Date: September 12, 2021

Bible Text: James 3:1-12, Mark 8:27-38 |

Grace and peace from the Lord Jesus Christ be with you!

[**The service begins about 12 minutes before the video today. We had some issues with our internet connections. So the video misses the welcome and introduction, the prelude, the call to worship and the opening prayer. One of our cameras was also displaying all it's icons through the stream. This doesn't usually happen, and it is not entirely clear why it happened today. We apologize for these shortcomings and hope they will not detract too much from your worship experience. **]

Life is full of difficult and conflicting situations and propositions. We tend to think of them as "either/or" questions where one is right and the other is wrong. But what if they can both be true or right at the same time? Like Peter was right about Jesus AND wrong about Christ. Or that the Messiah is God's means of salvation AND the Messiah must suffer and die. James gets in on the fun, reminding us that with the same mouth we praise God AND curse those made in God's image. How might the word AND help us navigate a challenging and polarized world?

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