Sermon: "Make A Joyful Noise: Joyful, Joyful", Psalm 100 (June 14, 2020)

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While my heart is full at being able to worship with you in this beautiful space once again, it’s impossible to forget that everything’s different now. When we first went into lockdown at the end of March, we told each other, “Don’t worry; it’ll just be a few weeks before we’re back to normal.” As we approached Easter, we reassured ourselves, “It’s an *authentic* Easter, hearing the Good News while hiding away in our homes. When we get back into the church building, we’ll have a REAL Easter celebration, with singing and bells and hugs and joy!” And yet, here we are, halfway through June, and we’ve been told on no uncertain terms that although we can begin to gather again, we must continue social distancing and refrain from singing together—ESPECIALLY in Church. None of us want to be in the news for becoming a hotspot for the virus’ spread. So, many of us are still staying home, and those of us who are physically gathered still remain physically distant from one another. While it’s wonderful to be back in this sacred space, it feels like a far cry from the Easter Celebration that we’ve been waiting and hoping for. We’re navigating a new worship experience, one that’s quieter, lonelier, and more technologically complicated than we’re used to.

Sermon: "Confessional Excerpts" (June 7 2020)

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These last couple of weeks have been emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and even physically taxing. We were already worn out from the isolation and caution demanded by COVID-19, and now there’s a national movement of civil unrest that’s rightly demanding the last remnants of our energy and attention. One thought that’s been haunting me ever since the news of George Floyd’s death broke is that, if I’m this bone-weary after a week of mourning the sins of our nation and doing my best to stand against racism, it must be absolutely debilitating for those who don’t have that choice, whose very existence makes it impossible to ignore or deny the injustices of American society. This thought has convicted me that I can’t afford to look away, even when it’s hard to watch.

Sermon: “Sensing the Sacred: When We Thirst”, Exodus 17:1-7/John 4:5-30 (March 15, 2020)

(This is the fourth sermon in our Lenten series, "Sensing the Sacred". 

The others can be found here, here, and here.)

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This week’s sermon is a bit of an outlier in our Lenten series, in that we’ll be talking about “thirst”, and thirst isn’t considered one of the traditional senses. However, technically speaking, a sense is any faculty by which we perceive stimuli originating from outside or inside the body.[1] Since our thirst is a way for us to perceive a need of our body, I’d argue that it can be considered a sense just as much as smell, sight, taste, sound, or touch (also, Lent is six weeks long so I had to get creative. Cut me some slack, here).

Sermon: “What Do You Do With the Mad That You Feel?”, Genesis 37:2-7, 11-12, 18-28/1 Kings 19:9-18 (August 13, 2017)

8/13/2017

Video Here

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As you hopefully recall from worship last week, the High School youth went to Pittsburgh, PA, for their mission trip this summer. We had a lot of incredible experiences on that trip, but one of the most unique was our opportunity to hear Hedda Sharapan speak. Hedda had worked closely with the Reverend Fred Rogers on his show, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and has continued the work that he began back in 1966 even after his death. Although I think the celebrity of such a person was somewhat lost on a few of our younger youth, for me, this was like meeting Beyoncé’s personal stylist. I mean, for those of us who grew up between the 60s and the early 2000s, Mister Rogers taught us everything we knew about the most important things in life: sweater vests, make-believe, friendship, and, of course, feelings. And meeting Hedda was like being one step removed from one of the greatest teachers I’d ever had. So I’ve had Mr. Rogers on the brain since July.

Sermon: "Ready or Not...", 1 Corinthians 12:4-11/John 2:1-11 (January 17, 2016)

1/17/16

I know that there’s only one God, but if I WERE polytheistic, I’d say that the lectionary gods were smiling on me this week. Today in worship, we’re celebrating the ordination and installation of new church officers, our new Deacons and Ruling Elders, and what lands in my lap but this passage from 1 Corinthians. I couldn’t ask for a better topic than the variety of gifts given by the same Spirit. We may not necessarily experience all of the gifts that Paul outlines in his letter to the Corinthians these days—when’s the last time you heard a reliable prophecy?—but certainly we’ve all observed how the diversity of God’s gifts to us works to make God’s presence felt in the world around us. In fact, I’ve personally seen a variety of these gifts shared right here at FPC.

Sermon: "So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish", John 6:1-21 (July 26, 2015)

7/26/15

This summer, I’ve been rereading some of the books that I loved as a kid. Several of these are obscure stories that I had eagerly purchased at my school’s Scholastic Book Fair, bookworm that I was, which had been unearthed during my dad’s summer purging of his house. Others are “classics” that almost everyone has read at some point or another: Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Lord of the Rings. I was a voracious reader as a kid, so this has been no small project.

Sermon: "Turn, Turn, Turn", Ecclesiastes 3:1-7 (April 23,2013)

4/23/13

For context, this is the sermon that I was required to preach in class instead of the one about the Boston Marathon Bombings (which had happened the day before). It was extremely difficult to write because my thoughts were elsewhere, and because I had little emotional connection to the situation (it was fabricated for the assignment). The following is what resulted:

Sermon: Response to the Boston Marathon Bombings (April 17, 2013)

4/17/13

So, I've never quite figured out why, but I was hit so hard by the Boston bombings back in April. Even though no one that I knew was there, I felt physically sick for about two weeks afterwards. In order to cope, I wrote this.