Hello, Friends!
       This past week was full of memorable milestones for my personal family, and for our family of faith friends at St. Luke.
       At annual conference Dianna and I affirmed a new appointive year of shared ministry with me as your pastor.  The past six years have been wonderful and challenging, for all of us, and many of us sense that our faith community is at a new stage in its evolution and blossoming in love and capability.  I begin year seven full of gratitude for all that has been, and full of hope for all that this year holds.
     On Saturday our youngest son, Rhodes, graduated from high school, and on Sunday we honored all three of our high school graduates, Rhodes, Olivia Mitchell, and Emily Sullivan.  As your pastor I was deeply gratified by the outpouring of affirmation and support for these three fine young people; as the mom of one of them, I was moved beyond measure by the sense that my son is so loved, encouraged, and buoyed for his journey by the good people of this fellowship.  
    I’ve spoken to you before of different ways in which I experience the United Methodist connection as family.  That continues to be true, and as a new year of our vocational connection begins, I’m even more grateful, more humbled, and more encouraged by that connectedness than ever.
    Maybe it’s because I’m getting older—and thanks for all your remembrances of that milestone, too, on Sunday—maybe it’s because both my parents are gone now, and the numbers of those I can claim as literal family have diminished.  Maybe it’s a manifestation of middle age, as the reality of mortality sinks in, and we begin to take in just how fragile we are, how ephemeral our earthly journey, how time really does seem to fly faster, as we age.
    Whatever the reason, I’m newly appreciative, today, of all those with whom I’ve come to know more about love, through the church.
    Because he was eight days old when I was ordained, Rhodes’ entire lifetime has been enfolded in that love, and on Sunday, I believe he, Olivia, and Emily were once again the recipients of a life-sustaining measure of God’s love, which can continue to nourish them in this tender, transitional time of their young adult lives.
       So thank you, Friends, from the bottom of this mother’s heart—and thank you, from the depth of this pastor’s soul—for being who you are.   And if it’s been awhile since you’ve joined us for worship, I hope you will, because I promise you, Brian Wren’s hymn text for Pentecost is true, around here:

 There’s a Spirit in the air,
 telling Christians everywhere:
 Praise the love that Christ revealed,
 living, working, in our world.

Lose your shyness, find your tongue;
Tell the world what God has done.
God in Christ has come to stay.
Live tomorrow’s life today! 

     I look forward to living with you this Sunday, and all our days to come.

Shalom,
Sarah