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Unanswered Questions + The Gift of Abiding | Shawnee Community Christian Church

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An Honest Conversation Over Breakfast

A few months ago, I was grabbing breakfast with our retired “big biscuit” group on Shawnee Mission. As we caught up, I mentioned how excited I was to turn 50 soon—thinking that reaching a real grown-up age meant I’d finally have everything figured out. They laughed right out loud, and honestly, they had every right to. We all carry this hidden expectation that at some point, the heavy seasons will magically pass and life will finally make complete sense. But real-life challenges don’t disappear with age. We often find ourselves sitting in the “messy middle,” wondering why we don’t know more by now.

A Neighborly Paraphrase of John 14:1-7

“Don’t let your hearts be heavy or anxious,” Jesus told His friends. “Keep trusting God, and keep trusting me. There is plenty of room in my Father’s presence—it’s an expansive home with space for everyone. I am going ahead to make sure a place is ready for you, and I will absolutely come back to gather you close, so we can always be together. You already know the way to where I’m going.”

Thomas, always the practical and literal thinker, spoke up : “Lord, we honestly have no clue where you’re going. How are we supposed to know the directions?”

Jesus looked at him and said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. Real life is found in knowing me and walking with me. By knowing me, you are already resting in the presence of the Father.”

Resting in the Messy Middle

For generations, people have taken verse 6 (“No one comes to the Father except through me”) out of context, using it like a theological grenade or a slamming door to gatekeep who belongs and who doesn’t. But Jesus didn’t offer this insight to Thomas as a declaration of exclusion. He was talking to a tight-knit family of friends on the single hardest night of their lives—right after Judas walked out and right before the arrest.

Jesus wasn’t handing out a checklist to get into heaven; He was offering a beautiful, restorative invitation to abide. To abide means to rest deeply in God’s grace, knowing that wherever we are, God already is.

We acknowledge with deep humility that the institution of the church has often harmed people by trying to draw lines around God’s love. That is why we actively reaffirm our commitment to being an open and affirming church. God is our home, a divine place of permanent belonging for all people. We are committed to throwing that door wide open, ensuring that no neighbor ever has to hide who God beautifully created them to be.

YouTube Chapters

  • 00:00 – The Adulting Myth: Why reaching a milestone age doesn’t mean you instantly have life figured out.
  • 03:15 – A Troubled Night at the Table: The heavy real-life challenges the disciples faced before the arrest.
  • 06:40 – Unpacking the Misused “Gatekeeping” Text: How John 14:6 became a weapon instead of a promise.
  • 10:10 – What it Means to Abide: Finding safety and receiving God’s peace in the thick of it.
  • 13:55 – Reaffirming the Welcome: Our commitment to being an open, affirming, and actively repentant family.

 

Moving Beyond Conflict to Peace | Shawnee Community Christian Church

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If we are being completely honest, human relationships are messy. We disagree, we say things we don’t mean (or things we do mean but shouldn’t say), and we build up walls of resentment, pretending the divide between us is simply too wide to fix. We look at our broken world, our fractured politics, and our personal disagreements and think: reconciliation is impossible. But what if the blueprint for healing our communities isn’t found in a perfect set of rules, but in the very nature of a mysterious, loving God?

The Scripture: 2 Corinthians 13:11-13

Finally, brothers and sisters, farewell. Be restored, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the saints greet you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.

Finding Peace in the Messy Middle

This past Sunday, we celebrated Trinity Sunday—a day dedicated to one of the most beautifully complex ideas in our faith: God in three persons. If you’ve ever tried to explain the Trinity using metaphors like water, shamrocks, or an egg, you know how quickly we run out of depth. And as Pastor Tabatha confessed, that is completely okay. God is not a puzzle for us to solve; God is a relationship to inhabit.

When Paul wrote his final sign-off to the church in Corinth, he wasn’t dealing with a perfect, shiny congregation. They were cliquey, they were suing each other, and they were actively leaving people out. They were in the thick of real-life conflict. Yet, Paul’s parting blessing points them directly to the Trinity: grace, love, and communion.

Our peace and our unity come from the exact same source. We don’t have to fully comprehend the mystery of God to open ourselves up to the grace of Jesus, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. When we lean into that divine community, we are invited to extend that same grace to our families, our neighbors, and even our adversaries. God is extending a hand, inviting us out of our isolation and into a beautiful dance of restoration. Will we step onto the floor?

YouTube Chapters

  • 0:00 – Stumbling Through the Things We Don’t Understand
  • 1:15 – The Mystery of the Trinity: Beyond Our Understanding
  • 3:42 – Relationships are a Messy Middle (Lessons from Corinth)
  • 5:50 – Moving Beyond Hurt and Resentment
  • 7:30 – Invited into the Divine Dance of Love

 

When Church Feels Like a Bad App Notification + The Spirit’s Heart Language | Shawnee Community Christian Church

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If you’ve ever downloaded a language learning app, you know exactly how it starts. You’re motivated, you’re locked into your screen every morning, and you feel great about yourself. But then life gets overwhelming. You miss a day, and suddenly a little green cartoon owl is blowing up your phone with passive-aggressive, guilt-trippy notifications. Before long, what started as an exciting journey turns into a resentful obligation.

Too many of us have experienced a faith tradition that feels exactly like that nagging app notification. We carry the heavy seasons and unpolished scars of religious environments that used guilt and institutional power rather than unconditional love. But this Pentecost Sunday, we are reminded that the movement of God’s Spirit isn’t an algorithm designed to shame us into conformity – it’s a divine breath calling us back to who we truly are.

A Neighborly Paraphrase of Acts 2:1–21

When the day of Pentecost arrived, Jesus’ followers were gathered closely in one room. Suddenly, a sound like a rushing, vibrant wind filled the entire house, and what looked like flames of fire rested gently on every person there. Filled with the Holy Spirit, they began speaking in completely different languages. Permanent residents and immigrants from every corner of the known world—Parthians, Elamites, residents of Mesopotamia, Rome, and Egypt—were utterly bewildered. They weren’t just hearing standard information; they heard Galileans speaking beautifully about God’s power in their own deep, native tongues. While some skeptics laughed it off as too much early-morning wine, Peter stood up and declared: This isn’t drunkenness. This is the fulfillment of ancient hope. God’s Spirit is being poured out on everyone—sons, daughters, young dreamers, and old visionaries alike—bringing a beautiful disruption where anyone who seeks love will find safety.

As our guest preacher Stephen beautifully illuminated, the real miracle of Pentecost wasn’t just a supernatural shortcut to bypass studying a language. The crowd living in Jerusalem already spoke the common public languages of Aramaic and Greek to get by. They didn’t need a mechanical translation.

What they needed was to be heard.

Your first language is your “heart language”—the subconscious language of emotion, the language you use to pray, cry, or whisper “I love you”. For immigrants and outsiders living in a foreign empire, speaking their native tongue often carried social stigma and real danger. By speaking to them in their heart languages, the Spirit wasn’t just transferring data; the Spirit was actively affirming their identities, breaking down systemic walls, and declaring that they belonged.

Today, the institutional church has often forced people to speak “Christianese”—a language of rigid dogmas that can sound closer to an abusive partner than a loving Creator. If you’ve been wounded by the ugly side of church power, hear this clearly: your questions, your background, and your authentic self are radically affirmed here.

We don’t get a magical shortcut or a faith “Duolingo” to fix the hurt in our world. We have to do it the hard way—by staying in relationship, listening longer than we speak, tearing down walls, and learning the unique heart languages of our neighbors.

Our Neighborhood Statement: Shawnee Community Christian Church is a “nesting, resting, and growing place” for our community. We are a family of neighbors valued for our diversity and committed to asking hard questions together.

YouTube Chapters

  • 0:00 – Welcome & Celebrating the Birthday of the Church
  • 3:09 – The Green Owl: My Toxic Relationship with Duolingo
  • 5:48 – Looking Beyond the Familiar: The True Disruption of Pentecost
  • 7:33 – Spiritus: How the Divine Breath Empowers Prophets and Disruptors
  • 10:15 – Shavuot, Immigrants, and the Sacred Nuance of the Miracle of Tongues
  • 11:46 – Heart Language vs. Necessity: Finding Healing for Our Core Identity
  • 15:10 – Moving Beyond Institutional Power and Healing from Religious Trauma
  • 16:53 – Learning the Hard Way: How We Become Living Translators of Love
  • 18:42 – Communal Prayer: A Breath of New Life and Creative Hope