This week we come to a topic in our series on emotions that may feel daunting or heavy. We will think together about sadness and its role in our lives as well as in our faith journeys. What is the difference between sadness and grief and depression and melancholy? How do we process sadness and share it with each other? How can we help each other when we experience sadness that comes from living in a world of mortality and fragility?

And very important: what role does sadness play in our joy? How are they connected and how can one strengthen the other?

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This week, we dive back into our sermon series on Inside Out: Emotionally Healthy Faith, and we come to an emotion that is newer to the movie franchised, introduced in its sequel: ENVY. The “green eyed monster”. What is envy exactly, and is it always bad? How do we manage it, and also how do we steward our blessings and not seek out the envy of others?

In a culture of ladder climbing and more, more, more, how can we cultivate contentment, gratitude and the ability to rejoice with those who rejoice?

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This week, we take a break from our summer sermon series to welcome one of our dedicated COA leaders Helen Kelley as our preacher for the day. She will be focusing on Father’s Day, and God as our Father. Our Father…

…for us

…with us

…within us

How do we make sense of being able to have this relationship with our Almighty Creator? How do we make sense of a Father God if perhaps our own relationships with father figures have been difficult? How do our stories and experiences actually help us grow closer to God in our journeys of faith?

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This week, we come to an emotion that seems to dominate American life in the 2020’s: ANGER. Perhaps we have plenty to be angry about from all sorts of places on the political spectrum. And yet, as Christians, what are we meant to do with our anger? How did Jesus get angry? Is anger ever productive, and if so, how? We will consider how this fiery emotion takes shape in our real lives and prayerfully think together about ways to harness it for the things God is passionate about in this world.

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This week as we really dive into our Inside Out series on emotionally healthy faith, we begin with fear. It seems like we live in a culture of fear, and fear tends to drive us towards other emotions like anger and disgust and towards actions that do not represent the best of who we are. What is fear and where does it come from? Why do we struggle with it so much, and what can we do to make better use of fear in our journey of faith? Fear is not something that will just go away, but we do have some control and help from God about how it manifests in our life together.

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