First Houston United Methodist Church

Kathrin is the Executive Director of Neighbors in Action. On this special Sunday Kathrin describes how NIA strives to be like the body of Christ. www.fmhouston.com www.neighborsinaction.com/

Andy, Ken, and Ben are divided on the nature of bad churches and whether they can still do good, which leads to Andy coming out against the Bible (not really. Or does he?), and Ken announcing that First Methodist is going to war. There are some stirring pronouncements about the spiritual character of Houston, and at the end of it all, we try and buy Andy a yacht. Leave us a response or ask us a question! You can reach us at fmhouston.com/streets.

We need to learn to see then things inside ourselves that we need to take action about. In Corinthians, Paul shows us how. These verses are about a church struggling and doing everything wrong. Paul writes back to help show them a way through: The Holy Spirit is there to help us see things inside ourselves that we need to take action on, ways we need to change. If we keep coming and praying and listening and don’t change? That’s wrong. 1 Corinthians 2:6-11 fmhouston.com

A question about finding peace and rest gives us stories about various intentional practices, romantic dinners at Waffle House, and the time Amanda thought she was going to die at Disney World. Ask us a question! Hit us at fmhouston.com/streets to leave a question or a comment about the show.

Amanda Sermon Hard problems that don’t have easy answers require that we work together. Amanda talks about a scripture she loves - Acts 2, “the church in a snow globe.” People come in and they grow and they grow, and other people see what’s happening and want to come and be a part of it. Life inside the church can be more complicated today. We want clear, concise answers, but we live inside a life that’s a little gray. Hard problems that don’t have easy answers require that we work together, but they lead us to great places. When we have to work together we learn to love one another. Acts 2:38-47 fmhouston.com

The group takes a question about why the church has embraced the Sinner's Prayer when it never appears in the Bible, leading to a brief history of revivals and the Sinner's Prayer, plus the questionable theology we keep running into, and figuring out just what our role is in bringing people to Christ. Got a comment or a question? Visit us at fmhouston.com/streets

Andy is working on his evangelism - trying to be a person who is always on the lookout to make connections. It’s a hard time to meet people. But people are more hungry than they’ve ever been. God is trying to wake us up, to recreate us. We are called to love people just as He loves us. “Ask yourself a question: Do I love my friends, my spouse, my neighbor the way that God loves me? And if not, I need to close that gap.” 2 Corinthians 3:12-18 ——— fmhouston.com

The gang fields a question about how John Wesley treated confession, and how the church treats it today. It turns out to be a fertile topic, featuring some wide-ranging stories from everyone's experience, and a very specific callout of a certain church nearby. Send us a question or a comment, and help shape what the next episode of the show could be. You can reach us at fmhouston.com/streets.

Look at the flowers of the field - God will take care of them, God will take care of you. If we trust Him with everything that we’ve got, we’re invited to another life altogether. Jesus invited Peter to get out the boat and join him. How do we get out of the boat, too? Matthew 6:28-34 fmhouston.com

This week, the group has a question to wrestle with, as they explain what Jesus was doing when he changed the use of the word "blessed" in the Sermon on the Mount. Along the way, the group debates whether Jordan's opinions are going to ruin her chances of being ordained. Ask us a question! fmhouston.com/streets

As Amanda looks back at the early days of the pandemic, she thinks of an example of something she learned from the a visit to the San Jacinto Monument: Look out not just for the big moments, but the smaller ones. John 14:15-20 fmhouston.com

As we get back to basics, Andy focuses on what he finds most crucial: love of God and love of neighbor. It helps us to do the right thing, which is not always easy to know. On the eve of MLK Jr. Day, Andy reads from Charles Allen’s autobiography, as he came to terms with the racism he encountered in every day life, and the ways he needed to grow to be able to fight it. We are still a church that fights. And we have many battles left in front of us. John 3:13-17 fmhouston.com

With cases on the rise, the group heads back to recording remotely. It's the first time for our newest hosts, and it takes some getting used to. Meanwhile, Andy locks himself out of his apartment. Ask us a question! Since the season began, we have yet to get a single new question. Help us fix that. fmhouston.com/streets

The spark for Andy’s sermon today came from a book by Charles Allen, one of First Methodist’s most famous voices. And in the opening pages of the text, Andy finds himself brought back to the basics of our faith. Genesis 1:1-5 fmhouston.com

Andy finishes the Christmas season. fmhouston.com

The podcast starts off with Ken finally revealing what, exactly, took place at the Coneby Christmas Barn, before the group talks about the ways that 2021 surprised them, changed them, and made them look at the world differently. We are taking your questions! Visit us at fmhouston.com/ama for more episodes and to send us a question or a topic you'd like to hear more about.

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With Christmas upon us, the group talks about what things they do to find the Christmas spirit each year, and what traditions their families have kept to make Christmas Eve feel like an actual celebration of the birth of Christ. What they mostly find is that everybody has some pretty weird traditions in their family. Ask us a question! We're still taking questions at fmhouston.com/ama, and we'll get to your questions in the new year.

Andy discusses a passage where God sends us out to bring peace to the world - something that's important because, as he notes, “We’re not very good at creating our own peace.” And a lesson he learned from a 91-year-old friend about how God gets him out of bed in the morning. Micah 5:3-5a fmhouston.com

The group talks about how to get your family into the correct Christmas spirit, and accidentally spoils the secret that Santa isn't real (beware of listening with your kids around!). As a result, we get some unorthodox Christmas traditions, and the story of the time Ken successfully caught Santa Claus. We're still looking for your questions! Send us a question at fmhouston.com/ama and we'll include it in the show.

We're back! After a long pause and some retooling, the podcast has returned, with a new vision and title that's easier to find on web searches. "Ask Me Anything" is now "You Can Hear Us In The Streets" (for reasons explained in the podcast), and we use our first episode to introduce one of our new cohosts, Jordan Czichos, and talk about how to prepare your heart for Christmas during a difficult Advent. We're still looking for your questions! Send us a question at fmhouston.com/ama and we'll include it in the show.

The words of the prophets are often unpopular. But they help us get back on course. “Wherever we’ve been off course, we can get back on," Andy says. “At the end, you and I have to make a decision to love, to hope.” There’s always a way for us to respond. Luke 1:41-45 fmhouston.com

The light of God is powerful. Who is God calling you to seek out and be the light for? Luke 1:76-79 fmhouston.com

Today’s scripture is a common Advent passage - a passage about a time when God called Israel to follow the path he laid out for them. That path is still before us. Andy asks us to take it. “Put aside the things that divide us, and take a good look at the road Jesus has for us.” Isaiah 40:3-5 fmhouston.com

Luke 14 15-21 fmhouston.com

Amanda grew up with an open table - Thanksgiving was a time for all people, no matter how tangentially connected, to have a place. It reminds her of the covenant God invited us to: to love each other as ourselves, and invite them to the table. 2 Samuel 1:9-10 fmhouston.com

Andy discusses the importance of making an invitation to others by pointing out the way Jesus did just that: he ate with every kind of person. His table was always open. What’s a way that you could do the same? Luke 22:7-20

Does anyone really believe we can have world peace? Kristen sums up our Missions series by exploring the many meanings of the word “shalom” in our world, and showing us what true peace on earth would really look like. Isaiah 9:6

When William Shatner went to space, it left Andy thinking about what it’s like to get a true overview of the world, and what God is doing in it. Those things need action behind them. Andy talks about the ways God is calling us to take His hand and walk forward with Him in faith. John 17:20-23 fmhouston.com

As we kick off this year’s missions series, Amanda emphasizes God’s requirement for us to take action in order to bring justice to the world. We are to invite the world in to experience what we are experiencing, to discover grace and mercy. fmhouston.com

As we spend one more week closely looking at the Lord’s Prayer, Jordan talks about the way the prayer continues to look different to us each time we look at it. Prayer is an act of faith, but it is also work - good, faithful work. God needs us to be Kingdom-bringers. And the holiest work we can do is ask for God to bring His Kingdom down.

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On a recent trip to a prayer labyrinth, Amanda couldn’t find the answers she was looking for. And so she had to surrender and hand everything over to God - and God met her there. When Amanda looks at the Lord’s Prayer, she is reminded of the how we often ask God to sprinkle blessings on top of what we’re doing, instead of seeking God’s kingdom.

The greatest thing we can do to access the divine in our lives is pray. At the start of A Year of Prayer and Discernment, Andy focuses on what an incredible gift prayer is. We have a God who created us who wants to both hear us and speak to us. “Just beyond what we can see and know is a God who wants to move in us.” fmhouston.com

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1 Peter 4:12-17 Jordan looks at 1 Peter 4 and is reminded of "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day." Why? Because, as she point out, "the world is just icky sometimes." But Peter reminds us why we are called by God to form relationships - so that we can struggle through these things together. No matter what the pain you go through, don't go it alone. fmhouston.com

1 Peter 3:8-12 In Chapter 3, Peter echoes the lessons of the Sermon on the Mount to remind us of how Jesus Christ talked about living a life of forgiveness rather than retribution. Andy wants us to find ways to be a peacemaker. “Our days can’t be filled with conflict. We have to move on.” fmhouston.com

This week, Andy dives into chapter 2 of 1st Peter. He points out that our church is a diverse church - in the same way, the book of 1 Peter is the sort of story written to a diverse collection of churches. What Peter is writing about needs to be a model for us. “Each of us needs to be loved, each of us needs to be forgiven, and the church needs to be a place where we celebrate these things.” fmhouston.com

This week, Amanda Davis covers 1 Peter 1:13-16 Where did you see God at work today? fmhouston.com

Micah 6:7-8 Andy remembers a story of a woman who came into a church he worked at in need of food, and how the church responded - and whether their actions were truly just. “The church has to be a safe place to have a dangerous conversation.”

When Andy gives, he realizes that the relationships he’s formed matter. Giving and relationship are intertwined. Whenever we make the decision to give and invest, we see God move in every other area of our lives. fmhouston.com

For Amanda's first sermon, she dives into the importance of service, and what a life lived with that purpose looks like. fmhouston.com

As we talk about loving others as we love ourselves, we have a lot of things to overcome - mostly, ourselves. Paul viewed himself fully as a servant of Jesus Christ - to him, that was his identity. If we did the same, we could avoid falling into all sorts of traps. COVID has separated us from people and from having a mission. Andy talks about finding a way back. fmhouston.com

In Jordan's first sermon at our church, she dives into the parable of the talents, and what happens when you fail to live out the mission that God has given you. fmhouston.com

Keeping the Sabbath holy is a physical and specific act - we have to go out of our way to set it aside in order to worship the Lord. As we enter a new series about the tenets that make up our church, Andy lays out three ways to make the most of your Sabbath. fmhouston.com

Andy points out that Elijah is much harsher to the prophets of Baal than we like to admit - the things Elijah said are so alarming that scholars later dialed it down, thinking surely Elijah could not have said something like this. But Elijah knew that God was with him. Plus, Andy returns to baseball metaphors - twice! - because the Astros won 11 in a row. And, of course, he jinxes them immediately. fmhouston.com

Some of us are uncomfortable with the word “prophet.” But prophets are not people who have power, but people who rely on the message of God. We need to be able to rely on that message the same way. Our call is to be a place of refuge from the brokenness of this world. God has given us gifts to share in community together. Because it is not a place that is the presence of God, it is in a community together in which we see God. fmhouston.com

The pandemic has taken a lot of things from us, and one of those things has been the ability to gather together and worship. The story we listen to today shows how Solomon built a tangible place for God to be worshiped - but though that temple was grand, it was, like everything else, temporary. In the same way, we must use the symbols around us to point us to God - and not to make them too important as they are. Andy shows us how to hold on to what we’ve inherited from the past, but also see the new thing that God is calling us to do. fmhouston.com

For his sermon, Andy needed an example of crossing lines - and on Sunday morning, he got one. As the world begins to open up; Andy finds himself incredibly excited for this moment. We have stepped into a new blessing. It is a time to lead. And Andy wants to help you make it happen. fmhouston.com

As we exit the pandemic, there are many of us who are ready just to forget what happened and move on. But this is a powerful moment we should not let pass by: how do we step forward well and allow God to take the lead? In Joshua, the people of Israel are leaving the wilderness and entering a new land. As God pulled back the waters of the Jordan to allow them to cross, Joshua had the people get stones to build an altar to remember that crossing. Joshua is calling on them, in that moment of transition, to rely on God’s power, on God’s faithfulness. fmhouston.com