2020 July

What We Need Now Is Wisdom

What We Need Now Is Wisdom

This sermon is based on James 3:13-18. You can also view each week's sermon/worship service on our YouTube Channel during the weeks we cannot meet due to Covid-19 restrictions: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5ncsq_QNvCv61bIwKUpP5A SERIES OVERVIEW: Hard times. They come; they go, and then they come back. It’s hardly fair, but that’s life in a fallen world. Let’s face it: if hard times were dollars, we would all be rich. There are all sorts of stories in the Bible about people in difficult situations, even impossible situations. The people are enslaved in Egypt. They are oppressed and beaten down by foreign tyrants. They are carried off into exile. They find themselves starving and exhausted, wandering in desert wastelands. And then there are the lepers, the possessed, the blind, the deaf and the lame, each agonizing in their own private anguish. And don’t forget the dying, the brokenhearted and the despondent. In every case, there is

Insights on Rights and Eating Delights (Part Two)

Insights on Rights and Eating Delights (Part Two)

After last week’s shocking revelation that “Ring Around the Rosies” was NOT about the Black Plague, I decided to look into other nursery rhymes to see what they were not about. For instance, “Jack and Jill,” as is commonly reported, is not about the execution of Louis XVI of France (“broke his crown”) and of Marie Antoinette some months later (“came tumbling after”). I know this because the rhyme was published 30 years before Louis got guillotined. Plus, the original rhyme was not about Jack and Jill, but about Jack and Gill, two boys! “Rub-A-Dub-Dub” sounds innocent enough until you start to think about it. But its real meaning is even creepier. Apparently, this wonderful rhyme that we all recited while giving our kids a bath is actually a song about upper-class tradespeople (the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker) at a town fair getting caught peeking into the

What We Need Now Is Compassion

What We Need Now Is Compassion

This sermon is based on Colossians 3:12-14. You can also view each week's sermon/worship service on our YouTube Channel during the weeks we cannot meet due to Covid-19 restrictions: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5ncsq_QNvCv61bIwKUpP5A SERIES OVERVIEW: Hard times. They come; they go, and then they come back. It’s hardly fair, but that’s life in a fallen world. Let’s face it: if hard times were dollars, we would all be rich. There are all sorts of stories in the Bible about people in difficult situations, even impossible situations. The people are enslaved in Egypt. They are oppressed and beaten down by foreign tyrants. They are carried off into exile. They find themselves starving and exhausted, wandering in desert wastelands. And then there are the lepers, the possessed, the blind, the deaf and the lame, each agonizing in their own private anguish. And don’t forget the dying, the brokenhearted and the despondent. In every case, there is

Insights on Rights and Eating Delights (Part One)

Insights on Rights and Eating Delights (Part One)

I am not one to stir up controversy, and yet I feel compelled to do exactly that. I grew up knowing that the lines from a beloved nursery rhyme were actually sardonic words mocking the horror of the Black Death. From this knowledge, gained at such an impressionable age, I felt called to devote my life to sarcasm and mockery. As I grew older (and wiser), this belief in the “secret” meaning behind this rhyme was substantiated. The “Ring around the rosies” could only refer to the red rash that developed on the victims’ skin, a rash which would soon turn into painful black boils. “A pocket full of posies” was clearly talking about the ancient practice of trying to ward off an airborne plague through pleasant odors (it is common knowledge that airborne viruses smell foul and can be fought off by a “mask” of pleasant aroma, hence, the

What We Need Now Is Peace

What We Need Now Is Peace

This sermon is based on John 14:25-27 and 1 Peter 3:8-12. You can also view each week's sermon/worship service on our YouTube Channel during the weeks we cannot meet due to Covid-19 restrictions: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5ncsq_QNvCv61bIwKUpP5A SERIES OVERVIEW: Hard times. They come; they go, and then they come back. It’s hardly fair, but that’s life in a fallen world. Let’s face it: if hard times were dollars, we would all be rich. There are all sorts of stories in the Bible about people in difficult situations, even impossible situations. The people are enslaved in Egypt. They are oppressed and beaten down by foreign tyrants. They are carried off into exile. They find themselves starving and exhausted, wandering in desert wastelands. And then there are the lepers, the possessed, the blind, the deaf and the lame, each agonizing in their own private anguish. And don’t forget the dying, the brokenhearted and the despondent. In

Might as Well Face It, We’re Addicted to Rights

Might as Well Face It, We’re Addicted to Rights

Great things apparently, have happened while people were stuck in quarantine. For instance, Shakespeare likely wrote "King Lear" in quarantine. Isaac Newton, during the Great Plague of London in 1665, isolated himself and got to work developing calculus, analyzing light and color, studying gravity and, in his spare time, started developing his laws of motion (all in the same year!). Victor Hugo chose to escape Napoléon’s grasp by exiling himself in Jersey and, while he was there, wrote Les Misérables. During a cholera epidemic, Mary Shelley and her husband escaped to the countryside where they passed their time telling scary stories until Shelley figured out that the scariest story had yet to be written (she fixed that). And it was in seclusion that Edward Munch painted, “The Scream” (fact: while you may think “The Scream” is a painting of a man screaming, it is actually a man hearing a ghastly

What We Need Now Is Hope

What We Need Now Is Hope

This sermon is based on Hosea 6:1-11. You can also view each week's sermon/worship service on our YouTube Channel during the weeks we cannot meet due to Covid-19 restrictions: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5ncsq_QNvCv61bIwKUpP5A SERIES OVERVIEW: Hard times. They come; they go, and then they come back. It’s hardly fair, but that’s life in a fallen world. Let’s face it: if hard times were dollars, we would all be rich. There are all sorts of stories in the Bible about people in difficult situations, even impossible situations. The people are enslaved in Egypt. They are oppressed and beaten down by foreign tyrants. They are carried off into exile. They find themselves starving and exhausted, wandering in desert wastelands. And then there are the lepers, the possessed, the blind, the deaf and the lame, each agonizing in their own private anguish. And don’t forget the dying, the brokenhearted and the despondent. In every case, there is

Never Forgetting Real Church*

Never Forgetting Real Church*

I read this story the other day** about a man and his grown son who were out looking at possible houses for the son to buy. When the owner came to the door, she immediately recognized the father as an old friend. “Larry?” she asked? The father responded with a blank look on his face. “Larry, it’s me, Elaine. We went to school together!” The father still did not recognize her. “How could you not recognize me?” she said jokingly. She invited them in; and while the son was looking around the house, she went to grab her old high school yearbook. She showed the father her senior picture, but still he had no recollection of who she was. “Let’s look at your picture,” she said and quickly flipped the pages until she came to his picture. Under his photo, he had written, “Elaine, I will never forget you.” Real