Seekers recognizes that any member of the community may be called upon by God to give us the Word, and thus we have an open pulpit with a different preacher each week. Sermons preached at Seekers, as well as sermons preached by Seekers at other churches or events, are posted here, beginning with the most recent.
Click here for an archive of our sermons.
Feel free to use what is helpful from these sermons. We only ask that when substantial portions are abstracted or used in a written work, please credit Seekers Church and the author, and cite the URL.
“In This Moment” by Deborah Sokolove
7 August 2011
The 8th Sunday After Pentecost
We seem to be in the season of old, familiar Bible stories. Last week, we heard about Jacob wrestling with the angel and Jesus and the disciples feeding 5000 families with five loaves of bread and two fish. This week, Jacob’s older sons are selling the youngest, Joseph, off to some passing traders, and Jesus and Peter are walking on water. . . .This is one of those miracle stories that upset a lot of people. . . .But I am less interested in the literal, factual level of this story than in what we can learn from it about our own lives. In particular, I want to focus on the moment when Peter is doing fine, walking on top of the waves, then suddenly notices that the wind is howling around him. Suddenly, Peter becomes distracted and frightened, and begins to sink.
“What Do You Have?” by Marjory Bankson, David Novello, and Peter Bankson
31 July 2011
The 7th Sunday After Pentecost
The text for today begins with the shock of John’s death, and Jesus’ withdrawal to a deserted place, presumably to tend his own grief. But the crowds followed Jesus, needing more from him. Mark says in reporting this same story that “they were like sheep without a shepherd,” and so Jesus began to teach them that they too were part of God’s realm. But the real lesson came when the people began to get hungry and restless.
The disciples came to Jesus and said “Send them away, so they can buy food,” but Jesus answered: “What do you have?”
“Being Comfortable in Our Own Skins: Treasuring Our Soul’s Address” by Keith
24 July 2011
The 6th Sunday After Pentecost
With our current theme and all the bare figures on the altar, I come to celebrate Body by focusing on our physical bodies. Not the church body, or spiritual bodies, or other ethereal concepts, but our actual flesh and blood bodies. At Seekers, we purport to appreciate and honor our bodies, and (I’m sure) do not intend to be repressed about our bodies. I am here to claim that and put some flesh onto those notions.
It’s easy to agree in the abstract that bodies are good, but I’m not here to talk about hypothetical bodies, but real bodies – yours and mine. And don’t we all know how easy it is to be critical of our own bodies and wish that we were different in some way…or in many ways. I want to encourage us to love ourselves, and each other, just as we are. There is beauty in each of us, just as we are, for our bodies are God-given and good.
“The Experience of God: Stone Pillows and Living with Weeds” by Jill Joseph
17 July 2011
The 5th Sunday After Pentecost
At the broadest level, it is apparent that the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament provide texts that both give voice to, and invite, a deep and sustained involvement with God. They do so in diverse voices and many forms that include liturgical hymns, lamentations, narratives of a people’s ancient history, letters, myths, discourses, prophecies, parables, and a recording of what was certainly an earlier oral tradition of the life of Jesus.
They also, for me, present consistent challenges that I would like to avoid, but cannot. It is always easy to point to selected verses from Paul’s letters or that are attributed to him as examples of such difficulties. Even as our community explores the theme of “Learning to Live in the Body”, I find myself taken aback by statements such as we read today: “If you live according to the flesh, you will die; but, if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
“Everyday Salvation” by Pat Conover
10 July 2011
The 4th Sunday After Pentecost
We in Seekers have a lot of sources of guidance for the decisions we make. They are our version of living by the law. It is easy for us to resonate with the poetry of the portion of Psalm 119 in the lectionary for today. It is a poem about being steadfast in following the law even in difficult circumstances. It is not a dreary rote obedience, not a head down slump of conformity, not a shutting down of thinking, not shutting out real conversation with others with the hope of gaining insights or spotting creative opportunities. It is more like one of my favorite definitions of a friend. “A friend is someone who remembers your tune and sings it back to you when you have lost the melody.