September 14, 2014, The Rev. Doyt Conn preaching
There are a lot of different kinds of “I’m sorry.” They run the gamut from trying to get your mom off your back, to a real, authentic desire to wipe the slate clean, to start over, and to do it differently and to be different. That is the transformational “I’m sorry” we are talking about today.
September 7, 2014, The Rev. Doyt Conn preaching
“We need to talk.”
August 31, 2014, Emily Linderman preaching
I was planning on preaching my first Sunday morning sermon in this pulpit on the paradox of work and rest this Labor Day weekend. And I thought maybe I’d tell you a little bit about what in the world is an Associate for Staff and Ministry Formation anyway. I was planning on sharing with you why I care so much about the about the paradox of work and Sabbath and why I hope you might too. But some things are erupting all over our world and rippling through our communities and they have my attention.
In particular, Michael Brown, an unarmed, black teenager was shot 6 times and killed by a white police officer, and the resulting protests and the reinvigorated conversations about racism in journalistic and social media outlets, vigils, and organizing meetings all over our country, the world, and here in Seattle have more urgency than my job description.
August 24, 2014, The Rev. Doyt Conn preaching
Jesus gives us keys to walk through a door into a space that is bigger than the one we left behind, and, how in this space we have the power to bind what is bad and to loose what is good. This process of binding and loosing starts with how we see a situation.
August 17, 2014, The Rev. Kate Wesch preaching
Today’s sermon is about Mary and Elizabeth, cousins who both bore sons who would change the world.
August 10, 2014, Diana Bender preaching
I do believe that it’s hard to hear God clearly, to discern God’s call to us in the midst of the noise and busyness and distraction of our everyday lives. Like Elijah, we can’t hear God in the drama of the wind and the earthquake and the fire. It is only in the sheer silence that God’s voice or presence is able to be discerned.
August 3, 2014, Wellesley Chapman preaching
When faced even with the banal stresses of daily life, God’s grace and compassion for us can seem quite distant. The pace of our lives can make it easy to get behind on our psalm reading, and our trust in God’s loving kindness gets further and further from our souls. And we suffer.
July 27, 2014, The Rev. Kate Wesch preaching
Today’s gospel feels like a riddle. In twenty short verses, we have six parables within parables. It is a nesting box of metaphors and similes for the kingdom of heaven. The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed, yeast, treasure, a merchant, a net, and the master of a household. Take your pick; find an image that works for you. In his book The Parables of the Kingdom, C.H. Dodd wrote: “At its simplest, a parable is a metaphor or simile, drawn from nature or the common life, arresting the hearer by its vividness or strangeness, and leaving the mind in sufficient doubt about its precise application to tease it into active thought.” A parable is an earworm.
July 20, 2014, Charissa Bradstreet preaching
A few weeks ago Doyt preached on suffering and how our experience of suffering is greatly shaped by the soundness of our souls at the time when suffering arrives. So, how do we promote soundness of soul so that when suffering comes it is not experienced as useless, but in fact becomes a period in which hope and faith increase?