Drew Downs

Make a New Normal

Sermons

Sermons preached in a context, but written for people of all sorts and conditions.

  • He Lives!

    How the empty tomb provides all the ending we need The Great Vigil of Easter  |  Mark 16:1-8 He isn’t here They bought spices, then brought them to the tomb, to anoint him. Three women: Mary, Mary, and Salome. And they come out in the dark, shortly after the sun fades out of view on…

  • The ugliness is the brutality, not the day itself: it isn’t ugly. Not the sacrifice. Not what Jesus does in showing off the destructiveness of our obsession with power. Walking to his death defiantly humble, leaving Jerusalem displaying the same character with which he entered.

  • Keeping it 100

    When Jesus gathers his disciples for the Passover, Jesus does this one most radical act. No, not the Last Supper or the footwashing. What he does is treat Judas like one of the team. Like he isn’t about the betray him. The message, if we can hear it, is not only get together and eat,…

  • Palm Sunday  |  Mark 11:1-11   Learning Holy Week I must have been 9 or 10 when I realized that the story didn’t make sense. I could follow the main elements of the story. I could make sense of the basic plot points. But there were holes. And the way we told it just confused…

  • Learning in the absence of Jesus Lent 5B  |  John 12:20-33 Wishing to See “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” It is a deceptively simple moment. We’d almost overlook it. These people come to Philip looking for Jesus. Philip goes to Andrew and they both go to Jesus. “Sir, we wish to see Jesus,” they…

  •   An alternative homily for Lent 4B |  John 3:14-21 It is an odd place to begin the story: with the snake. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. The lectionary cuts off the…