurrection of Jesus, and also to think about the changes this brings about for our own lives.

How Great Thou Art: We sang this song to praise God on perhaps three different levels.  First, we have images of God forming worlds on the cosmic scene.  Second, we have the Easter story.  And third, we have the future hope of reconciliation between God and creation on a large scale.  God's "greatness" in this song might be attributed to the fact that God not only made the cosmos, but takes notice of humanity within that sprawl--and not just "notice," God emptied Godself out for the good of the divine-human relationship--and so, we can expect that God will continue to be this overwhelmingly loving creator for us.

Hope:  On Easter, we get the resolution to a plot we have been following since Advent.  In the midst of the darkness of Advent, we held out hope that a light would come.  And we found on Christmas that God lit a fire in our darkness.  In the weeks since, we have watched with bated breath to see how the Light fared in the darkness.  On Easter, we see conclusively that the darkness did not overcome it.  This song is about that story, and it's about the analogues of that story that we experience throughout our own lives.  God is still lighting fires in our darkness, and the darkness is still not overcoming them.  And now, on Easter, we have reason to believe that this isn't a story, but the story.  

Because He Lives:  We sang this song to remind ourselves that the Resurrection has an effect on our daily lives--that it is relevant for our own outlook on life.  Everything is different because of this moment.  Everything has changed.  Every story now gets woven into a greater story, and tragedies don't triumph in the end.

Doxology: During Lent, we put the Doxology to bed, and replaced it with Be Thou My Vision.  Now is the time to bring it back.  We will once again close our time together each week with this proclamation that God is worthy of praise from every inch of the cosmos.

-JM

ITLOTC 3-25-16

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Lent

John 18:1-19:42
18:1 After Jesus had spoken these words, he went out with his disciples across the Kidron valley to a place where there was a garden, which he and his disciples entered.
18:2 Now Judas, who betrayed him, also knew the place, because Jesus often met there with his disciples.
18:3 So Judas brought a detachment of soldiers together with police from the chief priests and the Pharisees, and they came there with lanterns and torches and weapons.
18:4 Then Jesus, knowing all that was to happen to him, came forward and asked them, "Whom are you looking for?"
18:5 They answered, "Jesus of Nazareth." Jesus replied, "I am he." Judas, who betrayed him, was standing with them.
18:6 When Jesus said to them, "I am he," they stepped back and fell to the ground.
18:7 Again he asked them, "Whom are you looking for?" And they said, "Jesus of Nazareth."
18:8 Jesus answered, "I told you that I am he. So if you are looking for me, let these men go."
18:9 This was to fulfill the word that he had spoken, "I did not lose a single one of those whom you gave me."
18:10 Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it, struck the high priest's slave, and cut off his right ear. The slave's name was Malchus.
18:11 Jesus said to Peter, "Put your sword back into its sheath. Am I not to drink the cup that the Father has given me?"
18:12 So the soldiers, their officer, and the Jewish police arrested Jesus and bound him.
18:13 First they took him to Annas, who was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, the high priest that year.
18:14 Caiaphas was the one who had advised the Jews that it was better to have one person die for the people.
18:15 Simon Peter and another disciple followed Jesus. Since that disciple was known to the high priest, he went with Jesus into the courtyard of the high priest,
18:16 but Peter was standing outside at the gate. So the other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out, spoke to the woman who guarded the gate, and brought Peter in.
18:17 The woman said to Peter, "You are not also one of this man's disciples, are you?" He said, "I am not."
18:18 Now the slaves and the police had made a charcoal fire because it was cold, and they were standing around it and warming themselves. Peter also was standing with them and warming himself.
18:19 Then the high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and about his teaching.
18:20 Jesus answered, "I have spoken openly to the world; I have always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all the Jews come together. I have said nothing in secret.
18:21 Why do you ask me? Ask those who heard what I said to them; they know what I said."
18:22 When he had said this, one of the police standing nearby struck Jesus on the face, saying, "Is that how you answer the high priest?"
18:23 Jesus answered, "If I have spoken wrongly, testify to the wrong. But if I have spoken rightly, why do you strike me?"
18:24 Then Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.
18:25 Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. They asked him, "You are not also one of his disciples, are you?" He denied it and said, "I am not."
18:26 One of the slaves of the high priest, a relative of the man whose ear Peter had cut off, asked, "Did I not see you in the garden with him?"
18:27 Again Peter denied it, and at that moment the cock crowed.
18:28 Then they took Jesus from Caiaphas to Pilate's headquarters. It was early in the morning. They themselves did not enter the headquarters, so as to avoid ritual defilement and to be able to eat the Passover.
18:29 So Pilate went out to them and said, "What accusation do you bring against this man?"
18:30 They answered, "If this man were not a criminal, we would not have handed him over to you."
18:31 Pilate said to them, "Take him yourselves and judge him according to your law." The Jews replied, "We are not permitted to put anyone to death."
18:32 (This was to fulfill what Jesus had said when he indicated the kind of death he was to die.)
18:33 Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, "Are you the King of the Jews?"
18:34 Jesus answered, "Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?"
18:35 Pilate replied, "I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?"
18:36 Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here."
18:37 Pilate asked him, "So you are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice."
18:38 Pilate asked him, "What is truth?" After he had said this, he went out to the Jews again and told them, "I find no case against him.
18:39 But you have a custom that I release someone for you at the Passover. Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?"
18:40 They shouted in reply, "Not this man, but Barabbas!" Now Barabbas was a bandit.
19:1 Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged.
19:2 And the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and they dressed him in a purple robe.
19:3 They kept coming up to him, saying, "Hail, King of the Jews!" and striking him on the face.
19:4 Pilate went out again and said to them, "Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no case against him."
19:5 So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, "Here is the man!"
19:6 When the chief priests and the police saw him, they shouted, "Crucify him! Crucify him!" Pilate said to them, "Take him yourselves and crucify him; I find no case against him."
19:7 The Jews answered him, "We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die because he has claimed to be the Son of God."
19:8 Now when Pilate heard this, he was more afraid than ever.
19:9 He entered his headquarters again and asked Jesus, "Where are you from?" But Jesus gave him no answer.
19:10 Pilate therefore said to him, "Do you refuse to speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?"
19:11 Jesus answered him, "You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above; therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin."
19:12 From then on Pilate tried to release him, but the Jews cried out, "If you release this man, you are no friend of the emperor. Everyone who claims to be a king sets himself against the emperor."
19:13 When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus outside and sat on the judge's bench at a place called The Stone Pavement, or in Hebrew Gabbatha.
19:14 Now it was the day of Preparation for the Passover; and it was about noon. He said to the Jews, "Here is your King!"
19:15 They cried out, "Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!" Pilate asked them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests answered, "We have no king but the emperor."
19:16 Then he handed him over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus;
19:17 and carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called The Place of the Skull, which in Hebrew is called Golgotha.
19:18 There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, with Jesus between them.
19:19 Pilate also had an inscription written and put on the cross. It read, "Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews."
19:20 Many of the Jews read this inscription, because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.
19:21 Then the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, "Do not write, 'The King of the Jews,' but, 'This man said, I am King of the Jews.'"
19:22 Pilate answered, "What I have written I have written."
19:23 When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and divided them into four parts, one for each soldier. They also took his tunic; now the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from the top. 19:24
So they said to one another, "Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see who will get it." This was to fulfill what the scripture says, "They divided my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots."
19:25 And that is what the soldiers did. Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.
19:26 When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, "Woman, here is your son."
19:27 Then he said to the disciple, "Here is your mother." And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.
19:28 After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfill the scripture), "I am thirsty."
19:29 A jar full of sour wine was standing there. So they put a sponge full of the wine on a branch of hyssop and held it to his mouth.
19:30 When Jesus had received the wine, he said, "It is finished." Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
19:31 Since it was the day of Preparation, the Jews did not want the bodies left on the cross during the sabbath, especially because that sabbath was a day of great solemnity. So they asked Pilate to have the legs of the crucified men broken and the bodies removed.
19:32 Then the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and of the other who had been crucified with him.
19:33 But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs.
19:34 Instead, one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once blood and water came out.
19:35 (He who saw this has testified so that you also may believe. His testimony is true, and he knows that he tells the truth.)
19:36 These things occurred so that the scripture might be fulfilled, "None of his bones shall be broken."
19:37 And again another passage of scripture says, "They will look on the one whom they have pierced."
19:38 After these things, Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, though a secret one because of his fear of the Jews, asked Pilate to let him take away the body of Jesus. Pilate gave him permission; so he came and removed his body.
19:39 Nicodemus, who had at first come to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds.
19:40 They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews.
19:41 Now there was a garden in the place where he was crucified, and in the garden there was a new tomb in which no one had ever been laid.
19:42 And so, because it was the Jewish day of Preparation, and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.

UBC Financial Status
as of: March 14, 2016

THE PLAN:  Our fiscal year runs from the first of July through the end of June.  This year’s budget is $309,412.  Fixed expenses (staff salaries, building and office expenses) are projected to be $253,373, or 82% of the total, and ministry expenses (the many things our church does for our community and for those who attend) are projected at $56,039 or 18%.

OUR EXPENSES AND INCOME:  Between July 1st and March 14th, we have spent $188,327 or about 61% of our budget. Those items considered fixed accounted for about 88% of this spending.  Our income from tithes and offerings during this period totaled $241,311; we have also received about $3,826 in building rental and interest.

OUR STATUS:  UBC’s available cash (checking account) balance is currently about $105,301 and we have another $89,315 in savings; we continue to carry no debt.  Our financial status relies heavily on your weekly tithes and offerings.  Thank you for your generosity and your commitment to the work of UBC.

If you’d like to be a financial partner with UBC, please sign up for monthly giving through EasyTithe.

Toph’s Sabbatical

Thank you to all who gave generously last Sunday for Toph’s Sabbatical.  We will still be accepting donations online for Toph’s Sabbatical through April 17.  You can give online (please make sure to note it is for “sabbatical”), or you may write a check to UBC and put “sabbatical” in the memo line.  If you have any questions, please contact David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

nUBC’ers Luncheon

If you are new to UBC within the last 6 months, we would love to have you stay for lunch after church on April 3rd.  We will provide the lunch, and give you a little more information about UBC and ways you can get involved in the life of the church here.  There will be a sign-up sheet in the foyer on  March 27, please sign-up then if you would like to attend, or email toph@ubcwaco.org .

Thailand Mission Team

If you would like to support our team members going on the Thailand Mission Trip in May, you can purchase a shirt by following this link:

http://www.ubcwaco.org/new-page/

Work is Worship

Greeters:  

Coffee Makers:  Stephen & Emmy

Mug Cleaners: Cooleys 

Announcements:

• Sunday Sermon: Easter YO!!!!   Luke 24:1-12
• If you are graduating in May, August, or December 2016, we would love to have you stay for lunch after church on April 24th.  There will be a sign-up sheet in the foyer starting on April 3rd.  Please contact toph@ubcwaco.org for more information.
• Chris Tweedt will be leading a series of three talks about the intersection of faith and philosophy. Talks will run in the evening from 7:30-8:30 and will take place at UBC. for more information email Chris @ christweedt@gmail.com
  • Feb 24: Perceiving God or Arguing for God?
  • Mar 23: What Does God Think About Suffering?
  • April 20: Who, If Anyone, Should We Trust about Religion? 

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Tom Haines: thomas_haines@baylor.edu

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Chris Kim: chris_kim@alumni.baylor.edu

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

Lacy Crocker: lacykcrocker@gmail.com

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu

 

The Mirror in the Wilderness (Part 6)

Every Sunday during Lent, we will be taking time to wrestle with our place in the culture of sexual violence within our society.  While this is, unfortunately, one of many sub-cultures of a broader culture of violence in our society, we have chosen to name this one during Lent because it is not necessarily an evil that we have named before at ubc.  I’ll be the first to admit that this is difficult, but we will face this difficulty together.  

The litany included in this post is taken from a liturgy in protest of sexual violence that you can find here, and the women who put that together are putting out more material and resources here.  This group is also hosting a series of liturgies on Baylor’s campus over the next month.  The next service will be “A Space for Hope” on Tuesday, March 29th, at 8pm in Elliston Chapel.

Posted below is something I read during church on March 20th.  It is the second of several pieces we will encounter in our liturgy over the next few weeks  You can read the first piece here, the second piece here, the third piece here, the fourth piece here, and the fifth piece here.  If you have any questions or concerns about anything you see here, please email me at Jamie@ubcwaco.org. 

---

This is the final week of Lent.  For the past 5 weeks, we have been reckoning with our place in the midst of a culture marred by sexual violence. If you haven’t been here, all of the readings I have done on this topic are available on the ubc blog under the title, “The Mirror in the Wilderness.” 

When we started this journey together, our aim was to use the season of Lent both to shine a light on the prevalence of sexual violence in our culture and to shine a light on ourselves revealing our complicity in this broader system—to talk about something we don’t talk about.  We’ve been doing this out of the conviction that problems in our culture are our problems, and that, as the church, we don’t get to point fingers at everyone else and pretend that we aren’t a part of the problem.  We are.

We have noted a few ways that we might consider ourselves to be complicit in this system: the impulse to distance ourselves from stories of sexual violence whenever possible, the cause and effect rhetoric we offer to those affected, and the language we let slide in the world around us and out of our own mouths.  These provide a starting point for weeding out our place in this broader system, but they are by no means the full picture.  There is more work to do. 

Lent is a time when we give particular interest to wrestling with sin in our lives, but it is not the only season where we do this. Shining a light on our sin is something we should ultimately always to be open to.  And so, I pray that you will continue to ask the Spirit to bring to light your complicity in this system of evil, even beyond this time we call Lent.  Keep asking hard questions of things that you assume are harmless.  Keep seeking wisdom and courage for combatting things that you know are harmful.

Systems are hard to take down because they transcend any one person or group of people—instead they reside in ideas, in apprehensions, in assumptions, in prejudices, in culture itself—all things that shape people.  But it’s not that people are removed from the equation.  People are shaped and thereby become the avenue by which culture shapes other people.  People live into the ideas that they receive, they pass them on—most often without mentioning them at all—and they contribute to the narrative of how things are.  Thus, these ideas are sustained by our acceptance.  But we’ve been talking about what happens when we don’t accept these ideas.  What happens when we decide the way things are isn’t cutting it anymore.  What happens when we pull back the curtain to try to figure out how these systems work.  What happens when we throw a rock in the machine.  When we take responsibility for our own complicity in systems of violence and seek personal transformation?  When we go off script in interacting with the people around us?  And when we pass this counter-system on to other generations?  The system will not be able to stay the same. 

We need to do this hard work for the good of our neighbor, for the good of the world, and for ourselves. 

So ubc, may be we a people of the way things could be.  May we be a people who search ourselves for ghosts in our own machines that would keep us from being more fully formed in the way of Christ, and who catch the wave of the Kingdom and ride it into fulfillment.

Now, if you are willing and able, please stand and join me once again in this litany of commitment.  We’ve said these words many times together, but make an effort to continue to let them form you.

As a community of faith we will not forget those who are hurting. We will listen carefully. We understand there are those among us who suffer in silence. And so...

We will not further silence our neighbor
with platitudes or should-haves.
We commit to hold their pain gently.

We know we must continue to challenge the power dynamics in our world that make abuse prevalent, even when these dynamics and systems benefit us.

We will not worship ideas or institutions.
We will love God and love our neighbor above all else.

We struggle to understand how the world can be so broken, but we will not let this deter us from seeking justice.

We will not cease praying for your Kingdom come.
We commit ourselves to the journey ahead.
Our friends will walk alone no longer.

---

JM

Setlist 3-20-2016

This week was the sixth Sunday of Lent, also known as Palm Sunday, and our songs were selected with these themes in mind. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

Here Is Our King by David Crowder* Band

Just A Closer Walk With Thee

Lord, I Need You by Matt Maher

In the Night by Andrew Peterson

Up On A Mountain by The Welcome Wagon

Be Thou My Vision

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

Here Is Our King: We sang this song because it was Palm Sunday.  We sang these words to take the posture of the crowds welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem.  This is in some ways strange, because we know that Jesus was not actually bringing about the political revolution that they expected, and we also know that this disappointment would ultimately make them turn on Jesus with the authorities.  Perhaps this can serve as a reminder to us that there is a difference between who God is and who we expect God to be, and the former is the one that deserves our worship.

Just A Closer Walk With Thee: We sang this song to look over our shoulder at last week's songs.  This is what we said about Just A Closer Walk With Thee then: We sang this song to declare one of our intentions as we walk through Lent together--to reach the other side as people who are more fully formed in the way of Christ.  When we sing this song at ubc, the second stanza is probably the most important, underscoring that the Christian life is one in which we all falter from time to time, but that our burden is shared by Jesus.  In Lent, this takes a slightly different meaning as we think about our time in the wilderness together.  Even in this more intentional time of formation, we are prone to wander, but we can press forward knowing that Jesus understands our struggles.

Lord, I Need You:  We sang this song because as we continue to seek transformation in this last week of Lent, we need God to be the one who changes us.  The petition in the bridge of the song (teach my song to rise to You when temptation comes my way), is in some ways answered in singing this song, as the chorus raises a song to God in the midst of temptation.  We have been singing it often during this season to allow God to root these words deep within us.

In the Night: This song is a journey through the biblical narrative, cataloguing the process of struggle and victory, woundedness and healing, etc., strung together by the refrain "In the night, my hope lives on."  We'll add a verse each week during Lent as we move toward Easter, when Hope really takes root.

Up On A Mountain: We sang this song to fast forward to Thursday night when we remember Jesus praying in the garden of Gethsemane, where he has essentially already been abandoned by his friends, and is terrified of what is to come.  If you aren't familiar with this song, you should check it out:   

Be Thou My Vision: We will sing this song every week during Lent to close our time together.  As we go back into the wilderness of Lent, we will ask once again for God to be our vision, wisdom, security, and hope.

-JM

Newsletter Additions

Town Hall Agenda

Friends, 

I have a few additional items to share with you that should have made yesterday’s newsletter.  I apologize for not being able to get them to you yesterday.

As you may have seen in announcements section of the newsletter UBC is having a town hall tomorrow, Sunday March 20th.  Because the format we’ve used the last couple of town halls has seemed to work the best, we’ll stick with that.  That means we will have the town hall in the sanctuary 10 minutes after the conclusion of the service tomorrow. 

The purpose of the town hall is to present what will be discussed at the April (quarterly) leadership team meeting.   That meeting will take place Sunday April 24th. 

Here are the items that are currently on the agenda. 

Scholarship recipients:

UBC enjoys a great relationship with Baylor, Truett, and the BGCT that allows us to partner with those institutions in providing scholarships to many of our undergraduate and Truett students. 

As part of that scholarship process, the application requires that there be a mechanism within the church that verifies the applicant’s good standing and ministry.   At UBC, the leadership team is the official mechanism.

Finance Update:

We will give a finance update on the current state of affairs at the church.  Additional the leadership team will receive a budget proposal from finance team for the 2016-17 year.

HR Reviews:

The HR team conducts annual reviews.  The paper reviews have been finished and submitted.  The HR is currently in the process of scheduling those interviews the staff.

Ministry Proposal:

In February the staff had a small retreat in which we planned for the 2016-17 year, set goals and identified financial needs.  That proposal along with some questions will be sent to the leadership team in our April meeting. 

OAR Update from Toph:

Toph will be providing an update from the Ownership, Accountability, and Responsibility committee.  As a reminder, this is a committee that has been investigating potential ways for UBCers to have a deepened sense of identity and connection with the community. 

A Children’s Update from Pastor Emily

Hello UBCKids parents!  We are getting close to the end of Lenten Journey!  This week, as you may know, is Palm Sunday!  To help our entire congregation feel the excitement and anticipation of this Sunday, the kids from the Bloom, Branch and Root Rooms will bringing palm branches into the service and participating the musical portion of our worship service!    Your kids will be dropped off and picked up in their normal classrooms and the UBCKids Volunteers will be helping with the processional, but please be sure to arrive by 10:15 so that we can be sure that we have time to distribute palm branches and get organized in time!  Please email Emily at emily@ubcwaco.org with any questions!  We can’t wait to celebrate this special Sunday with the rest of UBC!

 

ITLOTC 3-18-16

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Lent

Lent 6

Over the next six weeks we will be hearing from voices in within our community.  The article will address the texts and themes from lent.  Today we'll hear from Dan Venzin.  Dan is a Truett Student and also a chaplain at Baylor University 

______________________________________________________________ 

“Are you watching closely?” – Alfred Borden, The Prestige

Growing up, my family casually practiced lent, but mainly because my father was Catholic and that was a part of his tradition.  February would roll around and the question would start to be asked: “What are you giving up for lent?”  

My guess is that the first few weeks of lent were somewhat exciting or impactful for those who decided to “do something” during this time in the church’s life, but as this season moves on we start to realize that the world around us has not made the same commitment that we have made to the Lord in this time and that the world will not bend or assist us in our commitments.  Projects are still due, deadlines must still be met, dinner must still be served, and the show must go on.  As the season of lent progresses, I would contend that these commitments over time became harder to keep rather than easier.  We longed for the comfort of a piece of chocolate after dinner.  We ached for that second cup of coffee in the afternoon.  We wished we could have another cigarette after yet another hard day at the office or school.  We desired to use the thirty minutes we set aside to pray and read scripture and filled it with the old familiar comfort of Netflix. 

Put yourself in the sandals of the disciples.  “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”  That first interaction with Jesus was profound, and I bet they reminisced on what it was like for them when they first met this strange man whom they decided to leave everything and follow.  First Day – scary, yet exciting.  Second Day – Wow!  Take a look at what we are a part of!  Third Day – I Trust in Jesus!  Fourth Day – Okay!  People are kind of being rude to Jesus, but we’re still all-in.  Fifth Day – Hmm…these people are trying to kill the guy we decided to follow.  What have I gotten myself into?

Separate yourself from these stereotypical Lenten commitments and move into the memory of a time of trial or struggle: when sickness had taken hold of you or a loved one, when money had been so scarce that food was a real worry, when “telling the truth” had disastrous consequences, when your grades were so bad that you might be kicked out of school, or whatever the situation might have been.  Holding onto the commitment to live by faith in these situations is difficult, but it is the heart of what Lent is all about – wading through the mud and muck toward what our God has promised to us. 

We are at the pinnacle of our story, seeing first-hand the gravity of our commitment to the Lord, and it’s during these times that we are tempted to say “Have I taken the wrong path?  Am I naïve?  Why did I think I would find sanctuary in a man who lived thousands of years ago?”  Safety, security, and necessities have been torn away from us and we sit in the Garden of Gethsemane with Jesus as he, himself, is in anguish over what he knows is coming next – “My Father, if it is possible, take this cup from me…”

I want to remind you of what Jesus told those disciples that night, to those who left everything to follow him, to the ones whose grief was so great that their eyes grew heavy and sleep was the only comfort, to you – the ones whose hope has faded and tomorrow just might be the hardest day of your life: “Stay awake” (Matthew 26:41). 

UBC – Stay awake.  Our faith, the Christian faith, hinges on what happens next.  The night has come to meet the light.  The appointed time that Jesus talked about is here.  Stay awake.

Meet Our Newest UBCer

Elizabeth Anne Pond

Birthday: March 6th 

Birth Height: 20 1/2 Inches

Birth Weight: 7 lbs 15 oz

Enneagram Number: 4

Holy Week Schedule

aundy Thursday service will be held at UBC @ 5:30

If you have never been to one of our Maundy Thursday, we do them as a potluck mixed with liturgy.  So bring a dish to pass and be ready to read and listen to scripture together.  

Good Friday service will be held at UBC @ 5:30

Toph’s Sabbatical Fund

On Sunday, March 20th, we will be taking up a special offering to help Toph on his sabbatical this summer.  If you have any questions, please contact David_Wilhite@baylor.edu . 

nUBCers Luncheon

If you are new to UBC within the last 6 months, we would love to have you stay for lunch after church on April 3rd.  We will provide the lunch, and give you a little more information about UBC and ways you can get involved in the life of the church here.  There will be a sign-up sheet in the foyer on March 20 and March 27, please sign-up then if you would like to attend, or email toph@ubcwaco.org .

Sunday School

Resumes this Sunday. 

Philosophy Talks 

Chris Tweedt will be leading a series of three talks about the intersection of faith and philosophy. Talks will run in the evening from 7:30-8:30 and will take place at UBC. for more information email Chris @ christweedt@gmail.com.  The second of those talks will be this Wednesday.  The topic?  What does God think about suffering? 

Jesse Washington Walk & Memorial Service

Normally we reserve the space in the newsletter for UBC or UBC related events, but we felt like this was an important moment to share in and be a part of.

Work is Worship

Greeters:  Ben and Bekah West 

Coffee Makers:  Chad & Joel 

Mug Cleaners: Leigh & Stephen 

Announcements:

Sunday Sermon: Lent Six, Palm Sunday: Luke 19:28-40

Chris Tweedt will be leading a series of three talks about the intersection of faith and philosophy. Talks will run in the evening from 7:30-8:30 and will take place at UBC. for more information email Chris @ christweedt@gmail.com

Feb 24: Perceiving God or Arguing for God?

Mar 23: What Does God Think About Suffering?

April 20: Who, If Anyone, Should We Trust about Religion? 

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Tom Haines: thomas_haines@baylor.edu

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Chris Kim: chris_kim@alumni.baylor.edu

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

Lacy Crocker: lacykcrocker@gmail.com

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu

The Mirror in the Wilderness (Part 5)

Every Sunday during Lent, we will be taking time to wrestle with our place in the culture of sexual violence within our society.  While this is, unfortunately, one of many sub-cultures of a broader culture of violence in our society, we have chosen to name this one during Lent because it is not necessarily an evil that we have named before at ubc.  I’ll be the first to admit that this is difficult, but we will face this difficulty together.  

The litany included in this post is taken from a liturgy in protest of sexual violence that you can find here, and the women who put that together are putting out more material and resources here.  This group is also hosting a series of liturgies on Baylor’s campus over the next month.  The next service will be “A Space for Hope” on Tuesday, March 29th, at 8pm in Elliston Chapel.

Posted below is something I read during church on March 13th.  It is the second of several pieces we will encounter in our liturgy over the next few weeks  You can read the first piece here, the second piece here, the third piece here, and the fourth piece here.  If you have any questions or concerns about anything you see here, please email me at Jamie@ubcwaco.org. 

---

Today is the fifth Sunday of Lent, and we are continuing our reckoning with our place in the midst of a culture that is marred by sexual violence.  If you haven’t been around for the past four weeks, the things I have read during this time are available on the ubc blog, under the title, “The Mirror in the Wilderness.”

I want to return to an idea that I’ve mentioned before—that perhaps when we see a particular kind of violence hold a prevalence in our culture, there are certain ideas or assumptions that are engrained in our culture that in some way help this broken part go unmended, or perhaps normalize it.  For us, that also means there are ideas and assumptions engrained in us that make it difficult for us to be the presence of Christ within our culture.  Last week, we began dreaming together about what a culture that does not authorize or pave the way for a prevalence of sexual violence might look like, and I urge you to continue asking that question of yourselves. 

I want now to begin thinking on a much smaller scale and ask what a version of each of us might look like within that culture.  This is difficult because we don’t necessarily know how to be any other way than we are, but this tension is the Christian life, is it not?  Old things being made new?  But that means that we might need to question things that we have taken for granted in the process—things that we’ve never really thought were that big of a deal—little things we let slide.  What do you let slide?

Is it comments people you don’t know make to other people you don’t know?  Comments that are perhaps in poor taste—crude, yes, unwanted by the addressee, yes, but not necessarily harmful?  What if those comments really are harmful?  What if allowing them to go unchecked makes them normal, and what if this normal authorizes a broader culture of sexual violence?  Should you say something?  Would the stranger even care what you have to say?  Maybe it doesn’t matter if they internalize it.  Maybe it just matters that it’s spoken out loud.  But this is uncomfortable.

What about when it isn’t a stranger?  What about when it’s someone you love, or at least care for, making the comment, the joke, the behind-the-scenes insult, and you know they don’t mean any harm by it?  How do you know?  And how do you know that something small like this won’t snowball over time? Maybe the people you love do internalize the things that you say.  Maybe you help form them.  But this too is uncomfortable.

And what about yourself?  What do you let slide off your own tongue that steals power from other people, that makes light of what is decidedly heavy, that minimizes the cries of people who have been wronged, that normalizes aggressive behavior, on and on? You likely wouldn’t know unless you have been told or have taken time to look.  So in this fifth week of Lent, I’m asking you to look.  And it will likely be uncomfortable, but that’s Lent.

Now, we will participate in the litany of commitment that we have taken on the past couple of weeks, in the hope that it will continue to shape us.

As a community of faith we will not forget those who are hurting. We will listen carefully. We understand there are those among us who suffer in silence. And so...

We will not further silence our neighbor
with platitudes or should-haves.
We commit to hold their pain gently.

We know we must continue to challenge the power dynamics in our world that make abuse prevalent, even when these dynamics and systems benefit us.

We will not worship ideas or institutions.
We will love God and love our neighbor above all else.

We struggle to understand how the world can be so broken, but we will not let this deter us from seeking justice.

We will not cease praying for your Kingdom come.
We commit ourselves to the journey ahead.
Our friends will walk alone no longer.

---

JM

Setlist 3-13-2016

This week was the fifth Sunday of Lent, and our songs were selected with this theme in mind. Below, you’ll find the list of the songs and artists. Clicking the song titles will take you to the lyrics. Below the songs, there is an example of one way you might think of these songs in light of this week's theme. If you want to talk about any of these, feel free to comment at the bottom of this page or email me at jamie@ubcwaco.org.

Songs:

Come Thou Fount

Just A Closer Walk With Thee

Deliver Me by David Crowder* Band

In the Night by Andrew Peterson

Be Thou My Vision

How They Fit In:

There are many ways to think about the significance of songs and the way they fit together–-this is simply one way you can look at these songs in light of this week’s theme. 

Come Thou Fount: We sang this song to look over our shoulder at last week's songs.  This is what we said about Come Thou Fount then: As we continue through Lent, we are ultimately hoping that some change takes place in us that isn't undone as soon as Lent is over. We mainly sang this song for the final stanza, where we acknowledge our tendency to wander, and express a desire for God to fix us in place.  

Just A Closer Walk With Thee: We sang this song to declare one of our intentions as we walk through Lent together--to reach the other side as people who are more fully formed in the way of Christ.  When we sing this song at ubc, the second stanza is probably the most important, underscoring that the Christian life is one in which we all falter from time to time, but that our burden is shared by Jesus.  In Lent, this takes a slightly different meaning as we think about our time in the wilderness together.  Even in this more intentional time of formation, we are prone to wander, but we can press forward knowing that Jesus understands our struggles.

Deliver Me: As we near the end of Lent, we sang this song to express that we continue to rely upon the Spirit to pull us through and to change us into people who are more like Jesus.

In the Night: This song is a journey through the biblical narrative, cataloguing the process of struggle and victory, woundedness and healing, etc., strung together by the refrain "In the night, my hope lives on."  We'll add a verse each week during Lent as we move toward Easter, when Hope really takes root.

Be Thou My Vision: We will sing this song every week during Lent to close our time together.  As we go back into the wilderness of Lent, we will ask once again for God to be our vision, wisdom, security, and hope.

-JM

ITLOTC 3-11-16

ITLOTC

(In The Life Of The Church) 

Lent

Lent 5

Over the next six weeks we will be hearing from voices in within our community.  The article will address the texts and themes from lent.  Today we'll hear from Dani Miller.  Dani works at the Family Abuse Center.  

______________________________________________________________

We are in the fifth week of Lent! The excitement is building. I myself love to get excited about things. It is extremely easy for me to become giddy about an upcoming event. You should see my reaction watching the previews for super hero and Lord of the Rings movies; I am immediately stoked for all of them! Seeing one of my favorite music artists and talking to them for the first time? Could not contain myself. (Also, when I finally talked to this person, we discussed the weather. I did not prepare well.)

Now, how patient was I in waiting for these things to happen or come about? Zero patience exhibited. I was like a small child that can only see that Hogwarts acceptance letter in my hand and the way I express myself is by hugging all of the stranger’s legs around me. And yes, I actually did that once as my mother and younger self were waiting in line for an event. Now, I understand these are just small examples of what it means to wait in my life; seeing my inept attempts to be patient and content in the waiting makes me chuckle.

So, of course my natural tendency is to jump right on ahead to Easter and Jesus’ resurrection! It is not natural for me to sit and wait and contemplate hope that has not come quite yet. Jesus still has to suffer and we must suffer with him. We wait because God is doing a new thing, and we prepare ourselves for this event. Isaiah 43:19 states, “I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.” We have hope that God will guide and change us.

In this fifth Sunday of Lent we are not quite there. As Psalm 126:1 states, “we were like those who dream.” We are in transformation. It is happening and what we are building up to will bring shouts of joy. But, we must stay ready in this moment before. May we remind ourselves to keep our thoughts and prayers on what God is preparing and transforming us for. As Paul states in Philippians 3:10, “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death…” We do not ignore current or future pain and suffering that Jesus will go through, or that we ourselves will go through. The pain is acknowledged, but it is not our final hope. There is hope for the future joy found in the resurrection. Psalm 126:6 says, “Those who go out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, carrying their sheaves.”

We cannot skip over this event, we must dwell in it. Through Jesus’ suffering and death is how we can truly see the beautiful event of what the resurrection means. A common theme in the scripture for this week is looking ahead. The anticipation of here… but, not yet; of great and beautiful hope…. but, not yet.

May this prayer remind us of the path we are on.  

Creator God,
you prepare a new way in the wilderness
and your grace waters the desert.
Help us to recognize your hand
working miracles beyond our imagining.
Open our hearts to be transformed
by the new thing you are doing,
so that our lives may proclaim
the extravagance of your love for all,
and its presence in Jesus Christ. Amen.

How have you seen this time so far as a way to slowly transform and prepare for what is to come? 

SWCC Easter Egg Hunt

We still need some more volunteers to help with the Easter Egg hunt this Saturday, at the South Waco Community Center.  Volunteers need to be available at 10am, and we will be done by noon.  If you can help, please contact toph@ubcwaco.org .  

Toph’s Sabbatical Fund

On Sunday, March 20th, we will be taking up a special offering to help Toph on his sabbatical this summer.  If you have any questions, please contact David_Wilhite@baylor.edu . 

nUBCers Luncheon

If you are new to UBC within the last 6 months, we would love to have you stay for lunch after church on April 3rd.  We will provide the lunch, and give you a little more information about UBC and ways you can get involved in the life of the church here.  There will be a sign-up sheet in the foyer on March 20 and March 27, please sign-up then if you would like to attend, or email toph@ubcwaco.org .

Thailand Mission Team

If you would like to support our team members going on the Thailand Mission Trip in May, you can purchase a shirt by following this link:

http://www.ubcwaco.org/new-page/

Jesse Washington Walk & Memorial Service

Normally we reserve the space in the newsletter for UBC or UBC related events, but we felt like this was an important moment to share in and be a part of . 

Last of the Ecumenical Lent Worship Services

Is this Wednesday.  Hope to see you at First Lutheran!

Work is Worship

Greeters:  Rick 

Coffee Makers:  No Coffee Makers this week 

Mug Cleaners: No Mug Cleaners this week 

Announcements:

Sunday Sermon: Lent Five: John 12:1-8

Next Town Hall March 20th after church

Chris Tweedt will be leading a series of three talks about the intersection of faith and philosophy. Talks will run in the evening from 7:30-8:30 and will take place at UBC. for more information email Chris @ christweedt@gmail.com

Feb 24: Perceiving God or Arguing for God?

Mar 23: What Does God Think About Suffering?

April 20: Who, If Anyone, Should We Trust about Religion? 

Do you have an emergency and need to talk to a pastor? 

254 498 2261

Leadership Team

If you have a concern or an idea for UBC that you’d like to share with someone that is not on staff, feel free to contact one of our leadership team members. 

Chair- Kristin Dodson: kschwebke@prodigy.net

Joy Wineman: joy.wineman@gmail.com

Stan Denman: Stan_Denman@baylor.edu

David Wilhite: David_Wilhite@baylor.edu

Bridget Heins: bheins@hot.rr.com

Sharyl Loeung: sharylwl@gmail.com

Jon Davis: jdavis83@gmail.com

UBC Finance Team

Do you have a question about UBC’s financial affairs? Please feel free to contact any of your finance team members.

Tom Haines: thomas_haines@baylor.edu

Josh McCormick: Josh.McCormick@dwyergroup.com

Chris Kim: chris_kim@alumni.baylor.edu

Hannah Kuhl: HannahKuhl@hotmail.com  

Justin Pond: pondjw@gmail.com

Lacy Crocker: lacykcrocker@gmail.com

UBC HR Team

If you have concerns about staff and would like contact our human resources team, please feel free to email any of the following members.

Maxcey Blaylock: maxceykite@gmail.com

Mathew Crawford: mathewcrawford@yahoo.com

Callie Schrank: Callie_Schrank@baylor.edu

Rob Engblom: Rob_Engblom@baylor.edu

Ross Van Dyke: Ross_Vandyke@baylor.edu