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| "When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, 'It is going to rain'; and so it happens." (Luke 12:54) |
And so here we are, another Saturday! What in the world happened to all the other days in this week.
Oh, right....they have come and gone. In my case they were all consumed by our Summer Arts Camp, "Growing in Faith Through the Arts." It was a fun, exhausting, busy, exhilarating, exhausting (yes, worth mentioning twice, ergo the state of my mind) week. (There really is nothing quite like spending creative time with children!).
That's why the weekend has come way too fast, for me. What about you? Are you ready for this day, this 11th Hour of preaching prep? And if so, what text are you considering?
Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!
Seriously?
Thankfully, I'm not preaching this week, our Curate is (see above, "exhausted"...). But if I were I would probably preach on the beautiful words of Isaiah.
My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; he expected it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes.Yes, reflecting on yielding wild grapes would definitely be a metaphor I might play with.
So, what about you?
Pull up a chair and grab a mug. I have plenty of beverages to share and fresh produce aplenty (blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, tomatoes, corn on the cob...)...Regardless of where you are going with your sermon, if you have a brilliant idea or are completely stuck, we are here to journey through this day with you.
I've been thinking about what passes for peace (as opposed to the peace that passes understanding!) in our culture, especially in my church's city--where deaths and injuries by gun have reached record numbers. Complacency, laziness, learned helplessness, suppression, oppression--Jesus says he didn't come to "smooth things over" [The Message]. He's kind of "firebombed" our notions of peace, says Luke. I just don't know how this one is going to end/supposed to end. So I'm going to bed to think on it.
ReplyDeleteMeg, I do think that the reading from Luke speaks deeply into issues of oppression and civil unrest and injustice - there indeed is a call for division! I spent much of the summer reading Dorothee Soelle who has a lot to say about readings like this and Jesus' call to tend to the poor and oppressed.
DeleteGood MORNING! Sermon finished, which is a good thing as it has been a no good terrible very bad couple of days of one rejection after another, call-wise, writing-wise, and family-wise. Feeling rather apathetic about the fact that one of my members is doing a presentation during worship tomorrow during which I am confident that she will essentially preach 100% the exact opposite of the message I consistently put out there, because an hour later I will be ON VACATION and headed in the direction of a beach. Burned out a little?
ReplyDeleteRobin, hope the beach is restful, refreshing and fun.
DeleteRobin, I so hear you on this! Hang in there - the new call will come in time. May your time away be restful.
DeleteRobin, so empathize with the days of rejection.....hang in there. Hope your vacation is all you need it to be. The beach sounds like a wonderful place to regroup.
Deletea meeting all day today, and a week that was full of meetings and appointments. so an interactive sermon again. I must admit to feeling a bit lazy for not researching more about background and doing a proper sermon, but no time or energy - and this is what came to mind.
ReplyDeletefaith, race and grace
now do I prep 50 packages with the 3 pieces needed for each person, or just hand them out as I go??? hmmmm - it is 10.00pm - and do I have anything to package them in???
I'll think about it while I have a cup of camomile.
Good morning to those just starting Saturday.
Well done, Pearl! Great idea.
Deleteawesome! I have had an extraordinary week and I am not sure I have any connecting grey cells left..
DeleteWhat packages? What enclosures for each? How do you make this interactive?
thank you!
Ruth
Ruth each package has a person shape - which I bought at the supermarket; a piece of paper; and a butterfly shaped sticky note.
Deletethe person shape will be added to a sign to make a cloud of witnesses, the piece of paper will be scrunched up for those things we need to get rid off, and the butterfly a sign of grace along the way.
Awesome. Love it! The dear friend I took her funeral for yesterday, loved butterflies and the church is still full of them. Full of love and full of grace. God dropped a different sermon in my lap, almost word for word, which I am hugely grateful for. Doesn't often happen that way. Night. Go well, Pearl. x
DeleteRuth
ps. Pocketed the idea for the future though! :0)
DeleteMuddling back in to the thick of it after a lovely vacation. We got back on Tuesday, so I've had a few days in the office, but I'm not exactly inspired sermon-wise. Fortunately, I'm in the middle of the series on the Lord's prayer - forgive as we forgive. Should be an easy enough sermon to write - but as we all know, sometimes those 'easy' ones are deceiving.
ReplyDeleteBut first I have the dreaded Saturday council meeting. It should be pretty low-key, but the upcoming changes to health care has us on edge - we know the denomination's plan is changing and we don't have much information yet. The anxiety is a bit hit right now.
I smell bacon...which means my wonderful spouse is going to help me start my day off right with a good breakfast. A loving spouse is truly worth his weight in gold!
Welcome back, Ramona. I do hope the sermon is as easy as it seems it might be. ANd, yes a loving spouse definitely eases the load we bear!
Deletewell, it's done not fabulous, but it'll preach. Focusing on Hebrews text, playing around with the old hymn 'I sing a song of the saints of God' and talking about running the race as the everyday saints of God... God doesn't call superheroes [ref. the list of named and unnamed people of faith in the text] but very human people. Found the various lists floating about on t'interwebz [and corrected the incorrect ones] re. 'Noah was a drunk, Moses stammered, Rahab was a prostitute, etc.' and added in a few more women... At some point in the sermon I'll say to the folk that I have pictures of other saints and then get the live-stream camera to pan over the congregation, get them to look at each other - we are the current crop of everyday folk down through the generations who God calls to pass on the baton of faith etc.
ReplyDeleteNot wildly original, but the poor blighters did have to cope with one of my more academic sermons last week!
In the meantime am having a nostalgia session with the sounds of Petra playing in the background. Ah, middle-age!
On this chill, damp, dreich day, I am about to make a round of hot buttered toast and a pot of tea - help yourselves!
and against my better judgement, here it is... some stuff borrowed, some stuff new, some stuff 'orrid, but it'll do...as it were.
DeleteNik, I'll be around to read it soon! I think you have a good idea - and really sometimes the "good enough" sermons end up being better than one imagines....because somehow they speak right into what someone needed to hear. So I say, let it be! Trust the SPirit.
DeleteHot buttered toast sounds great, Nik. It is dreich here too. I have a Ruby Wedding celebration to go to this evening in a marquee.. so praying for a few angels to do some cloud sweeping..
ReplyDeleteLike this idea too- it was what was knocking around my head too. What I need now is a working brain... any idea where I might find one of those?
Ruth
'cloud sweeping' - nice picture. Wondering how that might link to that great cloud of witnesses... shall file that little nugget of a phrase away for another time Ruth :D
DeleteYou are welcome- it is a very common prayer of mine! :0) They have started.. the sun is breaking out, and there is almost enough blue for a pr of sailor's trousers.. keep sweeping, angels.
DeleteRuth
Hoping all goes well!
DeleteI don't usually play, because I don't usually preach, but tomorrow it is my turn to fill the pulpit at my home church and surprise, I haven't got my sermon together yet, although I've got a pile of notes, and I put all the rest of the service together early enough to get the hymns to the pianist and the order of service to the office administrator on time... This is only the second time I've done this. Not exactly nervous, but having some performance anxiety issues. Last time I led service, seminary wasn't on the radar. I fly out for a week's orientation next Sunday.
ReplyDeleteSo I need to spend today NOT doing yard work and NOT reading the Preacher Party or lurking on Facebook. I also need to not spend today writing up the enormous mass of deeply self-revealing preparatory paperwork for the career assessment I have scheduled later this fall (which needs to be mailed out in a couple of weeks and is nowhere near done.) And not shopping for textbooks on amazon. And not composing my packing list and wondering if there's a suitcase in this house that will stay locked long enough to get me to Chicago and back.
Holy smoke. This is happening. (!!!!)
In amidst a sea of knots and nots, a 'do' which is most useful: breathe, and breathe again... and remember the motto 'the Holy Spirit has your back'.
DeleteWhat might be the one word or phrase/ or image that wanders through your thoughts as you contemplate scripture and as you read your pile of notes?
Praying you find that calm centre in the midst of this 'holy smoke. This is happening' whirlwind. :)
Thanks. Being Unitarian Universalist, I'm not on lectionary or anywhere near it. Tomorrow's service is site-and-time specific but the broad theme is choosing adventure, taking risk, engaging the unknown... Possibly a little bit of Grace and Providence will find their way in there.
DeleteIt seemed like a good idea when I said I'd do it. :)
That is a very good themeatic idea - you'll be fine, I'm certain of it! And, we're here to help!
DeleteMore good, bad, ugly, crazy, dirty faith stories the author of Hebrews left out and and sweeping the dirt out from under the rug on some of those she did like Barak, David and Jephthah, "When Your Faith Can't be Sanitized."
ReplyDeleteYou are right about that. And who in the pew is going to know about the women who were tortured? Or the prophet sawed in half! --M
Deleteamen. amen.
DeleteWe are highlighting stewardship through the lens of Christian education. We will share the many ways the congregation supports the nurture of our members through Christian education. The sermon is a letter that I am writing to "a student," who is embarking on a new endeavor and how what they have learned in church can inform their future. We have college students leaving this week though I hope this sermon has implications for us all. I am using the salt and light passage from Matthew.
ReplyDeleteOoo...I like that "stewardship through the lens of Christian education"! Sounds intriguing.
DeleteI love love love the salt and light passage in Matthew. Excellent for the direction you are heading in.
DeleteI have a sermon I'm not wild about, based on something I wrote three years ago. hoping that by 5:00 tonight, I'll have it tweaked enough that I like it.
ReplyDeleteSometimes I don't like my sermon's until after I have preached them and "felt" the connecting points with people....weird, but true. So, regardless I bet your sermon has connecting points that will be effective.
DeleteGood morning preachers! I am back after two lovely weeks off, which I spent in NYC petsitting for friends. I love being in the city and it was great. And I am supposed to start vacation 2.0 on Thursday, going to spend 10 days with my kids and grandkids, but my supply priest is ill and had to cancel for next Sunday, so I've been scrambling to find someone last minute. I *may* have found a Rev Gal to fill in for me and if she can it will be awesome--I know she is a great preacher. And if not, well, I haven't given up yet!
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, I am still feeling uninspired. I am tempted to preach on Isaiah, but even if I do I have to come up with something to say about the Luke passage because I am also preaching at the outdoor Chapel on the Green service tomorrow afternoon in nearby Ivy City, and they only read the gospel. Sooooo.......we'll see.
I've had a run and some breakfast, so I really don't have any reason to procrastinate any longer...except maybe to go take a shower. I would love to get this baby written tho.
I'll be back....
Welcome back RevDrMom! Will be easier if you can write one sermon for both contexts....will have to ponder the connecting points between Isaiah and Luke....(harder to do since I am not preaching tomorrow..)
DeleteI too, am just back from 3 weeks out of the pulpit (nice vacation).
ReplyDeleteIn August we use alternative liturgical resources, i.e. New Zealand and Scottish prayer books.
Also, our organist/pianist in at her father's hospital bedside -- an unforseen emergency -- so we have no music tomorrow.
I'm rather "embracing" all the awkwardness of the liturgy to springboard into the "cloud of witnesses" and "running OUR race" . . . we are sometimes awkward, moving forward into God's inspiration re ministry and service -- going with the enthusiasm and passion God plants within us. Our Christian heritage (and cloud of witnesses support us) - but, ours is a new day, a new experience of God's involvement in our life, community, parish and world. "We make the road as we walk it" -- but, we never walk it alone.
How nice you had a good time off! How unfortunate about the organist/pianists father - hope all will be well. A contemplative said service can be lovely - hoping your congregation embraces it, even if it is a bit "awkward" at first....
DeletePatricia, love that last sentence.
DeleteIt's my first year with this congregation so I decided I would tell them that I have a policy of not preaching fire-and-brimstone until at least the third year. But I like the Luke text and decided to explore the waiting and anticipating Jesus is doing - coming to hurl fire but waiting until it's time, wanting this baptism to be completed but being constrained by the divine schedule.
ReplyDeletePsalm 80 will be used in the liturgy, and also explored a bit, as well as our desire for God to "restore us". The congregation will be invited to join together to say (pray) the last section of the Brief Statement of Faith - waiting for God's new heaven and earth while saying, come Lord Jesus.
Welcome to the party! I love the PSalm 80 idea...
DeleteHello preachers! After having last Sunday off (I spent a lovely week at our retreat center in the mountains of N.C. working on my DMin dissertation...and may I just say that I made good progress). Anyway, I am venturing off lectionary this week. I know, I know, it's a walk on the wild side, but I am preaching Luke's "shake the dust from your feet" text.
ReplyDeleteWe are doing some house repair stuff this weekend - painting, replacing cabinet knobs, etc.
Blessings on your "wanderings..." :-)
DeleteI am going with Isaiah b ut with a different twist. YEs in the Isaiah worldview it is a crisis that the vineyard wall is torn down and the vine produce wild grapes and things just generally go to pot. But maybe we need to go wild a bit to be who God would have us be? Maybe we have gotten to domesticated? Maybe our walls are too well-established?
ReplyDeleteTHere are a few phrases running through my ruminations:
"Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness" (one our USan neighbours hold dear)
"Peace, Order and Good Government" (a concept from Canadian Constitutional theory)
"Decently and in Good Order" (I am convinced my Presbyterian grandmother held this as her personal motto -- as long as you shared her definitions of the words of course)
"There are those of us who prefer a dead Christ in his place to a living one outside of our control." (does this strike close to the bone in many of our churches?)
MAybe we need to be indecent and disorderly? Maybe we need to have the courage to renew the vineyard by letting our understanding of it be destroyed?
YES - it's the go wild for Jesus bit that I would play up too - IF I were preaching. I hope you have fun with this!
DeleteI'm enjoying reading all of your sermon plans. I have been in deep procrastination mode, and that means cleaning the living space rather than getting busy with sermon prep. It's all running around in my head.
ReplyDeleteI made more coffee if anyone wants some. I just noticed with delight some sprouts popping up from the basil seeds I planted last week in a patio container. So many ways to procrastinate!
oh, perfect - thank you for the coffee!!!
DeleteI am back from a week of holidays wondering what I was thinking when I choose this scripture to focus on a month ago - one thing I was thinking was that I did not want to wade into the mire of the gospel lesson for today - so I pulled the Amos 'basket of fruit' forward and declared tomorrow a Summer Celebration (I live in a tourist community where our numbers swell in the summer with cottagers and visitors). So I am muddling about trying to reconcile the doom and gloom prophesy of Amos and what I find a quite hopeful image in the basket of fruit.
ReplyDeleteThen we go out to the beach for a picnic - so short and sweet is also a goal.
I have some wonderful 'last of the season' fresh raspberries to share.
SOunds delightful to me, and fun too!
DeleteJust when I think I'm not getting anywhere with the way I do council devotions - we have a nice talk about this Sunday's gospel text through the lens of the 'forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." I'm pretty excited since it's the first time ever my opening devotion has sparked discussion! Then there was a discussion on the value of the regular liturgy and changing things up a bit that veered off into some nice moments of personal sharing among the council members. A very good meeting indeed.
ReplyDeleteOf course that doesn't help the sermon get written. With the funeral planning meeting and all that goes with it, it's not looking good for starting writing until this evening.
Lovely re the council devotions! Hoping more inspiration strikes re the sermon!
DeleteI have changed direction.. with a breath of God's inspiration I am hugely grateful for, having a weary body and a brain like fudge. I am focusing on Hebrews 12- 1&2 and going with:
ReplyDeleteThe cheerers on- the very human 'saints' like Gideon who was told to "go in the strength he had" - enough because God was with him & sending him.
Asking "Who is in your crowd of encouragers?" saints gone ahead. (Heaven has enough saints I have known and loved, for a street party!)
"lay aside every weight" - what are you carrying? Going to give them each a stone and ask them to bring it for a Divine Exchange when they receive the Eucharist. Leaving whatever it represents at the cross and receiving grace, forgiveness, peace in exchange bought the with broken bread and poured out wine of Jesus life. Then to turn their backs on the altar and walk away from whatever they have left with God.
Finally following and fixing our eyes on Jesus the Pioneer. The one who forges the way for us, laying the path into the unknown..
( Haven't written the last bit yet. I have a party I have to be at, and so will be up very early tomorrow am to finish it all off.. and find some stones!)
It has come and flowed alot easier than I imagined. Others must be praying for me, and God is good to this weary preacher.
Ruth
YAY!!!
DeleteThanks, Terri. Bed calling loudly now. Will wake up and see what happens in the morning. Tomorrow is a new day, and I will gather fresh manna then.
DeleteRuth x
Yep, Jesus did upset us with this gospel. I haven't seen so many comments in a long time! I I posted here
ReplyDeleteMuthah+ thank you!
DeleteI have a draft! I tied Isaiah to Luke with the theme of unexpectedness--some times it brings us joy, other times it brings grief and hard times. Also a challenge to think of the fire Jesus came to set as a fire in our hearts, a fire to live as committed believers I think I will just use the Luke part tomorrow afternoon at the outdoor service.
ReplyDeleteOf course, I need to let it sit a bit and see if it still makes any sense when I reread it. Meanwhile I need to run to the store, and to the church to write the Prayers of the People.
Also, this is one time I found The Message translation of the gospel really helpful; often I don't care for that translation, but it worked for me today.
ReplyDeleteWOnderful x2!
DeleteI have been struggling with Luke and procrastinating in a big way, but I've finally decided to ditch Luke and work with Hebrews. Off to the races!
ReplyDeleteI have freshly baked chocolate chip cookies (one of the many fruits of procrastination!)
Go Tracy! I am with you and cheering from the side lines..
Deleteyes, please, chocolate chip cookies (even virtually)...and yay for you finding a direction for your homily!!
Deleteeech! Preaching the Luke passage again! This text had me baffled for a wee bit. I have preached it before and did the whole being fired up for God theme then. This time I have gone with Jesus anger and frustration - why he was and how its okay to get angry too! So long as the anger is for the right reasons and can be channelled positively. Linking in how nice, cosy, comfy, fluffy Christianity is not the whole picture - that there is a radical side too.
ReplyDeleteNot my best effort but also suffering fatigue and knowing I have a week before I go on holiday and there is so much to do!
On the upside we had a wee party last night with our family to celebrate 25 years of marriage and our holiday next week is a three week extravaganza round Europe to continue the celebrations.
Shuna
Nice - your upcoming holiday and celebrations! ENJOY!!! and, yeah I hear you on the "nice, cosy, comfy. fluffy Christianity idea....
DeleteI wish there was a like button. so many great ideas.
ReplyDeleteWoo-hoo! Lateness as a blessing - my funeral planning family was late enough that I got all the busy work at the church done. With nothing else to do I started thinking about my sermon..then writing (with a pen and PAPER - of all things!)...then writing some more. I think I have something preachable. At least, until I type it and start fleshing it out.
ReplyDeleteI'm just excited that I'm so much further ahead than I thought I'd be by this time. Added benefit - I was able to be present for the family and not stewing that I would have less sermon writing time.
Not that I would ever do anything like that.
Oh course you wouldn't do *that*...you would manage to be (mostly) fully present for the family....and, yay you! getting as much done as you did!!!!
DeleteWell, it's written. I have dealt with all the readings and tried to pull them altogether into a kind of 3-D representation of the predicament of living in faith... not fussed, really, about the "come to bring not peace, but division" passage; I read that as a statement not of purpose but of "upshot." The purpose is peace; but the result isn't going to be peace. So God is caught up in our futility and the groaning and travailing of creation etc. And you'll find an outline over at crimsonrambler.blogspot.ca.
ReplyDeleteAwesome! I'll be over soon to read it....
DeleteFinally, got the missing piece: context. Reading Priscilla's sermon to the Hebrews in light of its setting – Nero's persecution, the destruction of the Temple and the martyrdoms of Peter and Paul, along with the backdrop of Roman oppression and financial exploitation by the Romans and their collaborators. And in response to all that, faith… But not patriarchal faith, feminist faith, womanist faith.
ReplyDeleteyes. exactly.
DeleteEdited and short homily for the afternoon excerpted. I don't like it all that much, but it will do. We'll see how it goes over tomorrow b/c I don't have the wherewithall to start over!
ReplyDeleteNor should you start over - and really as I have said before - sometimes our "good enough" sermons become "great" ones because in our willingness to just say what has come to us (instead of TRYING to make it "Brilliant" we often end up being brilliant!
DeleteI have.
ReplyDeleteSeven hundred-ish words of beginning, and three hundred-ish words of ending, and that means I have to come up with two or three hundred words to fill the thought gap between them, and my brain is made of paste and I have the attention span of a ferret on crack in a shiny pinwheel factory.
And then it needs to sit overnight and I have to read it in the morning and see what I left out, because I know I skip things.
Help yourself to your choice of a crockpot boiled dinner (corned beef, cabbage, potatoes), a can of Moxie, or the virtual tasty baked goods I was going to make today if I finished my sermon early enough.
The attention span of a ferret on crack in a shiny pinwheel factory...lol! I know exactly. exactly how you feel, how your brain feels!
DeleteAaaand it preached! Just for completeness' sake, the whole service is here.
DeleteNext time I have the pulpit, if I wear a cute silky scarf, I will remember to pin it in place so it doesn't slither all over creation while I wave my hands around. File under "Wardrobe malfunction / things I don't need to learn in seminary."
well, here I am after a whole day at drumming class. we had a rehearsal, a "performance" for the other classes that meet around the same time as ours, lunch together, and then a closing class where we learned brand new material. it was a great time, and I really enjoy the people and I'll probably sign up for another session of the class...but WOW do I need to figure out how to rearrange the rest of my week so i can write sometime earlier than this!
ReplyDeleteThis week in the series of favorite hymns brings all the personal piety oldies--I Come to the Garden, His Eye is on the Sparrow, Just a Closer Walk...so I picked Psalm 139 and Psalm 23, and I think I had some idea of talking about how we build a relationship with God. It seemed like a good idea at the time. And this week I had an adult ed small group that discussed prayer and why we do it and how it works, even! But now I'm having trouble figuring out how to start. I need an opening line or an opening paragraph, and maybe that would bring me the rest of the sermon. I know I know how to talk about this stuff--I have a book about building and deepening a relationship with the Divine coming out in a month, for pete's sake!! But a sermon about it? apparently not...
building a relationship with God - it is on the one hand what we are doing all day every day with ever effort to be in relationship with others and even to maintain a healthy relationship with self (no self scolding, guilt, etc)...on the other hand it also means being creative and open to creativity (wild grapes - Isaiah?)....even means embracing a bit our history and tradition - such as the way one can "know" the church through singing these old hymns...?
DeleteTeri, those are not hymns from my tradition, but I once heard a priest say in a sermon that "I Come to the Garden" is an entirely unChristian sentiment, in that it's all about "me and God, all alone" and we need to be in community to understand and relate to God. Frankly, I disagree...we need a personal relationship with God, too. But how do the two work together?
ReplyDeletejust thinkin'
MB, these aren't really hymns from our tradition either--they are favorites of people who grew up Southern Baptist, mostly. They are all very me-and-my-Jesus. Apparently I Come to the Garden is about Mary Magdalen on Easter morning...let me just tell you how I've missed that entirely up until now. It always sounds a bit like a stalker or an illicit relationship to me.
DeleteI do agree that we need a personal relationship with God. And that it's simultaneously impossible and imperative to build that relationship alone.
The closing hymn is "I Will Come To You In the Silence" which at least broadens God's action to beyond our personal warm fuzzies. How to get there, and preferably without rolling my eyes during the sappy hymns (sorry, they're just a bit too break-out-the-lighter for me, though I know many many people love them!)....these are questions that are still up in the air.
I understand the Mary Magdalene connection -- that hymn and others of the same Jesus and me ilk are staples in my congregation. I've been preaching on hymns all month and once again getting needled about "You keep challenging us. . . ." (not intended as a compliment) -- the challenge being something along the lines of what MB's priest said, which turns out to be a radically huge challenge to the Jesus and me theology which I didn't actually know about -- but my people sure did! I'm imagining using Easter 2 to tell them "he walks with me and he talks with me" is not how the story goes at all. Actually, they probably have no idea that it's supposed to refer to MM and Jesus. Maybe I WILL preach on that when the time comes.
DeleteI will admit to loving "I Will Come to You in the Silence." But the words do in fact read as an address to a community ("I will call you each by name"), so I find it very satisfying as emphasizing a simultaneously individual/corporate call, themes of justice, and the presence of God in the silence.
The visiting cat got lost again for 4.5 hours this afternoon and was finally discovered in a closed kitchen cupboard in the entryway behind the stove. We think he slipped down to the basement when ds left the door open, and then climbed up the rafters and ductwork to locate an opening into the kitchen. The same way mice get in, which is probably related in some way. I wonder what sermon this little episode will illustrate someday?
I Will Come To You is one of my guilty-pleasure hymns. lol. I put it at the end of the service as an attempt to counterbalance the me-and-my-sappy-jesus of the first three hymns. :)
Deletenow, seriously, I must stop reading the news from Egypt and write a sermon. I get more and more distressed with every link and every photo. :-(
Done - even with the detours from helping an transient and figuring out which crew does the upcoming funeral dinner and helping the never-done-a-funeral-dinner-before crew leader figure out what she needs to do first. What a day this has been!
ReplyDeleteVeggieTales gave me my 'in' - thinking about 'forgive as we forgive' and then I thought God Wants Me to Forgive THEM?. I love VeggieTales! I wish I could show clips.
Anyone ready for an adult libation - I have wine and Woodchuck Hard Cider? Or maybe some tea or cocoa for those who (like me) cannot write while drinking adult libations?
Hello everyone. Prayers to all who are still sermonizing!
ReplyDeleteMine is done, after Jesus called me to burn the first draft and start again.
The fires near Sun Valley (about 2 hours from here) have colored the way I read this text from Luke. (Or maybe it is the smoke that has pervaded Boise that is doing the coloring).
I've been gone a lot (from here especially) this summer, but I'm back now! Have missed you.
Welcome Marci, welcome back!
DeleteChecking in for the night shift! Today was a full, good day with an installation and a backyard wedding reception (wedding happened somewhere else a few months ago)...after which I promptly came home, took a hot shower, and am now settling down to write.
ReplyDeleteBeen planning on preaching on Hebrews and the cloud of witnesses all week...but something in Luke is also calling to me. As much as I don't want it to.
Hoping all went well with the sermon writing, Semfem! Which ever direction it took!
DeleteSunday afternoon, the interactive worship went well. one person commented afterwards about how much time I put into getting worship ready. she thought I had cut out all the butterflies for worship - nope - sticky notes already in butterfly shape. :)
ReplyDeletewonderful! Glad it went well!
DeleteIt is 5am and I have a sermon all done! Yay! I had no intention of getting up quite THIS early.. but hey. I thought I can toss & turn or I can finish a sermon. Done. Might even be time for a little snooze, before I have to get up properly.... I have a chilled blueberry and banana smoothie- if anyone else is awake?
ReplyDeleteRuth
I'm up! Now, it's after 6am here. Wonderful that your sermon came together! Blessings on your day!
Deletesigh. 12:46am and still no words written. pastoral crisis of confidential nature (even to all other church members) has taken up my past 3 hours. I need that personal relationship with God that I'm supposedly preaching about to kick in and turn into 1200 words ASAP...
ReplyDeleteoh my goodness, Teri. I am holding you in prayer. I do hope the words came, come...and also for that pastoral crisis.
DeleteGood Morning, PReacher friends! I feel asleep last night at 9:30pm. (Didn't I say I was exhausted?) ...anyway, I think I have read all the sermons and commented and welcomed all y'all! If I missed you it was not intentional. AND - I will be holding each of you and all of you in my prayers as this day unfolds and you break open the word. Blessings!!!!
ReplyDelete