Sunday, July 6 – Galatians 6:[1-6] 7-16, Luke 10:1-11, 16-20 One of my first jobs after college was in sales. I worked for a company that sold Brittannica reading skills programs for young children and sets of the Compton’s Encyclopedia. It wasn’t easy and for my first six months, I couldn’t sell a thing. Someone […]
Sunday, June 29, 2025 – 1 Kings 19:15-16, 19-21, Psalm 16, Galatians 5:1, 13-25, Luke 9:51-62 Though there is a lot of rich material in all of our readings, today, I’d like to explore the idea of freedom. What does freedom mean to you? In the gospel of John, Jesus says If you abide in
Sunday, May 4 – Acts 9:1-6 [7-20], Psalm 30, Revelation 5:11-14, John 21:1-19 I’m currently reading a book called Why Religion Went Obsolete, by Christian Smith, a sociologist at the University of Notre Dame (see his conversation with Tripp Fuller below). In it, Smith writes about societal movements and changes since the 1990s that came
Sunday, March 16, 2025 – Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18, Psalm 27, Philippians 3:17—4:1, Luke 13:31-35 There’s a story motif that appears in many different cultures and historical periods throughout the world that mythologist Joseph Campbell called “the hero’s journey.” It’s a pattern that has become familiar to us through books or movies like Star Wars and
Sunday, March 9, 2025 (Lent 1) – Deuteronomy 26:1-11, Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16, Romans 10:8b-13, Luke 4:1-13 Since I began serving Redeemer as interim minister in October of 2023, my approach to preaching has been a week-by-week endeavor. It’s pretty much all I could do to just keep juggling all the plates that I had in
Sunday, February 9, 2025 – Isaiah 6:1-8 [9-13], Psalm 138, 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, Luke 5:1-11 I have to confess, I’ve never been very interested in fishing. As a child, my brother often took rod and reel and went with our Uncle Richie, who just passed away a couple of weeks ago, to see what they
Sunday, January 26, 2025 – Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10, Psalm 19, 1 Corinthians 12:12-31a, Luke 4:14-21 Listen to the suffering of the people of Judah. First, their king and his family were forced into exile in Babylon. Then a few years later, when the great Temple was destroyed, almost all the Judeans were forced out
Sunday, January 19, 2025 – Isaiah 62:1-5, Psalm 36:5-10, 1 Corinthians 12:1-11, John 2:1-11 If you were watching television in the U.S. between 1966 and 1973, I could probably say a certain phrase and hum a certain tune and you’d know exactly what I was referring to. “Good morning, Mr. Phelps” and [then I hummed
