Transformations & Transitions

Transcripts are computer-generated and may not be 100% accurate.

Jae: Alright, well the theme for tonight is Transitions and Transformations. I swear that my sweater will match, uh, with a message later. It, it's on me for a purpose. But the, the on the stage, oh yes. Up on the stage. Not used to that. At Bethlehem, we don't have to do that.

Um, but one of the many transformations and transitions that we're celebrating tonight is the return of Caitlin to our kids programs, to being a leader. And so, walkout song, Marta, if we could get you out here to celebrate that you, Marta has been serving with our kids and kids a transition or means a moving to something new. And so Marta is going to be moving not necessarily to something new, but to something old, which is to go back into, into service to just be in worship. And Caitlin is moving back into your group downstairs and so we're really excited for that and we, oh, no, that's okay. It's so good to be excited for the return of Caitlin. It's nothing about you, Marta. Um, so let's, let's just thank both of them. Thank you.

Alright. The, the main thing we're doing tonight is to celebrate the transitions and transformations of our young adults who work with our kids. And that's another reason that tonight is a kids program. Um, and so we're going to just kick it off by inviting Maggie and Sully up. Maggie and Sully started working with us this year and have really stepped in in big ways for our kids. And so we're so excited to be able to celebrate both of them tonight. They will still keep working with us a bit through the summer, but then they're bought both off to, um, I don't want to say bigger and better things, but to new and amazing things.

So thank you so much for being with us. And why don't you guys come on up, we have stools for you. Yeah, let's give 'em a hand. Okay. You guys are going to be up Here. Up here. Alright. Are you making countdown sounds? Crazy. Okay. There we go. It's a little bit awkward. You got to carry whole furniture. And I think we, this microphone is good. Is this, that microphone? Amazing. I'm not the sound guy, so, all right. So they're going to give us a little bit of reflection and then we'll do a little wrap up together. Um, but they're just going to share a bit about how they feel they've transformed this year.

Sully: Hi, I'm Sully. I work with the preschoolers and um, I'm just going to dive right in by saying that I've been so grateful for this opportunity to work at the table because I just love working with kids. Um, working with kids is where I most find God. And being here has further proved that it's what I want to do in the future.

Um, because I've just had so many great role models throughout the year, especially because I've moved six times and I've been to a numerous amount of churches. Um, so I experienced lots of different environments, um, with that. So, um, ironically when I was five years old, my family actually lived with the Mannings for a month. And it's funny because, um, Sam, Kate and Annie all used to babysit me and now I have the full circle privilege of babysitting their kids, which is just really fun.

Um, and it's also why I was so excited when Debbie reached out to me about working here at the table. Um, it's just been so much fun. And whether I'm babysitting or working at a church, um, I love experiencing God through kids' eyes.

Um, I would say that the foundation of my faith comes from my dad. He's a Lutheran pastor. Um, so faith has always kind of been around me, which I'm not going to lie at times has been a little intimidating over the years. But, um, what I've learned is that you can make faith your own thing. You don't necessarily have to be upfront about it or need to have a, by the book Faith Life. You can find God wherever, whether that's in nature or praying or like me hanging out with kids or, um, faith is fluid for everyone and it's why I know I'll bring faith into my college experience and further in the future.

Maggie: Hi, Um, My name's Maggie Ferrell. I work with the first and second graders here. Um, Sully actually helped me come here. I had a, um, couple friends and leaders and, um, adults in my life who go to this other camp I go to. And they were like, oh, there's this great place. It's called the Table. And they, um, they're looking for people to work and I had nothing going on on Sunday evenings, so I decided to do it. And I'm, I'm really glad I did.

Um, um, I grew up Catholic. My dad is, um, Irish Catholic and my mom, um, her family wasn't Catholic, but she was herself. So I kind of grew up going to church and, um, having a faith overall. I would go to summer camps that were Faith-based. And I went to Family Fest as a kid, which is Faith-based. Um, and then I would go to Wednesday night at the church that I go to on Sunday mornings called CPC.

Um, and I had a lot of places where I would really like be surrounded by God and I knew who God was and I, um, knew what he did for me, but I didn't really take him like outside of my life, especially as I got into high school. Um, I go to Edina High School and it's a pretty big public school. There's not a lot of, um, faith talked about. It's kind of like stigmatized. You don't really spend a lot of time talking about, oh yeah, I'm Catholic, or, oh, I'm Presbyterian, or I'm Lutheran.

So, um, I was kind of taught when I got to high school that um, my faith in God was something that I spent on Wednesdays, on Sundays. And when I went to camp, I didn't really talk about it outside. Um, and when I like went through high school, I struggled a lot with like self-esteem and, um, anxiety. And I had a little bit of a hard time like figuring out how I could fix that and how I could make that better.

Um, and towards the end of my junior year, my senior year, I kind of kind of was able to, um, realize that God is meant to go everywhere in your life. It's not meant to just stay at church or on Wednesdays when you're so surrounded by other people who feel the same way.

Um, and so I wanted to share on Wednesdays, this random Wednesday night, they were actually talking about something really similar and I drew a very detailed, exquisite drawing about what I'm trying to say. Um, but they were talking about how um, teenagers especially kind of fit God as like a slice of a pie and like your family and your friends and your sports and school and the other things involved in your life are like a section of this pie. But God is just a slice, like he's not a part of it. And then, um, other people view God as like the metal bits of like a wheel on like a bike or a car in the sense that it like holds the wheel together and is all around the circle. It's not just a slice of the pie.

So, um, I kind of took this and I brought it into my life and overall like my physical health and my mental health have been a lot better because I've allowed God to come in, um, everywhere. And I was kind of thinking about like in college I'm going to the University of Iowa and it's a pretty big school. There's like 30,000 undergrad I think. And so, um, it's once again a place where it gets kind of hard to like, um, bring your faith everywhere and things get in the way and it gets hard to go to church every week or spend your time with God. And um, I'm going to try and continue thinking about having it be a wheel instead of a slice of my pie. So Thank you.

Pastor Jae: You guys can sit down and I'll call you back up. Okay? Okay. They're going to be coming back up in just a little bit. Um, thank you for being my stage hand Christian anytime. Appreciate that. Um, they're going to be coming back up in just a little bit, but I want to kind of wrap that all together for us because the text for tonight was actually from Mark and it's something called the Transfiguration.

Kids, can you try to say that word with me? Transfiguration. And Transfiguration has a very similar beginning part of it to the word transform. Just like transformers. Transform means to what? Jack? To go from one thing to another to go go from one thing to another to change in a lot of different ways. Uh, there's a lot of transformations going on in our world and in the life of this community, right? On June 2nd, we are going to celebrate a transformation in somebody's life. A transition.

This building that we're in kind of looks a little bit old and weird, right? Yeah. This building is, yeah, this building is going through a lot of transitions and transformations. There were people in the neighborhood who were invited to come in and see the building and imagine what's possible for the future of this building. And a lot of really cool ideas came up. Like, could we play? Uh, I think someone wanted to play table tennis in here. I was saying to um, I was saying to someone that maybe like they could do pickleball in the gym. People want to do basketball. There's a lot of really amazing things that could happen in this building if a lotof love was put into it. A transformation, a transition.

But with transformations and transitions come a lot of anxiety. Raise your hand. Uh, if you've gone through something or are going through something right now where you have to, you know that a big change is coming and it's causing a lot of anxiety. Like you can't sleep, you, it's hard to eat. You're a little bit nervous about telling other people about it. Some people in here are going to middle school. Middle school in this community is going to be new next year. That is a transition, that's a transformation, right?

There are kids in this room who are going to go up a grade, probably most of us we're moving up to something new. Andrew right here is going up to what grade Andrew? First grade. First grade transitions and transformations are part of our everyday life and are part of being part of a church. They're really amazing. And so the transfiguration of Jesus was a moment in the gospels where some of his disciples before their very eyes saw Jesus be physically changed.

Jude, could you imagine that? What if I was standing up here and instead of wearing the sweater or looking like this, suddenly I was wearing like a 10 foot ball gown and I was shining like the sun. Jude. Would that be kind of crazy if I just like transformed into something else? That's what the disciples saw in Jesus is that before their very eyes Jesus changed.

And so before our very eyes, even though it takes a lot longer, kids transformed, uh, young adults transform even big adults, not young adults, we won't say old, but just longer term adults, We change, right? There's so many different ways we change. We were talking about the ways that um, we change even before service tonight, some of us.

And so that's what the transfiguration is and that change can cause anxiety. But what's amazing about what Maggie reminded us is that God is not just a slice of that change. God is holding all of that change in. So we don't have to be as anxious about transformation or transition as the community transitions and changes. God is everything that's holding around and inside holding all the pieces together so that that transition in June won't feel as anxiety inducing, hopefully, or moving up a grade.

God has got you Andrew, as you go into the first grade. Yes. Do you know that God's got you while you're in first grade? Yes. Yeah, he knows that. So that's what transition and the transfiguration reminds us and that's what Maggie brought for us to say, which is really awesome.

And so I'm wearing this anxiety sweater, which is really cool that Marta got me from, um, she, uh, thrifted it for me 'cause I saw it on her story and I said, “I have to have that sweater.” Uh, 'cause it's just ridiculous. It's for a bit, but it's also like the theme of transition sometimes just feels like this weird possum screaming. Like when you move houses or you go up a grade or, um, your community's going through a huge change. You feel like this possum. Like you just want to stand up and like scream or screech inside.

Um, but Maggie reminds us that God's got us. And so that's what tonight is all about in the transfiguration. I'm just going to read a bit of Mark nine, then we're going to invite them back up to receive a blessing and we're going to invite you all to be part of that blessing. So I'm just going to read from Mark 9 verse 6.

And in this verse, basically, Peter is freaked, so freaked out by watching Jesus completely change before his eyes that he's basically like, oh, great, um, actually Jesus, maybe we could just like make three sh shrines to like you and like the other and Elijah and like the, and Moses and it'll be really cool. But I also don't understand what's happening. And Jesus is just like, calm down, calm down and tries to explain to him.

But it says in verse 6 that Peter, “Peter said this because he didn't know how to respond for the three of them. The three disciples were terrified. So as you guys go on to college, there are going to be moments when you feel like this possum, uh, and you feel like Peter, that as you're watching this transformation happen to you and around you, you feel terrified.

Andrew, there's going to be moments in first grade, you feel terrified, Lily, in middle school there are going to be moments for sure that you probably feel a little terrified. And the good news in the gospel is that God isn't just a slice. God's the whole thing, which is an awesome image that Maggie brought for us tonight.