Unfinished Community Podcast

Welcome to the second episode of "Remote Pastoral Care!"  One of the many challenges during a pandemic is that you simultaneously find yourself with enough time on your hands to deeply consider and wrestle with all the inconsistencies, questions, worries, and doubts you have encountered along your faith journey, while at the same time being completely unable to just...go to church and have a...

Welcome to the first episode of our new video/audio series, "Remote Pastoral Care!"  One of the many challenges during a pandemic is that you simultaneously find yourself with enough time on your hands to deeply consider and wrestle with all the inconsistencies, questions, worries, and doubts you have encountered along your faith journey, while at the same time being completely unable to just...

We're still working through technical difficulties with the new video format, (which is why we're not only a day late but also opening with a disclaimer about doing visual bits on a podcast), but we're starting to get the hang of things. I hope!   Anyways, today we're talking about a very important subject: sheep. White sheep, black sheep, brown sheep, and all so very fuzzy and warm! But also...

It's a day late due to technical difficulties, but never fear; the sermon has arrived!   (It's me. The technical difficulties are me. Sorry!)   Today's sermon is a tough one, but after a brief explanation about our new video format (and a scripture reading from Luke Luke 24:36b-48 delivered by our very own Courtney Fraley), we delve into the difficult topic of confronting a difficult rea...

If you missed our Easter Sunday service online (and aren't really big on YouTube), then here's the next best thing!  Listen with us as we work through the story of Holy Week, recapping the story of Jesus' arrest, death, and crucifixion, before leaping joyfully into the odd and unexpected story of resurrection with Pastor Don's sermon entitled "And." We're talking about one of the core beliefs...

( For our audio-only friends, this has been taken from our Good Friday Meditation and Reflection video, which was shared via Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube on Good Friday. If you do actually like videos, feel free to check it out in one of those locations as well!) On this Good Friday, join us for a brief meditation and reflection on the crucifixion death of Jesus Christ. In this time, as we tur...

Featuring a mid-sermon scripture reading from the wonderful Claire Van Antwerpen, today's sermon comes to us courtesy of Pastor Akiko Van Antwerpen of Kobe Union Church, whose Palm Sunday sermon entitled "Come thou Unexpected Jesus - Cognitive Dissonance in Our Faith" explores a particularly hard question: what do we do when we call for Jesus to save us, and Jesus starts by wrecking up our own hur...

Today's "sermon" is less our usual walk through a particular bible passage, and more a discussion on the violent events of the past week, some of the history of racism in general (and American racism in particular), and what, just maybe, the great dysfunction at the root of it all might be. In the end, of course, (SPOILER ALERT!) the love of God is the solution, but understanding how to get there...

With scripture from 2 Kings 2:23-25 read lovingly by our own Courtney Fraley, today's sermon tackles one of the weirdest, most absurd passages in the Bible and, in tackling it, we talk about what it means to make false correlations as a means of covering our own backsides, justifying ourselves, and making ourselves appear a bit better than we are, and what the consequences of that can be sometimes...

One of the big questions us church folk often find ourselves asking is, "What are we doing wrong?" We wonder if we're making the right programs, preaching the right sermons, or inviting the right wealthy donors to our potluck fundraisers, all the while never questioning whether any of what we're building was what God really wanted built in the first place. Today (with scripture reading by Travis L...

Have you ever felt like you were doing it all wrong, because no matter how hard you prayed, no matter how much you dedicated yourself to living in a suitably "Christian" way, things never seemed to get better? Have you ever wanted to hear a pastor talk about the Holy Spirit yeeting people into the middle of nowhere? Then this week's sermon might just be something you could stand to hear! With scri...

Would you like to participate in an Ash Wednesday service, but you can't go to a church because of the pandemic? Or maybe you're just interested to see what it might look like when a church does Ash Wednesday across multiple continents, without ashes, and also in the middle of a pandemic?  If that's something that interests you, check this out!  It's the 2021 Ash Wednesday service for Un...

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in a community where it was safe to be authentically broken? With scripture reading from Matthew 18:15-20 provided by Steve Augustin, today's sermon wrestles with what it means to be an imperfect person, living in a community of imperfect people, holding each other accountable with grace and mercy even (and especially) when the leaders among us...

With a scripture reading from Galatians 5:16-28 lovingly offered by Rev. Andy Nakajima, today's sermon talks about how we can move past reading the Bible self-centeredly, and use it not just to determine what qualities we should have in our own ineffable spiritual lives, but as a means of discerning the qualities God asks for from those entrusted with the service of community leadership. As always...

For those of us who are Christian, taking time to pray is important. We may not be together, or even on the same continent, but we can share a time of prayer remotely, whenever and wherever we can. Prayer can be a difficult subject for some of us, so I hope that wherever and however this prayer finds you, that we might find a little light for the week together. Remember that no matter where you ar...

Toady, in a bit of a solo venture from Pastor Don, we talk about how to deal with some of the absolutely frustrating lunatics in our lives (yes, even the QAnon folks) by surrendering ourselves in the interests of God's holy and divine love. Spoiler alert: it's a lot harder to do than it is to write (or preach) about! As always, this sermon is meant to be the start of a conversation, not the entire...

For those of us who are Christian, taking time to pray is important. We may not be together, or even on the same continent, but we can share a time of prayer remotely, whenever and wherever we can. Prayer can be a difficult subject for some of us, so I hope that wherever and however this prayer finds you, that we might find a little light for the week together. Remember that no matter where you ar...

With scripture reading from the amazing Claire L. Van Antwerpen (from Jonah 3:1-5), today's sermon speaks to how we can come to reckon with our own sense of self-righteousness, and explore what it means to serve the Lord not from a position of moral superiority, but from the position of a servant seeking only to do God's will, and not to layer our own biases and judgements on top of God's desire t...

For those of us who are Christian, taking time to pray is important. We may not be together, or even on the same continent, but we can share a time of prayer remotely, whenever and wherever we can. Today's probably going to be a bit stressful for all of us, what with the inauguration and all, so I hope that wherever and however this prayer finds you, that we might find a little light for the week...

With scripture readings by Claire Van Antwerpen (Isaiah 51:1-8) and Travis Love (Romans 12), today's sermon is less of a call to repentance, and more of a wrestling match. The first step of that journey of repentance is wrestling with just what has happened, and starting to figure out who we are without that piece of ourselves we're repenting of. From a youth spent watching evangelical theology cr...

For those of us who are Christian, taking time to pray is important. We may not be together, or even on the same continent, but we can share a time of prayer remotely, whenever and wherever we can. I hope this prayer helps you find a little light this week, knowing that no matter where you are, and no matter when you are, God is still with you!

With scripture readings by Travis Love and Kate Mears, today's sermon is based as much on the tragic and terrifying events of this past week as it is on the passages from 2 Timothy 3:1-9 and Matthew 7:3-5. In our sermon, we hopefully start the conversation about the role of repentance in responding to this week's attacks, and what it means to explore our own responsibility in the terror that has g...

This is the audio recording of the online Christmas Eve service for "Unfinished." Featuring scripture readings by Courtney Fraley, Kate Mears, and Claire Van Antwerpen, this is a brief exploration of the what, why, and how of the Christmas story, and what it means to us not just on Christmas, but as followers of the newborn Christ in all the days to come. Please join us, and have a truly Merry Chr...

Delivered for the International Japanese Fellowship's Christmas service, Pastor Don speaks from Luke 2:1-20, and talks about how the Christmas story might not be the Advent we expected, but it'd definitely the Advent we needed. Join in the conversation on Pastor Don's Discord server, using the link: https://discord.gg/vqxYTfkcTk. We'd love to hear your voice!

In a sermon based on Amos 5:18-24, today's sermon talks about how God's calling on our lives brings us away from a group identity, and not necessarily towards one. It's a complicated topic, so join us for the conversation here and on online; email Pastor Don for details on how to join in!