Cosmopolitan United Church

06/06/2026

Meditation June 7, 2026
Gen. 12:1-9, & Ps. 33:1-12;
Hos.5:15-6:6 & Ps.50:7-15.
Rom.4: 13-25
Matthew 9: 9-13, 18-26.

ABRAM’S MOVE OF A LIFETIME
Now the Lord said to Abram, “go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.” (Gen. 12:1, NRSV)

HERCULES, THE GREATEST HERO in Greek mythology had one mission in life. He was a demigod – one born a half human and half god, being the son of the god Zeus and Alcmene, a human. Hercules’ sole desired end was to find the help of the gods the means to attain to where he really belongs among the gods in Olympus, or else stay a lowly human. Disney has him sing in the movie “Hercules” of his dream,
“I’ve often dreamed of a far-off place, where a hero’s welcome would be waiting for me;
Where the crowds would cheer when they see my face, and a voice keeps saying, This is where I’m
meant to be.”

By contrast, Abram, our biblical hero never dreamed of any far-off place. He was so engrossed in his daily activities of raising livestock, and was evidently good at it. He was resigned to being childless, realizing that he and his wife Sarah are passed child-bearing age. He was content with life as it was in Ur, where he felt he belonged. But one day Abram, the man who never dreamed of a far-off place had a visitor. It was the God of creation, who said to him, “Abram, go from your country . . .to a land that I will show you.” Suddenly the dreamless livestock owner in Ur, Abram, later to be changed to Abraham, has a journey on his hands. His call was for him to go to the land of Canaan where he would settle and raise a nation of which he would be the father. That was a tall order. The last time I checked he would travel a total of 1200 plus miles. That was equidistant to a journey between Los Angeles, CA to Kansas City, MO; or the whole length of the Philippines from Basco, Batanes in the north to the town of Bongao, Tawi-Tawi province in the south. He was to travel by what we would call primitive means – by foot, or animal-drawn carriage of some sort, or anything else his creative abilities would avail. A simple play on our imagination about his travel on that call to go to Canaan yields us a heightened respect for the man.

We all move in life from places or condition of relative comfort. Often, we are called to move from familiarity and belonging to something altogether strange and of uncertain future. Embracing the move is often an act of faith and trust in the One who controls our destiny. And that act of obedience to something even just partially discernible is in and of itself fulfillment of the call. For often our call entails a lifetime journey in which the call inspires our aspirations, our waking moments populated by actions inspired by Scriptures, the ultimate arbiter of values we live by. Many of us move by physically uprooting ourselves from where we have been raised in love and connected to those we have grown accustomed with in a sense of belonging. But we also obey our call by a change of trajectory inspired by a power greater than ourselves. These types of moves are means by which God’s will is manifested through us. They fulfill our call when they become means of grace and blessing to others aside from ourselves. They are in contrast to those in which we are motivated by mere self-will, selfish interest over those around us, or of power amassed in pursuit of nefarious ends. The one and only purpose for our life, or a move in station to something relatively better, is the will of God. And that will is predicated by our becoming a blessing to those around us, to the glory of God’s name. May you find fulfillment in God’s daily call for us all to know God’s will and enjoy God forever. AMEN.

Joy and peace,
Pastor Ben
Rev. Dr. Ben Vinluan

05/31/2026

Sunday Worship Service- May 31, 2026
Sermon: "Sent by the Triune God"- Rev. Praveen Raj
Liturgist: Elm Jay Sagadraca

05/30/2026

Meditation for May 31/26 – Trinity Sunday
Gen. 1:1- 2:4a; Ps. 8; 2 Cor. 13:11-13; Matt. 28:16-20.

TRINITY SUNDAY: GRASPING A MYSTERY
Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image. . .” (Gen. 1:26a, NRSV); “O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth!” (Psalm 8:1, NRSV).

TRINITY SUNDAY IS ONE of those guideposts in our journey as a Christian community. It’s the first Sunday after Pentecost. It is the beginning of a long season culminating at Advent. This period is called ordinary time in the Christian calendar. It does not mean unimportant or insignificant. It is a time given to support new disciples, and the whole congregation in living out the “gifts and callings discerned during the Easter season, and commissioned on the day of Pentecost.” So, it is just the reverse of being insignificant, because it is instead a very important period in which we creatively live out what we believe. As they say that’s where we “talk the talk, and walk the walk.”

That is actually the second aspect of ordinary time, the first one being the period between the baptism of Jesus and the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. Taken together it is a long period of 33 or 34 weeks. That period is sometimes referred to as Christmastide, and the other one referred to above is otherwise known as the period of Eastertide. You can see how important these two periods are, for they encompass more than half of the entire year. And taken as a whole, we begin to understand how Trinity Sunday is related because the doctrine of the Trinity involves our experience, indeed, our total journey of faith. Faith is the arena where doctrine is the useful tool for the Christian disciple, or faithful follower of the Lord Jesus.

As Christians we approach the doctrine of the Trinity, or any doctrine, for that matter, as an attempt to understand a profound mystery. It’s something we can only approximately understand. Christians from the beginning have wrestled with the immutability of God as one, as proclaimed by the ancient faith they have inherited from the Hebrews. They did affirm that, but were intrigued by the various ways by which they have experienced God. So, at the beginning of the Christian era, emerging theologians were preoccupied by it, along with other critical aspects of theology. Around the third century of the Christian era, Tertullian the great theologian from Carthage, (in today’s Tunisia) writing in Latin rather than Greek, was the first one to use the term Trinity. He said that God is one substance in three persons. Very simply put, but so profound. And his formulation has profoundly influenced Christian thinking until today, both Roman Catholic and Protestant, and the Orthodox wing of the Christian church.

As a practical elucidation of Tertullian’s formula, we first of all discern God as the Creator of us all. We did not create ourselves. There we find God’s all-powerful nature. Then in Jesus we find God caring compassionately for humankind as a whole, and all of us human family even individually. Then comes the Holy Spirit who is present in the world to guide us in our witness as faithful disciples toward the consummation of God’s purpose of eternal life for all in God’s eternal habitations. All three roles are accomplished by the One God we know as Father, Son and Holy Spirit – all three persons but one substance. Our Presbyterian friends like to insist that we think clearly and seek to understand more profoundly. So, John Calvin came along and produced the Institutes of the Christian Religion. But some two hundred years later John Wesley, during a Bible study and prayer meeting, experienced that much desired profound understanding, when he felt his heart strangely warmed because the Holy Spirit said to him God accepted him just as he was; and that the rest of his life became the arena where God continued to guide him towards a blessed fulfillment. For me, I find the teaching of the Trinity as a reminder that our birth and life isn’t something that took place willy-nilly, but purposeful, God making it possible. Our entire life, each of us, is where we live out that purpose, reflective of the ordinary time I mentioned above. That is made possible because of what Jesus accomplished in his life and ministry (Incarnation). And we do not do so as autonomous, self-directing functionaries. God through the Holy Spirit, s Jesus promised, is always with you and me through it all. To be sure the Spirit’s presence isn’t just focused on us alone. For God is concerned for all of creation, aside from each one of us. The wonder that that entails that God’s love and grace are not diminished by inclusion goes back to the amazing mystery of the love of God. AMEN.

Joy and peace,
Pastor Ben
Rev. Dr. Ben Vinluan

05/25/2026

Sunday Worship Service- May 24, 2026
Sermon: "Pentecost People, Not Babel Builders"- Rev. Praveen Raj
Liturgist: Elm Jay Sagadraca

05/23/2026

Meditation May 24,2026 -Day of Pentecost
Num.11:24-30; Ps. 104:24-34,35b; 1 Cor. 12:3b-13; Jn. 7:37-39.

THE SPIRIT AT WORK
“. . .and when the spirit rested upon them, they prophesied. . .Moses said to him. . .would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirt on them.” (Numbers 11: 25b,29b, NRSV).

THAT STRIKINGLY BRIGHT RED LILY standing upright among other but lesser blooms caught my eye as I went to the front yard. It was just in time as I was thinking about the approach of our usual observance of Pentecost. Traditionally, we associate Pentecost with the color red, because it signifies power by its ability to transform and purify. The irony was not lost on me that in its delicate and vulnerable estate, that lily nevertheless exudes a capacity to captivate and boldly proclaim a power beyond itself. Never mind that it stood there alone, in a class by itself.

We are used to identifying Pentecost with tongues of fire alighting on each one of the disciples at that house in Jerusalem. But the account of the charismatic experience provided the select seventy elders in the desert shows that God does not work only in selective ways, and shuns others. In fact, it’s inspiring how God “took some of the spirit that was on him” (Moses) and put it on the seventy. And that “some” was sufficient to provide charismatic power and gave them ability to fulfill their role of leadership at a given time. And it was equally amazing to see that two others not originally among the original seventy elders, by some mysterious process, were gifted with as much ability that made Joshua, Moses’ assistant, suspicious. But Moses rightfully dismissed his fears saying, “. . .would that the Lord give his spirit to all the people.”

One thing is clear. The spirit is always at work in lives and situations in all of creation. And when allowed to do so as where Moses worked with God in assembling the seventy elders, we are renewed and are never the same again. That renewal is infectious that it works in others as well, beyond our capacity to control or manage. That should give us pause, especially when we begin to feel that keeping up with a faithful way of living seem to set us apart. There’s beauty that may not be apparent, and an inner quality that is fulfilling. That’s what that delicate lily reminded me of when I saw it standing there in its own quality, contented amidst its being different, fulfilling a purpose greater than its transitory and vulnerable existence. No matter your condition, whatever challenges confronts you and me, I believe that God continues to work in our life. We are a work in progress. Methodists like to think of that process as “moving unto perfection”, with John Wesley’s teaching that our faith journey is actually where the Spirit is at work in and through us guiding us to that moment of the perfectibility of grace towards our real home in God’s eternal habitation. May the Lord bless you and keep you always. AMEN.

Joy and peace,
Pastor Ben
Rev. Dr. Ben Vinluan

05/22/2026

A summer camp for our youth!

05/22/2026

05/18/2026

Sunday Worship Service- May 17, 2026
Sermon: "What is Real Glory"- Rev. Praveen Raj
Liturgist: Elm Jay Sagadraca

05/16/2026

Meditation May 17, 2026, 7th S of Easter/26
Acts 1:6-14; 1 Pet.4: 12-14; 5:6-11; Jn.17:1-11.

THE CASE FOR HUMILITY
“Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time. . .” (I Pet. 5:6, NRSV).

IN MANY CULTURES, including where and when I grew up, children are supposedly best seen, and not heard. Children need to be trained to be humble. Or be kept in their place. Things may very well have changed because of influences from outside resulting from the widespread effects of the information revolution. But the traces and vestiges of the desire to keep children away from full participation in family and communal life remain. The educational innovations involving early childhood education and others similarly designed based on appropriate and sound educational principles may have had the effect of countering that old, antiquated cultural understanding. If it was motivated by desire to raise children to become well adjusted, proper and well behaved, or for whatever outcomes were desired, I believe the old practice was a failure.

But the matter of humility, which is related to all of this, remains a major concern in all of life. It relates not just to children but to all. The place – or the case, for humility, is part of the core concern of human life from time immemorial. The Greeks, perhaps most notably of all ancient cultures, located humility at the center of humans’ relationship with the gods. Pride or hybris (hubris) which is defiance of set perimeters promulgated by the deity results in dire consequences. Hench the example of Icarus, who dared to fly too close to the sun despite his father’s explicit instructions, he flew too close to the sun, and he lost his feathers as a result plunging to the sea, and died a tragic death. As for the Jewish people, the concern seems to be not just the avoidance of the dire consequences of pride. There developed a desire to cultivate a way of life in partnership with God, and not out of fear of God. “Love justice and walk humbly with God” is an emphasis arising from an intimate connection with God, following the discovery that God invites and encourages that closeness. Humility is a lived experience of grace, after years when experience of God was characterized by fear, guilt, and separation.

In our current experience of grace seeking to move on to perfection, in the language of John Wesley, humility is to be a common, shared experience in the same manner as other aspects of our faith journey are concerned. “Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God” said Peter. Interestingly, he did not bother to say humble yourselves to one another because that is a given. The call is for everyone, engaged in humility together toward God - “under the mighty hand of God.” In Paul’s summary of the qualities of the Christian life, “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control,” we see a celebration of the Christian life. Peter, by the stroke of his pen, made an all-embracing and powerful rubric – which is humility, making it possible for all of those qualities to shine more brightly, to give glory to God, because of humility.

I see the church seeking to live that aspiration and hope throughout the millennia. This in spite of times when it may have clearly lost its way. Pope Leo XIV is clearly a demonstration where the church sees humility as a major aspect of its life. And our church – for those who happen to be United Methodist – for all of the problems and challenges we have faced in recent years, is showing a becoming sense of vulnerability in its willingness to align its structure in pursuit of its desire to rid ourselves of racism inherent in colonialist mindset, in adapting the new regional set up for the entire connection. That means that major regions of the world – Asia, Africa, the Americas and Europe will each be seen as a region regardless of size or wealth of resources; and as co-equal partners, with due respect to their statuses, without seeking undue advantage for either. That augurs well for a day when true humility across the connection drives and motivates ministry, in the spirit that the epistle envisioned, “humble yourselves. . .under the mighty hand of God.”

May we remember to humble ourselves in the sight of God, as individual servant disciples, as part of our total faith journey. AMEN.

Joy and peace,
Pastor Ben
Rev. Dr. Ben Vinluan

05/11/2026

Sunday Worship Service- May 10, 2026
Sermon: "This Story Can't Begin Without Her"- Rev. Praveen Raj
Liturgist: Elm Jay Sagadraca