Yes, There Is Such Thing as a Dumb Question
I used to reassure my students that it was okay to ask questions. “There’s no such thing as a dumb question,” I would say. Obviously, I was wrong.
A Helper as His Partner
Here’s a sermon in honor of John Shelby Spong, who passed away last month at the age of 90. It deals with one of the passages he cites as a “terrible text” from Genesis: the story of the creation of Eve to be Adam’s helper.
How To Make Jesus Mad
Here’s one way to make Jesus really mad.
Wisdom: Where Reason and Kindness Meet
It’s true: people are idiots, and idiocy kills. On the other hand …
Everupspringing
Here’s a “sermon” I preached in my church recently. I put the word in horror quotes there, because this wasn’t anything like a homily—more like a poetry slam, really. But I try not to let things get too predictable in church!
For Those Working with Struggling Churches
It’s a burden, isn’t it? It’s hard not to feel like a failure, when your church is struggling and you don’t seem to be able to do anything about it. You know that you shouldn’t feel that way; you know you shouldn’t feel responsible for saving the church. You tell yourself that your people already have a savior, and it isn’t supposed to be you. But still.
This is a presentation I made for the 2021 spring meeting of the Prairie Association of the Illinois Conference of the United Church of Christ. It’s about eighteen minutes of prayer, song, and reflection, written especially for those working with struggling churches.
How to Feel Beautiful
Hello friends! Today I’m feeling hopeful about spring: here in north-central Illinois, we’re having temperatures in the mid fifties. This morning, I saw my first two red-winged blackbirds of the season—and then my first two robins!
I’ve been working on a new project, putting short sermons online for my church, the Open Prairie United Church of Christ in Princeton, IL. Here’s one with a valuable tip: how to feel beautiful. (Because you’re good enough, you’re smart enough, and doggone it, people like you!)
[vimeo id=394788470]
Best blessings!
Call to Change: A Ninefold Repentance
Hello, Merry Mystics! I preached a sermon last Sunday that I’d like to share with you. Our text was Matthew 4:12-23, which is the story of the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry and the calling of his first disciples. That text got me thinking about change: how much I hate it, and how much the church needs it.
The video from the church didn’t turn out so well, so I’ve made a new one for you:
[youtube id=RNil3N5b1Cg]
Here’s that ninefold repentance, in case you’d like to put it up on your door:
- Repent of teaching that Jesus’ life was a sacrificial offering, required to appease an angry God.
- Repent of valuing right belief more than right action, and creeds more than kindness.
- Repent of slandering God as a punisher who sends sinners to an eternity in hell.
- Repent of stubbornly insisting that the world is about to come to an end.
- Repent of our belief that God has a tribal bias—that God is more interested in us than in them.
- Repent of treating our guesses as dogmas, and our words as God’s words.
- Repent of our contempt for spiritual paths and religious traditions other than our own.
- Repent of treating scientific curiosity and skeptical investigation as threats to God.
- Repent of our indifference to the damage humankind has inflicted on the life of the earth.
God Is Not the Punisher
In my church last Sunday morning, our gospel reading was Matthew 3:1-12. It’s one of those Advent eye-openers. It’s not about good tidings of great joy, but about John the Baptizer’s apocalyptic threat: those who do not bear fruit worthy of repentance are about to be burned with unquenchable fire. Damn!
It seems like we always trip over that tension at Advent, which is partly about the delightful anticipation of Christmas, and partly about the terrifying threat of hell. But that tension isn’t unique to Advent; it’s at the core of the melodramatic way we’ve told our Christian story for centuries.
Here’s a short sermon about it. (Sneak preview: I don’t actually think God is going to burn anybody with unquenchable fire.)
[youtube id=UI1xlsuUe38]
The Center of the Circle
Hello, friends!
This one is by request. Fair warning: it’s a straight-up sermon, it’s serious, and it’s twenty minutes long. As you know, I am the pastor of the Open Prairie United Church of Christ in Princeton, Illinois; this is what I did in church last Sunday. My text was the Good Samaritan parable from the Gospel of Luke.
[youtube id=8NABAFdJiEw]