Liturgy, Advent 1: The X(Mas) Files: WHO?; Isaiah 40:1-5, Luke 3:2-9, 15-16 (December 3, 2023)

*You are welcome to use or adapt any of my resources for free, but I ask that you provide proper citation AND comment on this post to let me know.*

Hymns:

Hymn GTG #88, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” (vv. 1, 3, & 7)
Hymn GTG #95, "Prepare the Way of the Lord"
Hymn GTG #145, “What Child Is This?”

Sermon: "Bet Your Life", Hosea 11:1-9 (November 12, 2023)

As you all know, I had a minor medical procedure on Friday, which is temporarily impacting my voice. I’m so grateful to for the help of our currently serving leadership so that I don’t have to talk for an hour straight this morning, but I still felt it was important to preach the sermon myself. Since most of my weekend has been taken up by the procedure and recovery, I’d originally planned to recycle a sermon on Hosea that I wrote four years ago. But apparently, as is so often the case, the Holy Spirit had other plans.

Liturgy: Hosea, Hosea 11:1-9 (November 12, 2023)

  *You are welcome to use or adapt any of my resources for free, but I ask that you provide proper citation AND comment on this post to let me know.*

Hymns:

GTG #60, “Your Endless Love, Your Mighty Acts"

GTG #435, “There's A Wideness in God's Mercy”

GTG #39, “Great Is Thy Faithfulness”

Sermon: "R.O.I.", 1 Kings 18:20-39 (November 5, 2023)

Today’s scripture reading may be a new story to some of you, but regardless of how well you know it, we can all tell right away that we’re supposed to take a side here. The obvious choice, of course, is Elijah, right? He’s depicted as such a cool guy, the paradigm of a self-assured protagonist: sassing back to King Ahab, calling out the people on their indecisiveness, taking on 450 of Baal’s prophets singlehandedly, then making fun of them when they’re unsuccessful…you start to understand why he’s such a big deal, scripturally speaking, even without a book of prophesy named after him. He’s a wise-cracking, no-nonsense biblical superhero!

Liturgy: Elijah at Mount Carmel, 1 Kings 18:20-39 (November 5, 2023)

 *You are welcome to use or adapt any of my resources for free, but I ask that you provide proper citation AND comment on this post to let me know.*

Hymns:

GTG #409, “God Is Here!”

GTG #326, “For All the Saints”