Wesley UMC Hibbing

Wesley UMC Hibbing Find online worship services and announcements for Wesley United Methodist Church on this page. Visit the Wesley UMC website at: www.unitedmethodisthibbing.org

Our garden is being planted and watered! Thank you!
06/02/2026

Our garden is being planted and watered! Thank you!

Monday MusingSchool is out for summer! Like birds migrating north each spring, many city kids will soon escape to rural ...
06/01/2026

Monday Musing

School is out for summer! Like birds migrating north each spring, many city kids will soon escape to rural destinations to visit grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins at lake cabins, in small towns, and on farms. All summer long, right up until Labor Day, many will spend time outdoors kayaking, fishing, berry picking and swimming. Even when the weather is bad, nothing beats being in a cabin during a thunderstorm. As thunder booms and lightning flashes, board and card games occupy the time until the sun shines and everyone once again heads outdoors.

My parents loved having the grandkids visit them on Shagawa Lake each summer. My oldest brother, Peter, spent most of his adult life working in China until his sudden passing in 2017. It was always a big event when Peter, his wife, and four children would arrive for two weeks each summer from Beijing. One of my nieces seemed to enjoy the lake and outdoors more than the others. She would spend hours on shore catching crayfish and minnows. Even a bloodsucker would make it into her bucket. Whatever she caught, she would examine it, talk to it, and eventually let it go free. She carefully observed eagles soaring high in the blue sky and crayfish scampering backward on the lake bottom. She especially loved fishing. I remember one sunny day I took her fishing on the Burntside River. Each time she caught a fish, she would slowly take it off the hook, stare at it while holding it with two hands, and then slowly release it back into the water. In the evening, she drew pictures of what she saw during the day. Some drawings were so accurate it was hard to believe a 12-year-old drew them while others were a bit more abstract or fanciful. At the bottom of each drawing, she would sign it, “Snowyely.”

Today, when I look at the drawings she gave me as going-away presents, I am reminded of the Genesis passage we read on Sunday. “God said, ‘Let the waters swarm with living things, and let birds fly above the earth and all the tiny living things that swarm in the waters, each according to its kind. God saw how good I was. Then God blessed them.’”

My niece is now an adult finishing graduate school in China. Many years have passed since she gathered crayfish along the shore of Shagawa Lake or we fished together on the Burntside River. However, when I look at her drawings, I feel close not only to her, but also to Creation. My prayer is that this summer, as we enjoy time at the cabin with family or fish on a lake with friends, we will also praise God for creating such a beautiful place and then do all we can to care for this most precious gift.
Drawing by "Snowyely" See less

05/31/2026

Wesley Worship-May 31, 2026

Caring Corner will be open again on Tuesday, June 23rd from 12-3pm ☀️
05/27/2026

Caring Corner will be open again on Tuesday, June 23rd from 12-3pm ☀️

Caring Corner is open today! We are serving ham sandwiches!
05/26/2026

Caring Corner is open today! We are serving ham sandwiches!

05/25/2026

Pentecost, May 24, 2026

Memorial Day Musing“Lord, send down your Spirit and renew the face of the earth.”On Saturday, I presided over a gravesid...
05/25/2026

Memorial Day Musing

“Lord, send down your Spirit and renew the face of the earth.”

On Saturday, I presided over a graveside service at Waasa Cemetery near Embarrass, Minnesota. The sky was overcast, the wind was a bit chilly, and low-lying bogs and ditches were rejoicing from the previous evening's rain. As we entered the small cemetery, surrounded by birch, aspen, tamarack, and pine, we quickly found the grave site where the service was to take place. However, instead of finding one hole in the ground, there were five. Knowing there would be a graveside service and burial for a beloved family member, other family members, mostly cousins, brought the ashes of parents and siblings to be interred simultaneously so they could all rest together—a family reunion of sorts.

So, just prior to the planned service, each of the other four urns was placed into a pre-dug hole. Family members shared the name of the person, their family connection, and then a memory. After each person was named, I said these familiar words, “Almighty God, into your hands we commend your servant, in sure and certain hope of resurrection to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

All responded, “Amen.”

I continued, “These ashes we now commit to the ground: earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust… Yes, says the Spirit, they will rest from their labors.”

We then commenced the service for a much-beloved wife, mother, grandmother, sister, aunt, and friend. At the conclusion of her service, family members began placing dirt over her ashes and then spontaneously took handfuls of dirt and dropped them into the graves of the family members we had remembered earlier. With great love and reverence, everyone took their turn, gently releasing dirt on top of the urns until each had been properly attended to.

As I left the cemetery, I was deeply moved. These acts of remembering loved ones, placing their remains in the earth, and then embracing and reconnecting with family were Pentecost and Memorial Day wrapped into one beautiful liturgy, not in a church but in a small open field near a bog. It was a recognition that each of us is connected not only to the Creator but also to each other and to Creation herself.

“Lord send down your Spirit and renew the face of the earth.”

Image: Sr. Renata Liegey, OSB

Friends,On Sunday, I stood up in the pulpit to preach on Jesus’ ascension, but the words fell flat. Even though I though...
05/18/2026

Friends,

On Sunday, I stood up in the pulpit to preach on Jesus’ ascension, but the words fell flat. Even though I thought I was well prepared, nothing in my writing nor the thoughts in my head made much sense. It was so uncomfortable that at one point, I stopped for a few moments and confessed that I had forgotten what I planned to say. There were a few chuckles in the room because anyone who knows me also knows that I am rarely at a loss for words. As a matter of fact, the Staff Parish Relations Committee from one church described me as “loquacious” in an evaluation. I could not argue with that. When I got home from Church, I sought out Bingo for sympathy. He had little to say and was more interested in going outside to chase robins and rabbits than in my Sunday morning misadventure.

It was then that I recalled an event from the previous week. I came to work and found a small paper bag hanging from the k**b of my office door. I carefully opened the bag and pulled out a small, blue pottery dish covered with sheep. It was beautiful! Immediately, I looked for a card inside the bag. Finding none, I discovered a handwritten note on the outside of the bag that said they saw this small dish and thought about worship when we talked about sheep. It gave me great joy because they must have been listening to the readings and the accompanying message about Jesus being the Good Shepherd.

In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians he says, “I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, will give you a spirit of wisdom…I pray that the eyes of your heart will have enough light to see what the hope of God’s call is…”

My prayer is similar to Paul’s because this morning I prayed for a spirit of wisdom even when my words fall short, and I prayed that my heart would have enough light to see the hope in God’s calling within a beautiful piece of blue pottery covered in sheep. Finally, as an act of contrition, I also pray Psalm 19:14. “May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in your sight, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.”

05/18/2026

Wesley Worship - May 17, 2026

Address

303 E 23rd Street
Hibbing, MN
55746

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 1pm
Tuesday 9am - 1pm
Wednesday 9am - 1pm
Thursday 9am - 1pm
Sunday 9am - 11:30am

Telephone

+12182633653

Website

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