Grief and Blessings

"The Blessing of Tears"

by Eleanor Cowles

The Upper Room, March-April 2021

“When I think of God’s blessings, I think of family, friends, sunshine, or even my morning cup of coffee. Until recently, I never considered tears a blessing. … As we walk through life, we often miss blessings hidden in calamities. But while tears can blur our vision, they can also clarify our sight to reveal new truths. Perhaps we can see our way to reach out to someone in pain I believe when we have walked through pain and grief, we may be the path – and there our tears can meet. Truly, tears can be God’s blessing for this life.”

CONTENTS

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Nourishing Faith

Adult Class: Joy, Grief, Prayers, “Slum Songs”

Devotional 2021: Hope in the Wilderness

Pastor Appointment: Sorrow, Blessing, Faith

Pastor’s Column: God’s Time, God’s Plan

Welcoming All

New Meditation Room: Welcome Peace

Virtual Mission u 2021

Toy Library Transitions to WWW

United Methodist Women Virtually Active

Racial Justice: Book Club and Spiritual Work

Doing Good

South Minneapolis Meals on Wheels Delivering Smiles

United Methodist Women in the Mission Field

BEing Church

Keep Breathing and Abide

Messages: Thank You and Christmas Greetings

Nancy, Tiffany, and Iza: Happy to be Home

Sorrow, Loss, Memories

Faith Stories

Wanda Curry: You Never Know the Hour

Shirley Durr: Faith Like a River

Comments

Racial Justice Book Club

Circle of individual voices on anti-racist journey The journey began with the first Zoom session on January 12 by meeting the facilitator, Crixell Shell, Assistant Executive Director of the Minnesota Peacebuilding Leadership Institute, where she is a Peacebuilding Trainer and Coming to the Table Racial Talking Circle Facilitator. Book clubbers also met others who joined the circle and discussed the touchstones that will guide discussion. Some circle members are from Epworth and others from the wider community with more joining the circle at later sessions. As they introduced themselves to each other, circle members shared their personal intentions in joining this Book Club. They also shared their reflections on how the introduction to Ibram X. Kendi’s How to be an Anti-racist impacts the way they view our past racist thoughts, feelings and behaviors towards themselves and others. The Book Club was established as a place for contributin...

Faith Story: Faith Like a River

By Shirley Durr In Epworth’s 2021 Lenten Devotional, Hope in the Wilderness, the entry for February 25 was from “Along the Way: Fluid Formation” in Steve Harper’s blog Oboedire wherein the author compares faith to rivers that “meander” and “have seasonal cycles.” One of the questions after this entry asks, “Does your faith go in cycles – sometimes full and well nourished, sometimes too much to keep in, sometimes low or even empty? Where do you find meaning when your faith is running on empty?” This is how I answered. I try to let my faith flow and meander, fluidly faithful, you might say. I’ve never thought the purpose of my faith or my life was to get to heaven, for example. Rather, I think my purpose, my goal in this life I have been given, is to help as much as I can to build God’s kin-dom – which some call heaven but I call the Beloved Community– here on earth. Although I’m Methodist to the core, I’ve never wanted to contain my faith in one wine...

Epworth Echoes Spring 2021

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