SERMONS
Have you seen my?
That God does God’s best work when we’re utterly lost and unable to find ourselves. But that is exactly how God-The seeking shepherd and the same God we know as The searching woman operates.
On the Basis of Love
In Jesus, God only deals with you in one way. And that is on the basis of love. Not on law. Not on what you deserve or don’t deserve. Just straight-up boundless love. It is this kind of love that can be found within the walls of this very church. And it is on the basis of this love that you have been set free.
Practicing Grace
Tables are where we get to practice receiving and giving God’s grace. God has invited us to be a part of an incredible banquet – a metaphor for God’s community – the place where all of God’s people come together.
We get free too
But, if we can see this text through a lens of empathy, if we can understand that synagogue leader as one who is trying to be faithful, who isn’t ignorant or heretical, we can see in ourselves that same truth. When our rules get in the way of freedom, when our rules become more important to us than the liberation of God’s people from bondage, then hear me now, our rules have to change.
Mary, Part Two
Mary is an icon of God’s boundless love and comfort. As Jesus has been portrayed in images from every possible culture and ethnicity, so has Mary.
Risk Taker
Yet theologian Carter Heyward reminds us that faith, by definition, is uncertainty. Faith is full of doubt, steeped in risk. Faith is about matters not of the known, but of the unknown.
Be the Church
But truthfully: We’re already really good at worship. It’s one of the things Holy Trinity is known for. It’s the first thing we figured out how to adapt (and re-adapt repeatedly) during the pandemic.
Dealing With Stuff
This beautiful earth. This wonderful city. The people dear to you. Your neighbors—both people and creatures. The water of baptism. The meal of bread and wine. This community. Riches, indeed.
Are you a pray-er?
Not a piece of bubble gum. Not a shiny toy. Or a new car. Or the love of our life. Though sometimes life brings these things. But what we receive is the presence of God. The assurance that we are not alone. The promise that life is worth living. And that from suffering will come new life and resurrection.
What is the one thing?
The guest, Jesus, becomes the host. And we become Christ’s body. We become bearers of the hospitality we receive.
The "Good" Samaritan
So let’s bring back the shock value of this parable! Saying the Good Samaritan is the one who was neighbor to the one in the ditch is like saying the good immigrant, the good Muslim, the good you fill in the blank of which group is opposite from you, who you distrust, consider bad or suspicious.
Shake it off
That doesn’t sound like shaking off other people. Maybe the Spirit is calling us to something different: not shaking people off but shaking things up.
Outsiders Who Get It
And when they actually paid attention to those voices, things changed for them. Naaman washed his leprosy away. God’s grace found its way across established boundaries of ethnicity and ego alike.
No law against loving your neighbor
At that time 35 years ago, my pastor was not pro-choice. Most of my peers had never talked about it and would have considered themselves anti-abortion if asked. But that’s the problem when only given binary options. It’s either/or and there’s no room for gray, for nuance, for understanding and compassion.
God's freedom
You see, if we expand the definition of “possession” to include everything that conspires to keep us dead when God wants us alive, everything that keeps us bound up, when God wants us free, then this ancient story is not an oddity about a crazy demon-possessed naked man, but it is a reflection of our own lives. We too seek freedom from all that torments us. And like the healed man we find freedom (or salvation) in the presence of Jesus. Because there is no death-dealing power in this universe that can withstand the saving, healing, resurrecting power of Jesus.
What time is it?
Listen again to the scripture Leon chose, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Leon trusted this promise that no matter what season in life he was in, nothing would be able to separate him from God’s love in Christ Jesus.
You are God's delight
What if we each knew and believed and trusted that God loved us (and all of our neighbors even the hard to love ones) so very much that it made God laugh with delight to see us, to hold us, to squeeze us tight? I can’t help but think that such a thing would change the world.
Memory Incarnate
Breath it in. As if breathing in the scent of a loved one as you lie in their arms. As you hold them in your arms. As we as a community hold each other in our common mission that has been declared unto us.
Do you understand?
We learn a different language in this place. A language unlike any other. The language of forgiveness. The language of mercy. The language of acceptance. The language of diversity. A language that calls us to love this world and do all what we can to make it a better place.
Look out, not up
Look out, not up this Ascension Sunday and always. Seek and find God’s presence in places of pain and suffering, as God works through you. For we are people called to do justice and love mercy. We do not have the luxury of looking to others to fix the problems we abhor. We are called to be people who show up, tell the truth, and point to Christ, so that everyone may live life abundantly.