Sermon Blog

Many you have heard the youth, other chaperones, and I give Anita a hard time of the years, officially giving her the title of “The Bag Lady.”  She earned that title because she carries many bags when we go on a trip, and in those bags there are other bags with everything organized.  We might give her a hard time, but the other chaperones and I will have to confess, at least, that if one of our youth have a need that we weren’t prepared for, Anita was, pulling out of one of her bags whatever it is we have needed.  However, there is another designation that many of you don’t know, she doesn’t even know it, because I just came up with it preparing this sermon.  Anita is the “Queen of Nightlights.”  I don’t believe there is a room in our home that doesn’t have at least one nightlight of some sort—some rooms have two or more.  When we go on trips, she usually carries at least two nightlights with us—to place in the bathrooms if nowhere else.  That might...

Thomas Wolfe wrote You Can’t Go Home Again.   Evidently Mr. Wolfe was riding with me this past Christmas when I drove to the family gathering with my parents and sister and her family.  I’m actually surprised that the story has not gotten out any further from my family with regard to your directionally challenged pastor.  My parents still live on the street I grew up on.  They still live in the house that we moved into when I was five or six years old…so for you mathematically challenged folks, that is like 40 years.  This past Christmas we drove to their house.  We turned on the right street, drove up the street, pulled into the driveway, and got out of the car, as I told everyone that the odd vehicle must be my sisters van.  It was only after getting some of the presents out of the trunk and starting toward the front porch that I realized, “this isn’t my parents’ house.”  I had turned in the wrong driveway…two houses early.  Evidently I ...

There’s been a lot of discussion about flags this week, well, actually about one particular flag that many folks find offensive.  It has led to a massive exchange over social media about removing offensive flags—to the point that someone suggested the removal of the Duke flag because they found it offensive.  I am not going to directly enter into the debate over heritage verses hate—you will have to draw, on your own, what not the Southern, or Republican, or States’ Rights response should be, but what a disciple of Christ’s response should be.  I do want us to consider a flag this morning, a flag that I believe should be flown within the heart of every disciple of Christ.  It is not the Stars and Bars, nor even the Stars and Stripes, but it is a simple white flag.  I’m not talking about the white “Christian” flag emblazoned in the corner with a blue rectangle and cross that we find in many churches.  I am talking about the white flag that is normally ass...