Rev. Ron says that "I hope and pray that these weeks' reflections on being 'open' – our openness to all people after God's invitation and example, in both our hearts and minds – will inspire us in our interactions with one another and members of our community. As we continue to live in times of uncertainty and anxiety, I invite you today to reflect on what it means for our church to commit to having 'open doors,' to being generous, maybe even 'radical,' in our hospitality toward others."
Rev. Ron Bartlow says that "One of my deep appreciations for our Methodist heritage is that it has always taken seriously a person's ability to think. Indeed, 'reason' is one of the four methods by which we are exhorted to consider the things of God (the other three being Scripture, tradition, and experience). I invite you to consider what it means to demonstrate an 'open mind' as members together of our church community."
The first of a three week series in which we contemplate what it means to be a church of "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors." Culturally, we speak of the heart as the center of our emotional selves, the seat of our hopes and desires, the core of our love. As those committed to loving God and others, how we open our hearts becomes metaphor for how we respond to the world around us. Are we "hard hearted," callous and indifferent to the struggles and needs of others? Or are we "tender hearted," caring and impacted by the lives of those we meet?