Sermon Archive

Text: Matthew 4:12-23 Let me begin with a story… “Now it came to pass that a group existed who called themselves fishermen. And lo, there were many fish in the waters all around. In fact, the whole area was surrounded by streams and lakes filled with fish. And the fish were hungry. Week after week, month after month, and year after year, those who called themselves fishermen met in meetings and talked about their call to fish, the abundance of fish, and how they might go about fishing. Year after year they carefully defined what fishing means, defended fishing as an occupation, and declared that fishing is always to be a primary task of fishermen. Continually, they searched for new and better methods of fishing and for new and better definitions of fishing. Further they said, “The fishing industry exists by fishing as fire exists by burning.” They loved slogans such as “Fishing is the task of every fisherman.” They sponsored special meetings called “Fishermen’s Campaigns” and “T...

Text: John 1:35-42 As a season in the church year, Epiphany often goes ignored. We tend to view it as the breathing space that we have between Christmas and Lent, when we begin making preparations for Easter. Many of us go away on holidays, taking advantage of or fleeing from the winter weather. This isn’t such a bad thing, but it can mean that we miss some of the finer points of the gospel message. Up until this point, Epiphany has been about God being revealed in a broad context. We have nations and kings following a star bearing symbolic gifts for the Christ Child, we have the heavens being opened, and the divine voice over the waters of the Jordan at Baptism. This is epic scale stuff… at it fits. We tend to think of God in these really big, expansive ways. But not here… not with this story. There’s no big flash, no shining star, no descending dove… none of that. It’s funny, because John’s Gospel starts out with this big expansive stuff… “In the beginning was the Word…” but in this ...

Text: Matthew 3:13-17 In doing my research this week, I came across something that reminded me of the challenges of climbing into this pulpit Sunday after Sunday. A well-respected, highly-educated teacher of the faith got up into the pulpit and said “I don’t know how to preach.” Chances are most of his congregation would look at him incredulously and wondered what had gotten into him. After all, William Willimon is considered to be one of the finest preachers living in North America today. I have books of his stuff on my own shelves. He has made a career on the craft of preaching for over thirty years! Yet, here he was, from a pulpit, saying, “I don’t know how to preach.” In fact, he says that after 30 years, he says that he knows less about preaching a sermon than when he first began. I’m only eleven years into this, and I’m starting to understand what he’s talking about. When it comes to communicating, there are so many distractions and obstacles that seem to get in the way. It isn...

Text: Matthew 2:1-12 Happy Epiphany! If you ever wondered what the song the twelve days of Christmas was referring to, you should have received your twelve drummers drumming yesterday! It is a rare occasion that those of us within the protestant traditions get to celebrate Epiphany on the actual day… so we’re probably best to make the most of it, because we won’t get another chance until 2013. Twelve days after Christmas, on January 6th, is the day that Christians celebrate the visit of the Magi… the ones we often call wise men. It is the day in which we mark the revealing of Christ to the world… which is why we call it Epiphany… those moments in which God is revealed to us and to the world. The visit of the Magi or the wise men from the east, is the story of the light of Christ coming to the whole world. The challenge is, we tend to take all those stories around the birth of Christ in such a way, that we try to stuff it all into one night… and the stable gets pretty crowded, with Magi...