August 13, 2026 - "The Word Among Us" - A Weekly Note from Pastor Michael

The Word Among Us 

A Weekly Note from Pastor Michael 

A Widening Mercy 

Thursday, August 13, 2026 

The Federated Church of Chagrin Falls 

Over these past several weeks, we have spent a lot of time together in the fields and gardens of Matthew’s Gospel. We have scattered seed, tended what is growing, wondered about the fruit God is bringing forth among us, and asked what gifts God has placed in our hands to sow for the life of the world. 

This Sunday, the Gospel takes us somewhere new. 

In Matthew 15, Jesus travels beyond familiar territory into the region of Tyre and Sidon. There, a Canaanite woman cries out to him on behalf of her daughter. It is not an easy story. The disciples want to send her away. Jesus initially speaks of a mission limited to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But the woman refuses to disappear. She persists. She speaks. And by the end of the encounter, something has opened. 

There is a line in one of the hymns we will sing Sunday that captures the movement beautifully: “There’s a wideness in God’s mercy.” 

Perhaps that is one of the gifts of a living faith: our circles can become wider. 

We discover that people we once understood as strangers are neighbors. We encounter voices that challenge the boundaries we have inherited. We learn that faithfulness does not always mean having everything settled; sometimes it means remaining open enough for God to enlarge our understanding. 

That seems especially important for who we are at Federated. We aspire to be one of those rare places where we can bring both conviction and curiosity—where we can be rooted deeply enough to listen, secure enough to change, and loved enough to discover that God’s mercy reaches farther than we imagined. 

As summer begins its slow turn toward fall, perhaps this is a good word for us. We do not know everything the coming season will bring. But we can keep listening. We can keep learning. We can keep widening the circle. 

And we can trust that wherever the journey takes us, God’s mercy is wider still. 

Read Before Sunday 

Matthew 15:10–28 

As you read, consider: 

• Who is being treated as an “outsider” in this story, and where do you notice boundaries beginning to shift? 
• What do you notice about the Canaanite woman’s persistence? What does she see or understand that others in the story may not? 
• Where might God be inviting you—or our church—to widen the circle of compassion and belonging? 

Our church family looks forward to worshiping with you this Sunday. 

Let’s Draw the Circle Wider, 

Pastor Michael