Adventures with Moses Day 3

Lea Ann Koekenberg • July 11, 2026

God Provides, God Protects, God Leads

What an incredible journey it has been! As we wrapped up our final week of The Adventures with Moses, our church family celebrated everything we had learned about God's faithfulness throughout Moses' life. From a tiny baby floating safely in a basket on the Nile to a bold leader guiding God's people through the Red Sea, we have watched God's hand at work every step of the way.


This final week took us into the wilderness, where the Israelites were learning an important lesson: even when life is uncertain, God is our Protector!


As always, we began our evening by joyfully singing our Songs for the Month of Moses. It was wonderful to hear children, parents, grandparents, and volunteers all singing together. Music has become a special tradition of our Adventures with Moses experience, reminding us that worship is something every generation can enjoy together.


Miriam — played by one of our volunteers — helped everyone remember where our story left off. After God rescued the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and safely led them through the Red Sea, they found themselves wandering through the desert. Although they had seen God's miracles, they quickly became worried when they ran out of food and water. Like many of us, they sometimes forgot how faithful God had already been.


Our large group lesson focused on one of God's greatest gifts to His people—the Ten Commandments. Before the evening began, ten volunteers each received one commandment to read aloud. As they shared God's instructions, we discovered that the first four commandments teach us how to love and honor God, while the remaining six teach us how to love and care for one another.


One of the most meaningful moments came when each volunteer stretched out their arms to form a circle around the group. It was a beautiful picture of how God's commandments are not meant to trap us but to surround us with His love, wisdom, and protection. God's boundaries are gifts that help us live in healthy relationships with Him and with one another.


During our group discussions, families reflected on times when they wanted to leave tricky situations and talked honestly about how it feels when someone tells us "no." These conversations helped everyone understand that while rules can sometimes feel frustrating, they are often there because someone loves us and wants what is best for us—just as God does.


Together we explored several powerful passages from Exodus. We witnessed God's amazing provision as He sent manna from heaven and quail to feed His people. We saw Him bring water from a rock when the Israelites were thirsty, proving that nothing is impossible for God. Finally, we heard God give the Ten Commandments, showing His people how to live as His chosen nation.


One of the highlights of the evening was tasting manna! While we can't know exactly what the manna God provided looked like or tasted like, everyone enjoyed sampling a sweet treat that helped us imagine what it was like for the Israelites to gather God's daily provision each morning. It sparked wonderful conversations about trusting God to provide exactly what we need each day.


The children also created their own Ten Commandment Tablets, giving them a visual reminder of God's loving instructions.


We closed our final evening with a simple but meaningful finger prayer that reminded us to:


  • Remember that God is our God.
  • Honor His name.
  • Make space for Him in our lives.
  • Love our families.
  • Show kindness to others.
  • Thank Him for His many blessings.
  • Thank Him for His commandments.
  • Remember that His loving limits help protect us every day.



As we learned about the Ten Commandments, we also discovered something wonderful that Jesus taught many years later. When someone asked Jesus which commandment was the greatest, He answered with two simple but life-changing commands:


"Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind."


And the second is like it:


"Love your neighbor as yourself."


Jesus explained that all of God's laws—including the Ten Commandments—are built on these two great commandments. When we love God with everything we have and love others the way God loves us, we are living out the heart of everything God taught His people through Moses.


It was a beautiful reminder that God's rules were never just about following a list—they have always been about living in a loving relationship with God and caring for one another. Just as God surrounded the Israelites with His love and protection in the wilderness, Jesus calls us to surround others with that same love every day.



God is our Protector.


Whether protecting baby Moses in a basket, calling him through the burning bush, leading the Israelites through the Red Sea, providing food and water in the wilderness, or giving commandments filled with wisdom and love, God never stopped caring for His people.


The story of Moses reminds us that God's faithfulness didn't end in the wilderness—and it hasn't ended today. He still provides. He still protects. He still leads those who trust Him.


Thank you to every child, parent, grandparent, volunteer, musician, actor, teacher, and leader who made The Adventures with Moses such a meaningful, intergenerational experience. Watching families grow together in faith has been a tremendous blessing.


As we leave this adventure behind, may we continue walking with confidence, knowing that the same God who faithfully led Moses continues to guide each one of us today.

The Web of Life

By Rev. Richard Brendan • October 8, 2026
Indigenous Peoples Day invites us to pause and remember that we live on land with a story much older than our own. It is a day to listen to the voices, wisdom, stories, and resilience of Indigenous peoples and to acknowledge the painful history that is also a part of this land’s story. It calls us to move beyond simply remembering and to ask: “How might we live with greater humility, gratitude, and respect for the people and the Earth who have been here long before us?”

World Wide Communion

By Rev. Dr, Carolyn Scanlan-Holmes • September 29, 2026
Although we define our world with borders, walls, and ideologies, World Communion Sunday brings us a simple reality: we belong to each other. This Sunday, we gather around a table that expands across the globe, a table of radical hospitality where all are fed, all are valued, and all are loved. Together, we commit to the collective work of peace, justice, and healing for our planet. Join us as we break bread and build bridges.

The Art of Living: The Art of Prayer

By Rev. Dr. Carolyn Scanlan-Holmes • September 22, 2026
Be honest: When you pray, does it feel like a genuine conversation—or just another item on your to-do list? Sometimes, the most familiar things are the hardest to truly see. This Sunday, we continue week two of our series, The Art of Living, by stripping away the routine and taking a radical new look at the most famous prayer in history. Diving into the Gospel of Matthew, we're looking past the familiar recitations of the Lord's Prayer to discover what it actually takes to build a thriving spiritual life. Whether your prayer life feels vibrant, completely stuck, or non-existent right now, Jesus' words offer the reset you need. This week, we're digging into the setup, motive, and heart of prayer—moving past empty repetitions and performance checklists to find a space where true connection and forgiveness can transform our daily lives. Mastering the art of living doesn't start with striving; it starts with humility and silence in the presence of God. Join us this weekend as we discover how a simple shift in our prayer life can change everything. See you Sunday!

The Art of Living

By Rev. Dr. Carolyn Scanlan-Holmes • September 14, 2026
A new two-week series exploring how faith connects to daily rhythms and habits — with a visual artist and writer bringing "The Art of Living" to life.

Hunger is Rising and God Calls Us to Respond

By Michael Ransom • September 13, 2026
You can make a difference with the power of the pen

Kissing the Leper

By Rev. Richard Brendan • September 7, 2026
St. Francis's embrace of the leper reveals a truth about love: it grows not by avoiding what frightens us, but by moving toward it.

Where Were You?

By Rev. Dr. Carolyn Scanlan-Holmes • September 1, 2026
Remembering 9/11

It's the Journey.

By Rev. Dr. Carolyn Scanlan-Holmes • August 25, 2026
Life comes with no map. We try to make our own and we set out, sometimes with excitement, sometimes with fear or grief, or just because standing still isn't an option. Sometimes we go not entirely sure where we're headed or what we'll find when we get there. In one of the most quietly beautiful stories in the Gospel of Luke, two travelers, heavy with loss and confusion, walk a road from Jerusalem. They meet a stranger, who falls in step beside them. They don't know who he is. They don't know what's coming next. But they keep walking. Somewhere in the walking, something shifts. The Road to Emmaus isn't really a story about a destination. It's a story about what happens on the way there: the conversations, the companions, the moments of unexpected recognition that change everything. Join us Sunday as we explore what it means to be on a journey full of unknowns. Do we fear that which we cannot know, or can we embrace the uncertainty as part of the adventure?

Learning from the Mystics: A Pure Heart

By Rev. Dr. Brenda Freije • August 18, 2026
What if Jesus’ words, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God,” are not about who gets to see God someday, but an invitation to learn how to see God now? The great Christian mystics believed that the heart is more than the center of our emotions. It is an “organ of spiritual perception,” a way of seeing beneath the surface of things into the deeper reality of God’s presence. Richard Rohr says this is what mysticism is really about. Mystics are not spiritual elites who have strange or extraordinary experiences. They are people who have learned to go beneath the surface and discover the “connected core of reality.” The result is not simply a different experience of God; it is a different way of seeing everything. They begin to see grace in all things and the deep connections between all things—seeing a neighbor instead of a stranger, a human being instead of an enemy, sacred creation instead of commodities, connection instead of separation, and Divine Presence where we previously assumed God was absent. And that gives us perhaps the most important test of genuine mystical spirituality: Are we becoming more loving? The goal of contemplative practice is not extraordinary spiritual experiences. Its fruit is a growing capacity for compassion, generosity, freedom, and love—a different way of being in the world. Let's explore what Jesus might mean by a “pure heart,” what keeps us from seeing clearly, how learning from the mystics and their practices can help us awaken to a God who may be much closer than we realize, and how all of this might enable us to act in the world with greater peace, hope, and clarity.

Mother Love, Mother Loss

By Joy Dyer, MSW, LCSW • August 10, 2026
The relationship we have with our mothers is one of the most meaningful in our lives. Sometimes sweet, sometimes difficult…or worse…but always full of complexity. And researchers have determined that this most significant of relationships actually begins in the womb. It’s the template where we first learn about love, whether we were fortunate to have loving mothers, or mothers who sadly were unable to love us as we needed and deserved. This primal, intense relationship continues throughout our lives, influencing and shaping who we become and how we relate to others as we journey through on our own paths. Is it any wonder then that the death of our mothers is one of the most impactful losses that we will experience? And yet, even after her death, it’s possible to have a continuing conversation and relationship with her…with her gifts and her flaws…that allows for connection and the possibility of repair and forgiveness. This Sunday, please join us as we explore the joys, sorrows, and possibilities of the eternal bond between mother and child. Joy Dyer, MSW, LCSW, brings 37 years of clinical social work experience, including work in end-of-life care and advanced bereavement training. She specializes in grief in all its forms. Joy returns to The Garden on Thursday, September 3 for Debunking the Myths of Grief.