Zao MKE Church

A Subversive Geneology of Incarnation: Zerubbabel

This Advent, we’ll be deep-diving on some of the more unexpected or obscure ancestors in Jesus’s gospel genealogies, linking them with the four themes of Advent: Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. Today is Advent Week Three: Joy. Our focus is on Zerubbabel, who found joy with his community by building something new amidst the rubble.

A Subversive Genealogy of Incarnation: Judah

This Advent, we’ll be deep-diving on some of the more unexpected or obscure ancestors in Jesus’s gospel genealogies, linking them with the four themes of Advent: Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. Today is Advent Week Two: Peace. Our focus is on Judah, as we look at his gradual process of being reforged into an instrument of peace.

A Subversive Genealogy of Incarnation: Tamar

This Advent, we’ll be deep-diving on some of the more unexpected or obscure ancestors in Jesus’s gospel genealogies, linking them with the four themes of Advent: Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. Today is Advent Week One: Hope. But not the soft-focus, candlelit kind of hope we so often hear from the systems that benefit from the status quo. Today we’re checking in with Tamar, a trickster figure who shows us what hope looks like when all the institutional power is stacked against us.

Wicked

On opening weekend of Wicked: For Good, we're reflecting on those throughout history who have been labeled "wicked" for opposing empire and fighting for a better world. When we are called "wicked," how can we recognize our connection with those movements of resistance past and present?

Be Still

It's easy to feel alone. How can we learn to be still and connect to the reality that God is always with us?

Abiding in Connection

Pastor Jonah is back! When our nervous systems are continuously activated by the dangers and injustices all around us, what intentional practices can we cultivate to keep coming home to community, connection, and the love of God?

Remember Who You Are

As we seek to push back on the powers of empire, it can be hard to know where to start. There are so many causes and movements that are worthy of our support, but we can only do so much as individuals. Let's remember that we aren't meant to do everything, but to discover who God uniquely made us to be.

Guest sermon by Chris Chapman

Heartburn Hermeneutics

What do you do when everything you thought you knew collapses? And what does it mean to start over? This week we explore the story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus, as we learn to listen to what our bodies can tell us about what is true and who to follow.

Guest sermon by Tamice Spencer-Helms

The Sacred Art of Cherry Picking

One thing progressives and conservatives undeniably share is this: we all cherry-pick the Bible. It’s an unavoidable reality that we gravitate toward certain passages and stories while overlooking or even rejecting others. If that’s the case, then the question isn’t whether we cherry-pick — but how we do it. Can we acknowledge this fact and still approach Scripture in ways that are rooted in integrity? And could there be a way in which “cherry-picking” becomes not a flaw, but something thoughtful — even sacred?

 

Guest sermon by Josh Scott, Lead Pastor at Gracepointe Church in Nashville

Grieving Is Holy

We live in a world that simultaneously gives us reason for immense sorrow and tells us to constantly stay positive and look on the bright side. It can be hard to look at the state of the world and have hope, but is that the whole point? What if our faith found room for both honest grief and reason to hope in the goodness of God? We will explore this through the lens of Lamentations, a book all about acknowledging the reality of the world and finding reason to hope for better.

Guest sermon by Chris Chapman