Fourth Sunday of Easter (A) — John 10:1–10
Trinity Lutheran Church, Pleasant Valley, PA
Bethany Lutheran Church, Stony Creek Mills, PA
Faith Lutheran Church, Mount Penn, PA
Good readings inspire good questions. The fourth Sunday of Easter doesn’t usually get a lot of questions, though, with readings so familiar and well-loved. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.” It brings us comfort, not challenge. Maybe that’s what we need most right now. Still, I can’t help but ask.
Continue readingFriends in Christ,
Holy Saturday is perhaps my favorite day of the Church year. I’m not sure why. It should be a day of sorrow, of shock, when hope is lost. Not a day we celebrate in the church very often, mostly because it is a day filled with pain.
Continue readingThe First Sunday of Lent (A) — Genesis 2:15–17, 3:1–7; Matthew 4:1–11
Bethany Lutheran Church, Stony Creek Mills, PA
Faith Lutheran Church, Mount Penn, PA
The LORD God took the human and put it in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it. And the LORD God commanded the human, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”
It’s nice to work in the church again. Teaching last year was fun, and I hope I can do it again. But I’ll need to include congregational work in there as well. Preaching and teaching, singing and worship, sharing each others’ lives, are vital in real life of faith. Having them again, I’m certain I cannot live without them.
Continue readingFestival of the Transfiguration (A)—Exodus 24:12–18; 2 Peter 1:16–21; Matthew 17:1–9
Come up the mountain.
In Exodus today, God’s people have already left Egypt, following God’s directions to the mountain called Sinai. Wondrous things happen on mountains. People believed gods lived there. It makes sense; it climbs into the sky, reaching up to the clouds, into heaven, beautiful and breathtaking. The perfect place for God’s splendor, or at least God’s unreachable-ness. The Israelites at Sinai knew they stood in the presence of the Almighty.
Continue reading“I am the Alpha and Omega,” Jesus says. “The beginning and the end.”
Elsie’s beginning, it seems, was some distance away, in England, the other side of the pond. Far away today; further away (it seemed) when she came to the shores of America with her new husband, Frederick, a soldier from the States. It’s funny that war can actually bring people together, sometimes.
Continue readingSermon for the Presentation of Our Lord — Malachi 3:1–4, Luke 2:22–40
Proclaimed at Faith Lutheran Church, Mount Penn, PA
As I’ve been waiting for my time here to begin, I’ve been substitute teaching in the public schools nearby. I was eager, at first, to work in Hamburg. It’s where I grew up, and at the very least, I wanted to see the new high school, which was rebuilt shortly after I graduated. So a few weeks ago, I finally grabbed a half day in the chemistry lab. I’m not sure I’ll do it again. Continue reading
The Baptism of Our Lord (A)—Acts 10:34–43
Proclaimed at Trinity Lutheran Church in Pleasant Valley, PA.
It’s nice to have a chance to be back here at Trinity, after more than a year away. Spending October before last with you was a lot of fun, though I have to admit that I enjoyed 2019 even more. Some of you may remember that I was going to Malaysia, to teach for a year at Malaysia Theological Seminary. It was a wonderful place to be, and leaving there was very difficult. The land is beautiful, with thick jungle and expansive seacoasts and fantastic architecture. The culture is interesting, and the shape of faith is often a joy. But the true asset of Malaysia, its true gift to the world, is the people. Continue reading
Sermon for Epiphany (A): Isaiah 60:1–6 and Matthew 2:1–12
Proclaimed at St John’s Lutheran Church in Sinking Spring, PA
It was a dark time in Israel when the prophet of the third part of Isaiah spoke. His words acknowledge that there will come a day when “Darkness shall cover the whole earth, and thick darkness the peoples.” This worldwide darkness was a larger reflection of the darkness that already hovered over God’s people. Certainly, things were a little better than they had been. A hundred years earlier, Israel was captured by the Babylonians, who took the wealthy, powerful people away into exile, and left the poor and destitute in the land to become more poor and destitute. By the time the prophet speaks, the people have returned home and begun to rebuild. But they are still under the oppression of the Persians. The community is constantly in conflict—the elites who returned opposed the farmers who stayed. And the ruins of the old civilization are a constant source of despair. Remember the great nation that God once built here? How can we ever be like that again? Continue reading
Today we thank you, O God, as this year draws to a close, for the season that is also ending at my home congregation. Pastor Bruce Osterhout has faithfully cared for the people God has placed in his charge for five and a half years. He has often done so bearing the pain of the systemic challenges that, like many congregations, have been part of our story for decades. And he has always done so with a focus on the gospel as articulated in Matthew 25: Feeding the hungry, quenching thirst, welcoming the stranger, clothing the naked, caring for the sick, and visiting the imprisoned. Pastors are human, and none is perfect; but Bruce’s passion for the needs of the world has brought much to this community of faith and helped us to grow incredibly. He will be deeply missed at Zion’s. And I am glad that, as a colleague, I don’t have to miss him too much. Grant him discernment for the future, God, and confidence in work well-done. Amen.
Today we thank you, O God, for Jeanette Rankin, whom I just learned about. Rankin was the first woman ever elected to the US Congress, in 1917, three years before women’s suffrage! Though remembered controversially for her pacifist faith convictions during the World Wars, she said “If I am remembered for no other act, I want to be remembered as the only woman who ever voted to give women the right to vote.” Pretty cool. Amen.
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