Tag Archives: resurrection

Bear witness to the goodness of Love!

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Easter 3B, 14 April 2024. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

  • Acts 3: 12-19.  You Israelites.
  • 1 John 3: 1-7.  We should be called children of God, and that is what we are.
  • Luke 24: 36b-48. And the psalms must be fulfilled.

God of hope, 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.

The Gospel of Luke is often viewed as kinder and gentler than the Gospel of John, when it comes to anti-Jewish or anti-Judean rhetoric about the life and death of Jesus. Written for Gentile audiences, Luke’s rhetoric seeks to prove Jesus as one who can stand up to and prevail against other Gentile deities or semi-deities, including Caesar. Luke insists that every claim made by Caesar was also true of Jesus, and even more so: miraculously born, son of God, Savior, God from God, Redeemer, Liberator, Prince of Peace.  Continue reading →

In the Middle of Resurrected Life

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Easter B, 31 March 2024. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

  • Isaiah 25: 6-9.  Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of God’s people will be taken away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.
  • 1 Corinthians 15: 1-11.  Also you are being saved.
  • Mark 16: 1-8. So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. 

O God of life, 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.

Hello! If you love being at Emmanuel on Easter Sunday, whether in person or on livestream, I’m so glad you’re here. I’m also glad you’re here even if you’re not sure you made the right choice this morning. Of all the days to come to church, I think Easter Sunday might be the most likely day to convince you that church is really not for you:  the service is long; the stories are unbelievable. Maybe the resplendent flowers make your nose itch, our puppets seem strange and ridiculous, or the hymns are not light enough to lift your heavy hearts. I get it; I see you. You might love the cantata this morning; it has all the feels. Continue reading →

Not Insurrection, but Resurrection

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Lent 3B, 3 March 2024. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

  • Exodus 20:1-17.  I AM
  • 1 Corinthians 1:18-25.  Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God.
  • John 2:13-22. They believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

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

Sometimes when I sit down to work on a sermon, I get tripped up by the first few words of a reading and fall into a deep exegetical hole! This week the words were “The passover of the Jews was near.” Why get stuck on that, you might wonder. Well, I’m going to tell you. It’s because Passover is probably not a good translation of the Hebrew word Pesach or the Greek word Pascha. There’s a long history of rabbis arguing about the etymology of Pesach, which can mean skipping over or hopping over or even limping over. There is, however, an even older meaning: to have compassion for or to make a sacrifice of mercy. [1] So we might understand that, according to the Gospel of John, very early in Jesus’ ministry, he made a pilgrimage up to Jerusalem to observe the festival celebrating God’s compassion or mercy, a Festival of Freedom from Oppression. In Jesus’ time, the Romans had taken the place of the Babylonians, who had taken the place of the Egyptians as the oppressors. Continue reading →

Resurrection is art and protest.

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Easter 4A, 30 April 2023. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

  • Acts 2:42-47.  Awe came upon everyone.
  • 1 Peter 2:19-25. So that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness.
  • John 10:1-10.  I came that they…

O God of abundant life, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may and cost what it will.

We are nearly halfway through the fifty days of Easter. Have you been looking for the art of resurrection? Have you seen any signs? I think of Ralph Ellison, who wrote, “I recognize no dichotomy between art and protest.” [1] Looking for the art of resurrection seems like a form of protest to me. The art of figuring out how to turn sorrow into joy seems like a form of peaceful protest! That is the work that speaks to Jesus’ primary teaching, which was about answering the question, “Is there life before death?” If the answer to that question is, “Yes,” how do we access its abundance? Abundant life for all is Jesus’ stated mission in the Gospel of John, in the portion we have before us, which reminds us that in the shadow of the cross, a most painful and humiliating death, we are not to forget the promise of God with us: Emmanuel. Continue reading →

How Sorrow Turns to Joy

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Easter 3A, 23 April 2023. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

  • 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 (or constantly) from the heart.
  • Luke 24:13-35. Were not our hearts burning within us?

O God of our aching and burning hearts, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may and cost what it will.

In today’s Gospel portion, we heard the Easter story of two on the road to Emmaus – one named Cleopas and the other is unnamed, which allows me to understand that the other was a woman. It’s a beautiful account of the art of resurrection, about how, even when we doubt it, we don’t understand it, we can’t imagine it, and we certainly are not looking for it, we might come to recognize that the Risen Lord can be walking along with us when we are overcome with grief and deeply afraid. The Risen Lord can be right in front of us without our knowing it. The Risen Lord can be in the midst of us when we share our food. Before I go further down this Road to Emmaus, however, I must go back to our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles. Continue reading →

Look for things that go right.

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Easter (A), 9 April 2023. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

  • Jeremiah 31:1-6. I have loved you with an everlasting love.
  • Colossians 3:1-4, 5-15. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.
  • Matthew 28:1-10. Go and tell.

O God of new life, 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.

I wish you could see yourselves, the way you look from this pulpit; you look beautiful! I was hoping that you would be here, and I am so glad that you are. I’m glad for those of you who are with us via live-stream, too, even though I can’t see you! Thank you for celebrating Easter with Emmanuel Church! Welcome to those of you who are here for the first time, those of you who have been here more times than you can count, and  all of you who are somewhere in between. Continue reading →

Do not be afraid.

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9th Sunday after Pentecost, 7 August 2022,  The Rev. Dr. John D. Golenski

Genesis 15:1. Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
Hebrews 11:1.  Do not be afraid, little flock.
Luke 12:32.

On the island of Torcello in the northern reaches of the Venetian lagoon, stands a Romanesque basilica built by the Veneti people over several centuries. They had left their cities on the mainland to seek refuge from the ravages of the Huns. There they worshipped with their bishops until malaria drove them to the group of islands we know now as the city of Venice. The basilica remains on the almost-deserted island, a relic of earlier Christian worship.

Directly in front of the central doors of this basilica, which is really a museum, are the
ruins of an octagonal building which was pillaged for marble and bricks for constructions in Venice. It served as the baptistry, a separate building which opened into the basilica’s narthex. Looking into the eight-sided ruin, which had been topped by a dome, one quickly realizes that the structure focuses on the exact center where a large stone basin would have been placed. We know a good deal about the practices of the first centuries of the Church through the writings of hierarchs and scholars of the time, but also from the structure of buildings, many in ruins like Torcello’s baptistry, built around the liturgies of baptism and the Eucharist. Continue reading →

Song-Infused Days

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Easter 3C, 1 May 2022. The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Acts 9:1-6 (7-20). Go, for he is an instrument whom I have chosen.
Revelation 5:11-14. And the four living creatures said, “Amen!”
John 21:1-19. Come and have breakfast.

O God of resurrection, 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.

Many of you know that Emmanuel Church is between parish administrators in these weeks after Easter, so I am getting an eye-opening and humbling opportunity to serve as both your rector and your interim parish administrator. I’ coordinating and supporting the generous offerings of volunteers and learning about the endless and perplexing challenges of the ministry of the front office, which I’d only heretofore imagined or knew second hand. I have always appreciated the ministrations of administrators, and my admiration is surging at the moment! Administration, at Emmanuel anyway, is jammed full of details and procedures that are always in service to our mission of radical hospitality, advocacy and alliance, spirituality and the arts, and good stewardship of resources entrusted to our care. Continue reading →

The Discipline of Love

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Easter 2C, 24 April 2022.  The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Acts 5:27-32. Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree.
Revelation 1:4-8. To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood.
John 20:19-31. Peace be to you.…I send you….Receive the spirit of holiness.

O God of inspiration, 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.

Our lectionary in Eastertide turns away from readings from the First Testament and toward the Acts of the Apostles, volume two of the Gospel of Luke. This makes a lot of sense because Acts of the Apostles contains the stories of what Jesus’ followers did after Jesus’ execution, how they were inspired with a spirit of holiness to carry on lives dedicated to Jesus’ ministry marked by justice and right-relationship, by compassion, mercy, and peace. Although the book is more romance than history (in the way we think of history), the stories show that experiences of the resurrection in the early church are not as much about theological or philosophical ideas, but about the consequential actions of being in relationship with the Divine in public practice. Jesus and then the apostles were teaching about calling people to make choices that would shape the well-being of the larger community by their living in greater fidelity with God and one another in the midst of the oppression of an occupying army.  Continue reading →

The Splendor of Grace

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Easter Sunday C, 17 April 2022.  The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Isaiah 65:17-25. Be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating.
1 Corinthians 15:19-26. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.
Luke 24:1-12. Amazed at what had happened.

O God with us, 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.

Good morning! Good job getting here, whether you are here in the sanctuary or here via livestream. I’m so glad that you’re here whether you love this holiday, or you’re just trying to get through it. Maybe you couldn’t wait to celebrate Easter at Emmanuel for the first time in three years, and maybe you’re joining us for the first time ever. Maybe you are here because it matters to someone you love, or you are here for a sadder reason. I love to say, whether you have come for celebration or solace, whether you are energized or exhausted, excited or grumpy, whether you have skipped or stumbled into this Easter celebration, my hope for all of you is that you will leave here today knowing more deeply that you are loved, that even if (and maybe especially if) you don’t feel like you fit in, still you belong with us today. Emmanuel Church is a place where we actively practice belonging to one another no matter what. It’s not always easy, I assure you, but it is always worth it. This is a parish where we focus our efforts and attention not on whether we (or anyone else) will get into heaven, but on whether any heaven will get into us. This is a parish where we focus not so much on implausible ideas, but on fidelity in relationship. Continue reading →