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Staff Trax

Growing Up at Salem

This June is my 16-year anniversary of becoming Salem’s worship and music director. This Sunday, as we honor our graduates, I’m thinking about how old my kids were when Salem became our church family: Casey (graduating from college) was in first grade, and Brandon (graduating from high school) was 2 years old. Whoa.

We are celebrating 15 fantastic graduates this Sunday: six from high…

​The Good Shepherd

This Sunday is sometimes called “Good Shepherd Sunday.” The Gospel is John 10:1-10, which uses the imagery of sheep and shepherd. The Psalm is Psalm 23, which starts with the familiar text, “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.”

In the Gospel Jesus says he is the gate. He is the way to the Father. Anyone who enters through the gate will be saved. And once the sheep are in the…

Nehemiah Action

As I write this, we are two weeks away from Good Faith Network’s Nehemiah Action meeting. It will be held Tuesday, April 28 from 6-7:30 p.m. at the Leawood campus of Resurrection: A United Methodist Church (formerly known as Church of the Resurrection). It is not too late to let me, Renee Loya, or Chris Wise know you are coming.

I’ve spent some time thinking about why the work of Good…

Rebuilding the Cross

David Hellwege built this beautiful cross for Salem in 2017. It is hand carved to hold 190 taper or tealight candles, and we use it for prayers and memorials on All Saints’ Sunday and Good Friday. I like this description of a candle: it connects your space to celebration and memory, to relaxation and peace. I can tell you that one of my most meaningful moments in Holy Week is when the Good Friday…

A Day for Jokes

Yesterday was April Fools’ Day, a day known for playing pranks and jokes on others and often yelling “April Fools!” at the end.

Who can forget the April 1 a few years ago, when it was not only Easter Sunday, but there was a light snowfall early in the day. It seemed like a joke from Mother Nature. It doesn’t snow very often on Easter, known as a springtime holiday.

It seems…