Tag Archives: love

A Gentile and a Tax Collector

Posted on by

Proper 18A
September 6, 2020

Exodus 12:1-14 This day shall be a day of remembrance for you.
Romans 13:8-14 Love is the fulfilling of the law.
Matthew 18:15-20 Let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.

O Divine presence, grant us the wisdom, the strength and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

It’s Labor Day weekend, our secular signal that the summer is ended. That brings Jeremiah’s lament to my mind: “the summer is ended, and we are not saved,” say the people. The Lord responds: “For the hurt of my poor people I am hurt, I mourn, and dismay has taken hold of me. Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then has the health of my poor people not been restored?” …“It is because the people do not know me,” says the Lord of Love. That’s not the Hebrew Bible reading that our lectionary offers us this morning, but you might read chapters 8 and 9 in Jeremiah later on for extra credit.
Continue reading →

Thirst

Posted on by

Proper 8A
June 28, 2020

Genesis 22:1-14 Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him.
Romans 6:12-23 Present your members to God as instruments of righteousness…the stipend of sin is death.
Matthew 10:40-42 And whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple—truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.

O God of love, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Our lesson from Genesis about Abraham’s binding of Isaac is such a troubling story to me – it is, as theologian Phyllis Trible says, a text of terror. And the interpretation of this story also horrifies me. It so often gets taught as a theological yardstick story that sizes up Abraham’s obedience to what he understands to be the voice of the Holy One telling him to sacrifice his son. It gets paired with the story of Jesus’ death on the cross. I haven’t heard nearly enough criticism in religious settings about the kind of father who would be willing to kill his own son; or the kind of god that would devise such a horrendous test of faith. I wonder why anyone would want to worship such a god. 

Continue reading →

Unholy Trinity: Idolatry, Blasphemy & White Supremacy

Posted on by

Trinity Sunday (A), June 7, 2020.  The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Genesis 1:1-2:4 These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created.
2 Corinthians 13:11-13 Put things in order, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace.
Matthew 28:16-20 But some doubted.

O Trinity of blessed light, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Happy Trinity Sunday everyone. I’m feeling particularly spun up by the Holy Spirit this week and I want to preach about the turbulence of civil and religious unrest. A mighty wind is blowing people out of their homes, as Bishop Gates preached last week, and into the streets, throughout our land. We are hearing the Spirit in a variety of languages. Last Sunday, because it was Pentecost, we renewed our baptismal promises, and this week I’m going to speak to those promises. I’m particularly speaking to the questions: Will you persevere in resisting evil, and whenever you fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord? And will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being? Because Emmanuel Church is a predominantly white parish, not entirely, but predominately, this white priest is preaching primarily to the white people who are listening today. I think you know deep in your hearts the things I’m going to say, and yet, I have to be sure even though it feels awkward.

Continue reading →

Keeping Commandments

Posted on by

Sixth Sunday of Easter
May 17, 2020

Acts 17:22-31 For we too are [God’s] offspring.
Psalm 66:7-18 Blessed be God who has not rejected my prayer, nor withheld steadfast love from me.
1 Peter 3:13-22 Always be ready to make… an accounting for the hope that is in you.
John 14:15-21 If you love me you will keep my commandments.

O God of Love, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

One of the things that has happened in this terrible time of pandemic is that our scripture stories of courage in the midst of devastation have become so much more real to me. As I said last week, the world-wide disruption caused by the covid-19 pandemic is deeply revealing, disclosing, exposing, clarifying – an apocalypse of biblical proportion. For many of us, our sense of time is all messed up, and I’m starting to think about recent chronological time as “before the pandemic era” and “after the pandemic era.” In these last eight weeks, it has seemed like time has been folding, very much like our Gospel reading for this morning – past, present and future feel particularly distorted and layered in this continuation of Jesus’ very long valedictory speech that is set in the evening before his nighttime arrest. This portion of Jesus’ parting words always reminds me of the instructions that my mother used to leave when I was in high school before my parents went away for a trip (and I always feared that they would leave us orphaned). I am the oldest child, so the list of instructions was accompanied by my mom’s admonition for me to use my best judgment. Okay, I would think, I will, but have you met my brothers and my sister?

Continue reading →

What Is Being Revealed

Posted on by

Fifth Sunday of Easter, Year A
May 10, 2020

Acts 7:55-60 Filled with a holy spirit.
1 Peter 2:2-10 If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
John 14:1-14 Do not let your hearts be troubled.

O God of Love, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

“Do not let your heart be troubled,” Jesus says at the opening of our Gospel lesson for this morning. And then Jesus says some things that have been troubling the heart of folks ever since! Troubles with this text notwithstanding, the beginning of John 14 is often read at funerals and memorial services for solace. The promise that God has plenty of rooms prepared for us is so beautiful and comforting. Whenever possible, I leave off the second half of verse 6, because it seems to me that a burial service homily is not such a good time to be reading something that sounds so exclusionary. A burial service homily is also not such a good time to be explaining about translating and re-punctuating ancient Greek. I also have to say that the experience of countless “zoom” meetings in the last two months has helped me to see more clearly some of the many rooms where the divine makes a home with you all. 
Continue reading →

Courage & Compassion

Posted on by

Third Sunday of Easter
April 26, 2020

Acts 2:14a, 36-47 For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away.
1 Peter 1:17-23 …Love one another deeply from the heart.
Luke 24:13-35 Were not our hearts burning within us?
O God of our aching and burning hearts, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.
Three weeks into Eastertide, we are still hearing stories of the first day after the Sabbath, the day when the women found the tomb where Jesus had been laid to be empty. It’s a different Gospel from the last two weeks, and the stories are different. In Luke, Jesus’ first appeared not to Mary Magdalene, but to two of his followers who were headed out of Jerusalem to a place called Emmaus – one was named Cleopas. The other, a woman, I imagine….what was her name? Oh, it doesn’t say. Well, anyway. It’s a beautiful account of the art of resurrection, about how, even when we don’t understand it, we can’t imagine it, and we certainly are not looking for it, we can come to recognize that the Risen Lord can be walking along with us; the Risen Lord can be right in front of us without our knowing it, opening our eyes to the scriptures and opening our hearts to thanksgiving for shared meals. When they hurried back to Jerusalem to tell the eleven, they heard that the Risen Lord had also appeared to Simon (presumably Simon Peter), but there’s no story about that.
Continue reading →

Ready to love

Posted on by

Second Sunday of Easter – A
April 19, 2020

Acts 2:14a, 22-32 Deeds of power, wonders, and signs.
1 Peter 1:3-9 So that the genuineness of your faith…may be found to result in praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.
John 20:19-31 Peace be with you…Peace be with you.

O God of grace, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Today’s Gospel reading is a little like watching episodes of a tv show where the story leaves off at the end of one episode and picks up a moment later the following week. This passage begins, “later on the same day” – the same day that the tomb was found empty, the same day that Mary had mistaken the risen Lord for the gardener. The same day Jesus made Mary Magdalene the apostles to the apostles. And the Gospel says that she did go and tell the others that Jesus had said these things to her. That didn’t seem to do anything to assuage their fears because later on the same day, the disciples were hiding behind locked doors because they were afraid. 

Continue reading →

Hallelujah anyhow!

Posted on by

Easter A
April 12, 2020

Jeremiah 31:1-6 I have loved you with an everlasting love.
Colossians 3:1-11 When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed.
John 20:1-18 I have seen the Lord.

 O God of mystery and meaning grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Every Easter for the last dozen years, I’ve read the story of The Three Trees from the steps to the chancel, surrounded by children of many ages. As I weighed whether to read the story in our livestreamed service, I realized that sitting alone on the empty steps seemed truer to the Easter story than ever before. I imagine you who are watching and missing the physical experience of being together in a full and carried-away church are having mixed feelings much truer to the Easter story too. 

Continue reading →

Standing with Pelagius

Posted on by

Lent 1A, March 1, 2020. The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Genesis 2:15-17, 3:1-7. They knew that they were naked.
Romans 5:12-21. As sin came into the world through one man.
Matthew 4:1-11. And suddenly angels came and waited on him.

O God of Forgiveness, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

The season of Lent has begun in the Church, a period of 40 days, not including Sundays, set aside for Christians to examine our personal, individual estrangement from the love and mercy of the Holy One, and to return to right relationship with one another. Although each person is doing their own Lenten practice, as a congregation we come together for mutual support and encouragement as we go through a this period of intensified self-examination with a call to increased generosity in almsgiving, praying, fasting, and studying the Bible.

Continue reading →

Claim the scandalous holiness of God!

Posted on by

Fourth Sunday of Advent (A)
December 22, 2019

Isaiah 7:10-16 The Lord will give you a sign.
Romans 1:1-7 [You] yourselves are called to belong to Jesus Christ.
Matthew 1:18-25 Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place this way.

O God of love, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.
Many of you have heard me say I love the way that each of our four Gospels tells a different story about the beginning of Jesus’ ministry – of how and when Jesus the Christ, Love incarnate, came into our world. The Gospel of Mark notes the beginning with John the Baptist preparing the way in the wilderness. Jesus came into the world, according to Mark, at his baptism. For Matthew, the preparation began with Abraham and he came into the world at his birth. Luke says, yes, he came into the world at his birth, but the preparation went all the way back to Adam. And for John – he was before the world even existed. Today the Gospel account belongs to Matthew, who writes, “Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah [or the Christ] took place in this way.” If, as I think, Matthew’s Gospel was written a few years before Luke, then this is the earliest extant birth narrative for Jesus.

Continue reading →