Tag: sermon

Sermon: As One Who Was There

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation, Uncategorized1 Comment

25299574_10214858114229862_8841640536640516071_o.jpgBy Rev. Denise Griebler
1st UCC Richmond, Michigan
January 28, 2018

Mark 1:21-28
Psalm 111

Well, I will tell you this: I went to worship that evening with the usual expectations – which is to say, I wasn’t expecting anything unusual.  It was just after sunset – which is when we worship. By our way of thinking, sundown is the beginning of the new day – a time to rest in God’s presence – a time to rest in the company of family and friends and neighbors. Continue reading “Sermon: As One Who Was There” →

The Sunday Long Read: Dove Songs and Fish Offerings

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation1 Comment

JonahBy Jim Perkinson, a sermon on Jonah 3:1-5, 10 and Mk 1:14-20, January 21, 2018, St. Peter’s Episcopal Church (Detroit, MI)

I am not a fish person—which is why I volunteered to preach this Sunday, where the lessons focus on fish, in the stories of Jonah and the whale and of the disciples on the Sea of Galilee called to become “fishers of humans.” To “catch” the significance of the latter, we need to reel in the former carefully. Though not included in the lectionary, the heart of the Jonah story turns on the following verse:

And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah; and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights (Jon 1:17).

The text is clear. Jonah was saved by a fish. But we need to go slow, since we often read it the other way around—that Jonah was saved from a fish. So in the interests of getting us hooked on the story-line, I want to string out three pieces of bait. Continue reading “The Sunday Long Read: Dove Songs and Fish Offerings” →

Sermon: Becoming my Body

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Feminist/Womanist/Queer Liberation and Theology, Uncategorized7 Comments
thirdtrimeseter
Third trimester By Julia Jack-Scott

By Lydia Wylie-Kellermann
Day House, Detroit Catholic Worker, January 14, 2018

Psalm 40:2, 7-10
1 Samuel 3: 3-10, 19
1 Corinthians 6: 13-15, 17-20

I am not a body person. I feel my identity rests in my head and my heart and far too often, I think of my body only as a tool. A means to an end. It helps me get me where I want to go, but it is not….me.

Lately, I’ve been sitting with health fears for loved ones as tests are done to see if there are things growing in their bodies. And I realized the fear that swells up in me. I don’t understand the body. How could something be killing someone I love from the inside without us knowing?

I grew up along Michigan Avenue where, even as a child, cars pulled over or hollered or followed. I learned what it was like to be a woman in this country and to be seen only as a body. And there is outrage in that rises up, for I want to be seen for the workings of my mind and not the shape of my body. Continue reading “Sermon: Becoming my Body” →

Christ the King Sermon: Bossy and Beautiful

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Biography as Theology, Cloud of Witnesses, Theological Animation, Uncategorized2 Comments

momBy Lydia Wylie-Kellermann
November 26, 2017, at Day House Catholic Worker in Detroit

“Let me show you how to fold this, Grandpa,” Isaac said after he picked up a dish rag off my dad’s kitchen floor. He carefully folded it just as he had learned at school. At night, we’ve been reading The BFG and it is slowed down by the fact that Isaac pauses regularly to point out all the words he can read on each page. It’s incredible! I love watching all these incredible things he is learning and knowing that I am not responsible for it. I just get to delight it in. Continue reading “Christ the King Sermon: Bossy and Beautiful” →

Sermon: She was not: The Bible’s most vividly brutal story, and why we must read and remember it

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Uncategorized1 Comment

 

concubine in Judges 19Ken Sehested, Circle of Mercy, 9.19.05
Judges 19:1-30

There have been two special occasions in my life when I have become agonizingly aware of the special fear women feel over the threat of sexual assault.

The first happened when Nancy and I were counting the days before our wedding in 1973. Every couple weeks she came in from where she went to school in New Jersey to meet me in a chaplain’s office in New York City. We were doing a series of premarital counseling sessions. Continue reading “Sermon: She was not: The Bible’s most vividly brutal story, and why we must read and remember it” →

Sermon: Fig Cakes, Tamales, and a Heap of Raisins

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Theological Animation, UncategorizedLeave a comment

tamalesBy Joyce Hollyday
Circle of Mercy: October 1, 2017, World Communion Sunday
1 Samuel 25

We held a sheep-shearing day every spring at Swan Mountain Farm, where I used to live. Mark, the chief shearer, always started with the rams because, he explained, they “come with handles.” Mark grabbed Charlie by the horns and wrestled him over on his side. Charlie, like all the sheep, began that morning as a massive ball of fluff, as wide as he was tall, his wool discolored a dingy brown by dirt. By the time the clipping was done, he was a skinny thing, and the thin layer of wool left on him was shockingly white. As soon as he could get his feet under him, Charlie escaped into the pasture. Mark then repeated the process with Chip. And when he ran into the pasture, the two rams, not recognizing each other with their new haircuts, aimed their horns, charged at each other, and butted heads repeatedly. Continue reading “Sermon: Fig Cakes, Tamales, and a Heap of Raisins” →

Sermon: It’s Like Burning Fire Shut Up in my Bones

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, UncategorizedLeave a comment

roseBy Rose Berger, preached at St. Stephen’s & The Incarnation Episcopal Church (Washington, D.C.)
June 25, 2017

Jeremiah 20:7-13, Psalm 69: 8-11, (12-17), 18-20, Romans 6:1b-11, Matthew 10:24-39

[Piscataway people on whose land this church stands. Bishop Budde, Pastor Sam, Rev. Linda. The Beloved Community that gathers at St. Stephen’s and the Incarnation.]

The prophet Jeremiah was asked to carry out one of the most difficult tasks ever assigned to any servant of God.[1]

During the last years of the kingdom of Judah, Jeremiah was to prophesy to King and Congress that because of their sin their fragile nation would be subsumed by the Babylonian Empire and they would all forcibly removed to the capital city of Babylon. Continue reading “Sermon: It’s Like Burning Fire Shut Up in my Bones” →

Sermon: Power of Names

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Theological Animation, UncategorizedLeave a comment
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My Grandma Bea, me, my mom, and my sister Lucy

Preached by Lydia Wylie-Kellermann at the Day House Catholic Worker
August 27, 2017

Exodus 1:8-2:10
Matthew 16:13-20

As I read the opening piece of the text from Exodus, it feels like I am reading a script from the white men who marched on Charlottesville two weeks ago.

It begins with the Pharaoh naming his fear that the Israelites are becoming too numerous and powerful. He is scared they will out-number and over-take him. He orders that they be forced into labor and when that doesn’t work, he orders murder.

It echoes of the treacherous low-wage labor forced on undocumented folks living in constant fear.

It echoes of a prison industrial complex holding captive more black men today than were enslaved in the south. Continue reading “Sermon: Power of Names” →