Down by the riverside I laid my burdens down and I'm travelin' light
Posted in Sermon Notes on Jun 4th, 2016
Identity Through the Lens of the Cross Mark 15:21, NRSV Galatians 2:20, NRSV Reflections If the cross points us to a God whose most essential characteristic is love, then our new identities are bound up in that same God — we are to be re-made around love, re-defined as those called to a life of […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Feb 28th, 2016
The Cross And Evil: Jesus and His Cry of Abandonment Psalm 22:1-2; 23-24, NRSV Mark 15:33-34, NRSV Reflections ON a Thursday morning a few months ago, I got a call from my doctor’s assistant telling me that I have Stage 4 cancer. The stomach cramps I was suffering from were not caused by a faulty […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Feb 19th, 2016
Jesus is what God has to say Mark 9:2-9, NRSV Reflections Jesus is the true and living Word of God. Jesus is what the Law and Prophets point toward and bow to. Jesus is what the Old Testament was trying to say, but could never fully articulate. Jesus is the perfect Word of God in […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Jul 18th, 2015
Psalms: Songs for All of Life Lament Psalm 69: 1-16, NRSV Reflections Until you bottom out, and come to the limits of your own fuel supply, there is no reason for you to switch to a higher octane of fuel. For that is what is happening! Why would you? You will not learn to actively […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Apr 24th, 2015
The Story of God: The Banquet Matthew 22:1-14, NRSV Reflections “Fears the Lord.” Reverence might be a better word. The Bible isn’t interested in whether we believe in God or not. It assumes that everyone more or less does. What it is interested in is the response we have toward him: will we let God […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Jun 30th, 2014
Series: The Ten CommandmentsIntroduction: Pathway to Freedom Exodus 19:1-6, 20:1-17, NRSV Reflections The truth is that life simply works better when we live in tune with the designs of its Creator. God’s commands are not hammers over our heads to get us to shape up. Rather, they are his loving instructions for how to do […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Apr 6th, 2014
Series: Lord of Lent Trial Before Pilate John 18: 28-40, NRSV Reflections Every call to worship is a call into the Real World…. I encounter such constant and widespread lying about reality each day and meet with such skilled and systematic distortion of the truth that I’m always in danger of losing my grip on […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Mar 7th, 2014
Understanding Jesus: He Gives Sight to the Blind John 9: 1-13; 18-41, NRSV Reflections “Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.” If it is “the Jews” whose actions illustrate this fact, it is only because they are the representatives of us all – as […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Jun 24th, 2012
Fear, Faith, and the Storm Mark 4:35-41, NRSV Reflections How can you live with the terrifying thought that the hurricane has become human, that fire has become flesh, that life itself became life and walked in our midst? Christianity either means that or it means nothing. It is either the most devastating disclosure of the […]
Posted in Sermon Notes on Jun 10th, 2012
Transformed by the Spirit… Together Acts 2:37-47, NRSV Reflections Historically, the Church’s ability to transform society has depended not upon a power of management over society or political brokerage of its own interests, but rather upon a willingness to exercise its freedom to redeem and re-create a fallen world.— Vigen Guroian, from Incarnate Love: Essays […]
Traveling Light Relay
Down by the riverside I laid my burdens down and I'm travelin' light