“Be the Loving Embrace of God to our Neighbors”

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 March 25, 2020
I’d like to share with you a beautiful centering prayer for these times:
Prayer for a Pandemic
By Cameron Bellm
May we who are merely inconvenienced
Remember those whose lives are at stake.
May we who have no risk factors
Remember those most vulnerable.
May we who have the luxury of working from home
Remember those who must choose between preserving their health or making their rent.
May we who have the flexibility to care for our children when their schools close
Remember those who have no options.
May we who have to cancel our trips
Remember those that have no safe place to go.
May we who are losing our margin money in the tumult of the economic market
Remember those who have no margin at all.
May we who settle in for a quarantine at home
Remember those who have no home.
As fear grips our country,
let us choose love.
During this time when we cannot physically wrap our arms around each other,
Let us yet find ways to be the loving embrace of God to our neighbors.
Amen.
 
     Let us choose love, 
Pastor Laurie
Categories : Messages from the Pastor
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Shelter-in-Place Resources

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 March 25, 2020

Updates from Government and Medical Leaders

Resources for Parents

Here are some helpful resources for talking with your children about the coronavirus and things to do with them.
Resources for Shopping Hours, Pharmacies for Seniors
 
Susan J. with the support of the wellness team, compiled a list of  resources that will help seniors/pregnant and the immune compromised community know which stores they can shop at exclusively during certain times or using special lines.  Anyone can access this resource list in view only mode.  If you  have difficulty opening this link in google docs for the first time, here’s some help.   To open the links that are in the resource spreadsheet, hover your mouse arrow over the link.  A little box will open with a symbol in the right hand corner with an arrow pointing upwards to the right.  Click on that symbol and you’ll be taken to the url’s website.

More Resources on the Virus – Anxiety, Disinfecting, Social Distancing, Masks…

 
Categories : Community

Shelter-in-Place Virtual Worship Services and Gatherings

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 March 18, 2020

Photo by Paolo Nicolello on Unsplash

Virtual Worship, Bible Study and Prayer

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven… Now is the time for “shelter in place” here in the greater Bay Area. It is a time to refrain from embracing, i.e. physical distancing. And more than ever, it is a time for social and emotional connection.

Skyline is utilizing Zoom.us for our virtual worship services and weekly gatherings. All events will use the same zoom link.  You can access the events on your computer, your smart phone, or a regular phone call.

Sunday Worship and the weekly gatherings will all be at this zoom link:

https://zoom.us/j/716026467
Meeting ID: 716 026 467
Dial in by phone 1-669-900-9128
Dial in by phone: 1-346-248-7799

  1. Sunday Services are being delivered by Zoom Meeting at 10 AM to 11 AM
    Videos of past services are HERE.  

  2. Pastor Laurie’s virtual bible study, Weekly on Tuesdays.  10:30 – 11:30 am.
  3. Pastor Laurie’s Prayer, Care, and Share time, every Friday from ⋅1:00 – 2:00 pm.  Join us for a time of praying, caring, and sharing!   If you’re at home, you’re invited to light your own candle, so we’ll all have our candles together.  We’ll gather with a little meditative music, then spend some time lifting up our prayers together.  In this stressful and uncertain moment, perhaps we need to turn to prayer even more than usual.  Join us, breathe deep, and trust that the Spirit will be with us wherever we are.  Whenever two or three are gathered in the name of God, even gathered digitally, the Spirit is in the space between, connecting our hearts and strengthening us.  Hope to see you for our collective prayer.
Categories : Church in the World, Community, Families, Messages from the Pastor, Our Church, Sunday Worship
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Practical and Spiritual Care for Ourselves and Our Community in this Unprecedented Time

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 March 11, 2020
We are living in a time of high anxiety. The COVID-19 outbreak has many of us on edge,  uncertain about what information to trust, and how to be responsible without being alarmist. Here’s some helpful advice from our Happiness and Wellness team about caring for ourselves, each other and the wider community in this time. 

Here is an excerpt from the Alameda County Public Health Department. Please review this valuable and timely information!

One of the advantages of being a smaller congregation in a large beautiful sanctuary, is that we can spread out! We’re also practicing elbow greetings, and making sure that we have plenty of tissue boxes on hand, and signs reminding one another to wash our hands for 20 seconds!!  However, If you are sick, or at risk, (see the link above)  I love you, and I want you to stay home. We will be recording the services (probably should have been doing this for years now, and will post on next week’s email as a link).

I invite each one of us to continue to practice gratitude for all the blessings we do have; to pray for the most vulnerable in the community; to pray for wisdom for our leaders at the national, regional and local levels; to take time to breathe deeply and to remember that the power of love casts out fear; to value the preciousness of life; to remember that you are not alone and that you have a faith community loving you and praying for you.

The psalmist left us these timeless words:  

God is our refuge and strength,
   a very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change,
   though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea;
though its waters roar and foam,
   though the mountains tremble with its tumult.
      

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
   the holy habitation of the Most High.
God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved;
   God will help it when the morning dawns.

 ‘Be still, and know that I am God

And lastly, since ‘wash your hands” has become the clarion call these days, here is an excerpt about turning the washing of hands into a spiritual practice:

Photo by Curology on Unsplash

We are humans relearning to wash our hands.
Washing our hands is an act of love
Washing our hands is an act of care
Washing our hands is an act that puts the hyper-vigilant body at ease 
Washing our hands helps us return to ourselves by washing away what does not serve.
Wash your hands like you are washing the only teacup left that your great grandmother carried across the ocean, like this water is poured from a jug your best friend just carried for three miles from the spring they had to climb a mountain to reach.
Like water is a precious resource made from time and miracle. (Dori Midnight)

May the peace that passes all understanding keep your hearts and mind centered on love.


 

 
Categories : Uncategorized

“As serious as I know the Coronavirus is, I wish…”

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 March 6, 2020
I’d like to share with you, especially in this season of searching  for leaders and policies that represent and protect all people, these words of the Executive Minister of Justice and Witness for the UCC, The Rev Traci Blackmon:

Dear God,

As serious as I know the Coronavirus is…

I wish Poverty was classified as a deadly virus so the world would respond to the deaths of the 2.6 million people who die annually in the US alone with precautions to contain its effect and protect the most vulnerable among us.

I wish Racism was classified as a deadly virus so the world would begin studying its origin and its mutations and investing adequate resources in developing a response to completely eradicate the effects of this disease on all citizens, globally.

I wish Sexism was classified as a deadly virus so that literally 50% of this world’s population might receive the attention, investment, and escalation of time and resources necessary to remove it from society.

I wish Homophobia was classified as a deadly virus so those showing symptoms could be effectively screened and, if infected, quarantined to protect the rest of us from getting sick.

I wish Transphobia was classified as a deadly virus so that we might actually work to save lives by stopping the spread of this disease.

I wish Xenophobia was classified as a deadly virus so that we would finally isolate the right people instead of those just seeking a safe place to lay their heads.

Basically…I wish the pain, silencing and marginalization of so many were enough to move us to panic mode…with daily updates…and urgent precautions…and monetary allocations…dedicated people at every level…working together like ALL of our lives depended on it…because they do.

I wish we were as ready and willing to wash our souls as we are our hands.

Hear my prayer, oh Lord.
And grant my request.

May we wash our hands, and our souls! 

Blessings upon your week, Pastor Laurie 

Categories : Community, Messages from the Pastor
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Lent – Lost in the Wilderness

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 February 24, 2020

Ever have an incredible spiritual experience? One where you felt the presence of God so close to you? One where you just knew that God had a plan for your life, and God was walking with you?

And then, has that feeling ever left just as soon as it came? And have you ever felt as though you are lost in the wilderness?

Jesus knew what that was like. So do we.

In Lent we are called share the wilderness experience, for forty days, to resist the temptation of forgetting that we too, are God’s beloved. 

Blessings upon your week, Pastor Laurie 
 
for further reflection: 

Henri J.M. Nouwen, 20th century
“Over the years, I have come to realize that the greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity, or power, but self-rejection….When we have come to believe in the voices that call us worthless and unlovable, then success, popularity, and power are easily perceived as attractive solutions….Self-rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the sacred voice that calls us the ‘Beloved.’ Being the Beloved constitutes the core truth of our existence.”

Jonathan Martin, 21st century
“But that’s one way we can identify the devil’s voice: It always plays to our fears. It is the voice that tells us we must do something to prove who we are, to prove that we’re worthy, to prove that we are who God has already declared us to be. When we know we are loved by God, we don’t have to prove anything to anyone. There is nothing we can do to make ourselves more beloved than we are.”

Categories : Messages from the Pastor
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A Light so Bright….

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 February 19, 2020
It seems fitting to end epiphany, the season of light, with a light so bright that no one on earth can produce it, a flash of brilliant, blinding revelation that illuminates not only who Jesus is, but also his mysterious words about his coming suffering, death, and rising again. May it also illuminate who we are on the journey. 
 
I share with you, for further reflection, two beautiful quotes: 

Marilynne Robinson, Gilead, 21st century
“It has seemed to me sometimes as though the Lord breathes on this poor gray ember of Creation and it turns to radiance–for a moment or a year or the span of a life. And then it sinks back into itself again, and to look at it no one would know it had anything to do with fire, or light….Wherever you turn your eyes the world can shine like transfiguration. You don’t have to bring a thing to it except a little willingness to see. Only, who could have the courage to see it?”

John O’Donohue, 21st century
“Much of the stress and emptiness that haunt us can be traced back to our lack of attention to beauty. Internally, the mind becomes coarse and dull if it remains unvisited by images and thoughts that hold the radiance of beauty.”

Blessings upon your week! Laurie 
Categories : Messages from the Pastor
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Love and Anger?

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 February 13, 2020

This Sunday we celebrate love and anger, featuring guest musicians Rachel Garcia and Thu Tran, known as The Singer and the Songwriter!!  Here’s more about their music and their background.    What a perfect way  to explore on Valentine’s day weekend the connections between love and anger, especially with those we are closest to!

In addition to this worship service, Rachel and Thu will perform a 30 minute set after fellowship time at 11:30, followed by a time of sharing Skyline’s love poetry.  Bring with you your favorite person to be angry with and to love!  Enjoy hearing Rachel and Thu’s  My Favorite Person.

 

Categories : Community, Events, Messages from the Pastor
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A Celebration of Love, Music and Poetry – Valentine’s Sunday: Feb 16, 2020

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 February 7, 2020

Join Skyline Community Church in worship on Sunday, Feb 16 in a celebration of love, music and poetry!

We’ll have Special Music during the 10 AM worship service and a 30 minute set at 11:30 after fellowship with Rachel Garcia and Thu Tran, known as  The Singer and the Songwriter.

from their website:  Rachel Garcia and Thu Tran create music as vibrant and diverse as their multiracial backgrounds. Rachel’s rich, nuanced vocal delivery and Thu’s dynamic guitar arrangements provide the backbone for the duo’s eclectic and heartfelt songs that tell emotionally honest and compelling stories. 

Their identities as mixed-race-Mexican-American and first-generation-Vietnamese-American (respectively) subtly inform the inclusionary, modernist perspective of their lyrics, which provide “smart commentary on social attitudes” (Pasadena Weekly), while their music and melodies cut across decades of classic American song forms, bending and blending genres to produce a unique sound with a fresh, clever and distinct approach to the classic traditions of American jazz, folk and blues.

 

 

Do You Love poetry? Please share your love poems with us for Valentines Day 

Submit Feb 11; Poetry Collection available Feb 16

Why?  Because, at the dawn of this new decade, we need love, we need poetry, we need your voice!  So, let’s have a poetry sharing on the theme of love! It can be a poem that you wrote, or one of your favorites!

Why would you want to take part? For many reasons!! 

  • it’s safe – it can be anonymous
  • poetry is alive, and personal
  • we need your voice of love 
  • special prizes – donated by Charlie Holmes, to be raffled off among participants!

 How Do I Write a Poem?   https://www.poetrynation.com/article-categories/improving-your-poetry/

Please submit your entries by Tuesday, Feb 11th, noon to to [email protected] , where we will compile them.  Contact Pastor Laurie with questions.  Enjoy your poetry experience!
Photo by freestocks.org on Unsplash

 

Categories : Uncategorized

Ash Wednesday Service

Posted by Administrative Coordinator on
 February 7, 2020

Ash Wednesday Service

Wednesday, Feb 26, 7-8 PM
Music, Prayer, Meditation, Candlelight, Silence, and Labyrinth Walking

Ash Wednesday begins the season of Lent for many in the Christian church. The forty days begins with the imposition of ashes on the foreheads of the faithful. For many, it is deeply moving to reclaim this powerful ancient ceremony.
Leaders for the Evening:
Rev Laurie Manning and Music Director Gabrielle Lochard
You are welcome, whoever you are and wherever you are on your life’s journey. 

Categories : Uncategorized
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