COOS Love Podcast

We all know that life is difficult, but rather than wishing it were easy, Jesus leads us to embrace the difficulties of life. Every situation, even the hardest one, is an opportunity to experience God’s love and to develop our own capacity for love. Ultimately God will use our whole life, even the most difficult parts, to transform us and prepare us for eternal happiness. Watch the video HERE. Con...

Jesus tells us to give to God the things that are God’s, and that means us. We are created in the image of God and are made for God. That doesn't mean we don’t have freedom: we are not slaves or puppets. It does mean that God is our home, and that we are to give God our hearts and live with the assurance that God’s love is and always will be where we belong, our home. Watch the video HERE (sermon...

Love is the energy that brings all things together into unity. Love is the raw force that brings atoms together; love is the power that draws people into unity with God and each other. That unity may be expressed in friendships, marriage, and myriad forms of community, but always it reflects the nature of Ultimate Reality, the God we worship as Three-In-One. If we want to discern where God is movi...

What does the kingdom of heaven look like, and how do we recognize it in our own world? Jesus’ parable of the wedding banquet challenges us to wrestle with difficult questions about God’s character, grace, and what it means to accept God’s invitation. Through the lens of Christ, we discover a kingdom shaped not by fear or violence, but by love, presence, and room for everyone at the table. The inv...

We assume we’re pretty good at recognizing endings, a relationship, a job, a chapter of our lives. And when something comes to an end, we tend to assume we know what that means—that whatever has happened is now behind us and there’s no going back. But resurrection invites us to wonder if there might be something more—something unexpected—that we can’t yet see. Because we tend to see endings as fin...

Jesus saw signs of God’s presence in the world around him, and he embodies God in his very self. The Incarnation assures us that God is not just “out there” beyond the stars but present and active in the physical world in which we live. One reason we pray is to cultivate that awareness of God’s presence all around us. Watch the video HERE. Connect with Church of Our Saviour HERE

Jesus calls us to love like he does, by emptying ourselves of self-centeredness. That is a daunting task. We cannot forcefully overcome our self-centered nature, but we can learn to be aware of our ego needs and to gently let go of them. We will never do that perfectly, but with God’s help we can grow in our capacity for selfless love. In the end, loving beyond self is what this life is all about....

We all tell ourselves stories about ourselves, narratives that define our sense of identity. Many people tell themselves stories of how they fail and mess things up, stories that weigh heavily over the years and make us miserable. Jesus offers a different narrative, one that emphasizes we are God’s beloved children and are safely held in God’s love always. The more we tell ourselves that story – t...

The Israelites complain. The vineyard workers complain. And, I admit, I complain too. Beneath our complaining, though, there is often fear—the fear that there won’t be enough, that things won’t be okay, or that someone else is getting more than we do. Faith invites us to trust God’s provision, in whatever form that may take, and receive enough for today. Watch the video HERE (sermon starts at 37:4...

As the recent commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks highlighted, we live in a world that can feel very dark and depressing. But just as the sun is always shining above the clouds and the rain, so the reality of God’s love and beauty is always there, even when life is hardest. Part of living in Christ is staying connected to the light of God and helping others to see that light...

Jesus teaches us that we are to forgive continually. That is often a process that demands prayer and patience, but it leads to freedom and more abundant life. Refusing to forgive just hurts us. God’s forgiveness is limitless, and the Holy Spirit has been poured into our hearts so that we might know and share that forgiveness. Watch the video HERE (sermon starts at 34:38) Read the sermon HERE &nbsp...

While we might be tempted to see ourselves as isolated beings, we are actually part of a greater reality. Our soul, our true self, is intimately one with God, other people, and all of creation. The more we are aware of that, the more we let that consciousness be the center of our being, the more energy we have in our lives. Watch video HERE.   Connect with Church of Our Saviour HERE

What if love isn’t another thing to accomplish, but something woven into everything we already do? When we remember that we are created in the image of God and deeply loved, the ordinary moments of our lives become opportunities to notice, receive, and share that love. We don’t earn our way into being loving people—we begin from the truth that we are already beloved. And from that place, love has...

We are here to learn how to love: to love God, to love other people, and to love the world we live in. Sometimes that learning is joyful, and sometimes it is excruciatingly painful. Unlike being in school, however, there is no final exam and we will all graduate. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus assure us that God is with us in this learning process, that we are loved unconditionally and...

Many people like to make to-do lists, and Paul’s letter to the Romans offers a formidable one, which includes persevering in prayer, being patient in suffering, and blessing those who persecute us, among others. But all of those are just manifestations of one single activity: living in the Spirit. When we live in union with God’s love, we naturally do the works of love. It takes a process of dying...

What if you’ve already been handed the keys? Not keys to decide whose in our out, but keys that open doors to hope, healing, reconciliation, and love. God’s grace takes on flesh whenever ordinary people choose to open a door instead of closing one. So—here’s the keys. Go open some doors. Watch the video HERE (sermon starts at 33:05) Read the sermon HERE Connect with Church of Our Saviour HERE

God desires to show mercy to everyone. Mercy is simply God’s unearned love, acceptance, and relief. The only thing that can prevent us from receiving mercy is to think that we don’t need it. The Gospel stories show us over and over again that the people who receive mercy are the people who know they need mercy. And the more we can accept our need for mercy and actually let it in, the more we will...

When life is hard, we may find ourselves wrestling with God as we work through feelings of fear, pain, anger, and despair. But struggling with God is a way of living close to God, who always loves us and always wants to bless us. If we hold onto God, and are willing to acknowledge our weakness and need, God will bless us and provide for us. Watch the video HERE (sermon starts at 31:14) Read the se...

We often become so focused on what we're looking for that we miss what has been right in front of us all along. Jesus' parables invite us to see the kingdom of heaven not as a distant future, but as God's loving presence already at work in the ordinary moments of life. When uncertainty tempts us to cling to easy answers, we are invited instead to trust the God whose love is quietly transforming th...

We don’t like to wait, but God has created a universe where waiting is part of the normal growth process. We are all being formed over time into the people God created us to be. Some of that formation is joyful, but hard experiences are also formative. Trusting that God is using all that we go through to shape us into beings capable of love and bliss allows us to live and wait in hope. Watch the v...

The Rev. Emily Fisher bids farewell to Church of Our Saviour. Watch the video HERE (sermon starts at 31:00) Read the sermon HERE Connect with Church of Our Saviour HERE

Today’s main point at Summer Celebration, our annual VBS here at COOS, was “God is Our Safe Place.” We want to instill in our children a deep sense of God’s love and mercy so that they can always feel like it is safe to turn to God. We also want that for ourselves as adults, however, and sometimes we struggle with images of God from our childhood which are angry, judgmental, and hurtful. It’s good...

Jesus' invitation to the weary is more surprising than it first appears. Rather than removing every burden, he offers us a different yoke—a different way of carrying the weight of life. As we learn from the One who is gentle and humble in heart, we discover that God  meets us in our weakness and gives us rest for our souls. Watch the video HERE (sermons starts at 33:13) Read the sermon HERE Connec...

Life is often hard for people, but our faith assures us that life in this world is good and meaningful. All that we experience here is preparing us for even deeper love and greater bliss. But the journey can still be agonizing at times, and cultivating trust is one of the ways we mature in faith. Trust is an active virtue which we can practice.  Watch the video HERE. Connect with Church of Our Sav...

Baptism initiates us into a life of expansive love. While the love of family and friends is beautiful and crucial, we are led by the Spirit to grow in love. Our experience of God should always expand our spirits and enlarge our hearts to include all people. The Apostle Paul assures us  that “Christ is all and in all.” We only love Cjrist above all things by loving Christ in all things. Watch the v...