OPENING PRAYER
Gracious and loving God,
We come to you just as we are—some of us joyful, some hurting, some calm, some restless. Thank you that you welcome our laughter, our questions, our worries, and even our doubts. There is no experience or emotion that we need to hide from you.
Today, help us to be honest with you and with ourselves. Give us courage to bring our celebrations and our sorrows, our gratitude and our grief, our wonder and our weariness. Let us trust that you can handle all of it.
Open our hearts to your presence in every season of life. Speak to us through your Word—through poetry, through wisdom, through the voices of those who have gone before us. Teach us to recognize you in songs of praise, in cries of lament, in gentle silence, and in everyday beauty.
Make us a people who are real with you, ourselves, and one another. Meet us here and shape us into a community where everyone’s story can be heard and healed by your grace.
We pray all this in the name of Jesus, who teaches us to pray with honesty and trust.
Amen.
SERMON
POINT: Becoming
POINT: Faith does not deny reality; rather, it embodies the courage to
POINT: The Bible’s Writings—Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Job—speak every language: celebration, complaint, questioning, wisdom, laughter, and tears.
POINT: The Psalms embody the complete range of human emotion—they allow us to bring
Psalm 13:1-2 NIV
How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts
and day after day have sorrow in my heart?
How long will my enemy triumph over me?
Matthew 27:46 NIV
About three in the afternoon, Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).
Psalm 22:1 NIV
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from saving me,
so far from my cries of anguish?
POINT: If you wrote an honest psalm today, what would it say?
Remember: Every part of our story—joy, sorrow, laughter, and doubt—is welcome in conversation with God.
THE LORD’S PRAYER
Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For yours is the kingdom,
the power and the glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.