Dear friends,
Tomorrow would have been my grandfather’s ninety-first birthday. Granddad was the family story teller. My childhood memories often lead me back to family meals, with Granddad at the head of the table, telling stories with a twinkle in his eye, and a laughing smile on his face. He told stories of growing up in the twenties, stories of generations of our family. He told stories that would have us, and him, laughing till we cried. He told stories at his own expense, as well as anyone else who might be sitting at the table. I loved the ones about my dad growing up, but ones about my own missteps are a lot funnier now than they were then. He told new stories and the kind of story where you knew what was coming, and laughed long before the punch-line.
Stories, old and new, tell us who we are, where we’ve come from, and where we’re going. Stories allow us to laugh at ourselves, admit our humanness, and move on. Stories also make space for grace and forgiveness, as we learn from our own, and each others, mistakes. We tell the same old stories as a way of rehearsing and teaching what it means to be human.
Sunday’s text is one of those “same old stories,” the story of Joseph. It begins in Genesis 37 and ends in Genesis 45. It’s a story of family troubles, big ones, hardship, heartache, and forgiveness. It’s a story sometimes sugar coated in Sunday School lessons and dramatically portrayed in “Joseph’s Technicolor Dreamcoat.” It’s a story we know well enough to tell it together, sitting around the dinner table. We know what’s coming, and yet we still cringe as the brothers plot, and wait with baited breath for Joseph to reveal himself to his brothers. It’s a story for those who think church is for perfect people, and the Bible is only about nice people. It’s an ancient story that still has the power to shape us. Come hear it again.

I’ll see you on Sunday,
Pastor Heather

Filed under: Weekly Invitations by admin