The First Sunday after Epiphany: The Baptism of Our Lord – January 10, 2026

Annual Meeting – 2026

There’s a line in Isaiah today that feels like it was written for a congregation standing on the threshold of an annual meeting. God says, “I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you.” It’s such a tender image—God not shouting orders from a distance, not handing us a map and wishing us luck, but taking us by the hand. Guiding. Steadying. Keeping.

And then, just a few verses later, God says, “See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them.” It’s as if God is saying: You don’t have to pretend the past isn’t over. You don’t have to cling to what used to be. I am already out ahead of you, planting seeds you cannot yet see.

This is a word for Israel in exile—people who had lost their temple, their stability, their sense of who they were. And it is a word for us.

Because today, as we gather for our annual meeting, we do so with a mixture of gratitude and grief. St. Michael and All Angels is a faithful, loving, generous community. And it is also a shrinking community. The numbers are real. The trends are real. The uncertainty is real. And if we’re honest, the future can feel scary.

But Isaiah reminds us: God does some of God’s best work with people who are afraid of the future. God does some of God’s best work with communities who feel small. God does some of God’s best work when the old things have passed away and the new things have not yet sprung forth. Because that is the soil where resurrection grows.

Isaiah 42 is the first of the “Servant Songs”—poems about a servant who is gentle but strong, humble but courageous, a servant who brings justice not by force but by faithfulness. And God says to this servant, “I have taken you by the hand and kept you.” Not because the servant is powerful. Not because the servant is successful. But because the servant belongs to God. And that is true of us.

Our worth as a congregation is not measured by attendance graphs or budget lines. Our worth is not determined by how many programs we run or how many people sit in the pews. Our worth is rooted in the simple, unshakeable truth that God has taken us by the hand. God has kept us. God has called us in righteousness. And God is not done with us.

But here’s the part we don’t always like to say out loud: sometimes churches die.

Sometimes the form of church we have known and loved reaches the end of its life. Sometimes the structures, the habits, the expectations, the ways we’ve always done things—they simply cannot carry us into the future. And that feels like loss. It feels like failure. It feels like death.

But in the Christian story, death is never the end.

Resurrection is not just something that happened to Jesus. Resurrection is the pattern of God’s life with God’s people. Over and over again, God brings life out of what looks like an ending. Over and over again, God brings new things out of what feels like loss.

And Isaiah says God doesn’t wait for us to figure it out. God doesn’t wait for us to be ready. God says, “Before they spring forth, I tell you of them.” Before the new thing even breaks the surface, God is already whispering: Do not be afraid. I am with you. I am doing something new.

So what does that mean for St. Michael and All Angels?

It means we don’t have to hide from the truth. We can name the challenges. We can acknowledge the shrinking numbers. We can admit that the future is uncertain. And we can also trust that God is not wringing God’s hands about any of this. God is not anxious about our size. God is not limited by our resources. God is not nostalgic for the past. God is already planting something new.

Our call is not to preserve the past at all costs. Our call is to listen—to pay attention—to look for the new thing God is declaring. Our call is to be the servant Isaiah describes: gentle, faithful, courageous, willing to let go of what no longer gives life, willing to follow where God leads, even when the path is unfamiliar.

Because resurrection never looks like going back to the way things were. Resurrection always looks like something we could not have imagined.

So today, as we gather for our annual meeting, we do so with honesty and with hope. We do so knowing that we are held by the God who takes us by the hand. We do so trusting that the God who brought Israel home from exile, the God who raised Jesus from the dead, the God who has carried this congregation through decades of ministry—that same God is with us now.

The former things have come to pass. And that’s okay. Because God is declaring new things. And even if we cannot yet see them, even if they feel small or fragile or uncertain, they are already springing forth.

God is not done with St. Michael and All Angels. God is not done with you. And whatever resurrection looks like for us—whatever shape the new thing takes—we will discover it together, hand in hand with the One who keeps us.

Amen.