Sermon Archive

Text : Jonah 3:1-5; 10; Mark 1:14-20 “The time has arrived; the kingdom of God is upon you. Repent, and believe the gospel.” These are Jesus’ words as his begins his public ministry, according to the Gospel of Mark. The book of Jonah also has a theme of repentance - the people of Nineveh, upon hearing Jonah’s warning from God, repent of their evil ways. Only trouble is, repentance isn’t a word we really like hearing anywhere, including in church. The wonders of the English language have given us the idea that repentance means having to be sorry for what we’ve done wrong. But this isn’t what the Biblical understanding of repentance is at all. Repentance means a change in actions and direction. In short, to repent is to make a substantial, real change in one’s life. It’s not about the guilt, it’s all about real, honest genuine change. Change your ways is a timely message these days. The message of last year’s US Presidential Election came to fruition this past Tuesday with what r...

Text : 1 Samuel 3:1-20 There’s a minister and hymn writer by the name of Thomas Troeger who tells the story of a preacher who was caught off guard by something that happened in a children’s story. Of course, being caught off-guard by what happens in our children’s stories goes with the territory, so it wasn’t really extraordinary that this preacher found themselves at a loss for words. Children’s stories are fun, because we really don’t know what is on the minds of children… despite the fact that all of us, at some point, was a child and probably asked these questions. I just think we’ve forgotten how to ask them. I think we can learn a great deal from some of the profound things that they say. As Troeger tells the story, it was of a typical Sunday worship service. The children had come forward for their time with the minister. She had prepared a story for them, and was all ready to deliver her message… but before she could actually begin, one little boy stuck up his hand, and quickly ...

Text: Mark 1:4-11 I remember once taking a road trip with a friend of mine… It’s hard to believe that it’s almost 20 years ago now. Keith and I made the trip from Calgary, with our easternmost destination New York City. In all, we were away from home for approximately three weeks… The bulk of our trip was through the United States, and the idea was simply to stop in each place and see what was there. Armed with our handy guides from the CAA, we were going to see as much as we could. One of our stops along the way was a town called Charlottesville, in Northern Virginia. We were heading towards Washington DC, to simply absorb all the sights there. Our stop in Charlottesville was to visit some of the historical sites there. Thomas Jefferson had made a large impact on the town’s architecture, and even maintained his own private residence there. Our plan really was to take our time, to not be so busy, and spend some time in a place we wouldn’t otherwise have thought about before we went int...