Looking Ahead to February 1, 2026

This is the first Sunday of the month so it is a week both to celebrate Communion and to highlight or Local Outreach Fund.

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Psalm 15
• Micah 6:1-8

Source

The Sermon title is How Should We Live?

Early Thoughts: In the face of injustice, in the face of a deep lack of grace, in the face of a serious absence of humility how should we live? What should we do?

If we truly believe that choosing to follow The Way of Jesus calls us to be different people, if we truly want to live as transformed people what would that look like?

In a world where state-sponsored terrorists execute citizens on the streets on Minneapolis, where governments restrict the rights of people based on gender or sexuality, where the richer get richer and the poor struggle to get by, where 'me/I/mine' too often seems more important than 'we/us/ours' how should we respond?

Scripture answers these questions over and over again. From Moses through the Prophets to Jesus the answer is laid before us. Still we seem to struggle to get it right.

Do Justice. Love Kindness. Walk Humbly with God.

It is easy to say. Even easy to sing. It might be harder to actually do. In fact I know it is harder to actually do. Apparently it is even harder to push our governments, our wider society to do.

In some United Church circles Micah 6:8 has taken on a very special status. It has been lifted up time and time again, usually with the emphasis on the first instruction -- do justice. We as a denomination with strong roots in the Social Gospel movement of the late 19th-early 20th centuries have often pushed hard for a more just world. Social, Community, and Financial Justice is a key issue in Scripture. We need to continue not only to push for justice but to actually do it ourselves in our own circles of  power and influence. But there are two more instructions.

What does it mean to love kindness? Kindness sometimes gets confused with niceness but I don't think they are the same. Niceness can too easily become "don't make waves" or "just get along" whereas loving kindness brings to my mind the Golden Rule philosophy -- do unto others as you would have done to you. To love kindness, I think, means caring for the needs of the people around you -- at which point it often intersects with the first instruction to do justice.

Then we have the question of humility. One of my colleagues has pointed out in the past that this may be the piece of Micah 6:8 where we most often fall short. When we think it is all up to us to rebuild the world we have failed to walk humbly with God. When we fail to listen to the people around us we have failed to walk humbly with God. When we insist that we are the only ones with the correct point of view we have failed to walk humbly with God. Most certainly can do better at being humble.

The world is not what we wish it was. Justice, love, kindness, and humility often seem in short supply. God calls us to live as transformed people. God calls us to put our faith in action, not just words and songs. We know how we are called to live. How will we respond?
--Gord