Sermons
Sermons preached in a context, but written for people of all sorts and conditions.
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Encountering the Love of GOD
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8 min read
in the lifting up and in the groundwork Trinity B | John 3:1-17 Focus There’s a joke clergy like to make this week every year. We send each other videos and post memes on Facebook about the challenge of preaching on Trinity Sunday. It is known by many as the one day each year in…
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When the Spirit Comes
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8 min read
Seeing, Hearing, Feeling and Testifying in Truth Pentecost | John 15:26-27 & 16:4b-15 When the advocate comes After Jesus comes back from the dead and appears to Mary, appears to his disciples, then appears to them again, now with Thomas in their midst, he says to them that iconic phrase: “Blessed are those who…
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Do
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8 min read
Jesus’s departing prayer incites a different kind of revolution Easter 7B | John 17:6-19 A Strange Prayer I might get into trouble for saying this, but please don’t pray like Jesus. If you take John 17 as your example and try to learn to pray like this, then, I don’t know if we can…
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The hard message of a simple love
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7 min read
To love as Jesus says and does Easter 6B | John 15:9-17 All You Need is Love? We are once again in John 15, which is part of this book’s accounting for Jesus’s final teaching at the last supper. Whereas Mark, Matthew, and Luke have Jesus get right down to the point, giving them…
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Living in the midst of death
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7 min read
Jesus’s vine image and the challenge of abiding in him Easter 5B | John 15:1-8 A Green Thumb My Mom is a gardener. When we moved up to Alpena from southeast of Detroit, we were moving into a rectory: a two-story beauty with a side porch and slightly sloping lawn. Big, mature trees next…