Rose City Park United Methodist Church

09/06/2026

Rev. Dr. David Weekley

Readings from:
Exodus 12:1-14
Matthew 18:15-20

Announcements:
-Prayer Chain: If you have a prayer request (confidential or otherwise), please email [email protected]. If you are interested in participating in the prayer chain, please contact Kay Pettygrove at [email protected].

Welcome to all! To those worshiping with us for the first time, we extend a special welcome!
_____

Rose City Park United Methodist Church
5830 NE Alameda
Portland, OR 97213

rcpumc.org
503.954.2830
[email protected]

09/05/2026

Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost
September 6, 2026
Rose City Park UMC
Rev. Dr. David Weekly, Pastor


Church Bulletin for online viewing
We are in person, this bulletin is for if you are watching online
and wish to follow along and have the words for participation.
YouTube link for viewing HERE - Facebook link for viewing HERE


PRELUDE Fountain Reverie -Percy Fletcher (1879-1932)



WELCOME AND PASSING OF THE PEACE

COMMUNITY NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS



INTROIT “In My Heart There Rings a Melody”
I have a song that Jesus gave me, It was sent from heav'n above;
There never was a sweeter melody, 'tis a melody of love.
In my heart there rings a melody, There rings a melody with heaven's harmony;
In my heart there rings a melody; There rings a melody of love.



THE CALL TO WORSHIP
One: Family of God, we live in a world full of conflict and division.
All: God calls us to be a people of reconciliation.

One: We live in a world full of misinformation and confusion.
All: God calls us to be a people of truth and clarity.

One: We live in a world that wants to settle disputes with harmful words and actions.
All: God calls us to be a people who make peace through compassion and honesty.

One: We live in a world that does not understand the ways of Jesus.
All: Yet Jesus teaches us to be a people of reconciliation and peace for the good of the whole world. Thanks be to God! Amen.
Written by Dr. Lisa Hancock, Discipleship Ministries, May 2026.



HYMN OF PRAISE #469 “Jesus is All the World to Me”
1. Jesus is all the world to me,
my life, my joy, my all;
he is my strength from day to day,
without him I would fall.
When I am sad, to him I go,
no other one can cheer me so;
when I am sad, he makes me glad,
he's my friend.

2. Jesus is all the world to me,
my friend in trials sore;
I go to him for blessings, and
he gives them o'er and o'er.
He sends the sunshine and the rain,
he sends the harvest's golden grain;
sunshine and rain, harvest of grain,
he's my friend.

3. Jesus is all the world to me,
and true to him I'll be;
O how could I this friend deny,
when he's so true to me?
Following him I know I'm right,
he watches o'er me day and night;
following him by day and night,
he's my friend.

4. Jesus is all the world to me,
I want no better friend;
I trust him now, I'll trust him when
life's fleeting days shall end.
Beautiful life with such a friend,
beautiful life that has no end;
eternal life, eternal joy,
he's my friend.



READING OF THE HEBREW SCRIPTURE Exodus 12: 1-14
1The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, 2 “This month shall mark for you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year for you. 3 Tell the whole congregation of Israel that on the tenth of this month they are to take a lamb for each family, a lamb for each household. 4 If a household is too small for a whole lamb, it shall join its closest neighbor in obtaining one; the lamb shall be divided in proportion to the number of people who eat of it. 5 Your lamb shall be without blemish, a year-old male; you may take it from the sheep or from the goats. 6 You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month; then the whole assembled congregation of Israel shall slaughter it at twilight. 7 They shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. 8 They shall eat the lamb that same night; they shall eat it roasted over the fire with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. 9 Do not eat any of it raw or boiled in water but roasted over the fire, with its head, legs, and inner organs. 10 You shall let none of it remain until the morning; anything that remains until the morning you shall burn with fire.11 This is how you shall eat it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand, and you shall eat it hurriedly. It is the Passover of the Lord. 12 I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike down every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from human to animal, and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord. 13 The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live: when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague shall destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. 14 “This day shall be a day of remembrance for you. You shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance.



ANTHEM The Prayer David Foster and Carole Bayer Sager
Rose City Park Choir arr. by Tom Fettke



READING OF THE GOSPEL Matthew 18:15-20
15 ‘If another member of the church[a] sins against you,[b] go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one.[c] 16 But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. 17 If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax-collector. 18 Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. 19 Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. 20 For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.’

MESSAGE Winning One Another Back Dr. Weekley



PASTORAL PRAYER AND PRAYERS OF THE COMMUNITY

THE LORD’S PRAYER
Our Father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.



OFFERING OF OUR TITHES AND GIFTS

OFFERTORY



DOXOLOGY #95
Praise God, from whom all blessings flow;
Praise God all creatures here below.
Praise God above, Ye Heavenly hosts,
Praise Christ, Creator, Holy Ghost. Amen.



DEDICATION OF THE OFFERING
Reconciling God, you mark our lives not with fear, but with mercy, and gather us into a people shaped by grace. As you delivered your children at Teach us to live in our “church clothes” every day—clothed in patience, truth, and love. Receive these gifts as signs of our trust in your power and our commitment to your work of healing and restoration. Use what we offer to mend what is broken, and to build a community where forgiveness and hope have the final word. In Christ’s name, we pray. Amen.



COMMUNION HYMN #3093 “Fill My Cup, Lord”
1 Like the woman at the well I was seeking
For things that could not satisfy
And then I heard my Savior speaking
Draw from my well that never shall run dry

Fill my cup Lord I lift it up Lord
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul
Bread of heaven feed me till I want no more
Fill my cup fill it up and make me whole

2 There are millions in this world who are craving
The pleasures earthly things afford
But none can match the wondrous treasure
That I find in Jesus Christ my Lord

Fill my cup Lord I lift it up Lord
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul
Bread of heaven feed me till I want no more
Fill my cup fill it up and make me whole

3 So my neighbor if the things this world gave you
Leave hungers that won't pass away
My blessed Lord will come and save you
If you kneel to Him and humbly pray

Fill my cup Lord I lift it up Lord
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul
Bread of heaven feed me till I want no more
Fill my cup fill it up and make me whole



CELEBRATION OF HOLY COMMUNION

The Great Thanksgiving and Celebration of Communion (All are invited)

Leader: Welcome family! Welcome relations! Welcome all! The house of the Creator is our gathering place today. The feast has been prepared for us all. This may be your first time to share the feast of Holy Communion. Welcome to the table that binds us all together! God, who walked with our ancestors, who walks among us now, and who will walk with our children's children for generations to come, we give you thanks for your presence.

All: In the air that we breathe, in the sound of rustling leaves and in the waving grass, we give you thanks for your presence.
In the sound of children's laughter, and in the songs of our elders,
We give you thanks for your presence.

Leader: Let us help each other stand and take off the robe of mourning.
Lift up your broken hearts:

People: We lift them up to God
Leader: Let us honor God

People: It is right to honor God

Leader: It is right to honor God and to give our thanks.
People: We give our thanks to God.


Leader: We send to you, Creator God, our dreams, visions, and prayers.
Let your Spirit move us to honor and respect one another – from the least to the greatest. May we treat everyone we encounter with dignity and love. May we affirm the image of the Creator within each one of us. May we help restore the image of the Creator on earth. May our words, thoughts, and actions nourish and sustain your creation.

We Prepare for the Feast

Be glorified, Everlasting Light who ends our mourning. Be glorified, Planter of righteousness whose hands have formed us with strength. Be glorified! (based on Is. 60:19-21; 61:3)

All honor to the Son of God who brings good news to the poor. All honor to Jesus Christ who brings freedom to the oppressed and sight to the blind. All honor! (based on Luke 4:18) All praise to the Holy Spirit who helps us in our weakness. All praise to the Sacred Spirit who teaches us how to pray and intercedes on our behalf. All praise! (based on Romans 8:26)

Leader: Jesus Christ, our brother and friend,
People: with honor and respect, we remember the great sacrifice of your life for us and for our people.

Leader: With awe and humility, we remember the miracle of your resurrection from death.
People: With faith, hope and trust, we remember the promise you made to return and lead us home.

Creator God, you understood the importance of community and relationship. On the night Jesus gave himself up for us, he gathered his disciples from many tribes, and shared a meal with them in preparation for his death and resurrection.

As Jesus stood in the midst of them, he took bread, gave thanks to you, broke it and gave it to his disciples and said, "Take, eat, this is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me."

After the meal, Jesus took the cup, gave thanks to you, gave it to his disciples and said, "Drink this, all of you. This is my blood of the new covenant poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me."

Sharing of the Feast

Leader: As the grain was given by Creator God to all peoples of the world,

People: Jesus Christ was also given to nourish and sustain.

Leader: As the fruit of the vine was given by Creator God to all peoples of the world, People: Jesus Christ was also given to bind us to God and one another.

Leader: Spirit, help us now. Come and breathe into these gifts of bread and juice. As we receive these gifts into our bodies, may our breath become the sweet breath of Christ. Rise up, People of God, the table is prepared and all are invited.

Words for the Journey

We have taken Jesus into us, we now go out into the different directions to be the hands and feet of Jesus. We go out to correct what we did wrong, what others did wrong, and to sometimes take the blame for another's mistake as Jesus did for us. We go out to stand up for the powerless, the voiceless, and those invisible. Gracious God, let your mercy and grace fall on us and give us courage to follow in the footsteps of Jesus.

All: Creator God, as we walk from this place with renewed strength for the journey before us, let us follow the path of Jesus, as the Spirit guides our steps. Help us to make wise choices in the days ahead, to serve those in need, and to remember our place in the circle of life. Remind us to listen to our elders, to teach our children the traditions of our people, to respect one another and all creation. As we wait for the day when we will be reunited with you and those who have gone before us, keep our hope alive and our footsteps on the path toward home. Amen.



CLOSING HYMN #398 “Jesus Calls Us, O’er the Tumult”
1. Jesus calls us o'er the tumult
of our life's wild, restless sea;
day by day his sweet voice soundeth,
saying, "Christian, follow me!"

2. As of old the apostles heard it
by the Galilean lake,
turned from home and toil and kindred,
leaving all for Jesus' sake.

3. Jesus calls us from the worship
of the vain world's golden store,
from each idol that would keep us,
saying, "Christian, love me more!"

4. In our joys and in our sorrows,
days of toil and hours of ease,
still he calls, in cares and pleasures,
"Christian, love me more than these!"

5. Jesus calls us! By thy mercies,
Savior, may we hear thy call,
give our hearts to thine obedience,
serve and love thee best of all.



BENEDICTION
One: Family of God, the lessons of reconciliation and peace-making are not easy. As you move into the week ahead, may God bless you with the desire to restore community where it is broken, to hold boundaries with firmness and grace, to listen with curiosity, and to speak with gentleness, that all may know we follow Jesus, our Christ. Amen.



CONGREGATIONAL RESPONSE #140 refrain “Great is Thy Faithfulness”

Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
all I have needed thy hand hath provided;
great is thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!



POSTLUDE Improvisation on Old 100th



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UPCOMING EVENTS
September 12 Blue Prints Arts Concert - 7:07pm in the sanctuary
September 13 Jack Ball Award recipient(s) announced



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STAFF
David Weekley, Pastor
John Green, Director of Music
Dan Pettis, Praise Band Leader/Pianist
Hye Yeon Kim, Pianist
Elsa Johnson, Building Manager
Andre Cordes, Financial Accountant
Chloe Carter & Olivia Leap, Nursery Team
Sarah Haftorson & Filipe Wild-Camara, Video Team
Carlos Diez & Carlos Diez, Jr., Custodial Team
Brian Bolster, Slides

Prayer Chain
Just as a reminder, the prayer chain is available to those that would like to request prayers. Also, if someone would like to join the prayer chain all they need to do is send a request to be added to the email address below. [email protected]

5830 NE Alameda St, Portland, OR 97213
503.954.2830 | [email protected] |www.rosecitypark.org
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An old church with a progressive heart. Come as you are to Rose City Park United Methodist Church!

09/02/2026

Rose City Park UMC

Rev. Dr. David Weekley, Pastor

September 6, 2026

Matthew 18:15-20





Winning One Another Back



Few of us want to talk about conflict. Even those who do not consider themselves conflict-averse rarely welcome it. Conflict reaches into our most vulnerable places. It can threaten our peace, our sense of community, and even our understanding of ourselves. Yet however much we may long for a world without conflict, we do not live in one. Conflict is part of life together. Labor and business experience it; in fact, Labor Day grew out of workers’ and unions’ efforts to address harsh working conditions, child labor, and the rise of organized labor. Families experience conflict. Churches experience it. Friends experience it. Even people who deeply love Jesus can wound, misunderstand, and disappoint one another.

So how do we enter and move through conflict faithfully? Amazingly, Jesus gives us a road map. Of all the things we may wish Jesus had given us clear answers for, here we receive a remarkably clear picture of how to navigate conflict in Matthew 18. That raises an honest question: Why do we not use it more? Many of us have heard sermon after sermon about following Matthew 18’s guide for handling conflict, but recently we do not see leaders or communities practice it well. Perhaps that is because it requires skills uncomfortable to practice.

Jesus begins, “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you.” Notice the first word of action: go. Jesus does not say, “Wait until they figure it out.” does not say, “Tell three friends first.” He does not say, “Build your case and prepare your speech.” He says, go.

That takes courage. But the courage Jesus describes is not the courage of confrontation for confrontation’s sake. It is the courage of love. Private conversation protects dignity. It refuses to turn pain into performance. It gives the other person room to listen without being humiliated.

Jesus asks us to have the courage not to triangulate. Triangulation happens when, instead of going directly to the person involved, we draw someone else into the tension in a way that avoids the hard conversation. We may call it venting, processing, or seeking advice, and sometimes we do need wise counsel. But Jesus begins by protecting the relationship from unnecessary exposure. He teaches us to go one-on-one first, not because the matter is small, but because the person is precious.

The goal is clear: “If they listen to you, you have won them over.” Jesus does not say, “You have won the argument.” Jesus says, “You have won that person back.” The prize is not being right. The prize is the relationship restored.

Jesus then says that if the person does not listen, take one or two others along. This is not meant to create pressure, intimidation, or a crowd of allies. It is meant to bring wisdom, accountability, and clarity. Sometimes conflict becomes so tangled that we need faithful people who can help us see what we cannot see alone.

Jesus teaches persistence and transparency. If the first conversation does not bring reconciliation, the circle widens—not to punish, but to bring in trusted witnesses who can help truth be heard clearly. If the conflict still remains unresolved, the church is brought in, not as a mob, but as a community committed to the healing of its members.

Humility means I enter the conversation knowing I may not understand everything. I may have been hurt, but I may also have contributed to the hurt. I may be speaking truth, but I must speak it with gentleness.

When Jesus speaks of telling the matter to the church, this is not endorsing gossip or public embarrassment. The widening circle is still meant to serve the same purpose: restoration. Each step is slower than our anger wants it to be and more patient than our pride prefers.

Even the difficult phrase “treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector” must be read through the life of Jesus. How did Jesus treat tax collectors? Jesus called Matthew. Jesus ate with Zacchaeus. Jesus moved toward outsiders with truth and mercy. In other words, if every step toward reconciliation has been rejected, there may be a need for boundaries, but those boundaries are still held with kindness and love. This is difficult to wrap our heads around in the abstract, much less when we are in a real conflict where we have been hurt or where we realize we have hurt someone else.



Frederick Buechner on Forgiveness

Frederick Buechner offers a profound reflection on forgiveness, emphasizing its role in restoring peace and mutual respect:

“To forgive somebody is to say one way or another, ‘You have done something unspeakable, and by all rights I should call it quits between us. Both my pride and my principles demand no less. However, although I make no guarantees that I will be able to forget what you've done, and though we may both carry the scars for life, I refuse to let it stand between us. I still want you for my friend.’” Frederick Buechner+1

He also notes that accepting forgiveness means admitting you’ve done something unspeakable that needs to be forgiven, and that both parties must swallow the same thing: their pride. Buechner connects this to Jesus’ teaching: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us,” explaining that the pride that keeps us from forgiving is the same pride that keeps us from accepting forgiveness .

In simpler, more direct terms, Buechner writes:
“When somebody you've wronged forgives you, you're spared the dull and self-diminishing throb of a guilty conscience. When you forgive somebody who has wronged you, you're spared the dismal corrosion of bitterness and wounded pride. For both parties, forgiveness means the freedom again to be at peace inside their own skins and to be glad in each other's presence.”



Jesus says, “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” These words remind the church that reconciliation is serious work. We do not handle conflict as independent judges. We stand under the teaching of Jesus, seeking God’s will, truth, and mercy.

That means we should pray before we speak. We should examine our hearts before we accuse. We should ask whether our words are aimed at healing or simply at winning. The gospel of Jesus does not make us harsh; it makes us holy.

Jesus closes this passage with a promise we often quote: “For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” In context, this is not only a promise for worship services and prayer meetings. It is a promise for the hard holy work of reconciliation. When two or three gather in Jesus’ name to seek truth, repentance, forgiveness, and restored community, Christ is there.

This is good news because conflict can make us feel alone. But when people gather in Jesus’ name, Christ is not absent from the room, but present to soften hearts, steady voices, reveal truth, and make reconciliation possible.

So, what would it look like for you to follow Jesus’ teaching about conflict this week? It may mean making the first move toward someone we have avoided. It may mean having a private conversation instead of rehearsing our frustration with others. It may mean inviting a wise and trusted peer to help us pursue peace. It may mean setting a boundary without surrendering love. It may mean forgiving again, not because the wound was small, but because the mercy of Christ is great.

As a worshiping community, we can practice these skills before we are in the heat of conflict. We can practice recognizing our neighbors as image bearers of God. We can hold space to pray for people with whom we are experiencing conflict or friction. We can invite ourselves to reflect on a recent conflict from the perspective of the other person.

These practices are not an invitation to excuse harm that has been done. They are not a call to minimize abuse, ignore injustice, or pretend that wounds do not matter. Rather, they help us gain grace and compassion for the imperfections, fears, assumptions, and differing worldviews of our neighbors. They help us to see the person across from us not as a problem to defeat, but as someone made in the image of God.

The church becomes a witness to the world when we handle conflict differently. The world knows how to cancel, accuse, avoid, and divide. Jesus teaches us how to seek, listen, restore, forgive, and remain faithful. In a fractured world, our willingness to practice reconciliation becomes part of our proclamation of the gospel.

Matthew 18 is not a weapon to win conflicts. It is a path to win people back. It is Jesus teaching us how to stay a community, a family, a friend, a colleague when sin, hurt, and disappointment threaten to tear us apart.

May we be people who go directly, speak gently, listen humbly, seek restoration, and trust that Christ is present wherever people gather in Jesus’ name.

Closing Prayer
Jesus, teach us to handle conflict in Your way. Give us courage to speak, humility to listen, patience to seek restoration, and grace to forgive. Keep us from gossip, bitterness, pride, and fear. Make us, and our church community be a people and a place where truth and mercy meet, and where Your presence is known among us. Amen.

08/26/2026

Rose City Park United Methodist Church

Rev. Dr. David Weekley, Pastor

08-23-2026

Exodus 1:8–2:10 and

Matthew 16:13–20



The Power Still in Our Hands



There are seasons when power looks as though it belongs entirely to one person: one Pharaoh, one throne, one decree, one empire, one political machinery, one voice loud and threatening enough to make everyone else tremble. Exodus begins in such a season. A new king rises over Egypt who does not know Joseph and does not remember grace. This king begins to govern by fear. This king looks at a flourishing people and calls them a threat; looks at their babies and calls them a problem. This Pharaoh looks at life itself and tries to make death public policy.

But the story of God rarely begins with the people who think they have all the power. It begins with people whom the world has underestimated: midwives, mothers, daughters, laborers, fishermen, people with no army and no throne, people whose names may be forgotten by rulers, historians, and would-be kings, but they are remembered by God.

Pharaoh’s strategy is familiar. First, Pharaoh creates suspicion: “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and more powerful than we.” The next step is to create oppressive policies: forced labor, oppression, bitterness. When oppression does not stop the people from multiplying, Pharaoh escalates, commanding Shiphrah and Puah, the Hebrew midwives, to turn the birthstool into a place of ex*****on.

That is what oppressive power does: it tries to recruit the helpers of life into the service of death. It tells teachers to silence truth, healers to ration compassion, neighbors to become informants, parents to surrender hope, and religious people to bless cruelty. Tyrants know they cannot do all this violence alone, so Pharaoh tries to make ordinary people carry out his fear.

But Shiphrah and Puah recognize something Pharaoh has forgotten: royal power is not ultimate power. The text says they feared God. Their “fear” of God was not cowardice; it was moral clarity. They understood that no command from a throne can make murder holy and they did not do what the king commanded. They let the boys live.

Their resistance was not dramatic in the way empires measure drama. They did not storm a palace. They did not command an army. They simply used the power available to them in the place where God had positioned them. They had hands trained to catch babies. They had knowledge of women’s bodies. They had access to a room Pharaoh could not control. And in that hidden, holy room, they chose life.

Then Pharaoh widens the death sentence. Every Hebrew boy is to be thrown into the Nile. The river that watered Egypt and provided life is turned into a weapon of empire and death. Into that world a mother gives birth. Moses’ mother looks at her child and sees that he is good. That word reaches back toward creation, when God looked at what God had made and called it good. Pharaoh sees a demographic threat; this mother sees a child marked with the goodness of God.

She hides Moses for three months. Think of the courage of that post-partum mother: exhausted, vulnerable, recovering, afraid, listening for footsteps, quieting a crying baby, measuring every hour against danger. When she can hide him no longer, she does not surrender him to Pharaoh’s decree. She makes a basket, seals it, places the child among the reeds, and entrusts him to the river in a different way. Pharaoh said, “Throw the boys into the Nile.” She says, “I will place my child in the waters, but I will not hand him over to death.”

She acts on faith, but certainly not with certainty. She does not know the whole plan. She does not know that the child in the basket will one day stand before Pharaoh and say, “Let my people go.” This mother only knows the power she has in that moment: to preserve, to prepare, to release, to hope. Sometimes faith is not knowing how God will use what we do. Sometimes faith is doing the life-giving thing anyway.

And then there is the girl, unnamed here, whom we know as Miriam. She stands at a distance to see what will happen. A pre-teen girl becomes the watcher at the edge of empire. She has no official role, no legal authority, no adult status, no political protection. But she has presence. She has courage. She has timing. And when Pharaoh’s daughter finds the child, this girl steps forward and speaks.

Miriam asks a careful question: “Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” In one sentence she turns danger into possibility. She does not overthrow Egypt, but she redirects a moment. She uses the power of attention, the power of speech, the power of a well-timed question. Through her, Moses is returned to his own mother. Through her, the child marked for death is nourished in the arms of the woman who bore him.

Shiphrah, Puah, Moses’ mother, and Miriam do not possess Pharaoh’s kind of power. They possess something better: power ordered toward life. Pharaoh’s power needs fear to survive. Their power is rooted in reverence, compassion, memory, and courage. Pharaoh hoards control; they practice stewardship. Pharaoh issues decrees; they make choices. Pharaoh tries to erase a future; they protect one.

In Matthew 16, we meet another scene shaped by power. Jesus, the carpenter’s son from Nazareth, stands with a group of fishermen and ordinary disciples near Caesarea Philippi, a place associated with imperial presence and religious display. There, away from the centers of respectable authority, Jesus asks, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” Then Jesus asks the sharper question: “But who do you say that I am?”

Peter answers, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” It is a confession, but it is also an act of truth-telling. Peter says aloud what has been revealed to him. He names reality in a world where rulers, crowds, and religious authorities will argue over who Jesus is and what his life means. Jesus blesses him, not because Peter has manufactured the truth, but because Peter has received it and spoken it.

Then Jesus does something extraordinary. He entrusts power to Peter and the disciples: keys, binding and loosing, authority for the community that will bear witness to the kin-dom of God. Jesus does not hoard power the way Pharaoh does. Jesus shares it, forming a people who can recognize truth, speak truth, and organize their life around truth. In a society that attacks truth-tellers, Jesus builds a community that can say what is real: that life belongs to God, that death will not prevail, that the gates of Hell will not overcome the people gathered around the living Christ.

These two passages ask us to reconsider truth-telling and power. We often imagine power only as command: the power to sign, to enforce, to punish, to dominate, to define whose life counts. This is the power defined and coveted in our social media. But Scripture shows us another kind of power: the power to refuse, the power to protect, the power to watch, the power to speak, the power to confess, the power to tell the truth, the power to act before we know the ending.

Shiphrah and Puah used professional power. Moses’ mother used maternal power. Miriam used the power of attention and imagination. Pharaoh’s daughter, moved by compassion though not knowing the whole story of God’s deliverance, used the power she had within Pharaoh’s own household to shelter a life Pharaoh had condemned. Peter used the power of confession. The disciples received the power of witness. None of them had all power. All of them had some power. And that was enough for God to begin.

This matters because oppression does not only ask, “Who has the throne?” Oppression also asks, “Will everyone else believe they are powerless?” Pharaoh needs the midwives to obey and needs the mother of Moses to despair. This king needs the sister to stay silent and needs the princess to look away. Pharaoh needs the workers, neighbors, and families to accept death as normal. But God keeps finding people who know that even limited power can be holy when it is used for life, for truth.

So, I believe the question for us today is not only, “Who has too much power?” That is an important question, and Scripture is not afraid to expose death-dealing rulers. But the question is also, “What power is still in our hands?” What room do we stand in? What child can we protect? What truth can we tell? What question can we ask? What policy can we refuse to bless? What neighbor can we shelter? What confession can we make when silence would be easier?

No one in these stories knows how God will use their actions. The midwives act because they fear God. Moses’ mother acts because she loves her child and refuses death. Miriam acts because she is alert to possibility. Pharaoh’s daughter acts with compassion in the very household of oppression. Peter speaks because the experience of Jesus has opened his understanding. Some act with explicit faith. Others act with mercy, instinct, courage, or compassion. And God gathers every action into a greater deliverance.

That is good news for those of us who do not know the whole story yet. We do not always see how one refusal, one act of care, one word of truth, one protected life, one honest confession will matter. But we are not called to control the whole outcome. We are called to be faithful with the power available to us. We are called to act for life and goodness in the place where we stand.

Jesus says, “On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.” Gates are defensive structures. They do not march; they stand. The church of Jesus Christ is not called to be a frightened community of gate-keepers hiding from death. It is called to be a truthful, life-bearing community moving toward the places where death has built its gates.

This morning and in all our mornings to come, let us remember Shiphrah and Puah, who would not let Pharaoh turn their vocation into violence. Let us remember Moses’ mother, who made a basket when she could not make the danger disappear. Let us remember Miriam, who watched, waited, and spoke at the right time. Let us remember the carpenter’s son, who entrusted the keys of God’s kin-dom to fishermen. Let us remember Peter, who told the truth about Jesus. And let us ask God for courage to use the power still in our hands.

For wherever Pharaoh commands death, God is still raising up midwives. Wherever empire tries to silence truth, Christ is still asking, “Who do you say that I am?” Wherever power is hoarded, the Spirit is still empowering ordinary people to act for equity and life. And may we never forget that wherever the people of God use what they have for goodness, the future begins to open, one courageous act at a time. Amen.