God so loved the world…. Loved = agape – reasoned love; pleasure of mind. world = cosmos. We hear that passage many times but do you really take that in?God…. Loves… this…. World…and all that is in it. Really, Really, Really likes it. Really, Really thinks it, and we, are special just because we exist […]
Today, we gather in the spirit of the Advent season, on this the second Sunday. Our overarching theme this Advent is a question that resonates deeply within all of us: “How does a weary world rejoice?” It is our hope to answer that question as a community this Advent and Christmas and to provide encouragement […]
Someone passed on a quote to me this week about being an adult: “Being an adult is pretty easy. You just feel tired all the time, and tell people about how tired you are, and they tell you how tired they are.” Do you ever feel that way? The poet William Wordsworth once wrote, “the […]
Today is called “The Reign of Christ” Sunday or “Christ the King” on the liturgical year. A couple of weeks ago, Carter, our lead pastor, asked the question in his sermon, “Who ARE you waiting for?” It is a good question, with all the mystery surrounding our faith. This week, I thought I might add […]
When you read Paul’s letter to the Philippians it feels like he is writing to “his pride and joy, his favorite child.” There are none of the angry or cautionary admonitions that you find in Galatians or the l and 2 Corinthians. Instead, he writes with great affection for the Philippians and expresses gratitude for […]
I have a confession to make. I have been preaching now for 34 years. And, in all that time, I have never preached on this parable in Matthew. Not because it doesn’t come up in the lectionary that I have often followed – because it does. No, I haven’t preached on it because this parable […]
There is a question in the PCUSA study catechism which Kerry and I often used with our Confirmation classes. It was a question that often made those confirmands chuckle. I confess it has made me chuckle, too, to think that those writing the questions thought to include it. “Won’t heaven be a boring place?” Maybe […]
“We are imperfect people striving to live God’s love in the way of Jesus Christ.” This is our new mission statement. It’s a declaration of our unyielding commitment to not only follow the the teachings of Christ, but to live them out in our everyday experiences and interactions. This statement, like mission statements for any […]
There are a lot of people in recent years who say they don’t need the church – or any religious community. The number of people who check the box for “none” to the question of their religion is growing on various national surveys. Then there are a lot of people who claim to be “spiritual […]
Writing not long after Hurricane Katrina in his book, Letter to a Christian Nation, Sam Harris explains why he cannot believe in God with these words: “An atheist is a person who believes that the murder of a single little girl – even once in a million years – casts doubt upon the idea of […]
Last week, I began a 4-week preaching series on “Conversations with a Skeptic.” Each week, we will look at a question posed by skeptics. The purpose is not to score points in a sharply-pointed counterattack. The point is to face the questions, and not dismiss them, because they are valid questions. And if we are […]
Edward O. Wilson was one of the most outstanding scientists in the United States until he died in 2021. In his book, On Human Nature, he confidently claimed that science can explain all that needs to be explained, including religion as a human created phenomenon. Theology’s days are numbered, he contended. Richard Dawkins has written […]