SERMONS

"We Are Beloved Dust" Sermon by The Rev. Brad Landry March 9, 2025 In the creation stories of Genesis, we learn that we are not worthless dirt. We learn that we are beloved dust. This sacred worth is our birthright as we are created in the image and likeness of God. And we, like Jesus, are marked as beloved. So more than a moral checklist or keeping the letter of the law this Lent, we have the Grace to live into our identity as beloved children of God.

"We Are All Part of One Body" Sermon by Breanna Carter February 9, 2025 As we leave these doors, you are called to be His disciple. A disciple, someone who follows Christ, is transformed by Him and is proclaiming his work to the world around us. We prove that we are disciples in how we love God, and then how we love his people. It's in how we love our families, and then how we love our friends, how we love our enemies and those who've wronged us. If and how we love those we don't agree with and those that we do, it's in how we live. Those who look like us and those who don't. You are called to be his disciple.

"God is Present in the Valleys" Sermon by The Rev. Ranie Neislar March 2, 2025 It is those valleys which fortify us in our faith. And that is what I hope we can all walk into as we experience lent. God is equally present in the valleys, and the more that we discern God's presence at these lower points of our lives, just like the followers are discerning these hard moments and their new season as they follow Jesus down off the mountain and to the cross, we are also called to do that, and in that we will persevere in our lives as disciples.

"Walk Lightly in the Light of Love" Sermon by The Rev. Brad Landry February 23, 2025 Both in the church and out in the world, so many times we are being forced to one side of the issue or another, becoming suspicious of those who believe differently than us, who look different than us, who were brought up differently than us. But you and I are called not to a culture war, but to a kingdom of God, where there is always a stranger to welcome, always a neighbor to befriend, and always an enemy to love. Let go of the burdens of fear, maybe you are trying too hard. Lightly, child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes. Feel lightly even though you're feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them. Walk lightly in love, to ask God to help you, to forgive, to ask God to help you, to love. To walk lightly in the light of love.

"Blessed" Sermon by The Rev. Cindy Carter February 16, 2025  I don’t know about you, but as a priest with many seminary classmates and other preachers on my social media I tend to see a lot of religious memes. I have to admit that I do enjoy these, and there are some that make me smile or even chuckle every time they come up (and as you know most memes do tend to come up over and over again on social media). One of my favorites of these religious memes came to mind more than once as I was working on this sermon. I’m guessing many of you have probably seen it. It shows Jesus, sitting in his best first century rabbi pose, teaching his followers and saying, “Now listen up, I don’t want four different versions of this going around.” (As a preaching nerd, I find that meme hilarious. It makes me laugh every time I see it.) Of course, it came to mind because our Gospel reading for today, is a portion of what is usually called the “Sermon on the Plain,” and it resembles the familiar Beatitudes which we read in Matthew’s more famous “Sermon on the Mount.” But, there are differences. Both Luke and Matthew seem to have exercised considerable freedom in compiling their collections of Jesus’ teachings to meet their own literary and theological purposes. Neither can be shown to be a verbatim record of an actual preaching or teaching event in Jesus’ ministry. You see each of the Gospels presents the story of Jesus in a different way, and much of their richness is lost if we try to make them fit together in one consistent account. The Gospels all proclaim the Good News of God’s salvation in and through Jesus of Nazareth. But, they are concerned less with the biographical details of Jesus’ life than they are with what that life means for us and for the world. For example, the Jesus of Matthew’s Gospel (where we find the Sermon on the Mount) is a new Moses who fulfills the scripture and establishes the authority of his words. Perhaps that is why Matthew placed Jesus on a Mountain when he delivered his Sermon on the Mount – an allusion to Moses receiving God’s word on a mountain, something those who heard Matthew’s Gospel would have easily recognized. The Jesus of Luke’s Gospel is compassionate, a friend to outcasts. Jesus is the savior who came to seek and save the lost. Just before Jesus delivered the Sermon on the Plain, he prayed on a mountain before calling his inner circle, his apostles. And, then he came “down… and stood in a level place” to be near all those who had come to hear him and to be healed. (Pause) As we read the series of blessings and woes in today’s reading we hear echoes of other readings we have heard recently from Luke’s Gospel. We hear echoes of Mary’s Song, the Magnificat, from Luke, Chapter 1, that we heard in the season of Advent. He has shown the strength of his arm, he has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. And, we hear echoes of the scripture from the prophet Isaiah on which Jesus based his sermon in Nazareth, a reading we heard a few weeks ago from Luke, Chapter 4. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Blessed are you who are poor…who are hungry now…who weep now. Woe to you who are rich…who are full now…who are laughing now. It’s a sermon about who’s in and who’s out in God’s kingdom. And, frankly, it’s a little bit, maybe more than a little bit, unsettling. A few words about this unsettling picture. First, the blessing of the poor, the hungry, and consequently those who weep is not intended to idealize or glorify poverty. Rather, this blessing declares, what a commentator has called, God’s “prejudicial commitment to the poor.” One theologian has written - “God has a preferential love for the poor not because they are necessarily better than others, morally or religiously, but simply because they are poor and living in an inhuman situation that is contrary to God’s will. The ultimate basis for the privileged position of the poor is not the poor themselves but in God, in the gratuitous and universality of God’s…love.” Jesus was the human expression of how God loves; and in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus is a compassionate friend to outcasts. And, that kind of love is scandalous, shocking, outrageous. Especially to those of us who are not poor or hungry. Rachel Held Evans, in her book Searching for Sunday , wrote “what makes the gospel offensive isn't who it keeps out but who it lets in.” The poor, the hungry, the weeping, the oppressed. Now, what Jesus was preaching here is what we call “eschatological.” It’s about how everything will be when God makes it all right. The coming of the kingdom will turn everything upside down and inside out. Every one of the conventional expectations that this world holds will be shattered when God’s kingdom comes in its fulness. Here and now the rich, the full, the laughing are on top; the poor, the hungry, the weeping are on the bottom. Not so in God’s kingdom. Now, I don’t know about you, but if that’s where we could end things with Jesus’ sermon this morning, well, God’s prejudicial commitment to the poor might sound just fine to me. Because I could know that God’s going to take care of it. Everything is going to be fine. But, you see, in this “sermon on the plain,” Jesus told us what God is like, who God is, and what God is up to. It is the same God we have heard in the words of the Old Testament prophets and all through scripture. And, once we know that, I believe that we must realize there are implications for the behavior of those of us here and now who are loved by God and love God back. There are implications for the behavior of those of us who have heard Jesus say, as he did in that sermon in Nazareth, that he was the very fulfillment of that scripture from Isaiah that talked about bringing good news to the poor and letting the oppressed go free. There are implications for our lives here and now if we dare to take the name of Jesus, if we dare to receive God’s love, if we love God back. My friends, there are implications for those of us who pray they kingdom, thy will be done. There are implications. AMEN.

"The Holy Spirit is Here" Sermon by The Rev. Brad Landry February 2, 2025 Our offering plates are too small. Our altar is too small. We are placing just a fraction of what we owe to God on this altar. From the nations, to Birmingham, to your grocery store, to your school. What we experience here is that light that enables us to shine in the darkness, to be the body and blood of Christ. To know that the Holy Spirit is not only active in Simeon and Anna, or the apostles or Jesus. The Holy Spirit is here, the Holy Spirit is here.

"God Has Sent Us" Sermon by The Rev. Brad Landry January 26, 2025 If God's vision is to become our vision to embody Christ's transforming love, we must resist with love the forces that seek to commoditize our divisions. The spirit of the Lord God is upon us, the body of Christ. For God has anointed us in our baptism to bring good news to the poor. God has sent us to proclaim release to the captives. God has sent us to give recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free. God has sent us to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. My friends, today this scripture can be fulfilled in your hearing. Today, this scripture can be fulfilled in your doing. Today, this scripture is fulfilled in your being. The body of Christ.

"Join Us at the Party" Sermon by The Rev. Cindy Carter January 19, 2025 If we focus too much on the details of a story, and it is very detailed, the details of the miracle, if you will, then I am afraid we might miss the bigger point. We may miss the sign, the showing of something very important about the true identity of this one who was born in a manger. Sort of like seeing the trees, but missing the forest. Trying to figure out all the details of the story, but missing its meaning. So how can we avoid the trap of focusing on the story's details and miss its significance? At a wedding in Cana of Galilee, Jesus turned water into wine to point us to the glory of his father, a God who I believe absolutely loves to hear the laughter of God's people, and who desires God's children to live their life together in a spirit of celebration and abundance. In her book 'Searching for Sunday', Rachel Held Evans wrote this, "The church is God saying, I'm throwing a banquet and all these mismatched, messed up people are invited here. Have some wine, join us at the party where the wine never runs out. And the best is saved for last." Amen.

"With God's Help" Sermon by The Rev. Brad Landry January 12, 2025 In our Old Testament reading, it says that God calls us each by name. God knows our name in this name of grace. Though it seems like it was only yesterday, we find that today is the day. Today is the day that we recall Jesus's baptism at the River Jordan. Though it seems like it was only yesterday. Today is the day that we remember our own baptisms. We don't say God will do it all. God has this figured out and I don't have to do a thing. God will take care of it. We aren't saying that. In this beautiful alchemy of grace, in one breath we say, I will. And we merge our wills with God, as we say, with God's help.