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Ramblings from Retirement – You’re gonna die By Retried Pastor Lee Hemen August 24, 2021 There are several quotes, memes, and statements floating around online and on TV that I have come to utterly hate and therefore disregard because they have become meaningless. They are: “We’re all in this together” and “If we can save even one life…” Both have become “pithyisms” – a new term that defines a statement that is made that means nothing but sounds pity. Politicians use them all the time to sound intelligent and to skirt the truth. First of all we are not all in this together because we do not know one another, we do not mingle in the same groups with one another, and most of you have absolutely no vested interest in who I am or what I do, except you are kind enough to read or listen to my ramblings. I know it is supposed to make us feel like we are part of a community, a family, or all in the same leaky boat but frankly we are not all in this together. Can we be supportive of a concerted...

 Ramblings from Retirement – Trust By Retired Pastor Lee Hemen June 2, 2021 Sometimes we can become so myopic in our daily lives that we forget the people around us or the Lord who made us. Jesus reminded his listeners that the two greatest commandments were to love God totally and others like you love yourself. Fussing or fretting about things you have no control over can lead to anxiety and frustration with your circumstances. Yet when we focus on loving God as we should and loving others as he commanded the things we have no control over seem to fade into the background where they belong. I used to fret about family members who did not know the Lord and I began to wonder if God was actually listening to me when I prayed about my concern for them. I was gently reminded by a brother in Christ that perhaps my prayers were not really for the benefit of those I was praying for but to satisfy my selfish needs. Of course at first I was offended that he would claim I was being selfish w...

Ramblings from Retirement – Worship By Retired Pastor Lee Hemen April 6, 2021 We just celebrated Resurrection Sunday, Easter for those of you who are biblically illiterate, and I noticed that we had several visitors even during our National COVID scare. And this got me to thinking about when I first began to Pastor and how frustrating it was when folks saw their church attendance as an afterthought. Attending their children’s sports programs, doing their hobbies, simply waking up and feeling like going to the beach or because it was sunny was an excuse to miss their church worship. It was frustrating because many of these same people would get their feelings hurt because they were seen as “visitors” by those who did show up regularly or when they were not asked to do certain ministries in the church because of their fly-by-night attendance. Now if you are getting your feelings hurt by reading this what does it say about your church attendance and why you feel you have to make excuses f...

Parents and children! - Ephesians 6:1-4 By Pastor Lee Hemen March 26, 2017 A child rebelling is as old as well couples having children. Some think that it is worse today than years ago, but it probably isn’t it just may seem that way. However, there has become a shift in how children are disciplined. The issue is not in whether a parent spanks or not but rather in the teaching that there are consequences for one’s actions. Consistency in parenting has degraded in our society and it has infected the school system as well. There are actually folks who think it is harmful to tell a child “no” or to hold them accountable for their behavior. This is simply not true nor is it emotionally healthy for the child to not know their boundaries. When we look into the pages of Scripture we can sometimes be hard pressed to find good examples of parenting yet we do discover some of the best advice for raising healthy, emotionally stable, and spiritually sound children. And here in Ephesians Paul gives...