Sermon Blog

  It is probably one of the most painful parts of my mental health history, and it is an area that when we talk about bitterness and forgiveness in a few weeks, I need to work on.   I was a fifth year senior at Methodist College.   I had entered Methodist on my track to be an ordained Methodist minister.   However, in the midst of a battle with bi-polar disorder as I struggled with depression and the desire to take my own life, I walked away from the ministry, thinking that might solve all my problems.   It didn’t.   I found that the only time that I had any peace, the only time I wasn’t thinking about cutting into my wrists, was when I was working at La Petite Academy during the summer and Faith Wesleyan Daycare during the school year—anytime I was working with children, my heart and mind became focused in on them and not on myself and the darkness.   I had changed my major at Methodist from Religion to Elementary Education, but I began to conside...

  As I began considering this series on “Who Are We,” one of the first things that stood out was the phrase “a holy nation.”   Why?   Well, it is because I cannot begin to tell you the number of times I have heard conversations or been part of conversations relating to our nation being “a Christian Nation.”   Discussions about prayer in schools—how dare they get rid of it, we are a Christian nation.   The removing of the Ten Commandments from courthouses—how dare they discuss that, we are a Christian nation.   The removal of the Christian Flag and most recently the kneeling soldier monument in King, NC—what are they thinking, we are a Christian nation. If it is not one issue it is another, whether it is the perception of Christian freedoms being taken away, or the allowed observance of other religions practices.   This sermon is not about whether or not the United States ever has been, is, or will be a Christian nation—the original intent or our Fo...

  Last week we began a season of remembering who we are—using 1 st Peter 2:9-10 as a springboard to launch our remembering or understanding, Peter told those dispersed Christians in Asia Minor, who were facing persecution and ridicule, and he tells us: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.   Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” Last week we examined what it means to be a chosen race.   We eliminated the idea that it had anything to do with the color of our skin, our ethnicity, the language we speak, or any other physical characteristic…being a chosen race simply means being those chosen by God and in Christ all of those other worldly boundaries are wiped away…as Paul would say, “for in Christ Jesus you are all children of god th...

  I remember the pressure.   All the kids in the neighborhood, really, as many kids as could get there from several streets around, would gather on that concrete slab, as we stood in the shadow of the backboard.   The top two players would be identified and named as captains.   The rest of us would stand around as each captain made their decisions.   As selection after selection was made, the tension increased.   None really wanted the “honor” that often fell upon me—the “honor” of being the last one chosen.   I have to tell you, as I think back upon those days, I think being chose last carried with it more pressure than any other person chosen, because I think that those of us, and some of you here may one of us, but those of us chosen last felt the pressure to perform at such a level that the next time a game was played, we would be selected sooner, maybe even be named captain. I will have to confess, though, that any dream I had of taking t...