Sermons

Twenty-third Sunday After Pentecost

November, 5, 2023

Text: Matthew 5:1-12

Today we celebrate all the saints who have gone before us – people who have shown us the way to be truly human – living God’s intention for human life. I say that because the root word for salvation is salvus, which means wholeness or completeness. Saints are people who were truly alive! Juicy! Compassionate and connected to something larger than themselves! Have you known any saints?

As Christians, we honor Jesus as the primary example of God’s intention for human life, but in each generation, there have been people who show us the way, guide us toward wholeness, and make a significant contribution to being a living, breathing Body of Christ in every generation.  

Twenty-second Sunday After Pentecost

October 29, 2023

When I signed up to preach today, I did not check what the lectionary passages were. I simply had been struck by a message that I needed to share and this was the first Sunday that was open. Frankly, I am not sure I would have had the gall on my own to pick the Sunday with the Greatest Commandment and the Second Like it. Yet, the message that has been in my heart fits.

I will confess I will be holding up a challenge which I do not always follow myself. Not through lack of effort, but that my energy and focus and will do not always align with the commandment. I do not always love God with my full heart and mind and strength. I get tired. My heart is full with sorrow and grief. And at the end of the day my emotional and physical strength have been spent. Certainly I don’t always love my neighbor as much as I love myself. Sometimes that gets cut short because I don’t love myself. When I am in one of those moods, where I look in the mirror and think I am just fat and lazy and privileged, it is hard to think loving thoughts towards myself. Thinking of loving thoughts of others? Where is love supposed to come from when it isn’t inside me?

Twentieth Sunday After Pentecost

October 15, 2023

Recommitment: what a day of gladness and promise. We are grateful for the gifts of the last year of life in Christ and in Seekers community.  We look forward to the year ahead, and to experiencing the ways Christ will be present and acting within us, between us and beyond us.

While writing this sermon,  I found myself calling to mind the names and faces of those of us who’ve been on this Recommitment journey these past weeks. And I felt what a miracle it is that exactly these individuals have been linked together as members in Seekers Church today. I don’t think this is random. We are the very people who God planned and contrived to bring together here and now: I trust that this has meaning and purpose.

Ninetenth Sunday After Pentecost

October 8, 2023

When I started to write this sermon, I did not intend to say anything about the situation in the Holy Land. However, yesterday, while I was visiting my oldest daughter in the peace and safety of her home on the Eastern Shore, we woke up to the news that Hamas had sent 3000 rockets and some unknown number of invaders into Israeli settlements, towns and cities on a major Jewish holy day. Unsurprisingly, the Israeli army retaliated with even greater force and more killing, and now there is a full-on war. At this time, we have not yet heard if any of our relatives have been killed, injured, or taken captive.

Eightenth Sunday After Pentecost

October 1, 2023

Ex 17:1-7
Mt 21:23-32
Phil 2:1-13

As I prepared to lead the Seekers Silent Retreat at Dayspring last weekend, I stayed at Overlook on personal retreat for a few day and while there I also reflected on the themes of scripture for this Sunday and what emerged for me was trusting n God’s presence, intentional pacing ourselves on the journey forward and responding to our call individually and collectively as a community. 

Commitment to call and community takes trust.