Hosted each week by the Faith To Go team in the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego, David Tremaine and Charlette Preslar, the Faith To Go Podcast highlights themes from the Sunday Gospel reading for you to take into your faith discussions and reflections throughout the week.
From NPR
Questions:
1) What are the resurrections in this story?
2) What changed in the father from before he went to war and when he came home?
3) Did his son resurrect something for him? If so, what?
4) Even though the father died, was he somehow still alive to the son? How?
5) Where do you see God moving in this story?
Views and Qs: Becoming a Butterfly
Watch this video together and then use the discussion questions below to reflect as a family.
Discussion Questions:
1) Did you learn anything new about caterpillars and/or butterflies? If so, what?
2) Does the caterpillar have to die for the butterfly to be born?
3) Is the butterfly in some way still a caterpillar when it reemerges?
4) What is the same before and after? What is different?
5) How is this similar to Jesus' description of resurrection in Luke 20: 27-38 (below)?
Feast and Faith: Blessings and Woes
For this week’s dinner discussion, we are talking about Jesus declaration that all things are alive to God.
Prayer -
Father, make our hearts pure for you. Try us. Refine us. Remove from us the dross of lesser metals and impurity of motive, and make us like gold to shine for your glory. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.
Discussion –
Based on the way Jesus is describing the resurrection in his conversation with the Sadducees, it seems like resurrection is both a continuation of life as well as a complete transformation of life as we have understood it. The Sadducees were a group that did not believe in the resurrection of the dead, as Jesus clearly did, and eventually lived out in his own experience. This continuation and difference is embodied in the resurrected Christ, as he is both a continuation of the Jesus that lived on the earth for 30+ years and is at the same time completely different as even his closest friends do not recognize him. Ponder this idea of resurrection together, and the ways these truths have presented themselves in your lives.
Questions
1) What do you think it means that to God all things are alive
2) How do you understand the idea of resurrection?
3) What do you think Jesus believes about the resurrection?
4) Is it possible to experience death and resurrection before our bodily death?
5) When have you experienced death and resurrection in your life? Something being totally different and yet continuous.
Final Nugget: Some deaths and resurrections, continuities in transformation, are built into our very humanity. One example is our bodily transformation during our early teenage years. In puberty, the childlike body that we had "dies," or goes away, and our new adult body is "resurrected" or born. This is often a challenging a painful process, and might give us a little experience of the big resurrection that Jesus is constantly describing.
Stay and Pray: A Devotion for Families at the Close of the Day Each week we feature a way for your family to reflect and pray together. For families with older children this is an at home liturgy for your family to participate in together. It is a daily devotion for families adapted from The Book of Common Prayer.
Before you begin, take a few moments to decide who will read the scripture reading and who will read the collect and closing.
Read the Psalm and Lord's Prayer in unison.
After a moment of silence, begin with the Psalm.
Psalm 98
(Read in unison)
1 Sing to the Lord a new song, *
for he has done marvelous things.
2 With his right hand and his holy arm *
has he won for himself the victory.
3 The Lord has made known his victory; *
his righteousness has he openly shown in the sight of the nations.
4 He remembers his mercy and faithfulness to the house of Israel, *
and all the ends of the earth have seen the victory of our God.
5 Shout with joy to the Lord, all you lands; *
lift up your voice, rejoice, and sing.
6 Sing to the Lord with the harp, *
with the harp and the voice of song.
7 With trumpets and the sound of the horn *
shout with joy before the King, the Lord.
8 Let the sea make a noise and all that is in it, *
the lands and those who dwell therein.
9 Let the rivers clap their hands, *
and let the hills ring out with joy before the Lord,
when he comes to judge the earth.
10 In righteousness shall he judge the world *
and the peoples with equity.
Gospel
(read by assigned person)
Luke 20:27-38
Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus and asked him a question, "Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies, leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; then the second and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her."
Jesus said to them, "Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage; but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. Indeed they cannot die anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection. And the fact that the dead are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive."
Prayers for Ourselves and For Others (take this time to each offer one person/event that you would like to hold in prayer as well as one thing you are thankful for)
Dear God, tonight I ask your prayers for.......
and I give you thanks for ..........
Amen
The Lord’s Prayer
(read in unison)
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy Name,
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those
who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen
The Collect
(read by assigned person)
O God, whose blessed Son came into the world that he might destroy the works of the devil and make us children of God and heirs of eternal life: Grant that, having this hope, we may purify ourselves as he is pure; that, when he comes again with power and great glory, we may be made like him in his eternal and glorious kingdom; where he lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Share some of your conversations in the comments below:
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