During an interfaith service held at Crescent Hill Presbyterian Church Monday following the morning’s mass shooting at Old National Bank, Rabbi Ben Freed of Keneseth Israel Congregation in Louisville pointed out it isn’t God who’s beating swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks in the Book of Isaiah.
With a big assist from the gifts of music leader Mark Miller, closing worship for APCE’s Circle of Faith event in Chicago ended Saturday where it had begun the Wednesday before, with Hebrews 12:1-2.
No sooner had the small delegation from the Presbytery of Mid-Kentucky — its general presbyter, stated clerk and moderator — renewed their passports and booked their flights to Taiwan than COVID-19 postponed their plans. Ever since three representatives from Changhua Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan, Mid-Kentucky’s international mission partner, had traveled to Mid-Kentucky in May 2019, the Revs. John Odom, Jerry Van Marter and Angela Johnson had long been looking forward to their reciprocal visit.
The ministry of presence is important in God’s mission. Yet even when a global pandemic causes cancellation of short-term mission trips, congregations and presbyteries in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) are showing care and compassion in creative and urgently needed ways from afar.