Seattle Mennonite Church Sermons: Recent Episodes
SMC preachers
Seattle Mennonite Church is an active Anabaptist Mennonite Christian congregation working faithfully at following Jesus in our urban context. All are welcome! Listen in to our Sunday morning sermons to get a sense of who we are.
Folks from our congregation who went to the Anabaptism 500 day-long event in Zurich, Switzerland tell histories, stories, experiences and places with us. Jonas & Laura Beachy brought us the historical backdrop to our 500 year anniversary. Nancy Chupp brought us thoughts on "Who Are These People" from today, back to the 70's, and back to the 1500s. She reflects on the lack of women's stories and how she didn't know any early Anabaptist women's names - and now she does. John Flickinger brought us insights into Mennonite World Conference and what Mennonites look like around the globe, and milling around outside big churches. Finally, Doug Basinger brought details about the experience itself and about how Mennonites have spread their history and stories. You should ask them all to share their photos, and to explain about that stolen baptismal font.
Stories begin at minute markers:
Jonas & Laura Beachy, history - 3:22
Nancy Chupp, Who Are These People (especially the women) - 16:12
John Flickinger, Global Mennonites in Zurich - 24:25
Doug Basinger, Zurich event and Mennonite stories - 31:02
Acts 8.26-40
Resources:
- Poem: Sarah Kinsel, “You are like trees planted by streams of water,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 180.
- Image: detail from Matthew Regier, “Trees of Living Water,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 179.
Through the ancient prophet Isaiah, God speaks to a people in exile: You are precious, you are honored, I love you. Through contemporary Anabaptist prophets of art and poetry (see credits below!), we too hear God’s voice reminding us that we are precious, honored, and loved. We name clearly the bodies that are particularly targeted with assault and violence in our country and world: trans bodies, Black bodies, Indigenous bodies, and other bodies of color, femme bodies, homeless bodies, migrant bodies, and more. And we honor that assault and violence takes many forms -- that a great many of us bear wounds in our bodies, spirits, minds, and dignity -- wounds that are real in individuals and communities. We also know that harm harms everyone, very much including those who perpetrate harm. We all need the embrace of Divine Love for the cessation of systems of harm and the flourishing of life. God speaks to each one: “You are precious, you are honored, I love you.” May we live as though it’s so.
Sermon begins at minute marker 1:08
Isaiah 43.1-4
Resources:
- Poem: Debra Gingerich, "Passing through Waters, or Visit to Switzerland," Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 39.
- Dona Park website, with more art and info: https://donapark.com/
- “Defund the Police? An abolition curriculum” by Mennonite Church USA, featuring the artwork of Dona Park.
- Refugee Artisan Initiative
- Image: detail from Dona Park, “When You Pass Through the Waters,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 38.
Reflections on the poetry of Lamentations, the scrap metal tears of artist Indira Urrutia Zúñiga, and the mysterious rise of Nickleback’s unpopularity.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:44
Lamentations 1.1-2, 20-22
Resources:
- Poem: Lament by Ruth Ann Myers Kulp
- Art: Jerusalem's Suffering by Lisa Obirek
- See this article Knitting with Tears, about Indira Urrutia Zúñiga's scrap metal tears.
- Image: detail from Lisa Obirek, “Jerusalem's Suffering,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 43.
- Hymn: 600: Oh Thou, in Whose Presence Text: Joseph Swain (England), Sacred Poetry: Comprising an Entire System of Divine Truth, 1790, alt. Music: Christian Lyre (USA), 1831; harm. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
What if God still dreams? What if that’s the truest, surest thing we can say and know: God is still dreaming? What if we devote ourselves, collectively, with dreaming beyond the probable, beyond the ‘realistic’, beyond even the possible? What if - even now - God’s shalom dream for all of creation is somehow, strangely, mysteriously coming true?
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:56
Scripture: Isaiah 11.1-2, 6-9
Resources:
- Poem: Todd Davis, “Fishing Jesse's Branch,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 183.
- “Kin-dom of God” origin: Most credit Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz, Cuban-American Mujeristatheologian, with introducing “kin-dom” language into theological discourse. “Isasi-Díaz’s theological vision of the kin-dom of God became part of theological discourse, but she desired more than simply adding new jargon to theological language. Her belief in the possibility of ushering into the world a true kinship of humanity never wavered. Any injustice gave her the occasion to pursue the kin-dom with passion, love, and hope — that every act of justice brings the kin-dom closer to reality. As a Cuban theologian, the struggle for that which is yet unseen — la lucha in the “now” with the hope of the “not yet” — was no abstract notion.”
- Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Douglas Carlton Abrams, God’s Dream, ill. LeUyen Pham.
- Image: detail from Randy Horst, “A Shoot Will Grow Up from the Stump of Jesse,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 182.
- Hymn 209 - We Dream of a Turning Text: Adam M. L. Tice (USA), 2008, © 2009 GIA Publications, Inc. Music: Scottish traditional; arr. Kathryn Harsha (USA), © 2019 Kathryn Harsha Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. #65474. All rights reserved.
In which an Ebenezer appears in this sermon’s starring role. An Ebenezer is a stone erected in remembrance of a person or an experience or a place where something special happened. In 1 Samuel, the Hebrew people set up an Ebenezer to memorialize their experience of God’s presence with them as they were victorious in battle against enemies. And when a preacher reflects on a poet’s reflection on this memorial stone she wonders her way a stone that stands for the end of it all, so that a stone may live its best life as a “mere” stone. Are you confused by this summary? Curious piqued? Listen in and come along for the ride…
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:29
Scripture: 1 Samuel 7.7-12
Resources:
- Poem: Jesse Nathan, “Stone of Help,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 65.
- Melissa Florer-Bixler, Fire by Night: Finding God in the Pages of the Old Testament (Herald Press, 2019), 73.
- InterPlay, from which the “I can talk about…” practice comes.
- Image: detail from Matthew Regier, “The Ebenezer Stone,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 64.
- Hymn 563 Come, Thou Fount Text: Robert Robinson (England), 1758, A Collection of Hymns [. . .], 1759 Music: American traditional (USA), in John Wyeth's Repository of Sacred Music, Part Second, 1813. Public domain.
When fearful, powerful rulers order death, may we all reach for the tools handed to us from our courageous, life-bringing foremothers in the faith: Shiphrah and Puah. “Learn them: Shif-rah. Pu-ah. Praise! Let them again be household names!” Their tools are: disobedience and cunning. May we disobey anything and anyONE who fails to honor God, who is LIFE.
Sermon begins at minute marker
Scripture: Exodus 1.15-21
Resources:
- Carmen Susana Horst, “Shiphrah and Puah (Selah),” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 180.
- Tikva Frymer-Kensky, Reading the Women of the Bible: A New Interpretation of Their Stories (Shocken Books, 2002), 25.
- Renita J. Weems, Just a Sister Away: A Womanist Vision of Women’s Relationships in the Bible, (LuraMedia, 1988), ix.
- Ashley M. Wilcox, The Women’s Lectionary: Preaching the Women of the Bible Throughout the Year (Westminster John Knox Press, 2021), 196-197.
- Women’s Bible Commentary, eds. Carol A. Newsome and Sharon H. Ringe (Westminster John Knox Press, 1992).
- Image: detail from Dona Park, “Resisting Genocide: Shiphrah and Puah,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 179.
- Hymn - 546 There is a Line of Women Text: John L. Bell (Scotland), © 2002 WGRG, Iona Community (admin. GIA Publications, Inc.) Music: Charlene Nafziger (Canada), © 2019 Charlene Nafziger Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929, #G9247078. All rights reserved.
We are gathered back in for singing and praying, formation and feasting. We kick off our artful fall worship with a Psalm; a very good place to start. And we receive from Psalmist, artist, poet, and preacher a blessing for the place of our gathering which is also the place of God’s dreaming.
Sermon starts at minute marker 2:24
Scripture: Psalm 1:1-3
Resources:
- Sarah Kinsel, “You are like trees planted by streams of water,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 180.
- Alejandra Oliva, “Cooking when the world is on fire,” The Christian Century, July 2025.
- Image: detail from Matthew Regier, “Trees of Living Water,” Drawing Near: A Devotional Journey with Art, Poetry & Reflection, ed. Eileen R. Kinch and John D. Roth (Herald Press, 2025), 179.
- Hymn 121 - When at Creation’s Dawn Text: Jean Janzen (USA), 1993 Music: James E. Clemens (USA), 1993, arr. © 2019 James E. Clemens Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929, #309248. All rights reserved.
In the Bible? Praise is nearly always political. Certainly in the book of Revelation where crying out “Salvation belongs to our God” is a direct affront to the Emporer of Rome who claims salvation comes soley through him and his “Pax Romana”. And a post script to our series on Revelation and Resistance: Thanks be to God for artists like John of Patmos (and countless others across time and space!) who buoy communities seeking to be faithful to the Way of Jesus in the midst of and in direct resistance to the empire.
Sermon begins at minute marker 3:37
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 650 - Revelation and Resistance - Praising God, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Chutzpadik definition, OED: “colloquial. Esp. in Jewish usage: showing chutzpah; impudent, impertinent; audacious, very self-confident.”
- “ICE detains mother after legal entry,” by Tim Huber, Anabaptist World, July 2025.
- Donate to Iglesia Cristiana Roca de Refugio, the Mennonite congregation in San Antonio where Pastor Dianne Garcia serves.
- Read more about Pax Romana on wikipedia
- “Salvation Belongs to our God,” Petra Praise: The Rock Cries Out, 1989.
- William Stringfellow, An Ethic for Christians and Other Aliens in a Strange Land, Waco, TX: Word, 1973.
- “You, Lord, are both Lamb and Shepherd,” text by Sylvia G. Dunstan, found in hymnal Voices Together, 432.
- Image: photo by Alex Radelich on Unsplash (detail)
Join Megan as she reflects on Revelation and Deren, Carl, Madeleine, Susan, and Melissa as they reflect on Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference's annual retreat and delegate assembly.
Sermon begins at 2:31
Revelation 5.1–11
Resources
- PNMC Resolution 2025
- Image: Sacramentary (of Bishop of Metz), Fol. 5. Ill. MS (fragment)., ca. 850-900. Paris: Lib., Bibliothèque Nationale; lat. 1141., JSTOR, https://jstor.org/stable/community.11660420. Accessed 22 July 2025.
The title Revelation comes from the Greek word apokálypsi, or ‘apocalypse’, which in Greek means literally, the lifting of the veil. Ordinarily, a veil conceals or obscures that which lies beyond it, and when the veil is lifted, one sees clearly. But in this book the reverse is the case. John, the exiled poet of Patmos lifts a veil, and what we see beyond it is exceedingly less clear than what we expected to see…
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:32
Scripture: Revelation 13.1–18
Photo by Juan Pablo Serrano on pexels
Join Christine Sine as she reflects on the Tree of Life and Revelation.
Revelation 21.1–7, 22-27; 22.1–5
Image: Tree of Life by Gustav Klimt, public domain
In our first of a six-week series on “Revelation and Resistance,” we step - with some well earned fear and trembling - into the wild, the wondrous, the terrifying, the evocative world of apocalyptic literature. With so much to UN-learn about the book of Revelation, Pastor Megan invites us to begin again. What IS this ancient genre of literature, why and how was it written, and for whom and what purpose? As a revelation of Jesus the Christ, named in just the first few verses of the book as the ruler of all earth’s kings, we find that we’ve stepped directly into perhaps the original “No Kings” rally and march. The book of Revelation will take down its dominant empire (Rome) and all those who were being persecuted or seduced by the imperial cult. As we carry forward, perhaps we’ll find inspiration for how to live in relationship to our own imperial cult… U.S. Christian nationalism.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:49
Scripture: Revelation 1.1–20
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 646 - Revelation and Resistance - Lifting the Veil, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “A view of resistance to oppression rather than judgement,” by Alison Forster, January 21, 2025, https://medium.com/counterarts/the-book-of-revelation-8935ac647b32
- Anabaptist Community Bible, MennoMedia, 2025, including introduction to Revelation by J. Nelson Kraybill.
- “The Intimate Apocalypse,” hand-bound booklet by artist and writer, Jan Richardson.
- Left Behind (terror-inducing!) book series: wiki page.
- Image: by Pastor Megan, at Seattle’s ”No Kings” rally and march, June 2025
Jesus left a legacy of stories, and as Luke ends and we reread Acts and the Epistles, we remember his disciples spread his teachings and established the church by telling his and their stories over and over. During worship this Eastertide season, we have the gift of hearing members of the congregation reflect on the practices that flow from our congregational covenant. Those 11 practices, along with the covenant, were affirmed by the congregation 10 years ago. We invite you to listen deeply to these reflections, and to engage with what you both read and hear. Are these practices still a good fit for SMC in 2025? Do these practices ground our collective sense of mission in the world? Today we hear from Morlin Elias on Creation Care, and Laura Schlabach on Justice for Oppressed Peoples.
Stories begin at minute marker 6:55
Acts 15.1-18
Resources
- SMC Congregational Covenant and Practices, written and affirmed by the congregation in 2015, and re-affirmed in our annual covenanting service every Pentecost.
- Poem read: https://www.thefreelibrary.com/My+Son+Throws+a+Blanket+Over+My+Daughter.-a0776923256
- Mennonite Action: https://www.mennoniteaction.org/
- "Letter to my newborn son" - https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/05/15/letter-to-my-newborn-son/
- Image by Matheus Bertelli on pexels
Jesus left a legacy of stories, and as Luke ends and we reread Acts and the Epistles, we remember his disciples spread his teachings and established the church by telling his and their stories over and over. During worship this Eastertide season, we have the gift of hearing members of the congregation reflect on the practices that flow from our congregational covenant. Those 11 practices, along with the covenant, were affirmed by the congregation 10 years ago. We invite you to listen deeply to these reflections, and to engage with what you both read and hear. Are these practices still a good fit for SMC in 2025? Do these practices ground our collective sense of mission in the world? Today we hear from Ann Marchand on Relationships, and Greg Thiessen on Economics.
Stories begin at minute marker 7:40
Acts 8.26-39
Resources
- SMC Congregational Covenant and Practices, written and affirmed by the congregation in 2015, and re-affirmed in our annual covenanting service every Pentecost.
- Image by Matheus Bertelli on pexels
- Hymn 453, As I Went Down to the River to Pray Text: African American spiritua.l Music: African American spiritual. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929, #77600. All rights reserved.
Jesus left a legacy of stories, and as Luke ends and we reread Acts and the Epistles, we remember his disciples spread his teachings and established the church by telling his and their stories over and over. During worship this Eastertide season, we have the gift of hearing members of the congregation reflect on the practices that flow from our congregational covenant. Those 11 practices, along with the covenant, were affirmed by the congregation 10 years ago. We invite you to listen deeply to these reflections, and to engage with what you both read and hear. Are these practices still a good fit for SMC in 2025? Do these practices ground our collective sense of mission in the world? Today we hear from Rita Kowats on Spiritual Practices, and Anita Stokes on Spiritual Formation of Children.
Stories begin at minute marker 15:13
Acts 1.1-14
Resources
- SMC Congregational Covenant and Practices, written and affirmed by the congregation in 2015, and re-affirmed in our annual covenanting service every Pentecost.
- Image by willsantt on pexels
- Hymn 386 One is the Body. Text: based on Ephesians 4:4-13, John L. Bell (Scotland) Music: John L. Bell, © 1997, 2002 WGRG, Iona Community (admin. GIA Publications, Inc.) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929, #77600. All rights reserved.
Jesus left a legacy of stories, and as Luke ends and we reread Acts and the Epistles, we remember his disciples spread his teachings and established the church by telling his and their stories over and over. During worship this Eastertide season, we have the gift of hearing members of the congregation reflect on the practices that flow from our congregational covenant. Those 11 practices, along with the covenant, were affirmed by the congregation 10 years ago. We invite you to listen deeply to these reflections, and to engage with what you both read and hear. Are these practices still a good fit for SMC in 2025? Do these practices ground our collective sense of mission in the world? Today we hear from Rex on Spiritual Journeys, and David on Giving and Receiving Counsel.
Pastoral Reflection begins at minute marker 2:31. Stories begin at minute marker 16:38.
Luke 24.36-53
Resources
- SMC Congregational Covenant and Practices, written and affirmed by the congregation in 2015, and re-affirmed in our annual covenanting service every Pentecost.
- Image by Zayceva Tatiana on pexels
- Hymn: VT 366 - Although the Lord Has Left Us Text: Fred Kaan (England), © 1972, 1997 Hope Publishing Co. Music: Melchior Vulpius (present-day Germany), Ein schön geistlich Gesangbuch, 1609 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929, #77600. All rights reserved.
Jesus left a legacy of stories, and as Luke ends and we reread Acts and the Epistles, we remember his disciples spread his teachings and established the church by telling his and their stories over and over. During worship this Eastertide season, we have the gift of hearing members of the congregation reflect on the practices that flow from our congregational covenant. Those 11 practices, along with the covenant, were affirmed by the congregation 10 years ago. We invite you to listen deeply to these reflections, and to engage with what you both read and hear. Are these practices still a good fit for SMC in 2025? Do these practices ground our collective sense of mission in the world? Today we hear from Janet on worship, Jennifer on discernment, and Pete on hospitality.
Sermon begins at minute marker 3:05
Scripture: Luke 24.13-35
Resources
- SMC Congregational Covenant and Practices, written and affirmed by the congregation in 2015, and re-affirmed in our annual covenanting service every Pentecost.
- Image: Photo by George Becker on pexels hands holding candle
- Hymn 459 Let the Hungry Come to Me Text: stanzas 1–3 Delores Dufner, OSB (USA), © 1985 Sisters of St. Benedict; stanzas 4–5 “Adoro te devote,” attr. Thomas Aquinas (present-day Italy), 13th c., trans. Omer Westendorf (USA), © World Library Publications. Music: plainsong, 13th c., Processionale (present-day France), 1697. Streaming permission from One License #40476.
Palmer Becker is a Mennonite pastor and writer whose three-part distillation of Anabaptist values has become a common refrain in Mennonite circles: 1) Jesus is the center of our faith. 2) Community is the center of our life. 3) Reconciliation is the center of our work. And according to Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth, reconciliation is a gift entrusted to us by God. Guest preacher, Randy Detweiler (from AMBS - Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, Elkhart IN), reflects on reconciliation as the God-given center of our collective work / ministry.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:32
2 Cor 5.14-21
Photo by Anna Shvets on pexels
“Why do you seek the living among the dead?” sounds like a chastisement. Until we remember that the only reason that ANYone knows that Jesus’ tomb is empty is because a whole crew of faithful women showed up at the place of death, with the intention of attending to the dead. Indeed, it is only by returning again and again to the tombs of today’s Empires that we can be gathered as resurrection communities who follow Jesus’ call to “storm the gates of Hades” which shall never prevail against us. May we keep seeking (and finding!) the living (and life!) among the dead (and places of death!). May we do so until every gate to hell is crumbled and ALL are free.
Sermon begins at minute marker 2:12
Luke 24.1-12
Resources:
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 638 – Remember What He Told You, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Not the story we wanted: An Easter and arrest story,” an emailed letter from Chris Hoke, Underground Ministries, April 18, 2025.
- Learn more about La Resistencia - “No estan solos; You are not alone.”
- Learn more about Community of Hope Mennonite Church in Bellingham WA - with gratitude for Pastor Rachael Weasley’s words, shared from a letter.
- Image: table turning at the Northwest Detention Center; Mennonite Action “God’s Love Knows No Borders” sign visible, April 2025
Join Rita Kowats as she explores the stories of Jesus healing the blind man and seeing Zaccheus. What lessons can we learn from (literally) blind faith and a spiritual curiosity that leads to climbing trees?
Luke 18.31—19.10
Resources:
- Link to sermon text.
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 529 – Loving God and Neighbor, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Image: Marvin Meyer on Unsplash
Not a single palm frond or “Hosanna” in this year’s Palm Sunday reading. Luke’s version of Jesus’ procession toward and into Jerusalem instead records people throwing their coats on the ground. Rather than simply reaching for a fallen branch, instead those participating in Jesus’ political street theatre give something of themselves that costs them a little something; the way Pastor Megan’s spontaneously discarded cardigan resulted in a very cold experience of worship. Thank you to the child-prophets in the church who spontaneously responded by bringing their sweaters to throw into the center of our worship circle as well. We experientially learned just how potent this action was as the crowds moved with Jesus toward his confrontation with the powers of the Empire. In our current heartbreak, may we follow the footsteps of Love Incarnate--Jesus--the Human One, who goes before us in this holy and harrowing week, and who laments with us.
Luke 19.29-44
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 635 - What Makes For Peace, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “Kindness,” Naomi Shihab Nye, Everything Comes Next: Collected & New Poems, 222.
- credit to Eric Massanari, Executive Conference Minister of Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference, and Amy Epp, Pastor of Evergreen Mennonite Church, for some of their words taken from letters written to their respective communities.
- More info about Mennonite Action can be found here: https://www.mennoniteaction.org/
- Learn more and get involved with La Resistencia here: https://laresistencianw.org/
- Lament hymn: Ya hamala Allah, sung in Arabic (trans: O Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. O Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. O Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, grant us your peace, grant us your peace, grant us your peace)
- Image: discarded coats in the church courtyard, Megan Ramer
- Hymns: # 312, Jesus is Coming; music: Bret Hesla (USA) text: Bret Hesla (USA). Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
321 Ya hamala Allah; music: Yusuf Khill, Palestine/Israel text: Arabic; from Latin liturgy, "Agnus Dei" (Rome), ca. 7th c., based on John 1:29, Yusuf Khill (Palestine/Israel) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
This Lukan fable has a pretty clear message: Wealth creates an impassable crevasse between humans. Wealth is only one of the many things that can create impassable crevasses between people; so too can race and religion and immigration status, to name a few more. But I have to believe the fable is ultimately meant to inspire us to bridge crevasses before it’s too late. This sermon will take you to the midnight bedroom of Ebenezer Scrooge, to the summit of Mt. Rainier (aka “mama Tahoma”), to a jail cell in Durham NC, and to an Executive Board decision of some uncharacteristically speedy Mennonites. Buckle up and come along for the ride; we need one another more than ever. And please remember: I do not answer questions. I do not answer questions. I do not answer questions. We keep each other safe, beloveds.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:22
Luke 16.19-31
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 633 - The Rich Man and Lazarus, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- 'Crevice' and 'Crevasse': A Gap in Meaning, Merriam-Webster.
- Anabaptist Community Bible
- New release: “MC USA and more than two dozen Christian and Jewish denominations and associations sue to protect religious freedoms,” February 11, 2025.
- Isaac Samuel Villegas, Migrant God: A Christian Vision for Immigrant Justice (Eerdmans, 2025), 6-8.
- Front Light podcast, by Mennonite Action, “From ‘quiet in the land’ to suing the US Government, reflections on Mennonite advocacy with Iris de León-Hartshorn,” Season 1, Episode 4 (2025).
- Mennonite Action: “God’s Love Knows No Borders” actions, 2025.
- Know Your Rights with ICE, by WAISN (Washington Immigrant Solidarity Network)
- Rebecca Solnit, A piece for all hard times. Excerpt: “They want you to feel powerless and to surrender and to let them trample everything and you are not going to let them. You are not giving up, and neither am I. The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything and everything we can save is worth saving. You may need to grieve or scream or take time off, but you have a role no matter what, and right now good friends and good principles are worth gathering in. Remember what you love. Remember what loves you. Remember in this tide of hate what love is. The pain you feel is because of what you love.”
- Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol, 1843.
- Image: Ladder bridging crevasse on Mt. Rainier; G310ScottS, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
- Hymn 149 - Forgive, Forgive Us, Holy God. Text: Shirley Erena Murray (Aotearoa/New Zealand) Music: Barbara Hamm (USA), © 1996 & © 2016 Hope Publishing Company. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
In today’s parable, Death came to the youngest son, in that far-off land, and asked its question. “I see you’ve become destitute,” said Death. “Here you are very far from home, with no money and no friends. Now that even the pigs eat better than you, do you still believe that life is beautiful?”
Perhaps to his own surprise, the son answered Death with a memory of Paradise. “In my father’s house,” said the son, “there were feasts, and friends, and fields. There was music, and dancing, and jewelry, and fine clothing.” And as he answered, something which had been dead in him began coming back to life. He started to feel again that life was indeed beautiful: and all this because of a memory.
Sermon starts at minute marker 8:10
Luke 15.1-32
Resources
- Text of Sermon
- Alves, Rubem. The Poet, The Warrior and the Prophet.
- Alves, Rubem. Transparencies.
- This sermon is, in large part, a conversation with the final chapters of the Alves texts.
- Oliver, Mary. “A Voice From I Don’t Know Where.”
- Image: Praise the Lord! By Randy Horst (posted on page below)
Hymn 300 - Far, Far Away / I Will Arise. Text: based on Luke 15:1-24; vers. anon., “The Prodigal Son,” Gospel Songs (USA), 1874 Music: American traditional (USA), Southern Harmony, 1835; harm. Charles H. Webb (USA) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Jesus desires our ingathering, and we so often are not willing. Jesus goes belly up, like a fierce yet vulnerable mother hen in the presence of a fox, ready to take us under the shelter of her wings. Are we willing? And what might we learn from Jesus about lament?
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:00
Luke 13.1-8, 31-35
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 631 – A Lament Over Jerusalem, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Barbara Brown Taylor, “As a Hen Gathers her Brood,” The Christian Century.
- Jewish Voices for Peace action: call your reps to demand the release of student activist and U.S. permanent resident, Mahmoud Khalil, abducted by the DHS on March 8, 2025.
- Image: “Christ the Mother Hen,” Kelly Latimore icons
- Hymn 298 - What Is the World Like. Text: Adam M. L. Tice (USA), 2009, © 2011 GIA Publications, Inc. Music: Sally Ann Morris (USA). Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
One familiar story which contains a familiar parable flows into another familiar story. Is there anything at all new to say about the Samaritan that’s called “good” or the Mary and Martha sisterly tiff? Unclear. But given our deep dive into Luke, and looking for threads, Pastor Megan notices two things: Luke is driving home that 1) we are meant to be moved with compassion, and 2) we are implored to listen to Jesus. Both are imperative in Luke’s gospel, and in Luke’s understanding of what it means to walk the Way of Jesus, with faces turned toward Jerusalem. Taken together, Megan wonders if there’s a thematic thread of urgency. There’s false urgencies that cause us to sidestep one in need (rooted in white supremacy culture), and real urgency to prepare for and engage resistance to empire (rooted in our call to collective liberation). Somehow we are invited to discern well between the Big Urgency and the little urgencies so that we can be sustained on this discipleship path taking us on a collision course with the corrupt powers of the world.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:53
Luke 10.25-42
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 630 – Two Sisters and a Good Samaritan, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Urgency, a characteristic of white supremacy culture
- People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond
- Image: this is a detail of a larger piece by artist, Dona Park, from the Anabaptist Community Bible
- Hymn 527 - Bless the Arms That Comfort. Text: Mary Louise Bringle (USA), © 2001 The Hymn Society (admin. Hope Publishing Co.) Music: Gustav Holst (England), 1906. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Visiting guest preacher Rachael Weasley shares about what her queer church plant is up to these days, and explores today's passage in a queer way.
Sermon begins at minute marker 3:43.
Scripture: Luke 7:36-50
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 529 – Loving God and Neighbor, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- https://bcmonline.org/
- https://www.journeywithjesus.net/
- Image: by Prafull Kawate on Pexels.
Fetus John the Baptist knew exactly who Jesus was, according to Luke. Adult John the Baptist sends emissaries to ask Jesus who he is. Jesus does not answer John’s question, but rather instructs the question-askers to simply report what they see and what they hear. It seems that, according to Jesus, his identity must be shown, enacted, embodied for it to be real. Similarly, our Anabaptist faith has a centuries-long history of being done, enacted, embodied. Our faith is a lived faith and has traditionally been proclaimed more in deed than in word. This is why the decision of our denomination to be the named plaintiff in a lawsuit against the Dept. of Homeland Security (Mennonite Church USA et al. v. United States Department of Homeland Security et al.) is completely in line with our 500-year history of following Jesus. Because our faith IS caring for our neighbor. So when the U.S. Government tries to prevent us from doing that, the free exercise of our religion is compromised and we must resist.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:18
Luke 7:18-35
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 626 – Are You Really the One?, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Iris de León-Hartshorn, “Our Anabaptist Witness as Mennonites,” (theological basis for legal action taken by Mennonite Church USA - see link below) February 12, 2025.
- “MC USA and more than two dozen Christian and Jewish denominations and associations sue to protect religious freedoms,” February 11, 2025.
- Mary H. Schertz, Luke, Believers Church Bible Commentary (Herald Press, 2023), 166.
- “Orthopraxy,” wikipedia article.
- Image: A valentine to Mennonite Church USA: “Roses are red | Violets are blue | You sued the President | I think I love you!”
- VT Hymn 428 Praise with Joy the World's Creator. Text: Iona Community (Scotland), 1985, alt., © 1987 WGRG, Iona Community (admin. GIA Publications, Inc.) Music: John Goss (England), The Supplemental Hymn and Tune Book, 1869. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Jesus sees a woman and is moved with compassion to respond. But what about all the other women, humans, creatures, who also needed his compassionate response??? And what about the root causes of her suffering - Shouldn’t he have fixed the systems instead??? Jesus sees a woman - really looks at her - and is moved to respond. May we who seek to follow Jesus do the same. May we, out of (legitimate!) concern for scalability and systems, never overthink our way to paralysis when given the opportunity and impulse to respond with compassion. Goodness knows, our country and our world need all the compassion that each one of us can muster.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:02
Luke 7:1-17
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 625 – A Centurion's Slave and a Widow's Son, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “A Jesus Who Troubles,” sermon on this text by Pastor Megan Ramer (sermon begins at minute 15:35), 2021.
- "Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy, now. Walk humbly, now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it." (Rabbi Tarfon, from the Pirkei Avot, 2:16)
- “Blessing in the Chaos,” by Jan Richardson; also appears in her book The Cure for Sorrow: A Book of Blessings for Times of Grief (79), 2016.
- Kate Bowler quote, from an instagram reel, February 2025.
- Vivek Murthy quote, taken from the Kate Bowler reel linked above.
- VT Hymn 647, There Is A Balm in Gilead. Text & Music: African American Spiritual. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Sabbath was to be the fountain around which the garden of all public life and policy grew in ancient Israel. On six days the people were to work, tending that garden, ensuring its health and growth and accessibility to all people, and on the seventh day they were to participate in the proper end and fulfillment of all work: reception of the fruits of perfect sanctuary. In rabbinic tradition, it is taught that if the people observe Sabbath completely and perfectly even once, the Messiah will come. The world where the sanctuary of Sabbath is truly established is the Promised Land.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:07
Luke 6:1–16
Resources
- Heschel, Abraham Joshua. “The Sabbath”.
- Martin Luther King, Jr., "Beyond Vietnam": Speech at Riverside Church Meeting, New York, N.Y., April 4, 1967. In Clayborne Carson et al., eds., Eyes on the Prize: A Reader and Guide (New York: Penguin, 1987), 201-04.
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 529 – Loving God and Neighbor, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Image by Ilya Schor
- Hymn 556 I Bind My Heart This Tide. Text: Lauchlan M. Watt (Scotland), The Tryst: A Book of the Soul, 1907, alt. Music: J. Randall Zercher (USA), 1965, The Mennonite Hymnal, 1969, © 1965 J. Randall Zercher. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Three major commemorations converged last week: the birth of the Anabaptist movement, the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. (and the broader movement of which he was part, including our Anabaptist ancestors, Rosemarie and Vincent Harding), and the anniversary of the first national collective action of Mennonite Action. Thanks to the Pastoral Team for Mennonite Action, we notice a thread through these significant commemorations: “the willingness of ordinary people to take actions that simultaneously speak a no and a yes.” Another story for today: fisherfolk in Luke’s gospel who leave everything (including a mountain of fish, representing a mountain of wealth) to follow Jesus. God, grant us wisdom and courage as we join these many ancestors of ours in walking a path that says NO to security and status quo and YES to the risky, uncertain, and liberating Way of Jesus.
**Sermon begins at 6:14
Scripture**: Luke 5:1–11
Resources
- This sermon was taken whole cloth (with some of my own riffs added) from “Prayers for a significant week” from the Mennonite Action Pastoral Team, January 20, 2025.
- Anabaptist Community Bible
- Episcopal Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde imploring President Trump to “have mercy” on immigrants and LGBTQ people targeted by his policies, at the end of her inaugural prayer service sermon in the National Cathedral, Washington D.C.: video clip linked here.
- The Movement Makes Us Human: An Interview with Dr. Vincent Harding on Mennonites, Vietnam, and MLK, Joanna Shenk, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2018
- Remnants: A Memoir of Spirit, Activism, and Mothering, Rosemarie Freeney Harding, with Rachel Elizabeth Harding, Duke University Press, 2015.
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 623 - The Call of Simon, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- others?
- Image: covers of the two Harding books noted above
- Hymn 57 Holy Spirit, Come with Power. Text: Anne Neufeld Rupp (USA), © 1970 Anne Neufeld Rupp, trans. Barbara Mink (USA), © 1988 Music: attr. B. F. White (USA), The Sacred Harp, 1844; harm. Joan Fyock Norris (USA), © 1989 Joan Fyock Norris. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
There’s lots going on in this story from Luke, and also in this sermon from Pastor Megan, and also in the story of our Anabaptist roots, and also in the congregational life of Seattle Mennonite Church. It’s all a bit of a mess, to be quite frank. But at the heart of all four stories (the gospel, the sermon, the history, and SMC today) is baptism and the co-creation embedded in a covenant community. Come along for the slightly wild ride!Sermon begins at minute marker 6:22
Luke 3.1-22 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 621 – John the Baptist and the Baptism of Jesus, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “The Most Radical Reformers,” Valerie G. Rempel, Anabaptist World, Vol. 6 No. 1, January 2025.
- InterPlay practice of “I could talk about” - read a brief description here: https://atlantainterplay.blogspot.com/2014/03/i-could-talk-about.html
- Image: detail from the cover of Anabaptist World, Vol. 6 No. 1, January 2025 - “Fugitive congregation at worship, Amsterdam, 1569, by Jan Luyken.”
- Hymn 212 Comfort, Comfort O my People. Text: based on Isaiah 40:1-5; Johannes Olearius (Germany), “Tröstet, tröstet, meine Lieben,” Geistliche Singe-Kunst, 1671; trans. Catherine Winkworth (England), Chorale Book for England, 1863, alt. Music: Louis Bourgeois (France), Genevan Psalter, Octante Trois Pseaumes de David, 1551; harm. adapt. from Claude Goudimel (France), 150 Pseaumes de David, 1564 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
When the writer of Luke’s gospel litters his stories with the names of politicians and references to their political maneuverings, we are meant to pay attention. When the tale of a 12-year-old Jesus choosing to remain in the temple occurs DURING THE PASSOVER… and IN JERUSALEM… we are meant to notice. It is, after all, bookended with the story Luke will tell at what turns out to be the very end of Jesus’ life, also during the Passover and also in Jerusalem. What occurs in both occasions is a potent confluence of religion and politics. And, in Jesus’ very first independent decision in recorded history, he opts to stay at that confluence. Jesus chose to remain where faith was potent, consequential, and in direct conversation with the politics of his day. Perhaps we who follow in his Way are invited to do the same.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:50
Luke 2.41-52 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 620 – The Boy Jesus in the Temple, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Many online resources tell a version of the events that took place in Zürich on January 21, 1525. An account from the GAMEO article on Zürich. An article from the Anabaptist World in 2015, by Valerie G. Rempel: “The Birth of Anabaptism.” Much can, has, and must be said to complicate often over-simplified stories of a monogenesis of Anabaptism, and over-emphasis on this story, as well!
- Wikipedia article on Josephus.
- Image: William Holman Hunt, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (LINK TO IMAGE)
- Hymn 223 Bless'd Be the God of Israel. Text: based on Luke 1:68-79; Michael A. Perry (England), Psalm Praise, 1973, © 1973 Hope Publishing Co. Music: George J. Webb (USA), 1830; The Odeon, 1837. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Since at least the 4th century, Simeon’s prayer has been among the last words spoken by Christians each night before the candles of evening prayer are extinguished. His words are the incense the church has sought to breathe while falling asleep and while lying in sleep for centuries: almost as if to say, how could we ever find rest in this world without clinging to our obscure certainty that even as we sleep God will speak her consoling word into all places? This sermon explores our shared longing with Simeon, and offers a reflection on the magic of candles (specifically, birthday candles).
Sermon begins at minute marker 7:40
Luke 2.21-38 Resources
- Alves, Rubem. "Candles." The Best Chronicles of Rubem Alves. New London Librarium, 2016, 60-64.
- “A Song for Simeon.” T.S. Elliot.
- Image: Ivan Murauyou
- Hymn 251 - There Were Angels Hovering Round. Music & Text: American traditional, 19c. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
As we wait for God’s “Big L” Liberating Love to be fully realized, we are called to BE God’s love of ourselves, for one another, and for all creation. We enter the story of Mary, and then Mary with Elizabeth, to see how this love begets more love and eventually changes the whole world.Sermon begins at minute marker 5:41.
Luke 1.26-56
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 617 - The Annunciation of Mary, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “Continue” by Maya Angelou
- Image: Henry Ossawa Tanner (American, 1859-1937) The Annunciation
- Hymn 221 - The Angel Gabriel Called Mary Blessed: text: Sarah Kathleen Johnson (Canada), © 2019; inspired by Basque carol “Birjina gaztetto bat zegoen,” paraphr. Sabine Baring-Gould (England), “The Angel Gabriel from Heaven Came,” University Carol Book, 1923. Music: Basque traditional; harm. attr. C. Edgar Pettman (England), University Carol Book, 1923. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Advent is a home for our longing that is at once ancient and new every day. We join our longing for the full inbreaking of God’s justice, peace, and liberating love to the longing of our forebears in the faith. Like them, we continue to wait while also being called into embodying our hope. Not because the conditions seem optimistic, but - in the face of any and all circumstances, with broken hearts - we “nevertheless / even now” enact our collective hope in the world around us.Sermon begins at minute marker 3:58
Scripture: Joel 2.12-13, 28-29 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 615 – Rend Your Hearts, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Image: Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
- Hymn 216 - Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming. Text: stanzas 1–2 anon., “Es ist ein Ros’ entsprungen,” (present-day Germany), 15th c.; Alte Catholische Geistliche Kirchengasäng, 1599; trans. Theodore Baker (USA), 1894; stanza 3 Friedrich Layritz (Germany), Liederschatz, 1832; trans. Harriet K. Spaeth (USA), The Hymnal, 1940, alt. Music: German traditional, 15th c.; Alte Catholische Geistliche Kirchengasäng, 1599; harm. Michael Praetorius (Germany), Musae Sionae VI, 1609. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Jesus equips the disciples with power and authority, and then sends them to their ministries with no bread, no staff, no money, not even an extra shirt - nothing. Why? As we prepare to release Tyler to his ministry as our Pastor of Faith Formation, and as we too are released to our individual and collective ministries in the world, what is the wisdom we might glean from Jesus’ approach with the disciples?
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:40
Luke 9.1-6 Image: Milada Vigerova on Unsplash
Hymn: VT 386 One Is the Body. Text & Music: based on Ephesians 4:4-13, John L. Bell (Scotland). Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
What does it mean to sing “Holy holy holy is God” NOT to God, but to one another? Might Isaiah’s magnificent and poetic imagery of the seraphim singing their praise of God’s holiness TO one another be received as an invitation to do the same?
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:11
Scripture: Isaiah 6.1-8
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 612 – Here I Am Send Me!, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Before I Was a Gazan,” Naomi Shihab Nye, from Everything Comes Next: Collected & New Poems (2020), 100.
- “A Few Rules For Predicting the Future,” Octavia E. Butler (2000), 7-15.
- “Schrödinger’s Seraphim,” Vija Merrill.
- Releasing friend of SMC met through the One Parish One Prisoner program of Underground Ministries.
- Image: Seraphim in Hagia Sofia, in Istanbul Türkiye, photo by Pastor Megan Ramer.
- Hymn: Voices Together 156 - There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy. Text: Frederick W. Faber (England), Hymns, 1861. Music: Lizzie S. Tourjee (USA), Hymnal of the Methodist Church with Tunes, 1878. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Jonah sought to protect his own people when God’s compassion and mercy were to extend to the repentant beyond Israel’s borders. Fairness, justice and truth are to be balanced with compassion and mercy by God’s definition and ways rather than our limited vision of who is repentant, when and how. Universal Saving expands when our small actions, reflections and words join together in a chorus of abundant love for all, which is no guarantee of outcome.Sermon starts at minute marker 5:34
Scripture: Jonah 3.1-10 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 611 Jonah and the Compassion of God, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Image by Adam Krypel on pexels
- Hymn: Voices Together 283 - Lord, You Have Come to the Lakeshore. Text: Spanish; Cesáreo Gabarain (Spain); trans. composite Gertrude C. Suppe (USA), George Lockwood IV (USA), Raquel Gutiérrez-Achon (USA), Willard F. Jabusch (USA), alt. Music: Cesáreo Gabarain, 1979, Dios con nosotros. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
What happens when a raven and a prophet form a little community of care? How about a Hebrew man and Phoenician widow - across religious and political divides? According to our storyteller, the needs of all are met, and the storyteller calls this God’s provision. Might this tale of unlikely dependencies be just the sort of good news we need in these tense and teetering days?
**Sermon begins at minute marker 3:20
*1 Kings 17.1-16* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 610 – Elijah and the Widow of Zarephath, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Consider the Birds: A Provocative Guide to Birds of the Bible, Debbie Blue (Abingdon Press), 2013.
- “If you think you can hold a grudge, consider the crow,” Thomas Fuller, NYT, October 28, 2024.
- Beef, by Lee Sung Jin
- The Birds, by Alfred Hitchcock
- Heckling, by an opinionated SMC birder
Solomon sets out to build a house for God, as people across time and place have done over and over again. But even in the dedication prayer, Solomon acknowledges that God cannot be contained by a building, regardless of size or grandness or even how delicious it smells. Just as Pastor Megan’s delicious-smelling cedar chest could never contain her bounty of beautiful quilts, so too Solomon’s cedar temple could never contain the enormity of God. Houses for God have never been about or for God, so much as they are for a people, seeking to create sacred spaces for living in relationship with one another and God; a people seeking to recharge their spiritual batteries. Sermon begins at minute marker 5:42
1 Kings 5.1-5, and 8.27-30, 41-43
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 609 – Dedicating the Temple, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Rainer Maria Rilke, “Ich bin, du Ängtlicher. Hörst do mich nicht,” from Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God, trans. Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy, 66.
- Image: rendering of quilts stacked at SMC during our Jubilee celebration, 2018.
- Voices Together Hymn 647 There is a Balm in Gilead. Text & Music: African American Spiritual (USA) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Whether in tents or temples, God is present and abiding with the Israelites and their descendants. God's living promise is a loving extensive, generational commitment/covenant among, between and with us just as we are: the only tabernacle God needs.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:47.
2 Samuel 7:1-17
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 608: I’ll Build You a House, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Image: Comet traversing twilight sky
- Hymn 748 Take, O Take Me As I Am Text: John L. Bell (Scotland) Music: John L. Bell Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Hannah’s Song, often referred to as The Magnificat of the First Testament, is a collection of Hannah’s utopian dreams. She sings of a world where the bows of the warriors are broken and where God lifts the poor from the ash heap and sits them with princes. This sermon explores Hannah’s life and story, from which her dreams grew, and it follows the flow of Hannah’s dreamsong as it cascaded down through the centuries, inspiring Mary of Nazareth and inspiring us.
“Hannah’s Dreamsong” was delivered by Tyler Merrill, who is currently in candidacy for Seattle Mennonite Church’s Pastor of Faith Formation position. It also serves in part as Tyler’s self-introduction to the congregation.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:37
1 Samuel 1.9-11, 19-20, and 2.1-10Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 529 – Loving God and Neighbor, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- The Poet, The Warrior, The Prophet. Collection of essays in theopoetics delivered by Rubem A Alves at the University of Birmingham in 1990.
- Image: Mary: Love Forever Being Born Icon by Kelly Latimore, used with permission. kellylatimoreicons.com
The Hebrew people grow weary of their supposed leader leaving them behind, and - in Moses’ absence - they ask for a symbol to represent God? Replace God? Hold them together as a community in a very destabilized time? Unclear, but even as we seek to empathize with a people who long for SOMEthing to keep them together, God and Moses are nonetheless displeased. And set about bickering over whose people they are. In the midst of this squabble, Moses appeals to God’s reputation: “What will the Egyptians say about you if you choose destruction?!” Preparing ourselves to participate in another sacred symbol on this World Communion Sunday - bread and cup with all who seek to walk in the Way of Jesus - we wonder how our public actions and presence (or lack thereof) contribute to God’s reputation in the world.
Sermon begins at minute marker 7:09
Exodus 32.1-14Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 605 – The Golden Calf, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “End Game,” lyrics by Taylor Swift.
- Mennonite Action - A movement of Mennonites taking action, explicitly AS MENNONITE-CHRISTIANS, to stop war and end the occupation of Palestine.
- Song: A Recitation of Psalm 40, in IsiNdebele (a language of Zimbabwe), sung by Bongiwe Ncube.
- Image: Small statue of the Golden Calf, Louvre museum (Paris, France), Wikimedia Commons.
- Hymn 717 - Renew Your Church. Text: K. L. Cober (USA), 1960, alt., © 1960 K. L. Cober, renewed 1985 Judson Press Music: American traditional (USA), 1842; adapt. Sacred Harp, 1844. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
A sermon about a 25 chapter novella, in three parts: 1) Joseph actually had an amazing technicolor princess dress, and isn’t that both telling and fabulous?! 2) Love unevenly distributed produces division, resentment, and - in this story - the hate-filled action of a band of brothers who traffic their beloved brother into slavery, and it’s that terrible?! 3) If (or when) you go through hell, don’t come out empty-handed, and isn’t it tricky to say anything at all about suffering and the good we sometimes wrest from it?!
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:03
Genesis 37.3-8, 17b-22, 26-34; 50.15-21 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 603 – Evil Made Good, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “Don’t Come Out Empty Handed,” Kate Bowler’s podcast, Everything Happens, interview with Rabbi Steve Leder.
- “Good Grief,” Kate Bowler’s podcast, Everything Happens, interview with Thomas Lynch.
- Image: “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,” Tulane Public Relations, CC BY 2.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Hymn 205 - Light Dawns on a Weary World. Text: Mary Louise Bringle (USA), 2001, © GIA Publications, Inc. Music: William P. Rowan (USA), © 2000 William P. Rowan (admin. GIA Publications, Inc.) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Abram longs for a child that he believes God has denied him. God meets Abram in that specific need, but then leads him to a more expansive - even cosmic - view. This is a story that might be easier for aunties like me to understand: I absolutely don’t have one or two or three children. I either have zero children, or I have children that number the stars. I choose the latter, and in this story God seems to agree. As a church, we claim all our children as belonging to all of us. And we explicitly bless those who devote their time and their energy to the education, mentoring, care, and love of our kids when we gather together on Sunday mornings.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:24
Genesis 15.1-6 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 602 – Trusting the Promise, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story,” Original Broadway Cast of Hamilton.
- Image: Photo by note thanun on Unsplash
- Hymn: Voices Together, 175, Planets Humming as They Wander. Text: Heather Josselyn-Cranson (USA), alt., © 2010 Heather Josselyn-Cranson Music: Sally Ann Morris (USA), 2009, © 2016 GIA Publications, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
We start a new Narrative Lectionary year at a very good place to start: In the beginning… We begin with the genesis of all things, and it doesn’t take long for everything to devolve into deception, messing up, shame, hiding from God, and scapegoating. If our ancient Hebrew forebears in the faith told this story because they - like us - knew their overwhelming capacity to screw up royally, then I think it’s telling to back up a few steps and see how they START that story. Despite what some may have you believe, their story (and ours) does not originate with sin, but with the tender shaping of soil, the intimate breathing of life, and holy belovedness.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:22
Genesis 2.4b-7, 15-17; 3.1-8 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 601 – The Knowledge of Good and Evil, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr
- Wikipedia article on the doctrine of “Original Sin” and Augustine’s shaping of it.
- “Beloved Is Where We Begin,” blessing by Jan Richardson, also published in her book, Circle of Grace.
- Image: Photo by Quino Al on Unsplash
- Hymn: 531 Holy Presence, Holy Teacher. Text: Shirley Erena Murray (Aotearoa New Zealand), alt., © 2008 Hope Publishing Co. Music: C. Hubert H. Parry (England), 1897. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from ONE LICENSE, license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Join Keyan, Eden and Rita as they share stories of discernment in the last of our series. This summer we asked congregation members if they would be willing to share stories from their lives about moments of discernment.Sermon begins at minute marker 3:46
Job 12:7-10
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast
- Rita's written text
- Image: Photo by Bakr Magrabi on pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/compass-on-hand-3203659/
- Hymn: Voices Together, 537 Lord, You Sometimes Speak. Text: Christopher Idle (England), 1966, Youth Praise 2, 1969 Music: Christopher Johnson (England), 1987, New Songs of Praise 4, 1988 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Join us to hear personal stories of discernment from Ken and Beth Miller Kraybill. They share about times of transition and decision in their lives.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:00
Matthew 4:18-22 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast
- Image: Photo by Neslihan A. on pexels.com https://www.pexels.com/photo/stairs-in-tunnel-16817922/
- Hymn: Voices Together, 283 Lord, You Have Come to the Lakeshore Text: Spanish; Cesáreo Gabarain (Spain); trans. composite Gertrude C. Suppe (USA), George Lockwood IV (USA), Raquel Gutiérrez-Achon (USA), Willard F. Jabusch (USA), alt. Music: Cesáreo Gabarain, 1979, Dios con nosotros. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Join us as Charlene Epp and Lauren Good share stories about times of discernment in their lives. This is the first part of a series. Each Sunday for a few weeks at least two people will share stories from their lives highlighting the ways they have discerned paths and truth.
Talks begin at 5:54
1 Corinthians 12:12-27 Image by Khanh Nguyen on pexels
Hymn: Voices Together 568, Christ Has No Body Here but Ours Text: based on a prayer attr. Teresa of Ávila (present-day Spain), 16th c.; paraphr. Brian McLaren (USA) Music: Brian McLaren; acc. Benjamin Bergey, 2019 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**When we think we need to be in control of everything, we become anxious about our capacity to control. Letting our sense of control go and trusting in God and the provision that God has offered seems so terribly hard. What happens when we lose track of the fact that we’re part of the magnificently interconnected system, and we begin to imagine that we can, or even that we must function on our own?
Sermon begins at minute marker*Leviticus 26:3-22, 34-35, 40-45* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast
- Blessing: Adapted by Liz from RCA Prayer for Godspeed and Farewell
- Image by Felix Mittermeier on pexels
- Voices Together Hymn: 145, Touch the Earth Lightly Text: Shirley Erena Murray (Aotearoa New Zealand), © 1992 Hope Publishing Co. Music: Swee Hong Lim (Canada); arr. Tamryn Parker-Carver (USA), © 2005 Hope Publishing Co. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**God delights in God’s playground - all of creation is meant to be enjoyed and to participate in the purpose of the rest of creation. This sermon is a celebration of all that God has created, called good, and invited us to participate in.
Sermon begins at minute marker 7:22*Psalm 104* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast
- Image: El Rio de Luz (The River of Light) 1877
- Voices Together, Hymn 539, God Speaks to Us in Bird and Song. Text: Joseph Johnson (England), 1888, alt. Music: Pax Ressler (USA), © 2016 Pax Ressler. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Brisa Peacock from Camp CAMREC shared a sermon as part of our series on Creation Care, offering a glimpse into how SMC's and WMF's relationship with CAMREC continues to contribute to the region's stewardship of land and waterways. She also reflected on how CAMREC's programs and hospitality efforts are propelling our neighbors, other Churches and faith groups, and schools not only to contribute to CAMREC's stewardship efforts but also to pursue Creation Care efforts when they return home.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:45*Psalm 65* Resources:**
- BibleWorm podcast
- Image: https://unsplash.com/photos/silhouette-of-man-standing-on-snow-covered-ground-during-sunset-3Ltuw4phQGE
- Voices Together Hymn 145: Touch the Earth Lightly Text: Shirley Erena Murray (Aotearoa New Zealand), © 1992 Hope Publishing Co. Music: Swee Hong Lim (Canada); arr. Tamryn Parker-Carver (USA), © 2005 Hope Publishing Co. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Creation itself, the morning stars and divine beings and whatnot – they were celebrating the foundations of the world itself before humans were even a thing. God and nature itself celebrated and called things good before human beings were even here. There’s a bigger picture here that requires removing ourselves from the center of our small, individual universes, and calls us to listen. So this sermon is about the work, challenge, and delight of listening to creation and to one another and ourselves as part of creation.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:41**Job 38:4-38
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast
- Image: Janik Butz on pexels
- Hymn: Voices Together, 595, When the Storms of Life are Raging. Text: Charles A.Tindley (USA), ca. 1906 Music: Charles A. Tindley, ca 1906; arr. William Farley Smith (USA), The United Methodist Hymnal, © 1989 The United Methodist Publishing House (admin. Music Services) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Cultures and traditions - including religions - all have multiple creation stories. Today we hear one from our scriptures told in Genesis, and our sermon shares another one - in the form of the children’s book “Big Momma Makes the World” by Phyllis Root.
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:32*Genesis 1:1-2:4a* Resources**
- Image: https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/big-momma-makes-the-world_phyllis-root/780964/#edition=3554170&idiq=4077937 Big Momma Makes the World by Phyllis Root
- Hymn: Voices Together 120, For the Beauty of the Earth. Text: Folliott S. Pierpoint (England), Lyra Eucharistica, 1864, alt. Music: Conrad Kocher (Germany), Stimmen aus dem Reiche Gottes, 1838; adapt. William H. Monk (England), Hymns Ancient and Modern, 1861 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Paul binds the physical body with resurrection, a holistic change from life as we have structured and understood it to that which is eternal as Jesus' life, death and resurrection gifted us. Our faith is intricately tied to a belief in the unbelievable while living and loving as Jesus did, attending to the needs of bodies in the here and now. Bodies matter now and in a future we can not know or understand - for now.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:03*I Corinthians 15:1-26, 51-57* Resources**
- Believers Church Bible Commentary: 1 Corinthians, By: Dan Nighswander
- BibleWorm podcast Episode 540 The Resurrection of the Body
- Working Preacher's Narrative Lectionary 584 - Death Swallowed in Life
- Image: Align Towards Spine on Unsplash
- Hymn: Voices Together, 433, I Believe in God Almighty. Text: based on Apostles’ Creed (Mediterranean), ca. 4th c.; Sylvia G. Dunstan (Canada), In Search of Hope and Grace, © 1991 GIA Publications. Music: American traditional (USA), Christian Lyre, 1831; harm. Ralph Vaughan Williams, The English Hymnal, 1906. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**There is one church for every prisoner in Washington State. Chris Hoke from One Parish One Prisoner brings reflections on the challenges and blessings of working with churches and prisoners.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:16*John 11:33-44* Resources**
- One Parish One Prisoner
- Image: Christ standing on the gates of hell
- Hymn: Voices Together, 348 Come Ye Faithful Raise the Strain, Text: John of Damascus, "First Ode of Canon for the Sunday after Easter," 8th c.; trans. John Mason Neale (England), Christian Remembrancer, 1859, alt. Music: Johann Horn (present-day Czech Republic), Ein Gesangbuch der Bruder in Behemen und Merherm (present-day Germany), 1544; rev. Catholicum Hymnologium Germanicum, 1584 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Relationships are a primary nourishment and fuel for a transformed community. Paul wrote letters only AFTER he engaged in relationship making. His work was able to flourish because he seeded intentional relationships with people that developed trust. How might we choose to nourish relationships in our lives, with our neighbors, with our community? How might we use Paul as an example to develop good trust in our relationships?
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:28*Acts 18:1-8* Image: by John-Mark Smith on pexels Hymn: Voices Together, 87, O Praise the Gracious Power. Text: Thomas H. Troeger (USA), 1984, New Hymns for the Lectionary, 1986. Music: Carol Doran (USA), 1984, New Hymns for the Lectionary, 1986. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
**Just as the Jewish community at Thessalonica was disrupted by the arrival and teachings of Paul and Silas, so, too, are we disrupted by things we often don’t feel prepared for. What does it mean to look disruption in the eye and experience it as an opening for Jesus to enter our lives anew?
Sermon begins at 5:03*Acts 17:1-9* Hymn: Voices Together, 553, How Many Times We Start Again. Text: Thomas H. Troeger (USA), © 2009 Oxford University Press. Music: Scottish traditional, The Scottish Minstrel, 1822; arr. Bradley Kauffman (USA), © 2020 Bradley Kauffman. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
The crippled man and the disciples both experience surprise and interruption in the norms of what they think **might happen for them this day. The man expected the same - people offering him coins or ignoring him. It has been the same day in and day out for years. Peter and John expected to continue in their grieving and confusion at the loss of their mentor and friend Jesus, and planned to go to the temple for a routine prayer service. Neither expectation happens, and they - and we! - are all better for it. What might it take for us to open our senses differently to the wonder of welcoming interruption and - perhaps - finding a miracle of healing within ourselves or those around us?!
Sermon begins at minute marker 3:06*Acts 3.1-10* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast
- Image: Photo by Yanko Argirov on Unsplash
- Hymn: Voices Together 834 Thuma Mina. Text: Zulu; anon. (South Africa); trans. anon Music: South African traditional; arr. © 1984 Peace of Music Publishing AB (admin. Walton Music Corp., a division of GIA Publications, Inc.) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
In the aftermath of Jesus’ death and resurrection, Jesus offers comfort and presence to his disciples. He continues to remind them he has not come to establish a nation state, rather that the disciples would be the ones to carry forward Jesus’ mission. Requirements for this include more waiting, receiving the power of the Holy Spirit. Devotion to prayer may be what will prepare them for what’s next. But that isn’t here yet. They must prepare themselves to be led by the Holy Spirit.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:58
Acts 1.1-14 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast Episode 535 Waiting for the Spirit
- She Reads Truth podcast Episode 96 Acts Week 1 with Christine Caine
- Working Preacher Narrative Lectionary podcast 579: You Shall Be My Witnesses
- Believers Church Bible Commentary: Acts, by Chalmer E. Faw
- The Women’s Bible Commentary, Carol A Newsom and Sharon H. Ringe editors
- Image: by Eran Menashri on Unsplash
- Hymn: Voices Together 366 Although Our Lord Has Left Us. Text: Fred Kaan (England), © 1972, 1997 Hope Publishing Co. Music: Melchior Vulpius (present-day Germany), Ein schön geistlich Gesangbuch, 1609. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Jesus lives an increasingly life of truth-telling to civic and religious authorities. All the while he enfolds the marginalized and oppressed into a just and merciful embrace of care and love, calling disciples to do the same. Up to his impending death disciples cannot grasp what this will cost him. A woman enacting honor and love provides Jesus’ followers, then and now, with an example of unbridled recognition of who Jesus is. What is imprinted on our being? How can we break alabaster jars to display open and prepared hearts?
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:09
Mark 12.13-17, 14.3-9
Resources
- BibleWorm podcasts: 528 The Parable of the Tenants, and 531 The Triumphal Entry and the Anointing at Bethany
- Image by vicky_photographies from Pixabay
- Believers Church Bible Commentary: Mark, by Timothy J Gaddert, editors Elmer A Martens and Willard M Swartley; Herald Press, Scottdale PA 2001
- Women's Bible Commentary, Third Edition: Revised and Updated, editors by Carol A. Newsom, Sharon H. Ringe, Jacqueline E. Lapsley; Westminster John Knox, 2012
- Hymn: Voices Together 320, My Song is Love Unknown. Music: John N. Ireland (England), Songs of Praise, 1925 Text: Samuel Crossman (England), The Young Man’s Meditations, or some few Sacred Poems..., 1664; rev. Hymns for Today’s Church. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
News of wars, natural disaster, and human suffering greets us every evening, without
fail. Where is God in this? Does God not see? Jesus warns his disciples of the temple’s
destruction, and worse, yet to come. Indeed, God in Christ does see what human
beings are doing to one another. It is we who cannot stand to look, listen, or respond to
the fires, the famines, the faces of suffering around us. And yet, and yet. Jesus comes
among us to announce God is near at hand, God’s gracious will is carrying forth, God’s
reign unfolds in our very midst. God is with us in the midst of earthquake, flood,
homelessness and hopelessness. As the fig tree comes into blossom, so the ministry of
fellow believers serves as sign of new life to us. The coming of God’s reign isn’t going to
look like yesterday. We wait with prayer and expectation. Christ is coming soon.
Preacher: Pam Russell
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:38
Mark 13.1-8, 24-37
- Image: Photo by Federica Gioia on pexels.
- Voices Together 319, Stay With Me the Night Has Come. Music: Welsh traditional. Text: David Bjorlin (USA), © 2016 GIA Publications, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Struck by Mark’s mention that Jesus sits across from the treasury box in the Temple, observing HOW each person gives their money, Pastor Megan ponders what Jesus might observe in how SHE lives with her own money (and for this Way walked together, how WE live with ours). Would Jesus be glad that the widow gives her last mite and has nothing to live on, or might Jesus be praising the widow for revealing - by her courageous and some might even say confrontational act - the baked-in injustice of the system that leaves a widow with only a mite in the first place? And what does love of God, self, and neighbor have to do with it all?
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:38
Mark 12.28-44 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 529 – Loving God and Neighbor, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Image: Melissa Kelly
- VT 552 "As a deer…" #10783 Words: Psalm 42 Music: Louis Bourgeois, Genevan Psalter. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem is a deliberate act of political confrontation with the Roman Empire’s powers-that-be. After casing the mostly deserted late evening Temple, he makes plans to return the next day to make a royal mess of things; to disrupt business as usual. The Way Jesus walks, the Way that Jesus calls us to walk (together!), is a Way lined with palms that leads to confrontation with Empire.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:03
Mark 11.1-19 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 531 – The Triumphal Entry, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Ched Myers, “Palm Sunday As Subversive Street Theatre,” posted on Radical Discipleship, 2021.
- Marcus J. Borg & John Dominic Crossan, The Last Week: A Day-to-Day Account of Jesus’ Final Week(Harper, 2007).
- Image: Melissa Kelly
- VT 146 Lord Jesus, Come and Overturn #99565 words: David Gambrell music: Klug’s Geistliche Lieder ©2015 GIA Publications, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**The cries of the suffering are not always polite. When we are suffering, can we let loose and trust our community to hold us? When our neighbors are suffering, can we build our resilience in the face of their screams for justice, for relief, for healing, for mercy?
Sermon begins at 6:41
Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 527 – The Healing of Bartimaeus, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Image: Melissa Kelly
- VT 610 Precious Lord, Take My Hand #73682 Words: Thomas Dorsey, Music: George Allen ©1938,1966 Hal Leonard Corporation. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Jesus’ guide for discipleship invites us to rethink our expectations of what discipleship means and who disciples are. Embedded in the invitation is a deep look meeting the soul of our being with enduring love and perpetual hospitality to embrace the next steps of faith-filled following the Jesus Way.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:37*Mark 10:17-31* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: ⦁ Episode 526 – The Eye of the Needle, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Mark: Believers Church Bible Commentary, Timothy J Geddert; Herald Press, 2001.
- Narrative Language Lectionary: 570 First Last and Last First
- Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto; New York: Little, Brown Spark, 2022
- Richard Rohr, “The Need for Mysticism”, Daily Meditations, August 2, 2020.
- Image: Nagara Oyodo on unsplash
Hymn
VT 758 Who Will Speak a Word of Warning text: Richard Leach, © 2000 Selah Publishing Co., Inc. music: Alfred V. Fedak, 1988, © 1989 Selah Publishing Co., Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
I can talk about a woman who experiences a minimum of three healings in one healing story. The first is busting through all sorts of internal and external barriers to step out her door and into a crowd. The second is reaching for the hem of Jesus’ cloak to seize a cure for her illness. And the third is - with one word - being restored as family, reclaimed as belonging. I can talk about Jesus making a powerful one wait in order to give his full attention and presence to a marginalized one. And I can talk about - especially in a moment of big transition or uncertainty - never underestimating the power of food.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:06
Narrative Lectionary, Year 3
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 522 – Healing Interrupted, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Image: Photo by William Farlow on Unsplash
- Hymn VT 519: God, Give Me Faith Like A Child. Text - Adam M. L. Tice, 2012, © 2013, GIA Publications, Inc Music - Sally Ann Morris, b.1952, © 2013, GIA Publications, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Tempted to avert our gaze from the mention of “evil spirit” or “demon”, instead Pastor Megan chooses to hold this story’s gaze and look for what may be true… then and now. What is true? What binds humans is indeed legion. What liberates humans is indeed Jesus. Who liberates humans is indeed us. Whew. Buckle up as we explore what makes demons tremble.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:05
Mark 5.1-20 Resources
- Intersectionality: In the sermon, I credit the origin of intersectionality to the women of the Combahee River Collective. In fact, Kimberlé Crenshaw should be credited with the origination of the term, in a pair of essays from 1989 and 1991. The work of the Combahee River Collective, particularly their work on ‘simultaneity’ in the 1970s, laid a foundation for Crenshaw’s development of the concept of ‘intersectionality’. But credit for coining the term and more fully developing the concept of ‘intersectionality’ belongs to Crenshaw!
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 521 – Making the Demons Tremble, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Frank Peretti wrote a series of fiction books depicting demons, angels, and ‘spiritual warfare’ for a largely Pentecostal and more conservative evangelical Christian audience through the 1980s and beyond. I’m still recovering from the images his terrifying books emblazoned on my young impressionable brain.
- Ruth C. Duck hymn text published in Voices Together 642, “Healing River of the Spirit” verse 3: “Living stream that heals the nations, make us channels of your power. All the world is torn by conflict; wars are raging at this hour. Saving Spirit, move among us; guide our winding human course, till we find our way together, flower homeward to our Source.”
- Image: Photo by Tony Rojas on Unsplash
- Hymn: VT 285 - Cast out, O Christ. Text: Mary Louise Bringle (USA), 2002, © 2006 GIA Publications, Inc. Music: William Tans’ur (England), Harmony of Zion 1734 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Jesus' parables meet us in story form about ordinary livelihood understandings. Throwing these stories alongside life experiences of these livelihoods can provide spirit openings to fuller understanding of what it means to be kindom people. With these parables Jesus invites followers to be and embody kindom messaging without expectation and with generosity.
Sermon begins at the 9:06 minute marker
Scripture: Mark 4.1-34
Photo by Şahin Sezer Dinçer on pexels
Hymn VT 519 God, Give Me Faith Like A Child: Text - Adam M. L. Tice, 2012, © 2013, GIA Publications, Inc Music - Sally Ann Morris, b.1952, © 2013, GIA Publications, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Christine Sine teaches us about where Jesus was most likely born, how the Inn we traditionally invoke probably wasn't what we consider an Inn at all. She reminds us of the Mennonite tradition of radical hospitality and encourages us into Chalking our doors as a blessing for all who enter our homes and to consider who we might be excluding from those homes and blessings.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:42*Matthew 2: 1-12* Resources**
- Blessing, instructions and image of door chalking
- Image by Alexander Grey on pexels
- Hymn: Hymn 274 See Whose Glory Fills the Skies Text: adapt. from Charles Wesley (England), Music: George D. Elderkin (USA), 1890; arr. Evelyn Simpson-Curenton (USA), © 2000 GIA Publications, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Rita and Janet lead us through reflections for the Christmas season on angels and being angels.
Sermon begins at minute marker 7:05*Mark 1.1-20*
Resources**
- Image: Photo by Julia Kadel on Unsplash
- Hymn: 266 Where is this Stupendous Stranger. Text: Christopher Smart Hymns and Spiritual Songs ..., 1765, alt. Music: © 1989 Joan Fyock Norris. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Pastor Megan contemplates modern day child prophets and the purposefulness of God coming embodied as a lowly infant. She shares the story of young girls from our community acting on their convictions and their callings.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:12
Luke 1.5-25, 57-80
- Image: by Anastasia Shuraeva on pexels
- Hymn: Hymn 223 - Bless’d Be the God of Israel. Text: based on Luke 1:68-79; Michael A. Perry (England), © 1973 Hope Publishing Co. Music: George J. Webb (USA), 1830; The Odeon, 1837. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
“All of the people shouted with praise to God because the foundation of God’s house had been laid. But many of the older priests and Levites and heads of families, who had seen the first house, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this house, although many others shouted loudly with joy. No one could distinguish the sound of the joyful shout from the sound of the people’s weeping, because the people rejoiced very loudly. The sound was heard at a great distance.” Old and young, joy and sorrow, praise and weeping co-mingle in our church, in our communities, and - often - in our bodies. We sing our refrain of God’s steadfastness through it all; showing up with our whole selves and honoring the whole selves who sit next to us.
Sermon begins at minute marker 3:55
Ezra 1.1-4; 3.1-4, 10-13 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 515 – Rebuilding from the Ruins, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Image: Photo by Papaioannou Kostas on Unsplash
**Jeremiah pens some of the most beautiful words of hope to his community. But those hope-filled words are smack in the middle of horrors. Pan back even just a few verses, and one can see that Jeremiah is writing from prison, where his people are under siege by the Babylonian Empire, their towns and cities are ravaged, homes and even palaces are in rubble, and the streets are filled with corpses. sigh. What does hope even mean in the context of such devastation and sorrow in Jeremiah’s world and in ours? If hope is as puny as mere optimism, it might not mean much. But hope is a fierce practice that only makes sense in the face of the hopeless. As we engage both the expectant Advent of our communal church life, and the joyous cultural festival of Christmas in the wider community, how might we stoke and nurture our practice of hope in a broken and beautiful world?
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:00*Jeremiah 33.10-18* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 513 – Hope Against Hope, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Why Christmas Is Canceled In Bethlehem,” analysis by Ishaan Tharoor, The Washington Post, November 29, 2023.
- Cole Arthur Riley, Black Liturgies. “Advent, a season where we make space for grief, longing, sacred darkness, and silence…” Inhale: The world feels dim. Exhale: But we dream in the dark.
- Jan Richardson, “That Wild Advent Hope,” sent by email November 30, 2023.
- Image: First Sunday of Advent at SMC 2023, photo by Pastor Megan
- Hymn: VT 236, Creator of the Stars of Night. Words: Conditor alme siderum, 9th c.; trans. John Mason Neale (England), 1851, rev. The Hymnal, 1940, alt., © 1985 Church Pension Fund. Music: Sarum plainsong (England), ca. 9th c. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
When the Very Good King Josiah is informed that a long lost scroll has been found in the dusty corner of a closet, he rends his garments in mourning for himself and for his people. Despite his commitment to just labor practices, and the narrator’s assurance that he did what was right in God’s eyes, the rediscovered scroll of Deuteronomy makes clear that he and his people had been called to an even more radical life of justice-seeking. How might this story speak into our own desire to walk (together) in the liberating Way of Jesus? And what might it reveal to us about the difference between being driven by the promise of a particular outcome versus a renewable commitment to faithfulness?
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:24
2 Kings 22.1-20; 23.1-3 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 512 – Finding the Torah, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Learn more about Underground Ministries’ One Parish One Prisoner program.
- Dozens of Doughnuts, by Carrie Finison.
- Image: Photo by Pastor Megan, at the Federal Building in Seattle, November 2023
- Hymn: VT 406, Because the Words We Wait to Hear. Text: Jane Manton Marshall. Music:: © 2003, Wayne Leupold Editions. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**The prophet Isaiah writes poetry: to express deep love between God and God’s beloveds, to convey heartache, to cleverly and poignantly pierce through word play, to evoke hope and catalyze action, to faithfully proclaim the truest nature of God. If poetry is good enough for Isaiah, pastor Megan suggests, it might just be good enough for us. We hear of sacred love, heartbreak, longing, and conviction from poets Jane Kenyon, Naomi Shihab Nye, Marwan Makhoul, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Lucille Clifton. Come along for the ride!
sermon begins at minute marker 4:41 Isaiah 5.1-7; 11.1-5 Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 510– The Song of the Vineyard and the Stump of Jesse, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Jane Kenyon, “Briefly It Enters, and Briefly Speaks,” Collected Poems, 2005.
- Naomi Shihab Nye, “Kindness,” Words Under the Words: Selected Poems, 1995.
- Maxine Hong Kingston, The Fifth Book of Peace, 2003.
- Lucille Clifton, "spring song," The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton, 1987.
- After sharing this sermon in poetry, someone in the congregation reminded me of this gorgeous and piercing musical rendition of Isaiah’s poetry, by the inimitable Sinead O’Connor, may she rest in peace: “If You Had a Vineyard”
- Image: Marwan Makhoul, trans. Zeina Hashem Beck, via Gaza Poets Society, https://www.instagram.com/p/CO3URKVgw7M/
- Hymn: Hymn: VT 161 I Sought The Lord. Text: Holy Songs, Carols, and Sacred Ballads (USA), 1880 Music: J. Harold Moyer (USA), 1965, The Mennonite Hymnal, © 1969 Faith & Life Press/Mennonite Publishing House (admin. MennoMedia) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929 and #57595. All rights reserved.
**Tom Sine encourages us to create neighborhood empowerment projects that young generations could join in, without requiring church attendance or membership. He talks about the value of examining Pew Research profiles of generations in order to predict action areas of common interest. His challenge to us is to think about the future like city planners.
Sermon begins at minute marker 3:42*Matthew 13:31-32* Resources**
- Image: Photo by Mike Von on Unsplash
- Hymn: 573, Strong, Peaceful Man of Gallilee. Text: Harry W. Farrington (USA), 1921, The Hymnal for Boys and Girls, 1935, alt. Music: John B. Dykes (England), Hymns Ancient and Modern, 1861. Public domain. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Much could be said of the exaggerated and hyperbolic showmanship of this contest Elijah sets up between himself and the prophets of Baal. But step back from the spectacle, and I want to know why the people remembered this story, told it over and over, and eventually wrote it down? Might it have to do with the quiet way that Elijah calls the people to remember who (and whose) they are. “Come closer," he says. Then, in their near presence, he silently rebuilds an altar, lays 12 stones for 12 tribes, and with simple, quiet action reminds them that they are indeed God's own. They cannot worship both God and Baal. Despite the prevailing cultural norm that they don't need to choose amongst gods, Elijah seeks to convey that they must indeed choose. And that choice is consequential. Might our central and centering practice of communion similarly help us remember who we are as God's beloveds and followers of Jesus in a world where false gods vie for our ultimate loyalties?
Sermon begins at minute marker 7:15*1 Kings 18.17-39* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 509 – Elijah and the Prophets of Baal, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Image: members of Seattle Mennonite Church call for a ceasefire in Gaza at an interfaith action coordinated by Jewish Voice for Peace, at the Federal Building in Seattle, November 2023
- Hymn: 196, Come and Seek the Ways of Wisdom. Lyrics: Ruth Duck (USA), 1993, © 1996 The Pilgrim Press. Music: Donna Kasbohm (USA), 1995, © 1997 The Pilgrim Press. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929, #49254 and 05032 All rights reserved.
Amidst political maneuvers, power grabs, conditional allegiances, threats, oppression, and terrible advice, a king is crowned and a kingdom divided. And precisely NOone comes out looking like a saint. We too live in violent and divided times, and while Mennonites haven’t traditionally recognized the big “S” Saints of other Christian traditions, following in the Way of Jesus does mean seeking to live as a good ancestor for those who will come after. On this All Hallowed Souls and Saints Sunday, we remember the beloved souls who, having impacted our church community, joined the communion of good SMC ancestors in the last year.
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:04
1 Kings 12.1-17, 25-29 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 508 – The Division of the Kingdom, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Strong, Peaceful Man of Galilee, “ Voices Together 573, text by Harry W. Farrington (1921), music by John B. Dykes (1861), tune name MELITA, often referred to as the “navy hymn”.
- Image by Megan Ramer, Books about Saints
- Hymn: VT 672 For All the Saints, text William W. How, 1864 music: Ralph Vaughan Williams, 1906. Public Domain. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Is God a megalomaniac who needs our praise? Or do we praise God because WE need it? And what about those of us who struggle with “praise” given our religious histories? Or those of us who quite simply value being thoughtful, critical, reasonable, and intelligent creatures not prone to the frenetic religious fanaticism we might associate with “praise” of God? Even if we can find our way to a meaningful and reclaimed practice of praising God, how on earth are we meant to do this - or even consider this - in a time of genocide and ethnic-cleansing in Gaza?? Pastor Megan posits that perhaps this is precisely the time we are meant to praise God. “How? Why?? WHAT???” If these are your questions, tune in and see if you get there too. Be in touch with your own thoughts!
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:43*2 Samuel 5.1-5; 6.1-5; Psalm 150* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 507 – Praising the Lord, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “What is worship for?” Debie Thomas, The Christian Century, October 11, 2023.
- To learn more and act for an end to the genocide in Gaza:
- The Mennonite Palestine Israel Network (MennoPIN): https://mennopin.org/
- Community Peacemaker Teams (CPT): https://cpt.org/programs/palestine
- Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP): https://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/
- Image: Portion of the wall built by the State of Israel in Jerusalem. Photo taken by Pastor Megan Ramer on a CPT delegation to Israel and Palestine in 2003.
- Hymn: VT 95 Praise the Lord, Sing Hallelujah. Based on Psalm 148; The Book of Psalms, 1871; adapt. William J. Kirkpatrick (USA), ca. 1893, alt. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Christine Sine explores a variety of practices to increase our experience of gratitude. In this overstimulating, stressful world gratitude is an active way to push back on the negative and highlight the positive. This service ended in a St Francis Day blessing for our animals, those that God brings into our life and we sometimes forget to regard with gratitude.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:082 Corinthians 9.6-15 Resources
- Brother David Steindl-Rast - A Good Day - A video on gratitude. https://youtu.be/3Zl9puhwiyw?si=ltzLtlUqFzDZxay5
- Elaine Breckenridge’s blessing of the animals. https://godspacelight.com/2023/10/07/a-blessing-for-animals-to-celebrate-st-francis/
- Godspace gratitude resources and links - https://godspacelight.com/seasons-blessings/
- Image: Goldie, by Christine Sine
- Hymn: 419 - Great Is Thy Faithfulness. Thomas O. Chisholm, music, William M. Runyan, text, Songs of Salvation and Service, 1923. Public Domain. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**A whole bevy of women choose to creatively subvert the powers of death, risking their own lives, for the sake of choosing life. Shiprah and Puah - the midwives who bravely deliver life in defiance of the king, Jochabed - the mother and master basket-weaver who becomes a nursemaid to her own child, a sister protectrix who craftily executes a brilliant family-saving plan, a daughter of a king who says yes to the babe before her, inextricably weaving her life with those whom her empire oppresses. This is the birth of a baby and the birth of a people who will, together, stand on holy ground in God’s life-giving, liberating, power-subverting presence.
Sermon begins at minute marker 9:15*Exodus 1.8-14 - 2:10; 3.1-15* Resources**
- Image: Photo by Jackson Hendry - https://unsplash.com/photos/kKpTHqM2K-c
- Hymn: VT 740, Words & Music, Daniel Iverson, 1929; © 1935, 1963 Birdwing Music and BWG Songs, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from CCLI #23488. All rights reserved.
**Rita and Vija explore what it meant for Jacob, and for the disciples in the storm, to wrestle. How have other people struggled with their consciences, and their internal and external obstacles? How do you wrestle?
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:18*Genesis 32.22-30, Luke 8.22-25* Resources**
- Annie Dillard’s quote comes from her book Teaching a Stone to Talk
- Quote from Meister Eckhart: “The eye through which I see God is the same eye through which God sees me; my eye and God's eye are one eye, one seeing, one knowing, one loving.”
- Quote from Louise Penny in Glass Houses: She features a cobrador, a “cloaked figure acting as a conscience to those without one, forcing payment of a moral debt.”
- Image: Vija
- Hymn: VT 595 When the Storms of Life Are Raging. Music and text, Charles A. Tindley. Harmonization, William Farley Smith ©1989 United Methodist Publishing House. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**We have all laughed at and with Sarah for as long as we've heard the story. An 80 year old woman giving birth!?! Pastor Megan challenges us to consider laughter. What impossible things do we laugh at? An end to hunger? Reconciliation between settlers and indigenous peoples? A green and just economy? Healing for addiction? What have we laughed at that we should maybe consider a calling into impossible, great works of God?
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:03*Genesis 18.1-15; 21:1-7* Image:** Photo by Matt Barnard on pexels
- Hymn: VT 190, The God of Sarah Praise. Music - traditional. Words - David Bjorlin, ©2018 GIA Publications, Inc. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Pastor Amy shares moments and memories of God's love and favor over the 18 years of her ministry at Seattle Mennonite.
Sermon begins at 5:28*Luke 1.46-55, 4.14-22* Resources**
- Pokemon and Christian discipleship
- Youth play super giant dutch blitz
- Image: Artwork by Amy Epp
- Hymn: 549, Be Thou My Vision. Irish Traditional Mary Elizabeth Byrne trans. Martin Shaw harmony. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**A Psalm of praise becomes a Psalm of lament as the City of Seattle cites and fines our congregation for the humans who have found refuge on our property after relentlessly being swept from public parks and lands. As our friend Rachael Weasley so poignantly sings, “How can our anger give life?” Of the many names for God, right now I need these most of all: God is Warrior Protectrix. God is shelter. God is good news for the poor. God is love. ~Pastor Megan
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:02*Psalm 89* Resources**
- Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated (2021). Specifically: “Introduction” (xii), “Appendix: God Names and Divine Titles” (329-330), and Psalm 89.1-8, 14 (322-323; text below).
- “How Can Our Anger” by Rachael Weasley, Songs of Contemplation for Activists and Christians, now also published in Voices Together, 792 (MennoMedia, 2020).
- “Daughters of Hope” by Rachael Weasley, Songs of Contemplation for Travelers and Troublemakers; includes this quote from Augustine, 354-430 C.E. “Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.”
- “If the concept of God has any validity or any use, it can only be to make us larger, freer, and more loving.” James Baldwin, posted by blackliturgies (Cole Arthur Riley) on Instagram, August 2023.
- Austin Channing Brown, in an Instagram post on August 6, 2023: “Every woman has a well-stocked arsenal of anger potentially useful against those oppressions, personal and institutional, which brought that anger into being… Focused with precision it can become a powerful source of energy serving progress and change… Anger expressed and translated into action in the service of our vision and our future is a liberating and strengthening act of clarification.”
- Seattle Mennonite Church Congregational Covenant
- Image: “A (partial) name tag for God” - created in worship by Seattle Mennonite Church.
- Hymn: VT 134 Bring Many Names (WESTCHASE) ©1989 Hope Publishing Company.Text: Brian Wren Music: Carlton Young Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Psalm 89.1-8, 14 (trans. Rev. Dr. Wilda C. Gafney)
I will sing of the love of the FOUNT OF LIFE forever;
with my mouth I will make known your faithfulness from across the generations.
When I declare that your faithful love is established forever;
your faithfulness is established in the heavens,
[and you responded,] “I have inscribed a covenant with my chosen one;
I have sworn an oath to the descendants of Bathsheba:
“I will establish your line forever,
your throne that I will build, will be to all generations.”
The heavens confess your wonders, O WOMB OF CREATION,
and to your faithfulness in the congregation of the holy ones;
For who in the skies can be compared to the WOMB OF LIFE?
Who is like the MOTHER OF ALL among the children of the gods?
A dread God in the council of the holy ones,
great and terrible above all who surround her.
WARRIOR PROTECTRIX, who is mighty like you?
YOU
**Joy & Justice are the twin children of Jubilee. They go together like (love and marriage?) a horse and carriage… “You can’t have one without the other!” As we seek to be God’s Jubilee people for one another and the world, may we continuously form one another in the ways of joy and of justice.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:12*Psalm 146* Resources**
- “Ella’s Song,” written by Bernice Johnson Reagon in honor of her mentor, Ella Baker; performed by Sweet Honey in the Rock. “We who believe in freedom cannot rest until it comes.”
- Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated (2021).
- Voices Together, 107.
- Jubilee texts throughout the Bible, a sampling: Exodus 23, Leviticus 25 and 27, Deuteronomy 15, 1 Samuel 2.1-10 (Hannah’s song), Psalm 113, Psalm 146, Isaiah 61, Jeremiah 34, Luke 1.46-55 (Mary’s song), Luke 4.14-30 (Jesus’ first public teaching)
- Image: a still from the GORGEOUS video of “Ella’s Song,” produced and performed by the Resistance Revival Chorus. “The Resistance Revival Chorus (RRC) is a collective of more than 60 women, and non-binary singers, who join together to breathe joy and song into the resistance, and to uplift and center women’s voices.”
- Hymn: Arise Your Light is Come. Ruth Duck (USA), 1974, © 1992 GIA Publications, Inc. William Henry Walter (USA), 1894; desc. Diana McLeod (Canada), © 1995 Diana McLeod. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**“I implore you to exercise your power to help a friend (me!) to end this war. It matters to me.” When Sue spoke these words to a room full of Mennonites gathered to learn more about the (forgotten) Korean War near the 70 year anniversary of armistice, which paused the fighting but kept the war alive, Pastor Megan knew she’d been called in. She had been called in to bear witness to Sue’s bold truth-telling and to act in solidarity with her friend. What’s next? We will figure that out together, because we have been given to one another in the receiving and claiming and building of Christ’s peace. May it be so.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:11*1 Samuel 4.2, 5–11, 19–22; John 14.25–31* Resources**
- Yujin Kim, “Belonging in peace: A young adult reflects on her family and the Korean divide,” June 20, 2023.
- Sue Park-Hur and Austin Headrick, “Remembering the Forgotten War,” workshop presented at MennoCon in Kansas City, July 5, 2023.
- Anabaptist World (Vol. 4, No. 9), July 7, 2023. Multiple articles by Tim Huber: “Still Seeking Peace, 70 Years After War in Korea” (p. 8-11), “The church’s role in South Korea’s militarization” (p. 12-13), “Working for peace, one relationship at a time” (p. 14-16), “Fear, Love, and Walls that Divide” (p. 17).
- Image: detail from Yujin Kim’s artwork - both pieces can be viewed in their entirety by clicking the “Belonging in peace” link above. Artist’s statement on the piece featured here: “This artwork complements the illustration of the broken Korean Peninsula. The shape of the Korean Peninsula is filled with fish and waves. The divided land is now a body of water. Water is a symbol of freedom and solidarity because there are no borders in water. The fish represent people who are moving freely without any restraint, hesitation or fear. The illustration incorporates the style of Minhwa, the traditional Korean folk art. Minhwa was a tool for all people, free from rank or title, to express their honest desire and good wishes for others. Overall, the illustration expresses my honest hope and longing for peace in the Korean Peninsula.”
**The early Jesus Way community held resources in common and - in that sharing - were able to meet the needs of all. The book of Acts reports that the Holy One daily added to the numbers of this early Jesus Way community “those who were being saved”. Which causes us to wonder: Saved FROM what? And saved TO or FOR what?
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:21*Matthew 15.29–39, Acts 2.43–47* Resources**
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated (2021).
- Image: “kindness” - contribution from a young person in our community, responding to the question of what we are saved TO.
- Hymn: 387, We Are One in the Spirit. Text: Peter Scholtes (USA), 1966; Spanish trans. Federico J. Pagura (Argentina); German trans. Anton Schulte (Germany) and Bernd Schlottoff (Germany); French trans. Claire-Lise de Benoît (Switzerland). Music: Peter Scholtes, 1966; arr. Richard D. Wetzel (USA). © 1966 F.E.L. Publications, assigned to The Lorenz Corp., 1991, (admin. Music Services) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**The Canaanite woman calls out Jesus for his exclusion and abusive language. He responds by changing his mind, offering her the healing that she seeks for her daughter. Throughout history, it has been the brave souls who make themselves vulnerable by calling out people in power who have changed minds and opened hearts to be more just and loving. How will we respond when we are called out? Who are the voices that need to be heard?
Sermon begins at marker 4:38*Matthew 15:21–28* Resources**
- Bernie Sanders Black Lives Matter: Protesters disrupt | CNN Politics
- 1 Year Later: BLM Protester Who Interrupted Bernie Sanders’ Rally Discusses the Moment and the Movement
- Getting Called Out: How to Apologize - Franchesca Ramsey
- Image: BCC - _92959409_ap_54952227061.jpg (976×549) (bbci.co.uk)
- Hymn 667: Through our Fragmentary Prayers. Words: Thomas H. Troeger (USA), 1985, New Hymns for the Life of the Church, 1991. Music: Carol Doran (USA), 1985, New Hymns for the Life of the Church, 1991 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**The Holy Spirit disrupts our plans, and she beautifully disrupted the sermon plan this morning! When honored guests from the Palouse tribe spoke so powerfully to us during our time of welcome and gathering, Pastor Megan knew the sermon had to shift. We heard how the Holy Spirit blesses our diversities, and grants understanding. The Holy Spirit draws us out of our comfort zones and empowers us to act a little strange. The Holy Spirit compels us to bridge gaps and transgress boundaries established by the world. The Holy Spirit gets us into trouble… good trouble… necessary trouble. The Holy Spirit keeps us faithfully at variance. The Holy Spirit causes us to break unjust rules and defy unjust laws. The Holy Spirit inspires, empowers, challenges, comforts, disturbs, disrupts, enlivens us. Thanks be to God for the gift of the Holy Spirit, and the trouble she causes!
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:24*Acts 2:1-18; Romans 8:14-27* Resources**
- “King’s letter to an unfaithful church,” by Richard Lischer, The Christian Century, April 2023.
- letter from Pastoral Leadership Team of Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference, February 2022.
- John Lewis: “Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a lifetime. Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble.” --a tweet from June 2018
- Tower of Babel story found in Genesis 11.1-9
- Image: instant photo of Pastor Megan in our 2023 Pentecost “photo booth”
- Hymn: text: Shirley Erena Murray (Aotearoa New Zealand), 2004. Music: Lim Swee Hong (Singapore), 2004. Hope Publishing Co. © 2005. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Place-based watershed discipleship and the spiritual practice of reverence deepen our experience of kinship with all creation. Pastor Megan shares stories of learning to know mountains, learning to know neighbors and neighborhood, and learning to know our foremothers in the faith. To get more specific: she learns to love the contours of the Olympic Mountain range, the many neighbors who walk along 125th in Lake City, and the tent-making mother of teachers in Acts, Priscilla. In each of these cases, learning to know more fully nurtures loving more deeply, which may lead us to both honor and labor to protect all of our kin.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:03 Acts 18:24-27 Resources**
- Know Your Mothers project, by Cara Quinn: https://knowyourmothers.com/
- “Know Your Mothers project returns after hiatus,” published in The Christian Century, May 4, 2022, from Emily McFarlan Miller, Religion News Service.
- “Reverence vs. Faith”, Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery Podcast, with Sarah Augustine and Sheri Hostetler, Season 1, Episode 5, August 2021.
- “We won’t protect places we don’t love. We can’t love places we don’t know. And we don’t know places we haven’t learned,” adapted from Baba Dioum, Senegalese environmentalist
- Elizabeth Person, map artist & designer: https://elizabethperson.com/
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated (2021).
- The Women’s Lectionary: Preaching the Women of the Bible Throughout the Year, Ashley M. Wilcox, Westminster John Knox Press (2021).
- Willie James Jennings, Commentary on Acts, Westminster John Knox Press (2017).
- Women’s Bible Commentary, eds. Carol A. Newsom and Sharon H. Ringe, Westminster John Knox Press (1992).
- Image: Pastor Megan doing “office hours” in the alcove, taken by Dave Slonecker
Hymn: Voices Together, 115, Praise Be to God. Text: Nobuaki Hananoka, 1980. Music: Japanese traditional. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Many of us are becoming comfortable with Mothering imagery for God - so long as that imagery is tender and comforting and caring. But what about a Mother who curses, judges and chastises. The feminine of God is as diverse and expansive as the other gendered understandings of the Divine. Deuteronomy's curse text warns the people of God that to not follow God's law will have dire consequences. We human parents know what it is to warn our children that bad choices lead to bad outcomes and we are made in our Mother God's image.
Sermon starts at minute marker 5:19.*Psalm 145; Deuteronomy 28:58–68 Resources:*
- Image: illustration by Khoa Le for the book Mother God by Teresa Kim Pecinovsky
- Spotify Playlist, including Bobby McFarin's "23rd Psalm" using Mother images
- Hymn: Voices Together, 74, O Worship Our God, All Glorious Above. Text: based on Psalm 104; Robert H. Grant (England); Christian Psalmody, 1833, alt. Music: Sacred Melodies (England), vol. 2, 1815. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
The message of Resurrection, remembered in this Easter season, is a message of apocalyptic proportions. The Good News of the community of Love springs to life and begins to spread as Dustin begins to say goodbye.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:03
John 5:25-29; Acts 5:12–16; 2 Corinthians 4:13–15Hymn: 478, I Come with Joy. Music: American traditional (USA), Southern Harmony, 1854, alt. Text: Brian Wren (England), 1968, rev. 1993, © 1971, rev. 1995 Hope Publishing Company Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources
A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021.
Sarah Augustine, our Just Peace Climate Justice speaker, discusses the uses and failures of Capitalism and calls us to engage in an Indigenous cosmology that prioritizes Community Wellbeing over individuals and profit. She deftly contrasts a world view that demands continued growth and increasing consumption against the basic reality that we exist in a closed system of mutual dependence. Sarah speaks clearly about the ways we are willing to sacrifice human life, particularly Indigenous lives, in order to continue our extraction-based, consumerist lives without any real change.
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:412 Corinthians 4:7–12; Luke 7:18–23 Resources
- Sarah Augustine is the Executive Director of Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery and a cofounder of Suriname Indigenous Health Fund
- For more information about the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) explore the National Indian Child Welfare Association (NICWA) (one of our Just Peace Partners) website.
- Photo by Goshen College photographers
- Hymn: The Garden Needs Our Tending Now Words: Mary Louise Bringle ©2002 GIA Publications, Inc., Music: French traditional, 16th c.; acc. Andrew Donaldson (Canada), 2010 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Pastor Megan inhabits the story found in John's gospel, of Mary Magdalene (Mary, THE Magdala; Mary the Tower) coming to the garden to find an empty tomb. Enter the story with her, listen for two bits of good news, and wonder where YOU are in this story...
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:00*John 20.1-18* Resources**
- “Mary the Tower” - a sermon by Pastor Megan, drawing on the research of Elizabeth Schrader, with much sermonic credit to Diana Butler Bass. (follow the link for those footnotes)
- Image: Giuseppe Calì, Mary Magdalene on Christ's Tomb, circa 1900 - https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?search=Mary+Magdalene+at+the+tomb&title=Special:MediaSearch&go=Go&type=image
- Hymn: Voices Together 355, Thine is the Glory. Text: Edmond L. Budry (France), “A toi la gloire, O Ressuscité,” Chants Evangéliques, 1885; trans. Mennonite Worship and Song Committee, 2018, adapt. from Richard B. Hoyle (England), Cantate Domino, 1925 Music: George Frederick Handel (England), Joshua, 1746
**John 3:16 is much loved by many & much detested by many others. This Laetare Sunday, Dustin looks beyond verse 16 to find a way to rejoice it.
Sermon begins at minute marker 7:20*Song of Solomon 4.7-16; Psalm 135.1-16; 1 John 4.7-12; John 3.11-17* Resources**
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021.
- Finding Fred Podcast: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-finding-fred-91432380/
- Baker, Elna. “This American Life.” Episode. The Problem with Ghosts no. 793: The Wedding Crasher. Chicago, IL, March 10, 2023. https://www.thisamericanlife.org/793/the-problem-with-ghosts/act-two-6.
- Sheeler, Jason. “Mister Rogers Encouraged Gay Costar Officer Clemmons to Stay in the Closet and Marry a Woman.” Peoplemag. PEOPLE, April 24, 2020. https://people.com/tv/mister-rogers-encouraged-gay-costar-officer-clemmons-to-stay-in-the-closet-and-marry-a-woman/.
- Hymn: Voices Together 298, What Is the World Like. Words: Adam Tice and Music: Sally Ann Morris; ©2009 GIA Publications, Inc.
**We are still in the Garden, beginning to see movement towards the Table. What does this origin story say about gender, and culture, and danger? If we start with Jesus, what do we see about that first curse and the real danger? Join Megan as she discusses the story and the wisdom brought by rabbis through Midrash and learn about the way things are, danger, and First Tears.
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:23*Genesis 3:8-21; Mark 13:14-22* Resources**
- Photo by Kevin Toval on pexels https://www.pexels.com/photo/close-up-photo-of-a-woman-crying-15038210/
- Hymn: Voices Together, 162, The Love of God. Text: F. M. Lehman (USA), c. 1917, stanza 3 based on Rabbi Meir (Germany), “Haddamut,” c. 1050, and Qur’an 31:27 (present-day Saudi Arabia), alt. Music: F. M. Lehman, c. 1917; arr. Claudia Lehman Mays (USA), alt.
**Join Pastor Megan in a reflection on the story that begins with dirt in a garden. We've heard it so many times, through so many tellings and retellings. What table was set in that garden by a trickster and a very human Eve?
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:41**Genesis 3:1-7; Matthew 7:15-20
- Image: Photo by Rachel Claire: https://www.pexels.com/photo/table-set-on-lawn-in-forest-4992937/
- Hymn: Voices Together 642, Healing River of the Spirit; text: Ruth Duck (USA), 1994, © 1996 The Pilgrim Press music: Sally Ann Morris (USA), 1991, © 1997 The Pilgrim Press. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Join us as Pastor Megan reflects on our Story's beginnings. Humans and gardens and all good, life giving stories begin in the dirt.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:35**Genesis 2:7-9, 15-25; Mark 16:9-15
- Image: Photo by Gabriel Jimenez on Unsplash
- Hymn: Voices Together 550, God Who Touches Earth with Beauty text: Mary S. Edgar (Canada), 1925, music: alt. Alfred V. Fedak (USA), 1988, © 1989 Sacred Music Press. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
In this scripture, we come to the “ending credits” of the story of Mary that we have been following for the past several months. Using the musical West Side Story, **Dustin urges us to ensure that we give credit to everyone who contributed to the story.
Sermon begins at minute marker 8:00**Luke 3: 21-23; 31-38
Resources
- Gospel of Musical Theatre podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-gospel-of-musical-theatre/id1565558402?i=1000544599942 & https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-gospel-of-musical-theatre/id1565558402?i=1000546595515
- Stephen Sondheim, Finishing the Hat: Collected Lyrics (1954-1981) with Attendant Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines and Anecdotes (New York, NY: Knopf, 2010).
- Hymn: Voices Together 441 Crashing Waters at Creation Words Sylvia G Dunstan - ©1991 GIA Publications, Inc. Music, Traditional Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Jesus’ ability to choose his baptism matters. Our ability to choose baptism, to choose discipleship, to choose joining the the Jesus movement, to choose walking in the Way, to choose covenant with one another ALSO matters. Despite how it may sound, this is not a generic U.S. American style rugged individualism. But instead, our individual agency leads us to a voluntary collectivism in which an “I” becomes a “we” in which each “I” is honored. Our community covenant is like a campfire that we keep stoked in the center of our gathering and our communal life. All are welcome to find your place in the ripples that radiate out from our center.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:42
Scripture: Isaiah 62:1-7, 10-12; Matthew 3:1-6, 11-17 Resources**
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021.
- Image: Danny Shives on Unsplash
- Voices Together #453, As I Went Down to the River to Pray. African American Spiritual. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**This sermon is a wondering, a story, a reflection, and - at the last - a blessing. A wondering about the treasures stored in Mary’s heart. A story about an aunt and her nephew ice skating. A reflection about Jesus at 12-years-old, about ALL 12-year-olds, and about belonging. A blessing for each beloved one… those on the way to, presently at, or well on the other side of age 12.
Sermon begins at minute marker 6:05
Scripture: Psalm 36:5-10 & Luke 2:41-51 Resources**
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021.
- Sarah Bessey, “A Blessings for your Faults,” https://sarahbessey.substack.com/p/blessing-faults (2021).
- Image: Photo by Emmanuel Olguín on Unsplash
- "On Children" by Sweet Honey in the Rock, text from Khalil Gibran's "The Prophet" - https://youtu.be/ti0rzHq_0xU
- "We Are" by Sweet Honey in the Rock - https://youtu.be/hWaw-tQ4W7w
- Voices Together 423, God the Sculptor of the Mountains, Music - Henry Purcell, Words - © John Thornburg, 1993 Augsburg Fortress Publishers. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Join us as Weldon reflects on prophecy and the prophets he has known and worked with in Iraqi Kurdistan. His work with CPT has brought him in contact with prophets, particularly women prophets, who are challenging and provoking the systems of oppression around them.
Sermon begins 7:18
Hymn: Voices Together 208, With Mary Sing Magnificat. Words - ©2000 Jeannette M Lindholm Augsburg Fortress Publishers. Music - English traditional; Ralph Vaughn Williams, harmony. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
Magi from the East, travel (for two years) guided by a significant astrological event. Along the way (in the opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors)they stop at the home of a poor widow and her son; before finding their way to the chaotic home of Mary, the harried mother of toddler Jesus in Dustin’s dramatic interpretation of the familiar tale.
Paralleling that energetic telling of the journey of the Magi with the somber story of the small French town of Dieulefit, who sheltered and saved its Jewish community from the Holocaust, Dustin calls on us to listen for the silent messengers.
Sermon begins at minute marker 9:10
Scripture:Isaiah 60.1-6, 11; Matthew 2.1-12 Image: https://holymassimages.blogspot.com/
Hymns: Voices Together 267 & 268, What Child is This, music, traditional English, words, William C. Dix Christmas Carols New and Old, 1871, and Child of the Poor, words and music - ©1994 OCP Contributors: Scott R Soper, Greensleeves, Scott Soper. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021.
- Menotti, Gian Carlo, Frances Frost, and Roger Duvoisin. Gian-Carlo Menotti's Amahl and The Night Visitors. Andrew Dakers Ltd., 1953.
- Obituary: Gian Carlo Menotti, The Daily Telegraph, February 2, 2007.
- Barnes, Jennifer. Television Opera: The Fall of Opera Commissioned for Television. Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Boydell Press, 2015.
Jesus’ formation began when he was still in utero**, when his mama sang the revolutionary songs of her own foremamas, and when Joseph drew a circle of family around a child not his own. Years later when Jesus’ own ministry proclaimed a liberation of systems where thrones and lowly unjustly co-exist, and dramatically redefined family, Mary & Joseph should have been the very least surprised of all. It is exactly who they formed the child Jesus to be. May we similarly form and be formed by the prophetic young ones in our midst who will continue to call us to ever-widening circles of chosen kinship and liberation.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:11*Judges 13.2-7; Luke 1.46-56* Resources**
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021.
- Jan L. Richardson, The Luminous Word: Entering the Mysteries of Advent & Christmas (Wanton Gospeller Press, 2005).
Image: Saint Joseph et l'Enfant Jésus, Yoruba-Nago (Kétou), 1930; Musée africain de Lyon. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license; original cropped to show detail.
Hymn: Voices Together 208, With Mary Sing Magnificat. Text: Jeannette M. Lindholm (USA), © 2000 Jeannette M. Lindholm (admin. Augsburg Fortress) Music: English traditional; harm. Ralph Vaughan Williams (England), The English Hymnal, 1906. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Elizabeth exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” Who was the blessed woman, and what does it mean to be blessed in the first place? Dustin is an emerging Mariologist, and he walks us through the unfamiliar early life of Mary before Jesus as he explores what it means to be beloved and blessed by God, and the way he sees the SMC community fulfilling that blessing.
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:53*Genesis 17.15-22; Luke 1.39-45* Photo from The Church Council of Greater Seattle
Hymn: Voices Together 216, Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming. Lyrics: stanzas 1–2 anon., “Es ist ein Ros’ entsprungen,” (present-day Germany), 15th c.; Alte Catholische Geistliche Kirchengasäng, 1599; trans. Theodore Baker (USA), 1894; stanza 3 Friedrich Layritz (Germany), Liederschatz, 1832; trans. Harriet K. Spaeth (USA), The Hymnal, 1940, alt. Music: German traditional, 15th c.; Alte Catholische Geistliche Kirchengasäng, 1599; harm. Michael Praetorius (Germany), Musae Sionae VI, 1609 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources**
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021.
- “The Gospel of James” translated by Stevan Davies in The Infancy Gospels of Jesus: Apocryphal Tales from the Childhoods of Mary and Jesus - Annotated & Explained, SkyLight Paths Publishing, 2009
- RadioLab, “The Ashes on The Lawn,” December 2, 2022. http://www.wnycstudios.org/story/ashes-lawn-2212/
- I Use My Love to Guide Me. Barnard Center for Research on Women, 2018. https://bcrw.barnard.edu/i-use-my-love-to-guide-me/
**When Mary said yes to Gabriel's invitation to be the bearer of Jesus, she did so as one in the long story of women partnering with God in creation. Each of us, like Mary, may be storytellers of God, helping to birth new things in our own lives and in the world: new families, new ideas, new art, new life.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:30*Genesis 16.7-13, Luke 1.26-38 Image: File:Henry Ossawa Tanner - The Annunciation.jpg - Wikimedia Commons *Hymn: Voices Together 251, There Were Angels Hovering Round, American Traditional. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources**
- A Woman’s Lectionary for the Whole Church (Year W): A Multi-Gospel Single-Year Lectionary, Wilda C. Gafney, Church Publishing Incorporated, 2021
- Monte Yellow Bird on art and storytelling: Art and Storytelling | National Endowment for the Arts
**An opening question for our sermonic adventure: Of all the Marys in our gospels, WHICH MARY is the Mary in John 11 and John 12? If you think you know the answer, your answer may be complicated by what you hear here. The biblical world has been shaken by the research of Elizabeth Schrader, and many of us have been introduced to Schrader’s incredible findings about Mary Magdalene in John’s gospel thanks to Diana Butler Bass preaching about it during the Wild Goose Festival in summer of 2022. A parting, poignant, and - for Pastor Megan and many others - deeply personal question to close: WHAT IF we had all grown up with both Peter the Rock and Mary the Tower?
Sermon begins at minute marker 4:11*John 12.1-8* Resources**
- Elizabeth Schrader, research: https://www.elizabethschrader.com/about-7
- “All the Marys,” sermon by Diana Butler Bass, preached at the Wild Goose Festival, summer 2022, listen to the audio OR read the text. This is the sermon, featuring Elizabeth Schrader’s research, upon which Megan’s is entirely based!
- “Magdalene,” song by Libbie Schrader
- Nestle Aland Greek New Testament (Novum Testamentum Graece), edited by the Institut für neutestamentliche Textforschung at the University of Munster (Germany).
- “Magdala’s Mistaken Identity,” Joan E. Taylor, Biblical Archaeology Review 48:3, Fall 2022. “The site of Magdala on the shores of the Sea of Galilee is associated by many with Jesus’s famous disciple, Mary Magdalene. Ancient sources, however, indicate that the site’s first-century remains are likely those of the Galilean harbor city of Taricheae. Explore what we know of this ancient Jewish town and how it came to be mistakenly identified with Magdala.”
- Voices Together 527 Bless the Arms That Comfort. Text: Mary Louise Bringle. Music: Gustav Holst, 1906. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Image: Detail of Papyrus 66, red underline added, to underscore the name “Maria” with a theta (Θ - “th”) added above the iota (ί - “i”), changing Maria / Mary to Martha. Available on Wikimedia Commons.
**Drama heightens in the exaggerated, fantastical tragi-comedy that is Esther. After a moment of reluctance, Esther rises to the occasion to successfully execute a plan to protect her people (and literally execute - on a 75-foot-high stake - the enemy of her people…). Speaking the language of the powerful, following every royal protocol, and understanding how both laws and egos work, Esther drives the plot of this raucous, fictional narrative. A minority gender of a minority people in the grips of an oppressive empire becomes the unlikely hero when she expertly wields the power of her positionality in relation to the king.
Sermon begins at minute marker 10:22*Esther 3:1-11 and 7:1-10* Photo: SMC photobooth
Hymn: VT 580 To Leave the Stones Unthrown, Words - ©2005 Hope Publishing Company, Contributors: Carl P. Daw, Jr.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast, Episode 152: Resisting Ethnic Nationalism, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr., August 3, 2020.
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- https://www.commonsensemedia.org/kids-action/articles/why-representation-matters-in-kids-media
- https://bmgator.org/31218/uncategorized/representation-matters-a-review-of-heartstopper/
- https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/may/31/young-gay-people-being-out-and-happy-its-revolutionary-meet-the-heartstopper-generation
**Before there was Rosa Parks, there was Ida B. Wells. Before there was Esther, there was Vashti. And after all of them was Brenda Salter McNeil. Those who say “No!” stand on the shoulders of many others who also had the courage to resist before them, making the powers tremble. We too have the opportunity to say “No” to oppression and exploitation. Do not fear being reduced to a naysayer, for our “No” ultimately allows for a “Yes”; a YES to the liberating, loving, and just Way of Jesus.
Sermon begins at minute 8:25.*Esther 1.1-22* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast, Episode 152: Resisting Ethnic Nationalism, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr., August 3, 2020.
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- Rabbi Zalman Schacter-Shalomi at Purim, reading Esther - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-p05qJWlTk. This is NOT the exact Purim celebration that Pastor Megan describes having had the pleasure of participating in, but Rev Zalman IS the same Rabbi! This video offers an example of what the Esther story in one contemporary Reconstructionist Jewish community’s celebration of Purim sounds, looks, and feels like.
- Brenda Salter McNeil, Becoming Brave: Finding the Courage to Pursue Racial Justice Now, (Brazos Press, 2020), 23, 31, etc.
- Read more about Rosa Parks: https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/rosa-parks
- Read more about Ida B. Wells: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ida_B._Wells
- VT 434 O God, Our Refuge Text: Brenda Hostetler Meyer, Music: The Walking Roots Band (2019). Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Image: Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash
All Saints Sunday was a wonderful chance to eat together and share stories of our saints. We even got to make icons and hear part of the story of Ruth read out loud by four voices. Listen as Dustin reflects on the stories of his saints, his icons, and one of his favorite books of the bible, Ruth.
Sermon begins at minute 7:02
Ruth 1:14-18 and 3:1-1Photo by Kampus Production on pexels
VT 209, We Dream of a Turning, Music - ©2019 MennoMedia Inc. Contributor: Kathryn Harsha
**As much as we learned otherwise in Sunday school, Boaz is not the romantic lead of a storybook romance. He is, however, one of the best examples we have in the Bible of how to use privilege, power and wealth in a way that offers a place to those who don't have those things and influences others to do the same.
Sermon begins at minute 8:19*Ruth 2:1-20 and 4: 9-17* Resources**
- Modern Love series by Alisha Rai (Ruth is not a romance, but these books are)
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- Hymn: Seek the Peace of the CIty, VT206. Text: based on Jeremiah 29:7, David Wright, 2004 Music: James E Clemens, 2004. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Image: Icon by Joe Monocello
The Bible has taught us well to allegorize stories by substituting God for the male figure in a story, and Jerusalem or Humanity for the female figure. However, Hebrew poetry lends itself to double entendres and multiple meanings. With the help of the 1957 Broadway musical The Music Man, **we will examine the well-established structure of this poem with curiosity; asking, “Can this song be sung a different way?”
Sermon begins at minute 6:36*Song of Songs 5:2-9 and 8:5-10* Resources:** See the SMC website or Facebook page sermon posting for links to the songs below:
- Meredith Wilson, “Goodnight My Someone” from The Music Man 1957 sung by Barbara Cook
- Gillian Russo, March 12, 2020, The history of Broadway shutdowns, Broadway News https://broadwaynews.com/2020/03/12/the-history-of-broadway-shutdowns/
- Meredith Wilson, “Being In Love” from The Music Man 1962 film sung by Shirley Jones
- Meredith Wilson, “The Sadder-but-Wiser Girl for Me” from The Music Man 1957 sung by Robert Preston
- Meredith Wilson, “Rock Island” from The Music Man 1957
- Meredith Wilson, “Pick-a-little, Talk-a-little” from The Music Man 1962 film
- Meredith Wilson, “My White Knight” from The Music Man 1957 sung by Barbara Cook https://open.spotify.com/track/6UuqE5oXVnxToLif1530eR?si=FvVchBJDSe-VUEm5Xl2-Pw
- The Gospel of Musical Theatre podcast, PRIDE BONUS: The Music Man! https://open.spotify.com/episode/0SuOaBfBwh1BmAauyZwgSy?si=TfsS_GpUS-eU-QvEHjiF5w
- Meredith Wilson, “76 Trombones” from The Music Man 2022 sung by Hugh Jackman
- Meredith Wilson, “Lida Rose/Will I Ever Tell You?” from The Music Man 1962 film sung by Shirley Jones & The Buffalo Bills
- Meredith Wilson, “My White Knight” from The Music Man 2022 sung by Sutton Foster https://open.spotify.com/track/3Bu9q5k2hArYMfgasl12FM?si=7xCvCxL2Som-ud_zKfYlPg
- Meredith Wilson, “Till There Was You” from The Music Man 1957 sung by Barbara Cook & Robert Preston https://open.spotify.com/track/1kU40UKP9BviW8m4HMgUQh?si=v8UvwKmuRU60iyO5wea58g
- BibleWorm podcast https://open.spotify.com/episode/2bqkenlYIp1f4nf0b16m6L?si=qrqiaIHoRouD01zLbzroQg
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- Voices Together 48, Music: Ralph Vaughan Williams, Five Mystical Songs, No. 4; Text: George Herbert, The Temple, 1633. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929.
- Image: Photo by Klub Boks from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/photo/marching-band-playing-different-musical-instruments-8884280/
No bones about it: Song of Songs is steamy. Before this sermon is through, we will acknowledge that people do, in fact, have sex. We will hear about desire and the clandestine rendezvous of lovers. We will learn that Pastor Megan has become an avid reader of romance novels, and bear witness as she practices more unapologetically owning that. We will celebrate bodies and the joy of human sexuality. We will dwell in the Sublime Song of young lovers who love themselves and one another with sensuous abandon. And we will call it all “holy”. Thanks be to God for the Song of all Songs!
Sermon begins at minute 6:16 (but you really should listen to the reading)
Song of Songs 1:12-2:6 and 7:1-13 Resources
- BibleWorm podcast, Episode 147:The Joy of Sex, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr., June 29, 2020.
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- Forgotten Books Bible Study video: Song of Songs Part I, with Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Book Review by Hannah Notess of Rafe: A Buff Male Nanny (Loose Ends 1), posted on GoodReads, February 15, 2019 [retrieved October 8, 2022].
- “His Banner Over Me” - song by Kevin Prosch
- I Sought the Lord #VT161 Music - ©1969 MennoMedia Inc.; Contributors: J Harold Moyer
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Image: detail of a medal from a series of Song of Songs medals made by Klaus Kowalski, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
**When at last the communal voice enters the lamentation, closing out the book of Lamentations, the community finds a way to speak in a singular voice with enough spaciousness to embrace its diversities. It’s almost magical how they pull it off. Have we, could we, might we do the same with our various experiences in this lingering, never-ending pandemic?
Sermon begins at minute 7:58*Lamentations 3.1-3, 17-33 and 5.1-3, 19-22* Image: Photo by Chang Duong on Unsplash**
Hymn: Voices Together 712 God of the Poor (Beauty for Brokenness). Words and Music - ©1993 Make Way Music, Contributors: Graham Kendrick
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast, Episode 146: Trauma Has Many Voices, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr., June 22, 2020.
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- “Great is thy faithfulness” - words by Thomas Chisolm
**It feels bad to feel bad! So often feelings and embodiments of anger and despair are punished or policed - especially in women and people of color. Maybe that's why we so often turn past the book of Lamentations: it leans fully into those shamed expressions of outrage, pain and grief. We don't want to feel those feelings, but right there in our sacred text we are given permission to not only feel them but to express them fully and forcefully. Being able to give voice to our outrage before God and toward God, allows us to then channel our anger at systems of oppression and violence and to uphold and amplify other voices that cry out for justice.
Sermon begins at minute 11:30*Lamentations 1.8-22 and 2.10-22* Image: Photo by Kelly from Pexels
Hymn: VT 708, As the Waters Rise Around Us, 2006 GIA Publications. Contributor: Mary Louise Bringle. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
Resources
- BibleWorm Bible Study Video "Lifting Up Theologies of Protest"
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- Walter Brueggeman, "The Costly Loss of Lament"
- Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg, "Woe/אֵיכָ֣ה" on how Lamentations gives voice to the grief and trauma of the loss of abortion rights.
**We encounter the timeless poetry of Ecclesiastes about the seasons of our lives. Pete Seeger iconically set this poetry to music so poignant and beautiful that it is known to nearly all of us. Like all good poetry, there is spaciousness to enter it from our many and varied places in life. Some of us may find in these ancient words a seed of despair, some of us a melancholic sort of hope, and still others enormous freedom. There is a time to hear from one another, and today seemed to be that time…
Sermon begins at minute 5:26*Ecclesiastes 1:4-11; 3:1-11* Image: Photo by Chris Lawton on Unsplash Ask the Complicated Questions, VT 440 words - ©2018 GIA Publications, Inc., Contributors: David Bjorlin Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: For Everything There is a Season, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr., June 8, 2020.
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018
- “Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There is a Season”: a song by Pete Seeger, most popularly recorded by The Byrds.
“Mysteries, Yes”, Evidence: Poems by Mary Oliver (2010)
If all of life is “vanity” or breath or vapor, as the Teacher of Ecclesiastes repeats, is it then “perfectly pointless”? If life is unfair, inscrutable, beyond our control, and destined for the grave, as the Teacher describes, is it then meaningless? Perhaps. Or Perhaps it’s simply precious, for the moments given to us as our portion. Whatever the case, do know that “a living dog is better than a dead lion”! Ahhh… What fun to adventure in this book that’s been mostly ignored within Christian communities, and to find ourselves surprised, tickled, and maybe even encouraged.
Sermon begins at minute marker 2:56
Ecclesiastes 1:1-3 and 8:16-9:10
Photo credit: Maximalfocus on Unsplash
Resources
- BibleWorm podcast: Making Meaning In a Zero-Sum World, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr., May 30, 2021.
- The Forgotten Books of the Bible: Recovering the Five Scrolls for Today, Robert Williamson, Jr., 2018.
- Ephemeral Art: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ephemeral_art
- Nihilism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nihilism_(disambiguation)
**In 2020 Seattle dollars, Mary pours out $100,000 worth of perfume on Jesus’ feet. Why? And when Judas questions her choice, citing how much further those dollars could have gone if given to the poor, doesn’t he have a point? Yep. But come along for this sermonic ride, exploring the honoring of bodies, and averted public shaming, and loving God with one’s all, and the many flavors of scarcity mindset, and Tanya Tucker’s gorgeously defiant “If your heart is in them flowers, bring ‘em on…”
Sermon begins at minute 3:54*John 12:1-8* Hymn: Voices Together 30 Jesus Calls Us. Words and Music - ©1989 Iona Community / WGRG (North America) Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources:**
- “Bring My Flowers Now” by Tanya Tucker, with Brandi Carlile, 2019. [watch music video]
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 351 – The Poor Will Always Be with You, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- For those interested in exploring Elizabeth Schrader’s research on Mary the Tower: 1. Schrader’s scholarly article “Was Martha of Bethany Added to the Fourth Gospel in the Second Century?” (2016) and/or 2. Diana Butler Bass’s sermon text and audio “All the Marys” (2022)
- “Seattle’s median household income soars past $100,000 — but wealth doesn’t reach all,” by Gene Balk, Seattle Times, September 25, 2020. [NOTE: this median income figure is newer, though still a few years old, and higher than the number quoted in the sermon.]
- Deuteronomy 15, NRSV
- All the World by Liz Garton Scanlon
**Jesus’s example of how to pray helps us see economic justice in a new way, helps us remember who we are to God and to each other, and helps us see that admitting dependance on God can lead to justice for everyone.
Sermon begins at 6:12.*Matthew 6.7-15, 19-21*, NRSV Updated Edition
Photo by Nicole Michalou via Pexels
Hymn: VT 740 Music & Text Daniel Iverson, 1929 arr. Herbert G. Tovey, 1935, 1963. CCLI #23488. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources: Story -*The Lord’s Prayer*, by Tim Lawdig
Just how easy is it for a camel to get through the eye of a needle? Pastor Debbie takes us through many translations and interpretations around the familiar quip. Did Jesus really mean what he is reported to have said - either literally or metaphorically? Who was this lesson even for? Maybe there are more questions here than answers.
Sermon begins minute 6:43
Scripture: Luke 4.16-21; 18.18-30 Image: uncredited gif
Hymn: VT 6 Let's Walk TogetherMusic - ©2006 Abingdon Press: Mark A Miller Text: Laurie Zelman
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Some of the most beloved words of Scripture - “Do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with your God” - are surrounded by some decidedly less beautiful words, to put it mildly. We know the gift of the beautiful and familiar nugget contained in Micah 6.8, but is there also gift in the tough stuff that comes before and after? Pastor Megan notices in the surrounding chapters a PROBLEM: the mundanity of everyday wickedness. An ANTIDOTE: sabbath interruption of the steady progression and accumulation of mundane wickedness. And a FRUIT, borne of the antidote: kinship, mutual aid, and an actively anti-predatory neighborly economy. Why the kohlrabi? You’ll just have to listen to find out…
Scripture: Micah 6.6-15, 7.1-7 Hymn: VT 207 What Does the Lord Require of You? Words based on Micah 6:8, Jim Strathdee; music Jim Strathdee
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
Resources
- “Faith seeking economic justice” by Walter Brueggemann, a eulogy for Biblical scholar Norman Gottwald [1926-2022], TheChristian Century, June 1, 2022 (p. 14-15).
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 348 – What Does the Lord Require of You?, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Image: “Green Kohlrabi” by Jonathunder, GFDL 1.2 http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/fdl-1.2.html, via Wikimedia Commons
- Voices Together [link to purchase through Menno Media]
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“The covenantal vision of a neighborly economy, so clearly and often voiced in the Torah, requires advocacy for both polity and practice that are pro-neighbor, anti-predation, and anti-accumulation… As our society grows more frightened and more repressive, the church is faced with an urgent call for truth telling—concerning both the exposure of our predatory economic system, which produces and sustains poverty through cheap labor, and the articulation of an alternative way that will yield neighborly abundance. But as long as the church is in unthinking collusion with dominant economic assumptions, this hard and transformative truth is unlikely to be spoken aloud.” —Walter Brueggemann
Leviticus is confusing. It wasn’t written to us or for us and we don’t even know who wrote it! Can we find some guidance for today in this text? Is it even relevant?Sermon begins at minute 3:55
Scripture: Leviticus 19.9-18, 33-37
Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash
Hymn: VT 206, Seek the Peace of the City, Words and Music - ©2004 Church Publishing, Inc. Contributors: David Wright/James E. Clemens
**The law in Deuteronomy is clear: every seven year all debt is to be canceled. But because people are people, it's pretty hard to live it out practically. What the law depends on and encourages is building a community of trust in which we know each other well enough to give and receive financial care from our neighbors. It also encourages us to interrupt our contemporary systems that depend on predatory lending and personal indebtedness. Cancel all debt! Period.
Sermon begins at minute 16:37 (this recording includes the Story for All Ages time)*Deuteronomy 15:1-11; 24:10-15*Photo by Monstera: signing a loan**
**On this Sunday when we celebrate the baptism of two young adults in our congregation, Pastor Amy explores the way baptism blesses and call us. In Jesus baptism, he was pronounced his allegiance not to the emperors and kings who ruled over his people but to God alone. He did so along with a community who, like him, were committed to hearts and lives oriented to the practical purpose of sharing resources, helping those in need and seeking justice. And ultimately his baptism was a moment of personal and intimate blessing between himself and the God who delighted in him. Every time one of us chooses to receive the waters of baptism, we too are connecting to our God and our community in this political, practical and personal way.
Sermon begins at minute marker 5:00*Luke 3:1-3; 10-14; 21-22*Photo credit: Amy Epp
Hymn: Come Thou Fount Robert Robinson (England), 1758, A Collection of Hymns*, 1759 American traditional (USA), in John Wyeth's* Repository of Sacred Music**, Part Second, 1813
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**We wrap up another Narrative Lectionary year with the lovely close of Paul’s letter to the community at Philippi. These words of encouragement, consolation, and assurance are bedside words: one can just as easily imagine reading them to a beloved child at bedtime, or a beloved elder at the time of death. They are a benediction of sorts, functioning as a semicolon - a pronounced pause - between the two main clauses of waking and sleeping, or living and dying, or worship and work. Listen to Pastor Megan’s comma of a sermon, extolling the semicolons of our shared life.
Sermon begins at minute 3:27.**Philippians 4:4-7
- Image: semicolon
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 345 – Pentecost, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Semicolon | sem·i·co·lon | noun | a punctuation mark (;) indicating a pause, typically between two main clauses, that is more pronounced than that indicated by a comma. [definition from Oxford Languages]
- Voices Together [link to purchase through Menno Media] 797 Text: based on Menno Simons, Reply to False Accusations, 1552; stanzas 1, 3, 4 vers. David Augsburger, 1978; adapt. Esther Bergen, 1990; stanza 2 by Mennonite Worship and Song Committee, 2017 © Mennonite World Conference
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**Philippians chapter 2 contains what is thought to be the earliest Christian hymn. Paul’s words to his beloveds in Philippi can be likened to a music director’s instructions to a singing group. Seattle Mennonite Church is like a choir with many voices, singing a complicated oratorio. Using this metaphor the instructions to the singers become: highlight your own part, practice and then listen to others so you know when to come in.
Sermon begins at minute 5:02*Philippians 2.1-13Image: Goshen Women's World Choir 2019, Goshen College Events Photography
Hymn: “What Wondrous Love Is This” (VT 564) Contributors: Alice Parker Tune: American traditional, Southern Harmony, 1840; harm. Alice Parker, © 1966 Alice Parker
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.*
**Paul writes from prison in a tradition repeated since his time by many activists, scholars and prophets of the Gospel. But this letter is less prophetic and more a love letter to a beloved congregation. In the style of Paul's letter to the Christians in Philippi, Pastor Amy writes her own letter of thanksgiving and encouragement to the Mennonites of Seattle.
Sermon begins at minute 6:50
Scripture: Philippians 1.1-18a**
Photo credit Ylanite Koppens
Resources
- Full Text of Pastor Amy's Sermon
- Hope Is A Discipline feat. Mariame Kaba — Beyond Prisons Podcast
Hymn: VT 717 Music: American traditional (USA), 1842; adapt. Sacred Harp, 1844 Text: K. L. Cober (USA), 1960, alt., © 1960 K. L. Cober, renewed 1985 Judson Press
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
**What if taking a break is okay? What if being Beloved is enough?
Sermon begins at minute 4:09**
Acts 17:16-34
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 342 – Paul in Athens, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Nonprofit AF taking a break this week; here’s a picture of a kitten,” Vu Le, May 8, 2022.
- “The Love of God” VT 162. Public Domain. Text: F. M. Lehman (USA), c. 1917, stanza 3 based on Rabbi Meir (Germany), “Haddamut,” c. 1050, and Qur’an 31:27 (present-day Saudi Arabia), alt. Music: F. M. Lehman, c. 1917; arr. Claudia Lehman Mays (USA), alt.
- “The God Who Only Knows Four Words,” Hafiz, from The Gift, trans. Daniel Ladinsky
- IMAGE: Rogue, photo by Megan Ramer
We zoom in on the powerful image of Paul and Silas, political prisoners, behind bars, surrounded by other prisoners listening to them, as they SING HYMNS to God. They are singing before **the miracle. They are singing as strategy, as prayer, and as soul-nourishment individually and collectively. We hear stories from some Mennonite sisters in the contemporary Jesus Uprising, as we ponder our own singing before the miracle, joining the Spirit’s groaning with sighs too deep for words.
Sermon begins at minute 7:23*Acts 16:16-34* Image: Jailed civil rights protesters, Tuscaloosa AL, 1964.
Hymns:*Come Now, O God: Words - ©2018 GIA Publications, Inc., Contributors: David Bjorlin
My Life Flows On: Music - ©1989 MennoMedia Inc., Contributors: Brethren Press*
**Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources**
- Mother God, by Teresa Kim Pecinovsky, ill by Khoa Le; read just before the recording
- “Expanding our identity in worship,” Sarah Augustine, Vision: A Journal for Church and Theology, Spring 2022: “Music and the arts”
- “Music and inclusion in Mennonite worship and peace-justice work,” an interview with Sarah Nahar, Vision: A Journal for Church and Theology, Spring 2022: “Music and the arts”
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 341 – Of Jailers and Slave Girls, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Black and Indigenous Solidarity in the Haudenosaunee Confederacy: Stopping the Narrative Violence of Columbus in Downtown Syracuse, New York,” Sarah Nahar, Stories of Repair: A Reparative Justice Resource toward Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery (2021).
- Porter's Gate, whose music from their album Justice Songs we used in our time of response.
- “Ramadan Nights Provide Cherished Pause in a Sudan on the Brink,” by Declan Walsh, The New York Times, April 28, 2022.
Rev. Dr. Randy Woodley looks at Luke's story of Jesus' parents losing him on a trip to the Temple in Jerusalem. He reflects on the ways that we can find hope in our younger generations. We may not understand them, but, they are evidencing all kinds of changes in our usual way of being in the world and in religion. Dr. Woodley reflects on what it would mean for The Church to work at being open to the ways that they are already "about their Father's business". They might not frame it that way. Jesus did.
Luke 2:41-52 **Image: Randy Woodley
Resources:**https://www.randywoodley.com/
- Interview about Randy's book Becoming Rooted
- Interview about Randy's book that was read in the service Harmony Tree
**Yes, it’s exceedingly unfair that Thomas gets such a bad rap. But that’s a sermon that’s been preached a thousand times, including several times by Pastor Megan. Instead, this week she dives deep into what she’d always previously glossed right over. Jesus says to the gathered, frightened, newly Spirit-filled disciples: “As my Abba God sent me, so I am sending you.” With a huge nod to the BibleWorm podcast Scripture geniuses, Pastor Megan wonders what it means to be sent just as Jesus was sent by Abba God. In short: We are sent to be incarnated - to experience kinship and share life with all of creation. Thanks be to God!
Sermon begins at minute 1:45*John 20.19-31* Resources**
- BibleWorm podcast: Episode 339 – Jesus Appears to Thomas, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Image: some Seattle Mennonites experiencing kinship with Thornton Creek (our watershed!), during Faith Climate Action Week 2022, photo taken by Pastor Megan Ramer
Hymn: VT 358
text: Victimae Pashali trans. FW Herzberger, 1911 music: German traditional
Death may not be the end of the story, but death is in the story. Like many of us, Mary is deeply feeling grief, loss and trauma after the loss of a beloved friend. She goes to the tomb, sad and disoriented and from the midst of those feelings, she encounters God. The resurrection joy she experiences does not take away her trauma but it does transform it. God is calling each of our names too, coming alongside and desiring joy and wholeness for all God's children even in the midst of our pain.John 20.1-18 **Image: SMC's Flower Cross, Easter 2022, Vija Merrill
Resources:**
- ING Podcast from Menno Media: "Rejoicing" with Angela Williams Gorrell (mennomedia.org)
- Willie James Jennings in conversation with Miroslave Volv: Joy and the Act of Resistance Against Despair | YCFC (yale.edu)
- Bibleworm podcast on the empty tomb: Episode 338 Come to the Tomb (John 20:1-18)
**Who is Jesus? Throughout John’s gospel, Jesus makes a series of key “I AM…” claims to various groups of people. I AM… the good shepherd, true vine, gate, living water, light of the world, way-truth-life, bread of life, the resurrection and the life. Additionally, John’s gospel begins - in gorgeous poetry - by naming Jesus as Word. Incarnate and embodied Word. Word made flesh, who tented among us. True and living Word. The Empire’s ultimate power over the people is death, and Jesus threatens that tenuous power-over by wielding life. As a result, Jesus is subject to an excruciating trial and torture, which at last gives way to his brutal execution. Pilate tacks a sign on the cross naming Jesus “King of the Jews”. But Pilate doesn’t get the final word on who Jesus is. Jesus-followers for centuries have named and claimed him as: teacher, friend, savior, brother, prince of peace, mother hen, way, and so very much more. Who is Jesus to you?
Sermon begins at minute 7:51.**John 19:16b-22
Image: word cloud generated by Seattle Mennonite Church worshippers, using Poll Everywhere **April 10, 2022.
Hymn: VT 329 Were You There
Text: African American spiritual, Journal of American Folklore*, 1897. Music: African American spiritual,* Old Plantation Hymns**, 1899
Resources:
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 336 – The Executed King, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- The Bibleworm Collaborative, Discord channel, April 2022.
- Glenn Boyd, executed by the State of Alabama, March 31, 2011, for the murder of Evelyn & Fred Blackmon.
**We are in our third week in a row of Jesus’ trial, and the story is getting increasingly painful to endure. If we stick with it enough to actually take it in, to allow ourselves to feel all we feel, we might notice that - while horrific - it’s not actually all that exceptional. Jesus is getting slowly and brutally churned up by the carceral system of his day, in the same way that beloved humans are slowly and brutally churned up by the carceral system of ours. Pastor Megan explores some of those contemporary echoes in the story, lamenting our complicity and the harm experienced by each one. We visualize a “circle of grace” within which each beloved - even in the midst of violence and violation - might experience the presence of God, who knows exactly what it’s like to be humiliated, violated, chewed up, and spat out. God, have mercy.
Sermon begins at minute 2:58.*John 19:1-16a* Image: detail from Our Lady of Ferguson****, by Mark Doox
Resources**
- Circle of Grace curriculum, Dove’s Nest, https://dovesnest.net/circleofgrace
- “Since I Been Down,” documentary about Kimonti Carter, former president and current member of the Black Prisoners’ Caucus, and founder of TEACH (Taking Education and Creating History), an innovative prisoner education program.
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 335 – The Trial Before Pilate, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- CORRECTION: The photos mentioned from Guantanamo Bay were actually photos of prisoner abuse by U.S. soldiers at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison in 2004.
- Black Mamas Bail Out Action with SONG (Southerners on New Ground)
- “Sandra Bland did not kill herself,” Crystal A. deGregory, The Atlanta Voice, May 9, 2019.
- Harold Moss, first Black mayor of Tacoma, 1929-2020, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Moss
The scene in Jerusalem during this time of Passover is fraught, and occupying imperial power is tenuous. Crowds travel all across the Judean landscape to convene in Jerusalem for an annual pilgrimage in which they retell a story of their ancestors finding liberation from oppressors. The contemporary oppressive overlords tremble at the prospect that the power of the people may rise up against them. It’s in this context that Jesus is tried by Pilate. The wheels of imperial self-interested violence cycles churn away - keeping everyone afraid of everything all the time. According to John’s gospel, Jesus has come as a True **Word that stands in opposition to the siren voice of the bandit leading his violent and scattered revolt. Nothing could be more threatening to the occupying imperial powers than an embodied TRUE word of belonging and nonviolent resistance.
Sermon begins at minute 3:14*John 18:28-40* Pilate Judgment, detail from a 15th century icon (*public domain*)
Hymn: Ah, Holy Jesus, VT 330 Words and Music - ©PD Public Domain
Music: Johann Crüger; Text: Johann Heermann**
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 334 – What Is Truth, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Willard M Swartley, JOHN: Believers Church Bible Commentary, Herald Press (2013).
- Women’s Bible Commentary, eds. Carol A Newsom and Sharon H Ringe, Westminster John Knox Press (1992).
- The Queer Bible Commentary, eds. Deryn Guest, Robert E Goss, Mona West, Thomas Bohache, SCM Press (2006).
Francis J Moloney, S.D.B., The Gospel of John, Sacra Pagina Series Vol. 4, The Liturgical Press (1998).
**On our Lenten journey in John's Gospel, Jesus is falsely arrested and accused for embodying truth that exposes the lies of powerful authorities, while Peter struggles with the call and cost of discipleship. That 1st century struggle between truth and lies is reflected in a 21st century reality in Iraqi Kurdistan, where activists and journalists are falsely arrested, accused, and imprisoned for exposing the lies and corruption of political authorities. The CPT Iraqi Kurdistan team accompanies, advocates for and amplifies the voices of those who are unjustly oppressed by political authorities. The struggle over following Jesus' truth or empire's lies is our choice today as much as it was Peter's choice then.
Sermon begins right away.*John 18.12-27* Photo credit CPT & Weldon Nisly
Community Peacemaker Teams links:**
- https://cpt.org/programs/kurdistan
- https://cpt.org/
- https://cpt.org/about/cpt-name-change
**Jesus was completely unruly at the margins of one of his community's most sacred celerations. Disruptions to Solemn Ceremony are very unexpected and annoying. But, Pastor Megan invites us to look for the life amongst the disruptions, to find the path of love that allows us to hear what the Disruptors, like Jesus, have to say.
Sermon begins at minute 2:20*John 7:37-52* Photo by Thirdman from Pexels**
**To be frank: John is a bit extra. John’s gospel will take anything that Jesus says or does in Matthew, Mark, or Luke, and turn the dial all the way up to “whaaaat?!” Following the feeding of way-more-than-5000 with 5 barley loaves and 2 dried fish, Jesus begins his discourse with “I AM the bread of life.” Which sounds positively quaint by the time he gets to the rather graphic proclamation that only those who munch on his flesh have life in them; that those who munch on his flesh will have eternal life. What can it possibly have meant then or now to munch on Jesus’ flesh?
Sermon begins at minute 7:25
Scripture: John 6.35-59 Image: meme**
Hymn: VT 480 I Am the Bread of Life Contributors: Sr. Suzanne Toolan Tune: © 1966, 1970, 1986, 1993, 2005, GIA Publications, Inc. Text: © 1966, 1970, 1986, 1993, 2005, GIA Publications, Inc.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources:
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 327 – The Bread of Life, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- Willard M Swartley, JOHN: Believers Church Bible Commentary, Herald Press (2013).
- Women’s Bible Commentary, eds. Carol A Newsom and Sharon H Ringe, Westminster John Knox Press (1992).
- The Queer Bible Commentary, eds. Deryn Guest, Robert E Goss, Mona West, Thomas Bohache, SCM Press (2006).
- Francis J Moloney, S.D.B., The Gospel of John, Sacra Pagina Series Vol. 4, The Liturgical Press (1998
We're all on the lookout for a sign - the thing that tells us we're on the right track, headed in the right direction - even if we're not superstitious. In the Gospel of John, Jesus is performing miracles, but John calls them signs, and they serve that strategic function of pointing the way to the big picture of God's love and God's kin-dom. In today's text, Jesus offers healing to a man's son, not out of compassion but because he sees that through this healing, he can point to the power of God's love, along a road that will end in resurrection.
Sermon begins at minute 5:09
Scripture: John 4.46-5.18 Hymn: Healer of Our Every Ill #00115Words and Music - ©1987 GIA Publications, Inc. Contributors: Marty Haugen
**Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Photo by Brendan Church on Unsplash Ace of Base's I Saw the Sign**
Okay, they don’t precisely “walk into a bar”, but they do meet at their local “watering hole”... the well… literally a hole with water **in it. Ha! Do I have your attention yet?! Two people like them are NOT supposed to interact at all, but these two beloved humans conspire to cross religio-socio-cultural boundaries to encounter one another: human to human. Neither do they shy away from the most pressing theological dispute that fuels the sometimes violent antagonism between their respective peoples. The Samaritan woman (anonymous) dives right into the thorns with the Jewish man (Jesus), and by the end of it all she goes to her people with 1) an invitation: “Come and see…”, and 2) an open question “Could this man be…?” Stick around through all the noticings in this gorgeous story, and be treated to a “biblical experiment in decolonization,” thanks to the compassionate heart and imaginative mind of one baptized with the waters of Shoal Lake 40 in Treaty 1 territory, Canada.
Sermon begins at minute 7:41**John 4:1-42
- Image: JESUS MAFA. Jesus and the Samaritan Woman, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=48282 [retrieved January 31, 2022]. Original source: http://www.librairie-emmanuel.fr (contact page: https://www.librairie-emmanuel.fr/contact).
- Note on JESUS MAFA (Vie de Jesus Mafa): French Catholic missionary François Vidil worked with Mafa Christian communities in Northern Cameroon in the 1970s to create a set of 63 paintings depicting the life of Jesus as if they’d taken place in a Cameroonian village.
- Hymn: VT 536, I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say. Contributors: Ralph Vaughan Williams, ICEL Tune: Music: traditional English melody, arr. By Ralph Vaughan Williams, 1872-1958 © Oxford University Press, London. Text: Text: Horatius Bonar, 1806-1889. Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 324 – The Woman at the Well, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- JOHN: Believers Church Bible Commentary, by Willard M Swartley, Herald Press (2013).
- Women’s Bible Commentary, eds. Carol A Newsom and Sharon H Ringe, Westminster John Knox Press (1992).
“Stolen Waters, Thirsty People,” Susanne Guenther Loewen, from Unsettling the Word: Biblical Experiments in Decolonization, ed. Steve Heinrichs, Mennonite Church Canada (2018), 220-221.
Pastor Rachael Weasley of Community of Hope in Bellingham reflects on our church and hers, and gives us a teaching from John. She reflects on how this passage qualifies as a parable and on what it teaches us about where the wind, or Spirit, takes us. She brings us double meanings, gratitude for playful spirits and thoughts about how and what we know without seeing.
Reflections on our churches begin at 25:34
Sermon begins at 35:47
Rachael Weasley - Pastor of Community of Hope, BellinghamVisit them online to find out more and make a contribution.
- Scripture: John 3:1-21 Inclusive Version
- Image: Photo by Monique Laats from Pexels
- Hymn: Abide with Me - VT 502 Words and Music - ©pd Public Domain Text: Henry F Lyte, 1847 Music: William H Monk, 1861
Additional resources:
Wisdom Commentary, Mary Coloe
**We are now a few weeks into the mystical, strange, poetic, beautiful, mysterious, harrowing, polemical, and prophetic Gospel of John. Since we’ll be slowly walking through John’s gospel for the next several months, it seems important to address John’s mixed legacy in Christian history, as well as the fraught context within which John’s gospel was written. Trust me: it’s more interesting than it sounds! May we join John’s central project of pointing toward the Only Begotten, the Word made Body who tents with humanity, the Lamb of God anointed to take away the sins of the world, the One in whom Grace and Truth kiss.
Sermon starts at minute 5:45*John 2:1-12* Image: detail of St. John the Evangelist, manuscript illumination from the Lindisfarne Gospels, late 7th century
Hymns:*God, be the Love, VT43, Words and Music - ©2013 Worldmaking.net Contributor: Richard Bruxvoort ColliganWhere Love is Found, VT 524, Text: Brian Wren, 1978* Faith Looking Forward, 1983 Hope Publishing Co. Tune: English traditional, ca. 19th c., transcr. as “O Waly, Waly” in Folk Songs from Somerset, 1906 Harm. by James E. Clemens, © 2004 James E. Clemens
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Additional resources:
Podcasts: Several episodes of the Bibleworm podcast**, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
This passage of John continues the story of the "Word Made Flesh" in John 1 with the story of Jesus' first disciples. There are three things Pastor Amy can talk about in this passage from: How the gospel of John is next level (everything in John has multiple meanings), how quality time is Jesus' love language (the disciples who find Jesus abide with him), and how discipleship is like the Spiderverse (just like anyone could be Spiderman, anyone can be a disciple - even you).
- Scripture: John 1.35-51
- Image: Photo by Joshua Hurricks from Pexels
- Hymn: What Child Is This Tune: traditional Text: William C. Dix (England), Christmas Carols New and Old, 1871
Our final text in the Hebrew Bible, before arriving at the Gospel of John next week, is the beautiful poetry of Isaiah. We hear of God’s shalom vision: a great feast where thirst is sated and hunger no more; where none has need and we are shown that we’ve always had enough - plenty - abundance for all. As we seek God’s ways and reject all that blocks God’s feast, we become conduits of God’s Life to grow in and through and among us. And then, like the emotional finish line of a long race, creation itself cheers us on, bursting into song and bearing witness to the Abundant Life we together nurture. Thanks be to God!
Sermon begins at minute 3:21
Isaiah 55:1-13 photo: by Natalia Mok on Unsplash Bibleworm podcast: Episode 316 – Come to the Waters, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
Elijah is having a “No Bones Day” (check out the links re: Noodle the 13-year-old pug to understand this reference!), and his people are having a whole “No Bones” season. Surrounded by the bleak and very dead pile of dried out bones, Elijah has no reason to feel optimism when God asks, “Mortal, can these bones live?” and they so obviously cannot. But Elijah doesn’t need to feel optimism; that’s not what God asks of him, or of us. Instead, God invites Elijah - and each one of us, in our own places of bleak and lifeless despair - to practice hope.note: Pastor Megan does refer to Ezekiel as Elijah throughout. Feel free to mentally adjust that name as you listen. **Sermon begins at minute 4:20
Scripture: Ezekiel 37:1-14 Image: Noodle and Jonathan Graziano, of “No Bones” fame**
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 315 – The Valley of Dry Bones, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “No Bones” video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwE9cyXM_v4
- About Noodle, his human Jonathan Graziano, and their “No Bones” game: https://www.npr.org/2021/10/19/1047302978/noodles-pug-bones-no-bones-day-tiktok-mood-prediction
Advent is all about the messy middle. Smack dab in the middle of exile, destruction, and the crumbling of a people’s sense of identity, Jeremiah pens a letter encouraging his kindred to live now, thrive now. Build homes, grow food, and create families, he writes. Don’t wait until you’ve emerged out the other side of this unmooring experience, he seems to say, but claim life now. In your longing and waiting, in your sorrowing and struggle, seek the welfare of the strange new land and unfamiliar people around you, for in their welfare you’ll find your own. In the messy middle of our own collective experience (of lingering pandemic and so much more), perhaps we too can be encouraged to claim life now **as we redefine home and food and family, seeking the liberation and wellbeing of all.
Sermon begins at minute 2:57**
Jeremiah 29:1, 4-14 Bibleworm podcast: Episode 314 – Seek the Peace of the City**, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash**
**The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. But light is complicated. It can burn and glare. The familiar and beloved song from the prophet is about military conquest and might, a leader whose rule is absolute. Yet it still reflects God desire for a reign of justice and righteousness.
Sermon begins at minute 2:30*Isaiah 9.1-7Woman Walking on Pathway Under The Sun by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels
Hymn: Longing for Light, VT 715 or Christ, Be Our Light - Bernadette Farrell. Words and Music - ©1993 OCP
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.Fanti Podcast John O'Donohue's*To Bless the Space Between UsFull Text of Sermon
The prophets bring us beautiful poetry and powerful challenge. Amos is clear that justice must be established at the city gate, at the entry point, at the first. Everything else flows from that. Without justice at the start, God *can’t even* with our worship…! Without justice, our songs and praises are empty at best, nails on a chalkboard at worst. Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.
Sermon begins at minute 1:40 Amos 1.1-2; 5.14-15, 21-24 Photo by Ivan Aleksic on Unsplash For the Healing of the Nations - Fred Kaan, Words - ©1968 Hope Publishing Company [Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.]
Bibleworm podcast: Episode 311 – Let Justice Roll Down**, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
**We continue our journey through the Hebrew Bible and hear a story from 1 Kings of God speaking to the prophet Elijah. Listen to our preacher’s reflections on the nature of God, God’s voice, God’s silence, our experience of the pandemic, and how to navigate when God shows up in unexpected and new ways.
Sermon begins at minute 4:04*1 Kings 19.1-16* [NRSV]*Rain Down*, Text and music © 1991, Jaime Cortez. Published by OCP. All rights reserved. [Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.]
**We remember our beloved saints who have passed on by reflecting on Jesus’ blessing, spoken to those who grieve: You shall laugh. And Jesus’ woe, delivered to those who laugh: You shall grieve. We are each one of us both, of course - those who laugh and those who grieve. Often all at the same time. And even when we experience a (brief) reprieve from one or the other, we are given to one another in community to bear the joys and sorrows of one another.
Sermon begins at minute 3:27
Scripture: 1 Kings 5:1-5; 8:1-13**
Music: Sally Ann Morris © 1998 GIA Publications, Inc.
Text: Thomas Troeger © Oxford University Press Inc. 2002.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Resources
- This Odd and Wondrous Calling: The Public and Private Lives of Two Ministers, Lillian Daniel and Martin B. Copenhaver
- “All Saints” prayer, by Janet Morley, All Desires Known (1988), 148.
- Photo: A couple of SMC saints - Chuck & Larry
**You are beloved and God’s Spirit is with you. Y’all are beloved and God’s Spirit is with y’all. We are beloved and God’s Spirit is with us. Sometimes the sermon is a mantra. With a couple of plump, plucked cherries atop.
Sermon begins at minute 4:20.**
- Scripture: 1 Samuel 16.1-13; Psalm 51.10-14
- Image: Photo by Mae Mu on Unsplash.
- “Beloved is Where We Begin,” Jan Richardson, from Circle of Grace: A Book of Blessings for the Seasons (2015), 96.
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 308 - The Anointing of David, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
**The story of Samuel and Eli is a study in how to listen and relate not just to God but between generations. It's easy for elders in the church to dismiss those who are young(er) as too inexperienced or idealistic to lead, and for the young to dismiss those who are old(er) as irrelevant or out of touch. What this story teaches us is that listening to each other allows us to hear God and be open to God's invitation. Pastor Amy brings a word of encouragement to each generation to listen with grace to the other and to lead confident in God's presence.
Sermon begins at minute 3:48
Scripture: 1 Samuel 3.1-21 Full text of the sermon: Prophetic Youth, Priestly Elders Image: "*Samuel in the Temple" by Laure Fournier in Children of God Storybook BibleHymn:* Here I Am, Lord - VT 545Text: Based on Isaiah 6. Text and music © 1981, OCP. All rights reserved. Contributors: Dan Schutte & Michael Pope
[Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.]**
**Though we think of manna as the bread that God rained down on the wandering Israelite community in the wilderness, “manna” was first a question. “What is it?!” The Israelites draw near enough to the strange flaky substance on the ground to ask “Manna?” and in so doing encounter the answer “Manna!” How might this story, along with the crowd asking Jesus for a daily dose of “bread of life”, inform our curiosity about seeking spiritual sustenance for our own lives?
Sermon begins at minute 04:06**
Scripture:Exodus 16.1-18
**Image: “Manna,” folio 6, from the Augsburger Book of Miracles (f°6), ca 1552
Hymn: Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah****; Words and Music - Public Domain; Text: William Williams; Music: John Hughes. [Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.]
Additional Resources:**
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 306 - Manna in the Wilderness, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Ich bin, du Ängstlicher,” Rainer Maria Rilke, Book of Hours: Love Poems to God - I,19; trans Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy (1996), 66.
Names can shape identity or character in powerful ways. When Moses asks God’s name, God responds with a verb: “I am becoming who I am becoming.” What does it mean, then and now, to be in relationship with a God who claims a name that is an action, a movement, a verb, a becoming…? Even as we weary of the constant adaptation required of us, especially now**, may we experience some comfort knowing that our God is on the move with us.
Sermon begins at minute 3:25*Exodus 2:23-25; 3:1-15; 4:10-17* Image: Moses before the burning bush. From the Haggadah for Passover (the 'Sister Haggadah'), unknown artist, 14th century.
Music: Taste and See - Tune: James E. Moore, Jr., © 1983, GIA Publications, Inc. Text: Psalm 34; James E. Moore Jr., © 1983, GIA Publications, Inc., Words and Music - ©1983 GIA Publications, Inc.**
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Additional resources: Bibleworm podcast: Episode 305 - The Call of Moses, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
**All of my first-born, rule-following instincts are troubled by this story of a younger son employing devious and conniving tactics to “steal” the blessing of his elder brother. But how was this story liberative to the people who remembered, told, recorded, and passed it down? Looking at the story again, with that question at the fore, reveals the subversion of power structures, within a trickster motif, and the ultimate blessing of ALL.
Sermon begins at minute 4:10**
- Scripture: Genesis 27:1-4, 15-23; 28:10-17
- Image: Isaac blessing Jacob, Esau returning from his hunt. From the Haggadah for Passover (the 'Sister Haggadah'), from the 14th century. [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Isaac,_Jacob_and_Esau.jpg]
- Hymns:
- Voices Together 440 - Ask the complicated questions, Joan Norris
Music - ©1989 MennoMedia Inc. [Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.]
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 303 - The Blessing of Jacob, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
The history of testing is troubling and it's been revealed how biased and even harmful tests can be. In the familiar passage of the binding of Isaac, God is giving the test. This story of God asking Abraham to sacrifice his child and Abraham proceeding to carry out this test without challenge or question is a troubling one for those of us who believe in a loving and merciful God. We ask, "How could God have done this?" But maybe that's the wrong question. How can we find more liberation in asking, "How is this liberating for those who tell it?" or "Why would a people tell this story of testing about their God and their patriarch?"Sermon begins at minute 03:42
Scripture: Genesis 21.1-3; 22.1-14
Image: Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- William J. Gaither, Text: Gloria Gaither, © 1974 William J. Gaither CCLI#15609
Additional resources:
- The Racist Beginnings of Standardized Testing | NEA
- Radiolab series on intelligence
- The Akehah Project
We start our new year with the Narrative Lectionary “In the [very] beginning…” (a very good place to start…). The first creation account, in Genesis chapter one, reveals a Creator God who creates and co-creates, makes and beckons forth life. And God sees all that comes to be and declares: “good, good, good, good, good, good, and SUPREMELY good.” Today is a good day to remember that “supremely good” is our original condition, our birthright, our truest and deepest core.
Sermon begins at minute 6:54.
- Scripture: Genesis 1:1—2:4a
- Image: artwork by Amy Marie Epp, 2021
- Hymns: Voices Together 830 - Go My Children
Go My Children, Music: Welsh Traditional, Words: Jaroslav J. Vajda. © 1983
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Summary: This one stumped Pastor Megan. We again ask: “Why do we worship?” And this week’s response, taken from our Voices Together hymnal, is: “To praise and give thanks.” Listen as Megan meanders through reflections on gratitude, even as she doesn’t feel very much like praising or giving thanks. And as she finds her way toward a genuine experience of gratitude, thanks to our gathering together as community for worship and shared life.
Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Resources
- Scripture: Revelation 7.9-12
- Photo Credit: Megan Ramer (worship art by Lisa Bade & John Flickinger)
- A Rhythm of Prayer: A Collection of Meditations for Renewal, ed. Sarah Bessey, 2021.
- Hymn: Praise, I Will Praise You, Text: French, based on Psalm 9:1-2, Claude Fraysse, English trans. Kenneth I. Morse ©1989 Hymnal: A Worship Book, Spanish trans. Pedro Stucky ©2003 Mennonite World Conference; Music: Claude Fraysse © 1975
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Summary: Pastor Amy realizes that God plays favorites! We, God's people, are the ones who God returns to again and again, we're invited to return to God's presence to be formed in worship. In worship we are shaped by the language in song, prayer and preaching. Week after week we tell the story of God and God's favored people. We come to understand who God is and who we are in relationship to God. In the Magnificat, Mary's worship tell's God's story. She passes the scripture and story and tradition on to Jesus, who also proclaims in worship, formed and favored by the story of the God who gave him life. We stand in their tradition.
Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Resources
- Scripture: Luke 4.16-19, 21 / Isaiah 61.1-2 (Voices Together 292); Luke 1:46-55
- Photo Credit: Megan Ramer
Hymns:
- Your Grace Finds Me - Text and Music: Matt Redman and Jonas Myrin; © 2013
- Together - Text and Music: Nathan Grieser; acc. Jonathan Landis © 2014
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Additional resources and citations:
- Full Text of Sermon
- Going to Church - BUILDING FAITH
Summary: Our pastors Melanie and Jonathan Neufeld have been with our congregation for the past 14 years, building a ministry with people experiencing homelessness, expanding the community of people who care about those living outside into a network, and offering companionship and love to those in our congregation. They share from their experience of ministry in Lake City as we prepare to bless them on their way to a new beginning.
Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Resources
- Scripture: Psalm 13 (excerpts); Philippians 4:4-7
- Photo Credit: Ken Kraybill
- Hymn: Lord, listen to your children praying, Voices Together 682; Ken Medema © 1973 Hope Publishing Co.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Summary: As we return to our church building for the first time in more than 17 months, we ponder the question: Why do we worship? Our new hymnal and worship resource, Voices Together, guides us through some of the foundational responses to that question. Firstly, we worship in order to be gathered as community. Summoned by the God who made us, we come home to God and to one another, finding (AND extending) belonging, welcome, transformation, liberation. However imperfectly: Welcome home, church…!
Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Resources
- Scripture: Isaiah 2.3-4, Voices Together 13
- Photo: by Kathryn Smith Derksen, in our worship August 15, 2021
In solidarity with Water Defenders at Line 3 in Minnesota, Christian Peacemaker Teams called on churches across Turtle Island to a Sunday of prayer and action during Eastertide this past spring - to better understand and support Indigenous-led resistance. Our own Weldon Nisly helped put the worship resource together and we were blessed to have him preach for us, weaving together several short stories that amplified the voices and bore witness to the lives of powerful, prophetic women.
Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Summoned by the God Who Made Us - Tune: American traditional; Text: Delores Dufner, OSB © 1993
- Beauty for Brokenness - Tune and Text: Graham Kendrick © 1993 Make Way Music
- Touch the Earth Lightly - Tune: SweeHong Lim © 2005; Text: Shirley Erena Murray © 1992
- For the Healing of the Nations - Tune: Henry T. Smart, 1867; Text: Fred Kaan © 1968 Hope Publishing Co.
Additional Resources
- Worship Resource from Christian Peacemaker Teams: https://cptaction.org/love-truth-action/
- Scripture: Psalm 23, adapted by Murphy Davis, in Surely Goodness and Mercy: A Journey into Illness and Solidarity
- Scripture: “Litany of Love from the Letter of John” adapted from 1 John 3.1, 16-24 by Weldon Nisly
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish
- Children’s Time: We Are Water Protectors, written by Carole Lindstrom, illustrated by Michaela Goade
- Call to Action: Stop Line 3 - Sign a petition to President Joe Biden … Video of Winona LaDuke responding to “What is Line 3?” … Read Sarah Augustine’s book “The Land is Not Empty” … Donate to Honor the Earth to support Indigenous-led advocacy, education, and litigation to Stop Line 3
- Blessing our Offerings: http://tinyurl.com/SMCoffering
- Image: from Christian Peacemaker Teams worship resource, 2021
Jesus told a parable “toward the necessity” that his hearers might be urged to pray persistently and not be discouraged. It was the story of a woman - a widow - who nevertheless persisted in crying for justice from an unjust judge who self-avowedly neither feared God nor respected people. As we emerge to resurrected life as a church community, may we grow in resilience and persistence - in the face of all that is different, hard, uncomfortable. And may we tune into the voices around us persistently crying for justice.
Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Scripture: Luke 18:1-8Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- As We Rise, O God, to Meet You - Text: David Wright © 2005; Music: James E. Clemens © 2005
- Longing for Light - Text and Music: Bernadette Farrell © 1993
- We Your People Sing Your Praises - Text: Rebecca Mosley and Josephine Munyeli © 2013; Music: Salvatore Ferretti as sung in East Africa, harm. Mennonite Worship and Song Committee, 2019
Additional Resources
- “Hope for a Broken World,” written and performed by Michael Bade, used with permission
- Call to Worship: adapted from Nancy C. Townley, writing at Ministry Matters
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish -https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our offerings: http://tinyurl.com/SMCoffering
- Photo by Timothy Eberly on Unsplash
Jesus is on a resurrection tour! He appears to the disciples not once but time and again - and then again when different ones among them are gathered. His set-list stays the same: Peace! But he changes the way he communicates. Likewise, we will need to communicate again and again the ways that we gather, our consent, our needs and what this new way of being looks like. We'll have to be patient and grace filled, even with the doubters. May Jesus bless us with his Spirit!
[Sermon at 24:08]
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Come Walk with Us, Contributors: Anders Nyberg, Lutheran World Federation, Gerhard Cartford, Tune: Arrangement © Peace of Music Publishing AB, admin. Walton Music Corp. Text: English tr. © Lutheran World Federation
- You're Not Alone - © 2005 Bryan Moyer Suderman/SmallTall Music, Tune: Bryan Moyer Suderman Text: based on 1 Corinthians 12:4-26, Bryan Moyer Suderman
- Holy Spirit Come to Us - Jacques Berthier, Taizé
- We will Walk with God Together - Text: Tr. by Bell; Tr. © 2002, WGRG c/o Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc., agent
Image: Drawing by Pastor Amy
On the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came to bless and honor difference, by allowing for bridging and understanding amongst differences. As we navigate the many differences in how we communicate, how we gather, and how we worship, especially in this season of transition toward resurrected life together, may we practice curiosity with ourselves and one another. Pastor Megan’s sermon, a continuation of our worship series “Presence in a Time of Transition,” begins at minute 17:05.
Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Holy Spirit, Come with Power - Tune: attr. B. F. White, The Sacred Harp, 1844; harm. Joan Fyock Norris, © 1989 Joan Fyock Norris; Text: Anne Neufeld Rupp © 1970, Spanish Trans. Barbara Mink © 1988
- We are One in the Spirit - Tune: Text: Peter Scholtes. Text and music © 1966, FEL Publications, assigned to the Lorenz Corporation, Dayton, Ohio.
- We Walk by Faith - Tune: Marty Haugen, © 1984, GIA Publications, Inc. Test: Henry Alford, 1844
Additional Resources
- Call to Worship: Howard Vanderwell and Norma de Waal Malefyt, Calvin Institute of Christian Worship
- Scripture: Acts 2:5-13
- Spirit of the Living God, Voices Together 740
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish, The Heron's Nest
- Nadia Bolz-Weber, “How do we catch up with friends when we are still figuring out who we are now? On AA, Lazarus, and Our Emotional Bodyguards,” June 6, 2021.
Bartimaeus is blind and cries out asking Jesus to have mercy on him. Rather than assuming he knows what Bartimaeus means by ‘having mercy’, Jesus asks him a direct and open-ended question: "What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus creates space for Bartimaeus to have full agency in answering for himself, naming his need and his longing. As we prepare ourselves for returning to embodied community together, we too will claim the practice of seeking robust and enthusiastic consent, in the spirit of Jesus! Pastor Megan’s sermon on communication and consent, a continuation of our worship series “Presence in a Time of Transition,” begins at minute 19:42.
**Series: Summer-Ordinary Time 2021
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
- The God of Sarah Praise - Text: David Bjorlin © 2019 GIA Publications, Inc., Music: Ashkenazic Yigdal, ca. 17th C.; transcr. Meyer Leoni, ca. 1770
- I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say - Text: Bonar, Horatius, Music: English Country Songs, 1983; harm. Ralph Vaughan Williams, 1906
Additional Resources
- Scripture: John 20:1-18
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish, The Heron's Nest
- Heart with Loving Heart United, Voices Together 813
- Prayers adapted from Re:Worship
- Blessing our Offerings: Donate
- Dove’s Nest: Faith Communities Keeping Children & Youth Safe, including information about their “Circle of Grace” curriculum
- Photo by Ave Calvar on Unsplash
Looking to the sacred text of John’s gospel, and the sacred text of creation, Pastor Megan ponders resurrection as not only a powerful Way of Life, but specifically as we emerge from the worst of the pandemic and begin our journey of return to incarnational community together. Bear witness to the powerful witness of fireweed at Lawetlat'la (name given by the indigenous Cowlitz people for the mountain many know as Mt. Saint Helens), regeneration of a renewed landscape of life, and the resilience of creation. [Sermon begins at 19:42]
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Now the Green Blade Rises, Music: French Traditional, Words: James Clemens. © 2001
- You've Got a Place at the Welcome Table. words and music: Joel Raney. © 2019 Hope Publishing Company
- Nothing Can Separate Us from the Love of God. Words: Romans 8. Music: James E. Clemens, © 2008 James E. Clemens
- Tuma Mina. Words and Music: Traditional South African
Image: “Regeneration at Lawetlat'la (Cowlitz name for Mount St. Helens),” taken by Megan Ramer, May 2021
The Holy Spirit comes to a community in the Pentecost story. And so we hear Scriptural reflections from our community. Pastor Megan shares what our Spiritual Leadership Team noticed and wondered about together as we dwelt in this story during Saturday’s meeting (in our morning practice of lectio divina). We are a people who gather around our center, covenanting with one another and our God. We are a people both gathered in and sent out by God’s Spirit. Thanks be to the Holy Spirit of wind and flame! [sermon begins at minute 15:30, covenanting begins at minute 32:05]
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Together - Text and Music: Nathan Grieser ©2014, Text rev. 2018
- Rain Down - Text: Based on Psalm 33. Text and Music © 1991, Jaime Cortez. Published by OCP.
- Come, Holy Spirit, descend - Text and Music: John L. Bell, ©1994, GIA / Iona Community / WGRG
- Holy Spirit, Come with Power - Music: attr. B. F. White, The Sacred Harp, 1844; harm. Joan Fyock Norris, ©1989 Joan Fyock Norris; Text: Anne Neufeld Rupp ©1970
Additional Resources
- Scripture: Acts 2.1-4
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish
- Prayers of the People: adapted from "Remake Us into the Church" by Norma Duerksen, found at togetherinworship.net
- Blessing our Offerings: http://seattlemennonite.org/donate
- Call to Worship: Voices Together 869
- Benediction: Voices Together 1067
- Photo: Seattle Mennonite Church says YES to our covenant, Pentecost 2021
Paul insists to the Galatians that all who follow Jesus are adoptees into the family of God and thus we receive our inheritance...not gold or property but Spiritual riches. As all adoptees know, family is the people who take care of you and who you take care of. Through the Spirit we can focus not on selfish desire but on taking care of each other and building unity.
Series: Narrative Lectionary - Year 3 - Eastertide
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Halle, Halle, Hallelujah! - Tune: Arr. by John L. Bell; © 1990, Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc., agent
- Thuma mina (Send Me, Lord) - Text: Zulu; Tune: South African Traditional; arr. © 1984 Peace of Music Publishing AB
- Renew Your Church - Tune: The Sacred Harp, 1844 Text: Kenneth L. Cober (1902- ), alt.
Additional Resources
- Scripture: Galatians 4.1-7, 5.16-26
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish:https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our Offerings: http://tinyurl.com/SMCoffering
- Praise God (Dedication Anthem), VT 70 - Text: Thomas Ken, 1695; Tune: Lowell Mason, 1830
- Image
- https://unsplash.com/photos/fkrHmwlutwY
- photo by Annie Marek-Barta on Unsplash
All of Acts is a story about a community / communities in transition; a story about finding a way together through much sorting and discerning; a story about claiming and releasing and improv; a story of a community’s long journey of becoming. All in the service of following Jesus together, as empowered by God’s Spirit. Today, Melanie and Jonathan share with us a story of our becoming, and theirs; a story of Community Ministry seeded in the rich soils of Seattle Mennonite Church and the Lake City neighborhood; a story of community ministries (plural!) midwifed, nurtured, and - ultimately - released. Today we embark on the sorrowful and sacred path of bidding the Neufelds farewell. Though it is impossibly hard to say goodbye to beloveds, we remember their time among us with deep gratitude, and we release them to seek and discover their next deep yes. God be with us, each one. [Megan’s intro begins at minute 21:15, Melanie & Jonathan’s sharing begins at minute 23:45]
Series: Narrative Lectionary - Year 3 - EastertideActs 15:1-18 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Come and Fill our Hearts - © 1982, 1991, 2011, Les Presses de Taizé, GIA Publications, Inc., agent; Contributors: Jacques Berthier, Taizé
- There's a Wideness - Text: Frederick W, Faber, 1861; Tune: Lizzie S. Tourjee, 1878
- Come Thou Fount - Text: Rober Robinson, 1758; Tune: American traditional in John Wyeth’s Repository of Sacred Music, Part Second, 1813
Additional Resources
- Call to Worship: Voice Together 862
- Prayers of the People: Voices Together 1048
- In Christ there is no East or West, Voices Together 390
- Scripture: Acts 15:1-18
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish:https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our Offerings: Donate
- Support Camp Carmec: Donate
- “Stay: A Blessing for Ascension Day,” Jan Richardson, Circle of Grace, 161 (2015).
- “We Shake with Joy,” Mary Oliver, Evidence (2009).
- Benediction: Voices Together 1068
- Image: Neufelds at Winnipeg Pride Parade, 2018, swiped shamelessly from facebook! :)
At first blush, Philip seems to be the hero of this remarkable story in Acts, being willing to expand the circle of the Jesus-following community. Philip offered baptism to the Ethiopian eunuch, a gender-variant foreigner from a racial minority. But Pastor Joanna Harader (of Peace Mennonite in Lawrence KS), invites us to take another look at the Ethiopian eunuch, and find a resilient and insistent faithfulness that has survived every possible barrier or attempt to cast out. Blessed be the resilient ones who show up for worship and community, in the face of marginalization. Blessed be the insistent ones who claim Scripture as their own, when it has so often been used against them. Blessed be the faithful ones who stare down the real possibility of rejection in order to ask the challenging questions and disrupt the status quo. “Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized???” [Sermon begins at minute 31:20]
**Series: Narrative Lectionary - Year 3 - Eastertide
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
- Come Walk With Us - Text: Zulu, South African traditional, trans. Gerhard Cartford © Lutheran World Foundation; Tune: South African traditional, Arrangement © Peace of Music Publishing AB, admin. Walton Music Corp. Text: English tr. © Lutheran World Federation
- Because the Words We Wait To Hear - Text: John Thronburg; Tune: Jane Marshall © 2003, Wayne Leupold Editions
- We Will Walk with God - Text: Xhosa, traditional Swazi, trans. John Bell; Tune: traditional Swazi, transcr. Swedish Youth Exchange project © 2002 WGRG, Iona Community
Additional Resources:
- Moons Prayer, by Michael Bade, used with permission
- Scripture: Acts 8.26-39
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish:https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our Offerings: http://tinyurl.com/SMCoffering
- Prayers: included words from “This is how we’ll make it,” a prayer by Rev. Mihee Kim-Kort, from A Rhythm of Prayer, ed. Sarah Bessey.
- “The Ethiopian Eunuch,” a conversation with the BK Apologist, Alfredo Valentin, and the Tru-ID Apologist, Adam Coleman - https://youtu.be/CtUKlodzizc
- Queer Virtue, Rev Elizabeth Edman, http://www.queervirtue.com/
- Image: “Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch,” Herbert Boeckl (1952 – 1960), fresco of the Seckau Apocalypse in the Angel's Chapel at Seckau Abbey, Styria, Austria; image licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
We had a 15 minute service of worship and prayer today followed by continuation of our Congregational Meeting from last week. Holy Work!
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Holy Spirit Come with Power - Text: Anne Neufeld Rup © 1970, Spanish trans. Barbara Mink © 1980; Music: The Sacred Harp, 1844, Harm. Joan Fyock Norris © 1989
- Renew Your Church - Text: K. L. Cober © 1960, renewed 1985; Music: American Traditional, adapt. The Sacred Harp, 1844
Additional Resources
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish
- Prayers of the People Adapted from Peter Haresnape's "Prayer of Formation," sourced from Christian Peacemaker Teams worship resources for solidarity with water protectors.
- Blessing our Offerings: Donation form
- Worship Psalm: Voices Together 184
- Benediction by Weldon Nisly, sourced from CPT worship resources
Acts tells us that as the community of disciples grew in number, “a dispute arose…” Not shocking for any of us who have ever been part of any human community: As numbers grow, disputes are surely to arise! This story of the early Jesus-following community trying to figure out how to organize themselves in the wake of Jesus’ death and resurrection, as their numbers are growing by the day, offers some insight into our own adventures in being community together. May we have ears to hear, and the grace to receive the Holy Spirit’s disruptions of our best laid plans as GIFT!
Series: Narrative Lectionary - Year 3 - Eastertide
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Come Away from Rush and Hurry Words - ©1999 MennoMedia Inc.
- The Church of Christ Cannot Be Bound Words - ©2005 GIA Publications , Inc.
- Our God in Heaven Words and Music - ©2008 Abingdon Press
- Go Now in Peace, Worship Continues Words - ©2004 Wayne Leupold Editions
Additional Resources
- Scripture: Acts 6:1-7:2a, 44- 60
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish
- Prayers of the People adapted from the Baptist Union of Great Britain
- Blessing our Offerings: http://seattlemennonite.org/donate
- Call to Worship: Voices Together 877
- Photo: Footbridge, Boulder River Wilderness, Megan M Ramer, 2021
The disciples on the road to Emmaus didn't recognize Jesus while he was walking with them. But like a flower that knows in its cells how to bloom, they knew in their bodies that to be disciples was to offer hospitality. They had been at hundreds of tables with Jesus offering welcome to strangers and sinners. Just like the disciples, we're living in a time of uncertainty, unsure of what comes next. Perhaps if we let the DNA of discipleship form us - welcome, hospitality, empathy and compassion - we'll be able to grow with confidence into whatever new form life will take.
[Sermon begins at 26:30]
Luke 24.13-35
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Christ Has Arisen, Alleluia! Words by Bernard Kyamanywa © 1968 Makurima University College; trans. Howard S Olson © 1977 Augsberg Fortress. Music Haya traditional.
- On the Journey to Emmaus, Words by Marty Haugen based on Luke 24. Music arranged by Marty Haugen from Irish Traditional © 1995 GIA Publications
- In the Bulb There Is a Flower, Words and Music by Natalie Sleeth © 1985 Hope Publishing Co.
- Go My Children, Words by Jaroslav J. Vajda © 1983 Concordia Publishing. Music Welsh Traditional.
Image: Photo by Michael Burrows from Pexels
We gather to celebrate the risen Christ with music, song and story. Children and their families bring their joy and creativity to the Easter story in a mini video-pageant and we conclude our worship with our tradition of belting out the Hallelujah Chorus (well, we hear ourselves singing from a couple years ago - but we belt along at home.) Alleluia! Christ is risen!
Series: Narrative Lectionary - Year 3 - Easter
Luke 24:1-12 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Lift Your Glad Voices - Text: Henry Ware Jr., 1817; Music: John E. Gould, 1878
- Eternal Light - Text: based on a prayer by Alcuin, 8th c., Christopher Idle, 1977 © 1982; Music: Irene Zacharias Moon © 2019
- Who are These? - Text: based on “Ad coenam Agni”, ca. 5th - 6th c., refrain, Brenda Hostetler Meyer, stanzas © 2019; Music: Jacek Galuszka © 1989
Additional Resources
- Scripture: Luke 24:1-12
- This Joyful Eastertide, VT 352
- When at Creation's Dawn, VT 121
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish:https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our Offerings: http://seattlemennonite.org/donate
- Call to Worship: Joanna Harader at SpaciousFaith.com
- Prayers of the People: adapted from Ann Siddall in Lent to Easter liturgies: Year C. Posted at Stillpoint Spirituality Centre.
- Learn How to Sign the Word Alleluia
- Easter Pageant: SMC children and their families, including Sarah, West & Aven, Elena & Adele, Daryl, Cedar & Rose, Kyle & Macaulay, Nico & Ethan and Naomi.
- Musical Accompaniment: Joanne Sprunger, Piano; Greg Thiessen, Trumpet
- Image: Photo by Jessica Lewis on Unsplash
Jesus is always surprising the crowds around him with his attentions; sometimes offending with his attentions. To whom is Jesus drawn? How often Jesus walks his body to the edge of the crowd and speaks directly to the marginalized or stigmatized one; calling them by name, or asking what they want, or offering them healing of some kind, or going to their home for a shared meal. And the crowds are left befuddled, or occasionally outraged. When Jesus gives his attention to a shouting blind beggar, and then to tree-climbing “tax guy” Zacchaeus, he enacts their belonging to the crowd. And the community has the opportunity, if they’ll resist the urge to reduce these beloved and complex humans to a stereotype, to experience salvation. Will they? Will we? [sermon begins at minute 29:05]
Series: Narrative Lectionary - Year 3 - Lent
Luke 18:31— 19:10 Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Let's Walk Together - Text: Laurie Zelman; Music: Mark A. Miller © 2007
- As A Sigh with Great Yearning - Text: Pierre Jacob (France) © SECLI; English adapt. Andrew Donaldson (Canada) © 2017 Music: Gaetan de Courreges (France) harmony Didier Godel (Switzerland) © FEEPR © 1988
- We Will Walk with God - Text and Music: Swaziland traditional; translated by John L. Bell © 2002
Additional Resources
- Land Acknowledgement: Mennonite Worship and Song Committee, 2019, from Voices Together, 878; Real Rent Duwamish:https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our Offerings: http://seattlemennonite.org/donate
- Enemy Pie by Derek Munsen
- Moon's Prayer - Michael Bade
- Prayers of the People adapted from "Prayer for Others" by Bruce Prewer
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 230 – The Blind Man and Zacchaeus, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- “Zacchaeus in the Present Tense,” C Wess Daniels, November 13, 2013.
- “The danger of a single story,” TED Talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, 2009.
- Image: Photo by Amer Mughawish on Unsplash
Jesus keeps on telling stories about wealth and money. Pastor Amy preaches on the rich man and Lazarus and the way, like the rich man in the parable, we are gatekeepers with wealth and resources. Unlike the rich man, we still have the opportunity to open the gate instead of stepping past those hustling for crumbs.
[Sermon at 29:10]
Scripture: Luke 16.19-31
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Here in this place - Text and Music: Marty Haugen © 1982 GIA Publications, Inc.
- What a Fellowship / Leaning on the Everlasting Arms - Text: Elisha A. Hoffman, 1887; Music: Anthony J. Showalter, 1887
Additional Resources
- Land Acknowledgement: Mennonite Worship and Song Committee, 2019, from Voices Together, 878; Real Rent Duwamish:https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our Offerings: http://seattlemennonite.org/donate
- Children's Time: Tiger Woman by Lawrence Yep. Illustrated by Robert Roth.
- Reparations: The Big Payback, hosted by Erika
- Move in Our Midst - Voices Together #827 - Text: Kenneth I. Morse 1942, 1949; Music: Perry L. Huffaker, 1950, The Brethren Hymnal, 1951
- Somlandela (We Will follow) - Voices Together #566 - Text and Music: Zulu; Zimbabwean traditional
Photo by Brandy Willetts on Unsplash
**Jesus’ parables contain an “excess of meaning” which makes preaching three of them on a single morning quite the challenge. What is one to do with the excess upon excess upon excess?? Instead of choosing just one sermon of the hundred variations a preacher might preach, Pastor Megan offers a whole series of vignettes, noticings, wonderings, sneak peeks of the sermons that might have been and might still could be. “I can talk about…” becomes a refrain for noticing the many noteworthy things in the stories of a shepherd with 100 sheep, a woman with 10 coins, and a father with two sons. In each case: rejoice, rejoice, rejoice… [sermon begins at minute 27:00]
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
- As We Rise, O God, to Meet You - Text: Delores Dufner, OSB,2013, alt., © 2016; Music: Nicolaus Decius, 1522
- Could it be that God is Singing - Text: Becca J. R. Lachman © 2004; Music: Southern Harmony, 1854,; arr. Alice Parker © 2008
- Longing for Light - Text and Music: Bernadette Farrell © 1993
Additional Resources
- Joanna Harader, “Bad at Math,” poem for Lenten Devotional, 2021.
- Amy-Jill Levine: “‘Prodigal son’ forces reassessment of Bible’s other brother pairs,” 2011 article in The Chautauquan Daily.
- Henri J. M. Nouwen. The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming. New York NY: Doubleday, 1992.
- Who Counts, by Amy Jill Levine and Sandy Eisenberg Sasso, illustrated by Margaux Meganck
- Photo: a mountainside sheep in England’s Lake District, by Megan Ramer
Summary: Jesus tells the truth about the violence his people were both experiencing and perpetrating. That truth-telling leads to lament: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem… How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!” And only then, in the wake of truth-telling and collective lament, can people find their way to the imaginative, healing, liberating path of Jesus. The writing of Joanna Lawrence Shenk leads us into engaging some Mennonite-specific truth-telling and lament about Dr. Vincent Harding and his experience as a Black prophetic leader in the mostly white Mennonite Church from the 1960’s on. We want to be willing! May we tell the truth, lament, and courageously find our way along the healing and liberating path to our Mother Hen Jesus’ wings. [sermon begins at 20:15]
Scripture: Luke 13:1-9, 31- 35
**Photo: Vincent Harding speaks at the Eighth Mennonite World Conference in Amsterdam, 1967. Box 19, Folder 8. Mennonite World Conference Records, 1923-2012. Mennonite Church USA Archives, Goshen IN.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.**
- Together - Text and music: Nathan Grieser 2014, rev. 2018 © 2014
- As a Sigh Great with Yearning - Text: Pierre Jacob, English adap. Andrew Donaldson, © 2017; Music: Gaetan de Courreges; harm. Didier Godel © 1988
Additional Resources
- Thy Word is a Lamp Unto My Feet - VT 398 - Text and music: Amy Grant & Michael W. Smith © 1984
- “Lament over Jerusalem: Commentary on Luke 13:1-9, 31-35,” Mitzi J. Smith, on Working Preacher blog, for February 28, 2021.
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 227 – The Parable of the Fig Tree, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
- The Cross and the Lynching Tree, James H. Cone, Orbis, 2013.
- “Beggars & Saints: What needs to be burned away so that we can hear Vincent Harding’s enduring call to revolutionary nonviolence,” Joanna Lawrence Shenk, Anabaptist World, February 12, 2021.
- Read more: “A Prophet Pushed Out: Vincent Harding and the Mennonites,” by Tobin Miller Shearer, Mennonite Life 2015, Vol 69.
I make plans. I create checklists. Checking boxes on those checklists is one of my greatest joys. And I’m TOAST without my calendar and its checklists. But Luke’s gospel gives us two very familiar stories in a row (Jesus at the home of Martha & Mary, and the parable of the Samaritan that many call ‘good’), and when taken together, a thread emerges. A thread of invitation beyond the plans. Even the Very Good Plans that we have for our time, our money, our energy. This does not mean that plans are inherently bad; they just occasionally prevent us from being present and responsive to an opportunity or person presented to us, in a moment for which we didn’t plan. Which of these was a neighbor to the suffering one? The one who (chucked their plans and) showed mercy. Go and do likewise… [sermon begins at 23:25]
Scripture: Luke 10:25-42
Image: Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Be Thou My Vision - Text: 10 10 10 10; ancient Irish; tr. by Mary E. Byrne, 1905; fr. Eleanor Hull's The Poem Book of the Gael, 1913, alt. Music: Trad. Irish melody; adapt. fr. The Church Hymnary, 1927.
Additional Resources
- God is Here Among Us Voices Together #62 - Tune: Jaochim Neander, 1680; Text: Gerhard Tersteegen,1729
- The Love of God Voices Together #162 - Tune & Text: F.M. Leaman, 1917; arr. Claudia Lehman Mays
- Heart with Loving Heart United Voices Together #62 - Tune: adapt. From “Sollen nun die Grunen Jahre, ca. 1700; Text: Nicolaus L. von Zinzendorf, 1723, trans. Walter Klaassen © 1965
- Land Acknowledgement: Mennonite Worship and Song Committee, 2019, from Voices Together, 878; Real Rent Duwamish:https://www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Blessing our Offerings: http://seattlemennonite.org/donate
- “Go and Do Likewise: Lessons from the parable of the Good Samaritan,” Amy-Jill Levine, (includes quoted excerpt from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s sermon on this parable)
- Bibleworm podcast: Episode 226 – Eternal Life and Truly Living, Amy Robertson and Robert Williamson, Jr.
A group has been meeting weekly for the past couple of months, going chapter-by-chapter through "Pursuing God's Will Together" by Ruth Haley Barton, a foundational text for the spiritual discerning we have done as church the past 7+ years. Jennifer Delanty was commissioned by the group to share with our congregation some of what they've been learning, wondering, and practicing together. Listen as she explores Jesus' experience of transfiguration, alongside our own experience of transformation, as we pursue holy indifference to anything but God's invitation to us. [Sermon begins at minute 20:15.]
Scripture: Luke 9.28-45
Image: "Pursuing God's Will Together," by Ruth Haley Barton
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license # A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Praise, I will Praise you Lord - © 1989 Brethren Press; Text: French; based on Psalm 9:1–2; Claude Frayssé; English trans. Kenneth I. Morse, 1988; © 1989 Hymnal: A Worship Book
- Darkness is not dark to you, God - Tune: Leonard Enns, © 2019; Text: Sarah Kathleen Johnson, © 2006 [sung to tune PICARDY, French traditional]
- O Lord, Hear my Prayer – Tune: Jacques Berthier (France); Text: based on Psalm 102.1-2; © 1982, Les Presses de Taizé, admin. GIA Publications, Inc.
- My Life Flows On - VT 605 - Text & Tune: Robert Lowry’s Bright Jewels for the Sunday School, 1869, refrain alt.; arr. © 1989 Hymnal: A Worship Book, alt.
Additional Resources
- In the Morning When I Rise - Text & Tune: African American spiritual, Public Domain; arr. Wendell Whalum © 1978
- Grant Us, God, the Grace - Text: Robert Murray; Music: attr. Christian Friederich Witt, adapt. Henry J. Gauntlett
- Call to Worship by Marlene Kropf, from Voices Together, 853.
- Land Acknowledgement: Mennonite Worship and Song Committee, 2019, from Voices Together, 878; Real Rent Duwamish:www.realrentduwamish.org/
- Photo: Pursuing God’s Will Together, by Ruth Haley Barton
We’ve got ourselves a BADnews - GOODnews situation with the pair of stories from Luke 7. Jesus is moved by a widow’s suffering to bring healing and a restoration of her wholeness in the community. Yet Jesus also brings healing to the “treasured” slave of a Roman military commander without liberating that slave from slavery. Additionally, Jesus calls that Roman military officer’s description of his own power and commanding authority “faith.” What?? On the one hand, Jesus’ mercy embodies his good news proclamation in his first public sermon delivered in his hometown just 3 chapters earlier, and on the other his failure to liberate and challenge the world’s domination structures seems completely inconsistent with who he’s proclaimed himself to be. Pastor Megan explores what to do when deeply troubled by Jesus, and - at least for today - casts the neat and tidy bows aside.
Sermon begins at minute 15:35.
Scripture: Luke 7.1-17
Image: Photo by Ilona Frey on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Here in this place - Text & Music: Marty Haugen, © 1982, GIA Publications, Inc.
- My Shepherd will supply my need - Text: based on Psalm 23, Isaac Watts, public domain; Music: American traditional, harm. J. Harold Moyer, © 1969 Faith & Life Press / Mennonite Publishing House
- O Lord, Hear my Prayer – Tune: Jacques Berthier (France); Text: based on Psalm 102.1-2; © 1982, Les Presses de Taizé, admin. GIA Publications, Inc.
- Jesus Christ is waiting - Tune: French traditional, 15th c.; harm. James E. Clemens, © 2001 James E. Clemens, Text: © 1988, Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc., agent
Additional Resources
- Let there be light - Text: William M. Vories; Music: Charles H. S. Zeuner
- Grant Us, God, the Grace - Text: Robert Murray; Music: attr. Christian Friederich Witt, adapt. Henry J. Gauntlett
- Call to worship by Carol Penner in Voices Together, 866
- Prayers of the People intro and closing by Ruth Duck, text from Voices Together, 735
- Benediction by Eleanor Epp-Stobbein Voices Together, 1069
We worship with Jesus in the field and in the synagogue. Jesus debates with his fellow Jewish leaders about God's gift of the Sabbath. The Pharisees and legal experts were trying to fence up the law, protecting it and their community. Jesus argued that the gift of rest and restoration for all of creation should not limit life and wholeness. Sabbath should not prevent God's people from sharing food to with hungry or from healing to those who are ill. For Jesus' disciples today, this story tells us something about the life-giving gift of Sabbath and about our own desire to put fences up around our the rules. Every fence should have a gate.
Today's Scripture reflections feature Jesus, a heap of fish, and pondering the BRAVERY of following. That leads directly into Brenda Salter McNeil's powerful storytelling of clergy in Ferguson in 2014 being asked by the young generation of leaders who'd witnessed a lack of integrity in the church: "Are you coming or not?" It is brave to show up, brave to receive critique, brave to change plans, brave to cede power, brave to remain rooted, brave to be humble, brave to follow.
Sermon begins at minute 12:50.
Scripture: Luke 5.1-11
Photo by Oziel Gómez from Pexels
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Sizohamba Naye (We will walk with God) - Text and Music Swaziland traditional, ©2002 WGRG Iona Community, GIA Publications.
Additional Resources
- Afternoon Prayer - by Michael Bade. ©2021, shared with permission
- Jesus walked this lonesome valley - Traditional Spiritual
- Call to worship: Joanna Harader at SpaciousFaith.com
- Brenda Salter McNeil, "Becoming Brave: A Tribute to Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr." Link to video: https://vimeo.com/496349681 (her 8-minute message starts at minute 19:50).
Crowds. They can be riotous, violent, insurrectionist mobs, afraid of losing power and hellbent on throwing a prophet off a cliff. Or they can be boisterous, hope-filled, sleeves-rolled-up masses resolved to build a movement for liberation. We meet both kinds in Luke's gospel and in our nation, both past and present. Recalling Jesus' inaugural teaching in his hometown, and honoring the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Pastor Megan ponders finding a home in the hope-filled crowd that support movements for liberation and celebrates good news for the outsiders of the outsiders. To watch the moving 2-minute film with archival footage, follow the link in "Additional Resources" below.
Sermon begins at minute 15:03
Scripture: Luke 4.14-30
Image: Photo by History in HD on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Guide my feet - Text and Music: African American Spiritual; harm. Wendell Whalum, © Wendell Whalum Estate
- Nothing is lost on the breath of God - Text and Music by Colin Gibson ©1996 Hope Publishing Co.
Additional Resources
- Jesus be the Center - Words and Music by Michael Frye © 1999 Vineyard Songs.
- Film by SALT, with archival footage of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom - https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2021/1/4/free-film-for-martin-luther-king-jr-day (all footage in the film are from Pond5's public domain section; the film's music is also purchased from Pond5).
My words are stuck God
Do I rage or do I weep?
Wrap me in your grace
“Haiku prayers” posted by John Stevens in Narrative Lectionary facebook group
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This week's images of white supremacy storming and occupying our Capitol have caused many of us to rage and weep. In short, to grieve. This was supposed to be a sermon about discerning paths, and in many ways it still is. Listen in as Pastor Megan explores the question of those who followed John the Baptizer into the wilderness, the same question many of us are asking: In light of all we have seen and heard, "What then should we do?"
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Sermon begins at minute 24:10
Scripture: Luke 3:1-22
Image: tweeted by Georgia STAND-UP
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Oh, Beautiful Star of Bethlehem - Text: Adger M. Pace, 1940. Music: R. Fischer Boyce, 1940. harmonized by Adger M. Pace.
- On Jordan's Banks the Baptist's Cry - Text: Charles Coffin, 1736, tr. John Chandler, 1861. Music: Musicalisch Handbuch...1690, arr. William Havergal, 1847.
- Praise the One Who breaks the darkness - Text: Rusty Edwards © 1987, Hope Publishing Co. Music: American folk melody.
- O Lord Hear our Prayer - Text: based on Psalm 102. Music: Jaques Berthier, © 1982, Les Presses de Taize.
- Grant us lord the grace - Text: Anonymous; Music: C.F.Witt, 1715, adapted by Henry Gauntlett, 1861
Additional Resources:
- Rachel Elizabeth Harding: facebook post - January 7, 2021
Sarah Augustine preached on the story of the boy Jesus in the temple. We connected deeply with Mary, dealing with a shamelessly unapologetic pre-teen son. And then - firmly identifying with his parents - Sarah invited us to see the freedom and unencumbered way of youth as the gift that it can be and - indeed - is. Unsettling as it can be. We are often tempted to dismiss youth as naive, unrealistic, or even just rude and demanding. May we grow in rejoicing at those who will not (yet) justify their/our systems, but will speak bold truths and offer incisive challenges. Listen in and you'll also hear some powerful storytelling of the youth with whom Sarah works. To learn more about Sarah's work in Yakima with the Dispute Resolution Center, check out their facebook page and/or their website.
Sermon begins at minute 14:15
Scripture: Luke 2.41-52
Image: Dispute Resolution Center of Yakima and Kittitas Counties
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Infant holy, infant lowly – Text: Polish carol, trans. Edith M. G. Reed; Music: Polish folk melody; adapted by A. E. Rusbridge, harm. © Mrs. A. E. Rusbridge
- Hail the bless’d morn – Text: Reginald Heber; Music: Southern Harmony, 1835, harm. © 1990 Alice Parker
Additional Resources
- Songs of praise the angels sang – Text: James Montgomery; Music: John Antes
- Ehane he’ama (Father God, you are holy) – Text: Harvey Whiteshield, tr. David Graber and others, © 1982 Mennonite Indian Leaders’ Council; Music: Plains Indian melody
- Call to Worship – Oscar Romero, from Sing the Journey, 137
- Opening Words – Cole Arthur Riley, Black Liturgies
- Children's Time – “Jesus goes to Jerusalem with his parents,” read by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, from his book,Children of God Storybook Bible
The Holy Spirit is on the move! The prophets Anna and Simeon are channeled by our own resident prophet Rita Kowats, this first Sunday of Christmas. The elders of Jerusalem wait, looking for the Spirit, ready to receive the infant Jesus and to declare the salvation of Israel. We are encouraged by these beloved elders - in scripture and in our midst - to also be God-receivers. Plus, Pastor Amy sings the children's time.Sermon at 16:30
Children's Time at 8:00
Resources:
- Hark the herald angels sing, words by Charles Wesley and George Whitfield, music by Felix Mendelssohn.
- What child is this. Words, William Chatterton Dix, 1865. Music, English traditional.
- O holy night. Words, Placide Cappeau. (Fr.) 1843 translation John Sullivan Dwight, 19559. Music, Adolphe Adam, 1843.
- Book: This is the Stable by Cynthia Cotton
- Image: "Song of Praise" by Rembrandt
This week in worship we continue to explore the rich and fertile darkness of Advent, hearing with Mary the invitation to partner with God in offering a home for God-with-us in her own body. And we experience a pageant like we've never done it before! Our families rose to the challenge of enacting and dramatizing the Christmas story from their own homes, speaking and acting and creating something our whole congregation could enjoy.
Pageant begins at minute 20:20.
Scripture: Luke 1.26-56
Image:
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Come, thou long-expected Jesus - Text: Charles Wesley; Music: Rowland H. Prichard, © Oxford University Press
- Come, Come Emmanuel - Text & Music: Rev. James Chepponis , © 1995, GIA Publications, Inc.
- We Three Kings - Text: based on Matthew 2.1-11; Text & music: Carols, Hymns, and Songs, 1863, John H. Hopkins, Jr.
- Joy to the world - Text: Isaac Watts; Music: “From Handel,” Lowell Mason
- Angels we have heard on high - Text: unknown; Music: traditional French carol
- The angel Gabriel - Text: Sabine Baring-Gould; Music: trad. Basque carol, arr. Edgar Pettman; Text & Music: ©1961 H. Freeman & Co.
- O come, all ye faithful - Text: John F. Wade; tr. Frederick Oakeley and others; Music: attributed to John F. Wade
- O little town of Bethlehem - Text: Phillips Brooks, 1868; Music: Lewis H. Redner, 1868
Other Resources, from Creative Commons: Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International (CC BY-4.0)
- Call to Worship – Advent Welcome, Anna Beth Roeschley, from “Along the Arc,” ©2017 Brethren Mennonite Council
- Offertory Prayer, Joanna Harader, 2017, spaciousfaith.com
Additional Resources
- With Mary Sing Magnificat - Text: Jeanette M. Lindholm ©2000; Music - trad. English melody, arr. Ralph Vaughan Williams, © Oxford University Press
- Prayer: Cole Arthur Riley, Black Liturgies
Episode Image: a still from our pageant (by the Reimergartins)
Seeds are germinated and nurtured in the deep dark black of soil. A newly liberated people draws on this rich metaphor in understanding how God's jubilee vision grows in them: from tender shoots of justice and praise, into oaks of righteousness. The prophet Isaiah helps proclaim God's release to these former captives, attending to their bodies and their cities, restoring both dignity and structures of justice. Seattle Mennonite Church has similarly long been called into the prophetic Community Ministry of bodily dignity and reforming our city's structures. God continues to be faithful in opening new paths to dignity and justice as we have experienced life alongside our neighbors who live on the streets. Listen as Pastor Megan preaches Isaiah (minute 17:47) and as Pastor Jonathan shares an exciting update about God's liberative work in our community ministries (minute 28:05).
Scripture: Isaiah 61.1-11
Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Bless’d be the God of Israel – Text: based on Luke 1.68-79, Michael Perry, ©1973 Jubilate Hymns (Admin. Hope Publishing Company); Tune: George J. Webb, 1830, The Odeon, 1837
- Joyful is the Dark – Text & Music: Brian Wren ©1989, Hope Publishing Co.
- Magnificat – Text: Taizé Community, Luke 1.46, 1978; Music: Jacques Berthier, Taizé; Text & Music: © 1979, Les Presses de Taizé, GIA Publications, Inc., agent
- My soul cries out – Text: Rory Cooney, based on Luke 1.46-58; Music: Irish traditional, arranged by Rory Cooney; Text & Music: ©1990, GIA Publications, Inc.
Other Resources, from Creative Commons: Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International (CC BY-4.0)
- Call to Worship – Advent Welcome, Anna Beth Roeschley, from “Along the Arc,” ©2017 Brethren Mennonite Council
- Offertory Prayer, Joanna Harader, 2017, spaciousfaith.com
Additional Resources
- Candle Walk: A Bedtime Prayer to God, by Karin Holsinger Sherman.
Anyone who has gone hiking or walking in the nighttime knows that darkness doesn't lead to not seeing; darkness leads to seeing differently. The prophet Joel writes that God's mothering, raven Spirit will be poured out on all flesh; causing children to prophesy, elders to dream dreams, and young ones to see visions. The nurturing embrace of darkness allows us to see differently so that we may first imagine, then believe, and finally begin to live into our elders' dreams and our young ones' visions. Thanks be to the God of shadows!
Sermon: begins at minute 21:00
Scripture: Joel 2.12-13, 28-29
Photo by Ryan Hutton on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Come Walk With Us – Text: South African traditional, trans. Gerhard Cartford © Luthern World Foundation. Music: South African traditional, arr. Anders Nyberg ©1984 Utryck; Walton Music Corp.
- Come, Holy Spirit, descend – Words and Music: ©1994 Iona Community / WGRG (North America)
- Joyful is the Dark – Words and Music: Brian Wren ©1989, Hope Publishing Co.
Other Resources, from Creative Commons: Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International (CC BY-4.0):
- Call to Worship – Advent Welcome, Anna Beth Roeschley, from “Along the Arc,” ©2017 Brethren Mennonite Council
- Offertory Prayer, Joanna Harader, 2017, spaciousfaith.com
Additional Resource:
- Instrumental Recording: Wayfaring Stranger – arranged by Michael Bade
In this worship we begin exploring in the dark. So much of the time language and culture teachers that all that is good and right an beautiful is full of light and all that is evil and terrible is dark. And thus that dark is something to fear and avoid. As we enter Advent with Daniel in the den of lions, we too may feel entombed: the darkening days, the fear of COVID, unknowns in political leadership. Yet we learn from Daniel's experience that though the dark is fraught and fearful, there is hope. There are angels.
Sermon by Pastor Amy begins 25:55
Resources:
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Joyful is the Dark, Words and Music Brian Wren © 1989, Hope Publishing Co.
- No Wind at the Window, Words by John Bell, © 1992 Iona Community. Music, Irish traditional, arr. Marty Haugen. © 1995 GIA Publications
- Comfort, Comfort O My People, Words by Johannes Olearius, 1671, trans. Catherine Winkleworth, 1863. Music by Louis Bourgeois, 1551.
Other Resources, from Creative Commons: Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International (CC BY-4.0)
- Call to Worship – Advent Welcome, Anna Beth Roeschley, from “Along the Arc,” ©2017 Brethren Mennonite Council
- Offertory Prayer, Joanna Harader, 2017, spaciousfaith.com
Additional Resources
- O Come, O Come Immanuel, words by anonymous ca. 6th-7th C., music Trope melody, 15th C.
- "In the Dark with the Lions," sermon by Amy Marie Epp. Full text here.
- “To Know The Dark” by Wendell Berry, from Terrapin: Poems by Wendell Berry
- Waiting is not Easy, by Mo Willems
Image by Isabella Juskova on Unsplash
The prophet Jeremiah records in a scroll God's words for God's people. The King, cozied up to a warming fire in his winter apartment, takes a penknife to the scrolls, excising and then burning God's words for God's people. But God's words have already been read in the hearing of all God's people; have already been inscribed on their hearts. So when God instructs Jeremiah to create a new scroll with the old words, Jeremiah is not only able to do so, but "many similar words were added to them." God's words of truth, justice, liberation, belonging, and covenant are for all people, are indestructible, and are both living and fruitful, giving birth to more and more "similar words" as God's people live into new times and places. This is good news!
Sermon begins at 16:45
Scripture: Jeremiah 36.1-8, 21-23, 27-28; 31.31-34
Photo: by Gaspar Uhas on Unsplash (detail)
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Music:
- Come and see - Words and Music by Marilyn Hauser Hamm, © 1974.
- Come thou fount of every blessing - Words by Robert Robinson. Music Nettleton. Public Domain.
- The Love of God - Words and Music by F.M. Lehman, arr. Claudia Lehman Mays, © 1917.
As I've lived with Isaiah's bizarre, fantastical, and awe-some / terrifying vision, I began to experience it as a musical composition:
- Introduction - In the year that King Uzziah died...
- Movement 1 - The Skirts of God
- Movement 2 - Frankenstein
- Movement 3 - Hineni
- Coda - Prayer of the Seraphim: Holy, holy, holy
Once through, I played with a musical variation of the whole composition for our congregation . I'm eyes wide open on how cryptic this description is. Trust me: it's fitting. I invite you into the mystery... [sermon begins at 14:14]
Scripture: Isaiah 6.1-8
Image: Skirt (of God?)
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- How Great Thou Art - Text & Music: © 1949, 1953 The Stuart Hine Trust CIO.
- I sought the Lord - Text: Anonymous, and written ca. 1878 (Public Domain); Music: J. Harold Moyer, © 1969 Faith and Life Press / Mennonite Publishing House
- May the Lord, mighty God - Text: based on Numbers 6.24-26; Music: Adapted from Pau-chen Li’s “Wen-Ti”
Jonah is dramatically, laughably angry about God's mercy for the Ninevites, and carries on a stompy, pouty tantrum. Often I laugh at his expense; this week I relate. We also recall that God's mercy for Nineveh follows sincere repentance and reparation of harm on the part of the powerful; and that Jesus centered his life and ministry among those at the pointy end of the State's violence. May we seek to do the same as we spread the faith. [sermon begins at 19:03; child dedication at 32:55]
Scripture: Jonah 3.1-10; 4.1-11
Photo by Neil Fedorowycz on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Here in this place - Words and Music: Marty Haugen © 1981 GIA Publications.
- Lord we bring to you our children - Words: Frank von Christierson © 1976 The Hymn Society, Hope Publishing Co. Music: American Folks Melody.
Other Resources
- Just as I am - Words: Charlotte Elliot, 1834. Music: English traditional.
- Hard Times Come Again No More - Words and Music: Stephen Foster 1894.
- When God Made You, by Matthew Paul Turner. Illustrated by David Catrow.
We may be able to identify with the widow of Zarephath who, in a time of a devastating, nation-wide crisis feels ready to die. In the midst of this certainty that she will not make it through, God provides a companion and the hope that each day she and her household will have just enough to make it. Pastor Amy invites us to find hope in that idea that, though we will never be completely satisfied, when we feel alone and desperate God will give us the resources we need to make to the end of each day.
Sermon begins at 27:23
Texts
- 1 Kings 17:1-16
- Full manuscript of the sermon, "Just Enough for Today"
- I Am One: A Book of Action by Susan Verde, pictures by Peter Reynolds.
Music
- "My shepherd will supply my need" Music: American folk melody, harmonized by J. Harold Moyer, © 1969 Faith and Life Press
- "Just a closer walk with thee" Words and Music: North American traditional.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- "He came down", Words and Music: Cameroon traditional. Arr. John Bell © 1990 Iona Community, GIA Publications.
- "Water has held us," Words: R. Deane Postlewaite. © 1978 Marjeane Postwaite. Music: Gaelic melody, harmonization by Martin Shaw © Oxford University Press.
From the womb of wild nature, Pastor Jonathan reflects on King David, new to kingship and in love with his royal residence. God too should have a divine place to dwell, David thinks! But God reminds David that the Divine has always dwelt with the people, roamed in the wilderness and been present in and through all things. Pastor Jonathan reminds us that our indigenous relatives have always understood this and that like King David, we have some un-learning to do about our desire to domesticate God. (Sermon begins at 18:45. You'll hear rain and weather in the background but hopefully that adds ambience!)
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Come Walk With Us, Text: South African traditional, trans. Gerhard Cartford © Luthern World Foundation. Music: South African traditional, arr. Anders Nyberg © 1984 Utryck; Walton Music Corp.
Other Resources
- O Healing River. Text: anonymous. Music: North American traditional.
- Where Does God Live? by Holly Bea
- "The Healing is Going On", by Michael Bade. Used by permission of the artist.
Image: Pastor Jonathan on his excursion to Cle Elum Lake Watershed north of Roslyn WA
Both in her "wretched" distress and joyous confidence, Hannah prays. She brings her "hot, holy mess" to her God, and she also prophetically sings of God's joyous and just Jubilee vision before it is visible to her or realized in the world. Perhaps her witness can serve as an invitation to those us of us also feeling a hot mess, whether or not we ever get our happily ever after. [reading from 1 Samuel in the voices of many SMC women and girls at 17:40; sermon begins at 21:03]
Scripture: 1 Samuel 1:9-11, 19-20; 2:1-10
Image: photo by Miguel Bautista on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- In the Bulb there is a flower - Words and music by Natalie Sleeth, © 1986 Hope Publishing Company
- We give thanks unto you - Words and music by Marty Haugen, © 1987 GIA Publications, Inc.
- Great is thy faithfulness - Words by Thomas Chisolm, Music by William M. Runyan, ©1923, 1951 Hope Publishing Company
Other Resources:
- Je louerai l'Eternel (Praise, I will praise you, Lord) - Words and Music (French) by Claude Frayssé, 1975, harmonization by Alaine Bergèse, © 1976. Translation by Kenneth I. Morse, © 1988 The Hymnal Project
- Call to worship: Re:Worship
God is angry at the Hebrew people over their casting of a golden calf for false worship, mere months after God has liberated them from slavery. God is angry. SO angry, in fact, that God seems ready to destroy them all... again. God ultimately relents from punishment and destruction, thanks to Moses and remembered belovedness. But the whole story prompts Pastor Megan to ponder her/our desire for a God of love, the reality of God's anger, and how often love looks more like anger than civility. Come along for the ride and let us know what you think! [sermon begins at 19:50]
Scripture: Exodus 32.1-14
Photo: www.pexels.com
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Over my head - Text & Tune: African American spiritual; arr. by John L. Bell, © 1997, Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc.
- The Lord is my light - Text & Tune: Lillian Bouknight; arr. Paul Gainer, © 1980 Savgos Music, Inc.
- There's a wideness in God's mercy - Text: Frederick W. Faber
- In the morning when I rise - Text & Tune: African American spiritual;
Other Resources
- Call to worship - from Ministry Matters, by Nancy Townly
- Tune (THE SERVANT SONG): Richard Gillard © 1977, Universal Music - Brentwood Benson Publishing; adapted by Betty Pulkingham
- In the morning when I rise - harmonization arr. by Wendell Whalum © 1978 Lawson-Gould Music Publishers, Inc.
- Children’s Time book - Ladybug Girl and the Best Ever Playdate, by Jacky Davis, ill. by David Soman
The Mennonite congregations across Washington State worked together to create a celebration video in honor of Mennonite Central Committee turning 100 years old. Normally we would have gathered this weekend for the annual Mennonite Country Auction, but this year we had to get creative about how to connect and experience community with one another. Listen to our full worship service here, but when you get to the celebration video at minute 14:15, consider switching over to youtube to actually WATCH it!
IMAGE: Mennonite Central Committee, centennial celebration logo
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Now thank we all our God - Text: Martin Rinkart, 1636; tr. by Catherine Winkworth, 1858; Music: Johann Crüger, 1647; adapt. by Felix Mendelssohn, 1840
- Come, Holy Spirit, descend - Words & Music: John L. Bell © 1994, GIA / Iona Community (Scotland) / WGRG
Other Resources:
- Washington Mennonite Fellowship: centennial celebration of Mennonite Central Committee - Video editing: Bryce Miller - www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6IR5MHyo6w
- Music in video: World of Mystery - Words & Music: Michael Bade © 2018
- Music in video: True Evangelical Faith - Text: Menno Simons; Music: Larry Nickel; Performed by: West Coast Mennonite Chamber Choir, 1991, directed by Tony Funk - www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmGZJA3kWkI
As a powerful Egyptian ruler, Joseph welcomes his family back into relationship and care saying, "Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good." Though many people interpret this to mean that terror or trauma experienced by people or creation is a part of a Divine plan. But God's dream for humanity is not terror but love and connection. It is dreamers like Joseph who connect us to the dream of God and who can inspire us to continue to pursue God's dream.
Sermon begins at 19:25
Transcript can be found here.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Here in this place, Words & Music: Marty Haugen, © 1982, GIA Publications, Inc.
- Response Music - I am sure I shall see the goodness of the Lord (Taize) Music: Taizé, © 2003 Ateliers et Presses de Taizé, GIA Publications, Inc.; Text: Public Domain
- My life flows on, Words & Music: Robert Lowry, 1869
Other Resources
- Let there be light, Lord God, Words: William M. Vories, 1908, Public Domain; Music: Charles H. C. Zeuner, 1832, Public Domain
We joined with Mennonite World Conference congregations around the globe in celebrating Peace Sunday. According to 1 Corinthians, when one of us suffers all of us suffer, and when one of us rejoices all of us rejoice. This, we as global Mennonites were urged to recognize, is peacemaking as accompaniment and solidarity. We got to hear a powerful story from our own Sarah Augustine of solidarity with the Wayana indigenous peoples of Suriname, and specifically with her friend Linia, who longs to protect her children and community from the mercury poisoning in their food supply due to extractive gold mining. [Regrettably, I failed to begin the recording until Pastor Amy's time with children, so the audio recording begins rather abruptly ... sermon begins at 9:35]
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 12.12-27
Photo: Mennonite World Conference, Peace Sunday
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- The love of God - Words & Music: F. M. Lehman, arr by Claudia Lehman Mays, Public Domain
- Bwana awabariki (May God grant you a blessing) - Words & Music: Swahili melody & folk hymn, Public Domain
Other Resources
- Mennonite World Conference, Peace Sunday 2020 worship resource
- We are people of God's peace, Words: Menno Simons, 1552, tr. Esther Bergen, © 1990 Mennonite World Conference; Music: Johann Hom, Public Domain
- You're Not Alone, words and music by Bryan Moyer Suderman. Used with permission.
- Suriname Indigenous Health Fund, www.sihfund.org
We are back to the Narrative Lectionary, and we kick off this year's journey through the biblical text with a Genesis creation account. In it, humans are created from the earth, for the plants, intrinsically connected to one another, and intimately sculpted and in-spired by God our Maker. Almost as soon as these relationships with earth, humans, and God are crafted, there is fracturing of our primal inter-connectedness. Is there any word of hope for we who are choking on the wildfire smoke of those fractures today? [Sermon begins at 22:55]
Scripture: Genesis 2.4b-7, 15-17; 3.1-8
Image: Photo by SwapnIl Dwivedi on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Woza nomthwalo wakho (Come, bring your burdens to God) - Text & Music: collected by Mairi Munro from the singing of the Mooiplaas congregation, South Africa - © 2008, admin WGRG The Iona Community (Scotland)
- Spirit, working in creation (Hymn to the Spirit) - Text: © 1978, John Richards. Music: attributed to C. F. Witt, Psalmodia Sacra, 1715; adapted by Henry J. Gauntlett, 1861
- Sizohamba naye (We will walk with God) - Text & Music: Swaziland traditional; translated by John L. Bell; transcribed by Swedish Youth Exchange Project, © 2002, WGRG The Iona Community (Scotland), used by permission of GIA Publications, Inc., agent
Other Resources
- Planet of the Clowns, by Bruce Cockburn; sung and played by Michael Bade
- When God Was a Little Girl, by David R. Weiss
We spend one final summer week with commentator Willie James Jennings, the Book of Acts, Paul imprisoned (yet again...), and the Holy Spirit calling Jesus-followers into common life and common space with one another. [sermon begins at 20:38]
Scripture: Acts 28:16-31
Photo by Karim MANJRA on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Longing for light - Words and Music by Bernadette Farrell. © 1993 Published by OCP
- You shall go out with joy - Music by Stuart Dauermann, Text adapted from Is. 55:12 by Steffi Geiser Rubin. © 1975, Lillenas Publishing Company
Other credits:
- In the morning when I rise - Words and Music: traditional; spiritual
- Book - The Colors of Us by Karen Katz - Read by Pastor Amy on YouTube
In this last Sunday of hearing from in our summer series: Jerrell Williams, pastor of Salem Mennonite Church, a fellow Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference congregation. Jerrell takes us on a journey with Hagar into the wilderness, a journey in which she encounters and names God El Roi, the God-Who-Sees-Me. This God who sees is also the God who walks with, who accompanies, who facilitates Hagar's survival and blesses Hagar with the promise that through her son Ishmael she has birthed a nation. This blessing and accompaniment by God undercuts the white Christian notion that blessing is equated with prosperity or possessions. Blessing is with those who are oppressed, who are marginalized, which is where we are called to be also. (Sermon starts at 20:35)
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Jesus Loves Me - Text: Anna B. Warner, 1859; Music: William B. Bradbury, 1862
- Hamba Nathi / Come, Walk with Us - Text (English Translation) © Lutheran World Federation, Tune Arrangement: Anders Nyberg, Gerhard Cartford © Peace of Music Publishing AB, admin. Walton Music Corp.
- My Soul Cries Out (Canticle of the turning) - Words and Music Rory Cooney © 1990, GIA Publications, Inc.
Other credits:
- Book - I Am Enough by Grace Byers, illustrations by Keturah A. Bobo
- Scripture - Genesis 21.8-21
"Disciples of Jesus should be desperate citizens. The desperate citizen will press their citizenship as far as possible for the sake of thwarting death and its agents."Pastor Amy explores the work of theologian Willie James Jennings and discusses the way our citizenship in nation should be engaged in relationship to our citizenship in the Reign of God. Now is not the time to opt out, when so many have had to fight desperately to be included.
Sermon begins at 22:32
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Jesus Loves Me - Text: Anna B. Warner, 1859; Music: William B. Bradbury, 1862
- What does the Lord Require - Words and Music by Jim Strathdee © 1986 Desert Flower Music/Jim and Jean Strathdee.
Other credits and resources:
- Seek ye first the kingdom of God - Words and Music by Karen Lafferty © 1972 Maranatha Music.
- Preaching to the Chickens: the story of young John Lewis, by Jabari Asim. Illustrated by E. B. Lewis.
- Scripture: Acts 25:1-12
- PHOTO: lettering by Amy Marie Epp, 2020
- Read more about the Acts Commentary by Willie James Jennings
- Pass the Peace in America Sign Language
- Land Acknowledgement: Real Rent Duwamish
- Offering: donations to Seattle Mennonite Church
We continue our summer worship series in which we listen to and learn from Black preachers. Today: Shannon Dycus, former pastor of First Mennonite Church in Indianapolis IN, and current Dean of Students at Eastern Mennonite University. We listened to Shannon’s 2016 sermon, delivered at Christian Theological Seminary, in which she in which she invites us to consider lament - Jesus’ and our own - in light of Jesus' image of our mother hen God gathering her brood to her breast with tenderness and vulnerability. [Sermon begins at 19:00, prayers at 34:35.]
Luke 13.31-35
PHOTO: lettering by Amy Marie Epp, 2020
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Come thou fount - Text: Robert Robinson, 1758; Music: American folk melody, J. Wyeth's Repository of Sacred Music, Part Second, 1813 - public domain.
- Jesus Loves Me - Text: Anna B. Warner, 1859; Music: William B. Bradbury, 1862
Other credits:
- Holy Spirit, come with power - Text: ©1970 Anne N. Rupp; Music: The Sacred Harp, 1844; harm. by Joan A Fyock ©1989, from Hymnal: A Worship Book, 26
- Children’s Time book: The Last Stop on Market Street, by Matt de la Peña
We continue our summer worship series in which we listen to and learn from Black preachers. Today: Austin Channing Brown, author of best-selling book, I'm Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness, and a powerful preacher. We listened to Austin's sermon, from the Evolving Faith Conference 2018, in which she revisits the story of Rizpah, whose sons were killed by King David because of their potential claim to the throne as descendants of former King Saul. In an act of final revenge against King Saul, Rizpah’s sons were hung on an open mountain hillside to decay in reach of scavenging birds and predators. Rizpah was outraged by the murder of her innocent sons, and climbed to the top of the hill where they hung in order to defend their bodies for weeks on end. In her anger and her grief, Rizpah stood up to power to fight for justice and dignity for her sons. [Sermon begins at 17:00, prayers at 38:10.]
2 Samuel 21.1-14
PHOTO: lettering by Amy Marie Epp, 2020
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- He came down - Words & Music: Cameroon traditional; Arr. by John L. Bell, ©1990, Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc., exclusive agent
- Jesus Loves Me - Text: Anna B. Warner, 1859; Music: William B. Bradbury, 1862
Other credits:
- Be Our Strength in Times of Trouble, Reunion Vocal Band, ©2020 Michael Bade, used with permission
- Children’s Time book: Each Kindness by Jacqueline Woodson.
Nothing about the yoke of intractable racism feels easy. Nothing about the burden of a runaway pandemic feels light. Is there any good news at all in these supposedly comforting words of Jesus? And what's the deal with all those words of judgment that precede the supposed comfort? Pastor Megan explores the good news of a well-placed "y'all" and steals her most memorable line (attributed, of course) from Pastor Melanie, "I'm in it for the shalom, [y'all]!" You'll have to listen in to connect all those dots. [sermon begins at 16:40]
Matthew 11:20-30
Image: Lettering by Amy Marie Epp, 2020
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- O Let all Who Thirst - Words & music © John B. Foley S.J. 1978
Other credits:
- You've got a place - Music & Words: traditional spiritual
- Just as I am, without one plea - Words by Charlotte Elliot, 1834. Music traditional English
We continue our summer worship series in which we listen to and learn from Black preachers. Today: Glen Guyton, the Executive Director of our denomination, Mennonite Church USA. He loves pie and is funny (though his wife may disagree). And he preaches a good word: When we flee from our path, or lock ourselves away in fear, God invites us back again and again ("I got you..."), and Jesus breathes the Holy Spirit on us, empowering us for the work of transformation and perhaps even some "good trouble" (RIP John Lewis). Sermon - "The Journey" - begins at 20:45.
Genesis 28.10-22; John 20.19-22
PHOTO: lettering by Amy Marie Epp, 2020
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- As I went down to the river - Music & Words: American folk song, arr. ©2004 James E. Clemens
Other credits:
- You've got a place - Music & Words: traditional spiritual
- Jubilee - Music & Words: ©2018 Michael Bade, used with permission
- Sermon - “The Journey,” Glen Guyton
- Follow the Drinking Gourd: An Underground Railroad Story, retold by Cari Meister, consultant David Burgess
We begin our summer worship series in which we listen and learn from Black preachers. We start with Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III, pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. With him we cry in lament for Ahmaud Arbery and so many other Black lives lost to the violence of white supremacy. With him we reach back into the history, celebrating the ingenuity, genius and resilience of Black people in American from enslaved to this moment. With him we are called from prayer into action on behalf of Black lives.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Hamba nathi (Come, walk with us) - Music & Words: South African Traditional; Arrangement by Anders Nyberg, ©1984 Peace of Music Publishing AB, admin. Walton Music Corp. Text: English translation by Gerhard Cartford, ©Lutheran World Federation
- The Lord is my light - Music & Words: Lillian Bouknight; Arrangement by Paul Gainer, ©1980 Savgos Music, Inc., admin. Malaco Music Group
Other credits:
- You've got a place - Music & Words: traditional spiritual
- Sermon - “The Cross and the Lynching Tree: A Requiem for Ahmaud Arbery,” Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III. To support the mission and ministry of Trinity United Church of Christ: http://bit.ly/TUCCSECUREGIVE, or CashApp: $TrinityUCC
- Children's Time - Let's Talk About Race by Julius Lester
In our annual Interdependence Day worship - on the Sunday nearest the 4th - we again expose the lie of supposed independence, and instead claim the joy of justly-ordered mutual dependence and collective liberation! Willie James Jennings's fiery, faithful commentary is our conversation partner as we engage the imprisoned Jesus-followers in the Book of Acts. We know that God's deepest desire is for the shaking of every prison foundation, the liberation of each imagination, and the release of every captive - on both sides of the prison bars. Thanks be to God! [sermon begins at 29:50]
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Acts 16.25-40
Photo by Jean-Guy Nakars on Unsplash
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Slowing Turning - Words by Delorses Dufner © 2003, GIA Publications, Inc., Music Gaelic traditional, harmonization by Richard Proulx © 1975, GIA Publications, Inc.
Other credits:
- You've got a place - words and music traditional spiritual
- Som’lan dela (We will follow) - Words and music Zimbabwean traditional
With our sibling congregations from around Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference, we lament not being gathered together for our annual assembly and we celebrate with the prompt, "Thanks be to God". Though, like the Psalmist in Psalms 9-10 we are experiencing the distress and anger of confronting injustice and oppression, we give thanks to God. Our Creator is a God of love and justice.
Message from Kathryn Jamison Pitts, our Conference Minister is at 14:47
Sermon from Pastor Amy Epp is at 24:54
Resources and citations:
- Video message and greetings from Kathryn on behalf of PNMC on YouTube
- Grey and Mama on TikTok - Grey says "thank you"
- Psalm 9-10 in the New Revised Standard Version
- Photo by Simon Maage on Unsplash
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Jesus be the center - words and music by Michael Frye, © Vineyard music, 1998
Other credits:
- Som’lan dela (We will follow) - Words and Music by Zimbabwean traditional
- My Life Flows On (How can I keep from singing) words and music by Robert Lowery, 1826-1899, Public Domain
In the drama of Acts, the Holy Spirit is the main character and the plot is The Common. What IS "The Common"? In short, it's the spectacular joining of God's people which enables collective boldness, criminal discipleship, and shared life. Pastor Megan reflects on insights gleaned through engagement with Willie James Jennings' magnificent commentary on the book of Acts as a "revolution of the intimate" (sermon begins at 22:20).
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SCRIPTURE: Acts 4:1-21; 31-35
IMAGE: Photo by Tirachard Kumtanom from Pexels
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Jesus Christ is Waiting - arrangement and music by John Bell © 1988, Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc.
Other credits:
- Som’lan dela (We will follow) - Words and Music by Zimbabwean traditional
- Before Me is Peace - Words Navajo traditional, Music by Pax Ressler, used with permission
Blessings for graduates abound! Today's homily by Pastor Megan (starts at 19:00) is a pastoral blessing for high school graduates and ALL. About not losing heart... until we inevitably do... and then what?? Also: pudgie pies & inherited tradition, but you're going to have to listen to make that "infinitely more tasty" connection. What a joy to be led by Pastor Amy (starts at 27:35) in wrapping each of our high school graduates in a hand-made comforter made just for each one, to bless them, and to send them with our love and our prayers!
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Be thou my vision - Words: Traditional Irish, translated by Mary E. Byrne; Music by Martin Shaw © 1931, Oxford University Press.
- Guide my feet - Words and Music: African-American Spiritual; Harmonization by Wendell Whalum, © Estate of Wendell Whalum.
Other credits:
- Som’lan dela (We will follow) - Words and Music by Zimbabwean traditional
- When God Made Light, by Matthew Paul Turner, Illus. by David Catrow.
Today, we tented with some Black Anabaptist kindred: Osheta Moore, Jerrell Williams, and Glen Guyton. Sister Osheta called her "Dear White Peacemakers" following to show up for anti-racism in better ways than we are. Pastor Megan follows her lead: I'm sorry. I'm listening. I'm learning. Also: Mennonites & Police Abolitionism - if we don't have the ancestors we need in this work, then our call is to BECOME the ancestors we wish we had. [sermon begins at 22:10]
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PHOTO: "Defund SPD," by Megan Ramer, June 2020
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- How Can We Be Silent - Words and Music by Michael Mahler, © 2003, GIA Publications, Inc.
- We walk by faith and not by sight - Words by Henry Alford; Music by Marty Haugen, © 1984, GIA Publications, Inc.
- My Soul Cries Out - Words and Music by Rory Cooney, © 1990, GIA Publications, Inc. (arrangement of Irish traditional tune)
Other credits:
- Not My Idea: A Book About Whiteness (Ordinary Terrible Things), by Anastasia Higginbotham.
In the days of protest, riot and rage over police violence against black people and the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Tony McDade and many others, we gather for Pentecost. We call on the Holy Spirit to come with power. We call on the Holy Spirit to burn and breathe in us as we kindle a fire under white supremacy in ourselves and in our systems. We remember that the Spirit breathes within us and within the bodies of black folks even to their last breath. #blacklivesmatter
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Halle, Halle, Hallelujah - Words and Music: Caribbean folk song, arr. Hal H Hopson, © 1998 Hope Publishing Company
- This little light of mine - Words & Music African-American Spiritual, public domain.
Other credits:
- Something Happened in Our Town, by Marianne Celano, Marietta Collins and Ann Hazzard.
- Holy Spirit, come with power - Words by Anne N. Rupp © 1970, Music The Sacred Harp 1844, harmonization Joan A. Fyock © 1989 - as found in Hymnal: A Worship Book, 26
- There are many gifts but the same Spirit - Words & Music by Patricia Shelly © 1977 - as found in Hymnal: A Worship Book, 304
Death swallowed up in life? That might be a little hard to swallow, considering the mounting statistics or loss of beloved ones in our lives. But when it comes down to it, what Paul is trying to communicate to the Corinthian church is how important our bodies are to God - in life and in death. That Jesus put on a human body to heal and feed and minister to other bodies like ours mattered to God too.
Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- You are salt for the earth: Words and music Marty Haugen, © 1986 GIA Publications
- Halle Hallelujah: Words and music Caribbean traditional, arrangement John Bell © 1990 Iona Community, used by permission of GIA Publications.
- Hope to the End: Words and music Church Neufeld. Used with permission of the artist.
What can be said of 1 Corinthians 13, the "love chapter," that you haven't already heard at one hundred weddings? How might we refuse to dismiss it as just another smarmy love song, and instead live every more fully, beautifully, heartachingly into its sacred siren song of love incarnate? Listen in as we sing together, pray together, and hear a familiar Scripture anew in the prophetic voices of some of our youngest ones.
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1 Corinthians 13.1-13
PHOTO: "Elephant Love Medley," Nicole Kidman & Ewan McGregor, from Moulin Rouge
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Healer of our every ill - Words & Music: Marty Haugen, ©1987, GIA Publications, Inc.
- Halle, Halle, Hallelujah - Words & Music: Caribbean folk song, arr. Hal H Hopson, ©1998 Hope Publishing Company
Other materials used as noted:
- Will you let me be your servant - Words & Music: Richard Gillard ©1977 Scripture in Song
The early community of Jesus-followers in Corinth struggled with factionalism - over-identifying with particular leaders. Just as Paul urged his friends to re-center Jesus, we too seek to center our collective call to discern how to walk the Jesus Way together in the particularities of our time and our place. It's Leadership Discernment season at SMC, and the very good news is this: we are a WE, and together - with our whole and real selves - we've got this. Listen in as we sing and pray together, AND get the scoop on which beloved has discerned a YES to serving as our next congregational chair!!
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Acts 18:1-4
1 Corinthians 1:10-18
PHOTO: current incarnation of Spiritual Leadership Team, Nov 2019
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Unless otherwise noted, permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- He Came Down - Words and music by John Bell © 1990 Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc.
- Halle, Halle, Hallelujah - Words and Music: Caribbean folk song, arr. Hal H Hopson, © 1998 Hope Publishing Company
Other materials used as noted:
- Be Our Strength in Times of Trouble - Words and Music Michael Bade, © 2020 Michael Bade. Used with permission of the composer.
- Maybe God is Like That Too, written by Jennifer Grant, illustrated by Benjamin Scipper, © 2017 used with permission from Beaming Books
What does the Thessalonian community have to do with popular broadways musical Hamilton? Like the musical's tribute to the battle of Yorktown, Paul's arrival in Thessalonica shook up the established Jewish community and turned their world upside down. Unlike the American revolutionaries, Paul calls the new believers to a revolution of non-violent love and justice. Knowing all about what it feels like to have our worlds turned around, how do with consider what we want to keep upside down as Jesus calls us to be members of his upside down realm.
Photo: modern Thessaloniki by Georgio Garipis at Unsplash
Joy infuses our worship and singing together; longing ignites our prayers. Pastor Megan's homily explores how biblical stories that seem to equate healing with miraculous physical cures, at best confound the deeper and more beautiful complexity of what we know about healing, and at worst cause great harm. At first glance our story from Acts 3 appears to be a transactional healing story (in the form of a physical cure) for one man, but upon holding its steady gaze reveals itself to tell a wildly more beautiful story of transformative healing for a whole community. How might a seemingly simple gaze reveal a path for healing our most profound ruptures, and might we find the JOY in that healing uncontainable?!
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Acts 3.1-10
PHOTO: screen shot of Rogue (the cat), beatifically demonstrating holy, healing gaze-holding, whilst Pastor Megan reflected on it - who was the better teacher?! ;)
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Halle, Halle, Hallelujah - Words and Music: Caribbean folk song, arr. Hal H Hopson, © 1998, Hope Publishing Company
- Amazing Grace - Text: John Newton, and fr. A Collection of Sacred Ballads, 1790. Music: Columbian Harmony, 1829.
This week, we jump from the gospel of Mark into Luke's distinctly different world and voice, as experienced in the book of Acts. Jesus is kidnapped by a cloud (!!!), and the disciples are left, jaws dropped, gawking at the sky. They are looking in the wrong direction, two messengers inform them, and they are also looking for the wrong thing altogether. Jesus doesn't call them - or us - "back to normal," but to something altogether different; you might even say ANYthing but normal. Listen in to our worship, praying, singing, and wondering together about crafting something new on the other side of this pandemic.
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Acts 1.1-14
IMAGE: detail from Albrecht Dürer, "The Ascension," public domain
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- My Soul Cries Out - Music, Irish traditional; words by Rory Cooney © 1990, GIA Publications, Inc.
- Halle, Hallelujah - Music, Carribean traditional; words by Hal H Hopson © 1998, Hope Publishing Company
- O Lord Hear My Prayer - Music and words, Jacques Berthier © 1982, Les Presses de Taizé, GIA Publications, Inc.
Easter comes whether we're ready or not. Thanks be to God! We gather to hear Mark's (short! sweet! scandalous!) resurrection account, to sing a couple of our favorite Easter chestnuts, to create a joyous cacophony of Hallelujahs, and to pray for and with one another. Oh, and Pastor Megan's "sermon in a sentence" this week? Fear isn't the final word; you are. Tune in for more on the Oxford comma, dangling prepositions (is that a real thing?!), and a gospel on loop.
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Mark 16.1-8
PHOTO: Easter Cross at SMC, 2018
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Christ the Lord is risen today - Words by Charles Wesley; music anonymous. Public domain
- Low in the grave he lay - Words and music Robert Lowry. Public domain
- Lift your glad voices - Words by Henry Ware Jr.; music by John E. Gould. Public domain
We gathered for a Good Friday service via zoom, to hear Mark's Passion Narrative, to sing, and to pray together.
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Mark 15.16-39
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
- Jesus walked this lonesome valley, words and music: traditional spiritual.
- Were you there, words: Old Plantation Hymns, Boston, © 1899, music: African-American spiritual.
- Stay with me, words: based on Matthew 26, music: Jacques Berthier, © 1984, Les Presses de Taizé, GIA Publications, Inc.
- How shallow former shadows feel, words: Carl P. Daw, Jr., © 1990, Hope Publishing Company, music: Thomas Tallis, The Whole Psalter Translated into English Metre, 1567-1568
We celebrate the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem with Jesus and shouts of Hosanna and waving our branches. Then Pastor Amy reflects on the good news of love poured out. Jesus silences the haters who would shame a woman for her loving gift and affirms extravagant love. He reminds them (and us) that there is more than one kind of good news. We will always be called to serve the poor. We will always be called to extravagant love.
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Mark 14.3-9
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Permission to podcast the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-726929. All rights reserved.
Sanna, Sannanina - South African Traditional, arr. Geoff Weaver. © 1993, The Jubilate Group
Hosanna, Loud Hosanna - Words by Jennette Threlfall, Music: Gesangbuch der H. W. K. Hofkapelle. Public Domain
Pave the Way with Branches - Words and Music by Bret Hesla. © 1999 admin. Augsburg Fortress
Sermon-in-a-sentence this week: "Keep alert and don't worry; its only the apocalypse." Tune in to hear Pastor Megan's brief reflection on reading the apocalyptic text of Mark 13 during a global pandemic, and to join our prayers and singing and sharing Christ's peace with one another. [Photo by 심 은하 on Unsplash]
Our new rhythm of gathering for zoom church from our respective homes each Sunday morning prompts Pastor Megan to claim with more regular intention her occasional practice of sharing a "sermon-in-a-sentence." This week's scriptural reflection can be distilled to this: "The heart of our faith is love of God, neighbor, self; all the rest is commentary." Tune in to hear a bit of that commentary, and to join your church community in praying and singing and recommitting ourselves to God's shalom vision of a just peace for all creation. May we hold on to one another in these days. [PHOTO: blue skies over Seattle in a time of global pandemic, Megan Ramer 2020]
There were 69 households participating in worship this past Sunday! Listen along to the prayers and sharing, music and reflection on scripture. Use the links below to find some of the resources named in the recording.
Scripture: Mark 12:1-12
Children’s Time: The Breaking Newsby Sarah Ruel
Offering: donate page of SMC website
More music by Michael B: Bai Tu Long Bay
Holy God, whose presence is known
in the structures we build
and also in their collapse,
inspire in us a community of hope,
not to contain your mystery but to be led beyond security
into your sacred space.
Blessing by Sheri Hostetler, pastor at First Mennonite San Francisco
Episode artwork: photo by Vija Merrill
Our first experience of gathering as church via Zoom. While absolutely nothing can replace being in the same space with our whole body-spirit selves, given the circumstances, this was a delight. Forty or more of us logged in for Lenten worship and prayer, and even some fellowship with folks who stuck around at the end. What an unexpected and sweet surprise it was to be able to gather with some in our SMC diaspora, as well as SMCers who are currently traveling away from home. We convened from Michigan, from Arizona, from Port Townsend on the Olympic Peninsula, from up in La Conner, and from our homes all across the greater Seattle region.
[Please note that the photo is only representative - We had so many folks logged in that not everyone could fit on a single screen!]
Not going to lie: this is a TOUGH message about the laughable impossibility of wealth in God's kindom and the dispiriting reality of growing homelessness on the West Coast and specifically on our front doorstep. But it's also about Jesus' love for we who have much, Jesus' sense of humor to help we who have much to perhaps laugh at ourselves, even if a bit uncomfortably. And it's also about the joy of God's kindom where - because wealth is NOT accumulated and pooled disproportionately - all have plenty and none go hungry or homeless or hurting.
Smack dab in the middle of Mark's gospel and SOMEone finally knows how to answer the persistent question: Who is Jesus? Peter responds, "You are the Christ." At this fulcrum, we've now tipped over to the second half of the gospel in which Jesus sets out to teach what being the Christ actually means. Jesus' first attempt to teach Peter about suffering, rejection, and death doesn't go so hot (mutual rebuking, Jesus calling Peter Satan...). When Peter thinks the bleachified, glowing, transfigured Jesus atop the mountain a few days later is a little more like it, he's again disappointed that they can't just stay in the glory. Listen as Pastor Megan reflects on what this story of a transfigured Jesus evokes in her as we stand at the precipice between the question (Who is Jesus?) and understanding its answer (What does "Christ" mean?).
The story of an insane, self-important, opportunistic, incestuous, tyrannical (but pretty small-time) political family is dropped into the Gospel of Mark just as Jesus' ministry is taking off: Herod. He thinks he can stop the Gospel message, but the Gospel cannot be stopped. Where there is oppression, there are prophets who name it and call it out. John way beheaded for it, but his message found new life in Jesus, and as Jesus disciples we are called to do the same to our leaders...some of whom may bear a striking resemblance to the Herod family.
Mark 6:1-29
artwork: Salome and the Head of John the Baptist by Caravaggio
A woman audaciously reaches for her own belonging and healing. There's not much left for Jesus to do... except to stop, seek her out, and quietly create the conditions for her to speak her whole truth in the presence of the community that has amplified rather than alleviated her suffering.
We are just starting our journey with Jesus through Mark's gospel, and already there's a pattern to his movement: margins --> centers of power --> get into / cause trouble --> retreat to margins for prayer and rest (and around and around). This causes Pastor Megan to think of a piece of our Mennonite history from Rosemarie Freeney Harding, with the formation of Mennonite House in Atlanta GA as a place of respite for activists and leaders in the black-led southern Freedom Movement of the 1960's. How might this movement pattern of Jesus shape our own lives of discipleship AND how might this bit of Mennonite history inform our discernment as a congregation of our place in God's liberation movements today?
Using poetry from Lifting Hearts off the Ground: Declaring Indigenous Rights in Poetry, by Lyla June Johnston & Joy De Vito, Pastor Melanie reflects on the beginning of Jesus' ministry and on what Jesus' followers are called to - both in scripture and today.
Photo by Joseph Barrientos on Unsplash
After a brief introduction by Dan, Kathryn Smith Derksen shares reflections on 4 years of life in (complicated and diverse, awe-inspiring and pain-filled) South Africa. And then she beautifully brings the message home with gracious truth-telling about colonialism in our own (U.S.) lands and among our own (Mennonite) people. Listen to her powerful invitation to resist bumbling around in denying, defending, or disappearing our problematic histories and present realities, and instead lean into reliance on God, caring for one another through connection and forgiveness, and working together for racial healing.
Daryl Morris powerfully raises his voice in word and song to reflect on his experience of seeking liberation from white supremacy. He raises his voice in longing and expectation for liberation as a response to the listening he has done to the voices of black folks - the prophetic and liberating voices of black history and the prophetic and insightful voices of his children.
An Advent sermon about longing and liberation, scrooge-y Zechariah and prophetic singing, despair and hope. Pastor Megan tosses out her written manuscript and dives deeper into why Advent is her truest spiritual home, and why she can't do faith solo.
Kat Goering reflects on the work of justice from her perspective as a public health grad student working with immigrant communities. She relates her experience of emerging from her white-centric, individualized analysis into the uncomfortable work of collective justice and liberation. She encourages our collective at SMC to seek the divine in each other and to seek to enact justice for all.
Comfort Y'all, My People
Pastor Amy cedes the sermon to a better preacher but reflects on the experience of the exiles Israelite being called by God to comfort each other in community. When God speaks, "Comfort, comfort my people" this isn't an offer but instructions. Offer each other care and comfort, for you who are troubled and in need also know bests how to console.
Jeremiah writes as his nation crumbles around him - from a prison in occupied Jerusalem, on the brink of the mass deportation of his people. Which makes his words of promise for justice and hope that God is making things right throughout the land surprising and incredible. On this first Sunday of Advent in which we are asking "What are we waiting for?" Pastor Megan invites us to tap into our own deep longing for God's justice, and to be ready to step INTO the vision as participants in more fully realizing God's justice throughout our own land.
Okay, so Hilkiah isn't actually Indiana Jones, but a whole epic adventure begins when he is sent on a mission into the under-construction temple and (re-)discovers the lost book of the law. Hearers of the lost-and-found-again scroll, including King Josiah and ALL the people, are chagrined to learn how far they've strayed from the faith, practices, and covenant of their ancestors. Engaging this epic adventure leads Pastor Megan to wonder about - in our own time and place and for our own church community - artifice and culture, the core of our faith-worship-practice, and the covenant seeds for justice and grace.
In startling twists: 1) cockroaches will apparently NOT be the last ones standing in a global apocalypse, 2) like a screeching record, a love ballad delivers lyrics of divine judgment, and 3) despite our best (read: worst) efforts, God's hope in us refused to be slaughtered. Listen in as Pastor Megan wonders about God's project of re-wilding for the sake of renewed life.
If you've ever found yourself on the pointy end of betrayal, I bet you'd tell a story of someone you loved. Or love still. So it is with God and God's people - at the time of the prophet Hosea and now. How can we ever come back from the ways in which we have betrayed our beloveds (especially our children and their futures), God's beloveds (everyone and all creation), especially when we are motivated by the best of intentions? Can we trust that God's most decisive motive toward us is impenetrable love? [Photo by Rene Bernal on Unsplash]
Pastor Amy recites the tale of Elijah's encounter with King Ahab and the dramatic showdown on Mount Carmel. Elijah was accused by the king of being a troublemaker. He absolutely was. In the way he challenged courageously, engaged humor and sarcasm (he had a potty mouth) and yet ultimately with prayerful humility, Elijah gives us a model of saintly trouble-making, calling God's people to the heart of God.
Skip ahead to minute 4:37 if you want to get right to the preaching and skip over the story. But it's a pretty good story.
1 Kings 5:17-39 and sermon text
Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence
1688 Treatise Against Slavery
A woman anoints Jesus' head with precious perfume. She offers this extravagant - even wasteful - gift under the angry eyes of the disapproving disciples. Yet Jesus says of that "what she has done will be told in memory of her." Sheldon Burkhalter explores the joy, love and beauty inherent in her gift and the way we who follow Jesus are called not only to acts of service but to acts of beauty as well.
This is part one. Part two concludes following the congregation singing "O Worship the Lord (in the beauty of holiness)"
Image by congerdesign from Pixabay
A woman anoints Jesus' head with precious perfume. She offers this extravagant - even wasteful - gift under the angry eyes of the disapproving disciples. Yet Jesus says of that "what she has done will be told in memory of her." Sheldon Burkhalter explores the joy, love and beauty inherent in her gift and the way we who follow Jesus are called not only to acts of service but to acts of beauty as well.
This is part two, following the congregation singing "O Worship the Lord (in the beauty of holiness)"
Image by congerdesign from Pixabay
King David is unmatched in the Hebrew Bible in stature and name recognition. How can this flawed and fallible person be THE ONE that is so lauded and admired? Pastor Amy tries to cut through the Bible's spin and see David with the eyes of Jesus. Which doesn't mean she likes him, but helps her understand that God's work is accomplished through him.
Image:
Gerard von Honthorst, King David Playing the Harp
God goes by many names. Maybe that's why when Moses asked a burning bush for it's name, God side stepped the question with the vaguest and most specific of answers: I AM. The God of our ancestors is big enough and intimate enough to answer to all names.
Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash
The struggle is real! The place of this story in our first testament is a witness to the reality that God's desire for humanity is that we both cling to and wrestle with our Creator. In the struggle that Jacob had with God, though he came out limping, he also came out blessed. After the surprise of the struggle, he saw the face of God.
We welcomed back to the pulpit our former intern Christie Dahlin to reflect on the ways we laugh - from discomfort or to keep from grief, to the pleasure of shared joy. As Sarah and Abraham have their lives and laughter transformed from bitter and pained to disbelieving delight at the welcome of their son, they realize that truly nothing is too wonderful the confound the mystery of God's work in their lives.
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Episode artwork by Guille Alvarez on Unsplash, who says this about his image, "I love to visit my grandma when I’m in Barcelona. She’s an example of fight against all odds. She was born before a Civil War, lived under a dictatorship for 40 years, with his father disappearing forever after exile. She then lost her husband very early and has lived more than 25 years alone in their flat in the city, always finding time to make her children and grandchildren smile."
Compared to the first chapter of Genesis, the story of creation in chapter two is tender and intimate, and speaks of God's caring closeness. God's fingerprints are all over creation and God's breath animates all creatures. When God scoops up some mud and created the first earth-ling then breathed into it, life begins! In times of stress and anxiety, in times of stillness and calm, we can still remember with each deep breath that God breathes within us and that we are connected to all other humans - just a bunch of God-formed mud-people - through the breath of God.
Full text manuscript of this sermon is here.
Aslan revives stone figures with his breath.
More about the book Jabari Jumps by Gaia Cornwall.
LaVar Burton Reads, a podcast in which your favorite star of Reading Rainbow and Startrek TNG reads his favorite short stories.
Long-time SMC member Lenae Nofziger recounts the places in her own life and in scripture where she find hope. She includes her own bout with depression, the strength of the prophets, the compassion and empathy of Jesus possible because of his own suffering. Suffering is not part of some cosmic plan by God, but "if suffering were unavoidable even for the son of God, how could anyone else avoid it?" Through it all, Lenae gives and account of the hope that is in her.
Pastor Jonathan reads from Jennifer's experience of Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference.
Madeleine Kelly Kellogg reflects on the highlights and experiences of being a youth at Mennonite Church USA youth assembly.
Doug Basinger reads the contribution of Sabrina Lindquist, SMC's representative to the Mennonite Church USA delegate assembly.
The sons of a father are lost - to the distant country of fast living and the distant country rules and jealousy. The woman lost and isolated by years of unclean bleeding. Through story and relationship, Jesus teaches a rhythm of solace: retreat and return and in the rhythm finding God.
Yep, that's ALL-CAPS on the COMMAND. What are we - a people who don't much like to be commanded at all - to do about having been commanded to remember the sabbath and keep it holy? What are we to do about the fact that we - on the regular - DON'T remember the sabbath or keep it holy? Whether you love and regularly practice sabbath, or resist it altogether, or think it completely unrealistic given the particulars of your life, this sermon is for you.
AJ Block reflects on worship and praise, hurt and freedom, the rhythms of reorientation, the embodied manifestation of the prophetic in our gathered body, and God's intention for us.
After hearing Mike read the gospel from Luke, Anna & Kevin each reflect - thoughtfully, vulnerably, honestly - on the story of Jesus offering healing to all 10 lepers though only one would say thanks, and God's coming to those (like us) most disoriented and lost. [Photo by Ev on Unsplash]
In May our adult Sunday School focused on beginning to understand our calling to hospitality to trans folks in our community. Starting with learning some basics about gender identity and expression using the Genderbread Person and some terms and definitions from BMC's Trans 101 resource, we turned the second half of the class over to Avery Kanode, who was gracious and generous enough to share from his own experience of realizing that he was transgender.
When if feels like life is too much, when people suck, when stress is eating us up, when injustice is rampant and we can't stand it, the Psalms are there for us. The Psalmist lets it all out at God in anger, blame, despair and grief and God takes it. Though we feel like the church doesn't want us to express our sadness or our anger, we never should feel like God is sending that message. Pastor Amy allows the Psalmist to speak and shares some of her own experiences of feeling the rising, overwhelming flood, knowing God to be present, loving mother through the storm.
Photo by Tim Marshall on Unsplash
What a gift to have these contemporary prophets & friends leading us in worship. Listen to inspiring stories and inspired reflections from members of the ecumenical / interfaith "Faith Action Climate Team" here in Seattle: Abby Brockway, Lynn Fitz-Hugh, and Keith Ervin.
We begin a worship series on the Psalms and, with huge credit to Walter Brueggemann, Pastor Megan begins by exploring how folks "on the desperate edge of their lives" cried these prayers and songs destined to last and resonate for thousands of year. And because a Psalm is better prayed than preached, Pastor Megan launches from Psalm 1 to write her own Psalm, her own "deeply human utterance" directed to the God of the wester red cedar, the redwood, the sugar maple, and the gingko. It is, at the last, a Psalm for something as fickle as happiness.
Listen to reflections from Pastor Megan interspersed with the reading of most of Romans 8 by Pastors Melanie & Jonathan. It's a whirlwind tour, but in the wind of that whirlwind, in the breath that allows words to be heard, and the breath that creates spaces between words, giving them meaning… in the wind and in the breath, perhaps God’s Spirit somehow - mysteriously - moves, dances, sighs in our midst.
Don't be an righteous tool, be a weapon of justice! With the armor of God, you too can do battle against the sin of white supremacy, racism and sexism. Sin's power is strong but new life in Christ and with the grace of God, we are free to shake off that power.
Resources in the sermon:
The Invisible Knapsack, by Peggy MacIntosh features all the ways that white folks carry privileges in daily encounters and experiences.
This American Life Episode "Get a Spine" featuring an excellent apology that models being a weapon of justice against sexism and harassment.
In our congregational meeting on June 2, 2019, we created space for telling the story of Mennonite Voluntary Service in Seattle, and for sharing memories and reflections.
It's all in that (long!) title: Pastor Megan begins her sermon with a greeting, based on Paul's greeting to the gentile Jesus-followers in Rome, then offers some CliffsNotes on Paul and his letter to the Romans, and concludes by sharing a bit of good news from these opening words of Paul's letter - good news of connection experienced and embodied across many miles.
We journeyed along with Paul and Barnabas, as they sought to follow Jesus and end up get mistaken as gods and frantically seeking to redirect! Pastoral Intern Christie explores the invitation and permission to go and do, even with the risk of making mistakes. As we move forward in small and faltering steps, there is a call to be in community and to root in remembering our deepest identity, that we are all God’s beloveds. [Photo by CHU TAI on Unsplash]
"What God has made clean, you must not call profane." Peter has visions of (forbidden) food while hungry and praying on a rooftop in Joppa, but it turns out to be far more than just a hunger-induced delusion. It turns out to be inspiration for him and his gatekeeping community to get out of the Spirit's way (or INTO the Christ-Spirit's Way) in not withholding belonging from unlikely others. Listen as Pastor Megan reflects on what this means for our embodied life as a community of radical hospitality, particularly in relationship with with our queer, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming folx.
Pastor Amy remembers the words of Waziyatawin, who told our congregation: These words do violence. The "Great Commission" in Matthew 28 is used to uphold the Doctrine of Discovery and has given white European colonizers a supposed reason to subdue and subjugate indigenous people and claim indigenous resources. But when we, Jesus' disciples, follow everything he's taught us, if the Greatest Commandments are to love God and to love our neighbor, maybe Jesus' final instructions to his disciples don't mean what we've always thought they meant.
Read the full sermon text here.
Learn more about Waziyatawin and find her writing here.
In the time with children, Pastor Amy read Big Cat Little Cat, by Elisha Cooper. A big cat teaches the little 'what to do, how to be, what to eat, where to go' etc. Like Jesus he's discipling the little cat.
The Empire tried to squash the Jesus Way of liberating love by killing him, and failed... miserably. Because life rose up. People, empowered by the Spirit of God, rose up. To proclaim and LIVE liberation and revolution and powerful insurrections of love together. Led - always - by women of color. Pastor Megan shares under-told stories of prophet-sisters leading uprisings of life from this world's tombs. [PHOTO: Worshipers dancing at an outdoor service during a festival in Brooklyn, New York. Some rights reserved by PaulSteinJC.]
Hosanna! Save Us! The cries carry Jesus from the donkey on the road into the temple, where he answers the call to save by with healing. Children and youth are even now calling out "save us". How may we respond with Christ-like action of action for justice and healing? (Sermon bonus: Pastor Amy sings Whitney Houston and Jesus Christ Superstar)
Image: Micah Bazant
Ye ol' sheep & goats. Pastor Megan shares how this passage meant so much to her in a time of shifting theologies and a changing faithview. Also making an appearance: Menno Simons, Mother Teresa, chevre, and #notallgoats. [Photo by Peter Lloyd on Unsplash]
It's our Gifts Discernment Sunday so there's only time for a brief homily, but Pastor Megan dips her toes in yet another "weeping & gnashing of teeth" kin-dom of God parable from Matthew and wonders if what sounds like punishment might, in fact, be grace?? Listen for how a circle of (mostly) women inspired this new possible interpretation...
Pastor Megan dives into both the thorns and roses of Matthew 18 and dares to say a few things about the fraught and tender topic of forgiveness. [Photo by Megan Ramer, Warm Beach WA]
"I gotta say: I really hate it when one of Jesus’ stories ends with evildoers getting thrown into fire. Don’t get me wrong, I dislike 'evildoers' as much as the next person, but burning them alive seems a little extreme..." Pastor Megan dives into some challenging parables, searching desperately for some good news, and wondering what each parable might contribute to our composite image of God's kin-dom, as revealed in Jesus' many, varied, and mystifying stories. [Photo by Kai Pilger on Unsplash]
Pastor Megan took us on a journey in this sermon. It is - to start - an invitation to prayer, then a snapshot, a wondering, a snippet, a slippery word, a preference, a story, a question, a complication, an affirmation, an encouragement, and - at last - a prayer. Come along for this exploration of generosity in the spirit of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount and the prayer he taught in Matthew 6. [Photo: Ñuke Mapu (Mother Earth), by Alicia Fernández]
"We want our forbears to stand on the right side of history...perhaps these cognitive gymnastics are a vain attempt to justify what is actually untenable." Jennifer Delanty talks about her realization as an adult the way the stories she'd been told as a child about one grandfather's infidelity and another's profitable land dealings erase the victimization and appropriation of indigenous persons and their land.
"I still remember the deed of our land in Oklahoma, signed over by the Cherokee nation, as they went on the Trail of Tears." Kyle Reimergartin walks into this declaration by his Mennonite Brethren grandmother and when he follows up later learns about land sales, Mennonite schools that were trying to assimilate native kids, and his ancestors' place in history. "I'm trying to be a storyteller and [with my students] it was really valuable for me to be a concrete example of how white people, divorced from the immediate impact of their actions, could think of themselves as just purchasing land from the United States government, while also knowing that the result of those actions were the forced migration and the death of many Cherokee Indians...as they walked the trail of tears...It's allowed my students to put a face on what white colonization looks like."
Jesus is baptized by John the Baptist in the River Jordan. This water ritual does more than simply mark his shift to public ministry; it effects that significant transition. Pastor Megan explores the inherent power in ritual to help effect transition in our lives - from the big to the small. And yes, pour over coffee is involved... [Photo by Tyler Nix on Unsplash.]
Jesus was a refugee. Jesus IS a refugee (and their name is Jakelin Caal Maquin, Felipe Gomez Alonzo). A weeping mother refuses to be consoled. What if the truest thing we can say from this Scripture is that we too ought to be inconsolable in the face of the horrific? Pastor Megan preaches a word of lament. [Image = detail from "Refugees: La Sagrada Familia" icon by Kelly Latimore]
Matthew's first verses may sound like a list of boring names. But these names tell the story of where Jesus came from. They tell the story of brokenness and triumph of loss and discovery, of exile and return. And especially when you look at the stories of the women, they tell the future of who Jesus will be and be with.
Here in Seattle, we've experienced an unusually windstormy couple of weeks, which makes an apt metaphor for our lives of gusty national politics, devastating news cycles, and the sturm & drang of December activities, expectations, and negotiations of awkward or painful or painfully nonexistent family dynamics. What will root us in these days? Pastor Megan mines Matthew's narrative of the birth of Jesus for roots to steady us in the windstorms of our world and lives.
Esther was more than just a vapid beauty queen. When her people were in danger she put her life on her line and used her power and privilege to accomplish justice. Esther's risk can teach us something about when and how we can examine our privilege and risk our comfort, security and power for the sake of a just peace.
A sermon from the depths of my soul for my favorite season of the year, Advent. On the lovely (accompanied by strings) and dangerous (banned by Nazis) Habakkuk, waiting, and the purest form of faith and hope summed up in a single word: nevertheless. ~Pastor Megan
Like a good spiritual director who knows we are both tender (in need of care) and infinitely fallible (in need of challenge), the prophet Jeremiah attends to a people in despair, and Pastor Megan invites us to receive his care and challenge in our own time and place.
What does it mean to be Christians in an age of perpetual war? Seminary Intern Christie, explores this question as we hear the words of the Prophet Isaiah, of swords to garden tools and nation not rising sword against nation; juxtaposed with a story of Assyria conquering Judah, a political circus of taunting and violence. Within this question, Christie explores the invitation to creative peacemaking, the need for church to do this work with, and the call to not grow numb as we engage in work for just peace.
We hear the story, rich with details and characters, of Naaman seeking a cure for his leprosy. Naaman's dogged pursuit of a cure is transactional and full of all the power plays he's accustomed to utilizing to his advantage, and it turns out he needs to be healed from all that at least as much as he needs a cure. Listen as Pastor Megan wades into delicate waters and reflects on her own experience of seeking cures and instead (or additionally) finding healing.
"To the angel of the Mennonite Church of Seattle..." Our 50-year-anniversary celebration weekend built toward our All Saints worship in which we heard letters of greeting, remembrance, and blessing from many of our former pastors. Pastor Megan shared her own epistle, honoring the saints whose vision gave birth to our church community, the saints who have walked alongside for the past 50 years, the saints who are yet to come, and the saints who have passed on from this world but never from our memories or hearts.
King Solomon plays a deadly game of chicken, with an infant's life at stake, and for this is he is called wise. Pastor Megan explores the anti-monarchy sentiment buried within this and other stories related to ancient Israel's kings, and considers the rotten-to-the-core empires of our own day. What are Mennonites, traditionally "in but not of this world," to do? Listen as she reflects on generational shifts in political engagement, doing ALL the things, and (like Jesus!) finding sustaining rhythms.
A story that moves from the quickstep to the tango. I the first minute or so of the recording is missing, with Rita's introduction of that key image of formality to freedom that she uses throughout her story.
Every woman has a story in which her body was in some way violated by a man. In which her consent was not sought. For Bathsheba her #MeToo moment changed the entire direction of her life. When David assaulted her she had no recourse. While there's very little redemption in this story, there's a little good news if we can learn from the prophet who confronted David in his sin. We too are called to prophetic naming and calling out of those who use their power to hurt, take and abuse.
Hannah shares her experience in community, benefiting from the fruit that other's planted and nurtured, and in turn sowing seeds that will grow plants from which others can harvest.
We continue our journey with the Narrative Lectionary into Joshua. Pastor Megan reflects on Joshua's final oration to his beloved people. You'll have to listen to figure out what on earth Yoda's got to do with it.
On his 40th Anniversary with his late wife Linda, Bob reflects on the way community has made God present over his and Linda's relationship with our church.
The ten commandments. They are often co-opted by institutions and governments as a litmus test for political affiliation. What they were in context was a covenant: identifying community, limiting the powerful and protecting the vulnerable. They were an offering and response to the God who raised up a people as on eagles wings.
Photo by Theo Leconte on Unsplash
Pastor Amy explores why the destruction of Pharaoh's army is so important to the story of the deliverance of the people of Israel and how, when it's used as a recurring chorus of salvation, a people oppressed need a God who is powerful enough to conquer armies. And also Disney.
What a week to hear this story! Listen as Pastor Megan exposes some of the troubling and resonant layers of our Genesis story of Joseph and Potiphar's unnamed wife. And yet heed the call to mark (Just)Peace Sunday with our Mennonite kindred across the country and world by reflecting on the sorry state of our immigration system here in the U.S. What might Joseph's story have to offer those of us distressed and those of us whose lives are disrupted by the vulnerabilities of migration?
Pastor Megan explores the extreme vulnerability Abram & Sarai must have experienced as part of their call to leave their land and kindred.
On this first Sunday of our Narrative Lectionary adventure, we start at the very beginning: Genesis. Pastor Megan wrestles with how Creator God becomes Destroyer God in the story of the flood, and the re-covenanting that takes place after. [Image: The Deluge, by Nicolas Poussin]
SMC member Melissa Kelly invites us to consider what the armor of God, fighting racism, the Deathstar takedown and attachment parenting have in common. And how we are called on as followers of Jesus to take off the armor of empire and put on the armor of God.
The explicit desire expressed in the Song of Songs can make us squirm, which is why we don't hear it in worship very often. But this book gives voice to human longing and and expression to the the desire between two lovers. It's been explained away by making it about God's love for humankind but really it's about two lovers who are really into each other - and that can tell us something about God too.
Pastor Megan reflects on the people we carry around within us, "releasing" and "retaining" the sins of others, and the ongoing practice of forgiveness.
On this Sunday, Pastor Megan shared the words of Jan Richardson, offering them as sustenance. © Jan Richardson, “The Gastronomical Jesus,” Reading from the Gospels, Year B, Proper 13 / Ordinary 18 / Pentecost +9: John 6.24-35, www.paintedprayerbook.com/2009/07/27/the-gastronomical-jesus/. [Photo by Ales Krivec on Unsplash]
Summer Ministry Intern Thalia Neufeld dives into the way the Holy Spirit moves throughout Scripture and her understanding of the Spirit's work in the world. She also relates her experience with the !explore internship program at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary and how the collective experience with other young people doing ministry work shapes the way she understands the work of the Spirit in her life.
Jesus and his message of God's reign of love were rejected in the town where he grew up. That rejection pivoted Jesus into a ministry that was even larger and more broad, full of healing and the love of God than the people in Nazareth imagined. Pastor Amy explores how rejection can be turned into empowerment.
A large groups of SMCers traveled to Boise this summer and had a great time! Pastor Megan reports on the annual meeting of Pacific Northwest Mennonite Conference that took place in Boise ID at the end of June. She shares stories, reflections, business, "fun details," and highlights from our time of worship and delegate meetings, service projects and shared meals, anvils and donuts, and even getting to know the new Executive Director of Mennonite Church USA, Glen Guyton. [PHOTO: presenting a garden tool made from a gun to survivors of gun violence who bravely shared their stories, having turned their trauma into public activism]
We welcomed Erica Lea-Simka, pastor of Albuquerque Mennonite Church in Albuquerque NM, to preach for our Pride Sunday worship.
Pastor Megan reflects on the most "boring" of all parables in which nothings happens ... or is it EVERYthing happens? Listen for punch lines like: "the smallest of all seeds which, when sown, grows and becomes the greatest of all ... shrubs!" and "if there were 7 habits of highly effective seeds, they would be 1)grow, 2)grow, 3)grow, 4)grow, 5)grow, 6)grow, and 7)grow." Also: a word for our grads and the adults who most love them.
Reflecting on Mark's story of Jesus facing accusers very early in his ministry, Pastor Megan explore how "Scribes ... they're just like us!", has a few words to say about the supposed "unforgiveable sin," and shares her desire to be among the misfits who get to sit at the table with Jesus and be claimed by him as true family.
On Trinity-ish / Trinity-PLUS Sunday, Pastor Megan shares snapshots of some of the MANY names for God and images of God that make up her limited yet growing collage of who God is.
The Holy Spirit is active and expansive and there is no getting away from her. God's promise is to breathe into our dry bones and enliven what feels barren, to bring life where there is no hope. God's Spirit is as powerful as a mighty wind and as intimate as each breath. From Ezekiel to Acts to the beloved ones receiving the waters of baptism, to all who hear this word, "I will put my Spirit within you and you will live!"
All goodbyes are not created equal. Listen as Pastor Megan reflects on a couple of the goodbyes she's experienced, her semi-obsession with good goodbyes, and what we can learn about all of this from the time Jesus said goodbye for the last time to his closest friends and companions. It's Ascension Sunday and it's time to stop craning our necks...
[Photo by Katarzyna Gonsior on Unsplash]
Pastor Melanie reflects on the story of the Ethiopian eunuch and Philip from the book of Acts, listening for some resonance with our Community Ministries here in the Lake City neighborhood. From something about Jesus that is attractive and transformative ... to nothing preventing the baptism of one formerly excluded ... to building social capital in movements for justice in our communities ... listen for these threads exquisitely woven together.
I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold, Jesus said. I must bring them also… So there will be one flock, one shepherd. Pastor Megan reflects on those other metaphorical sheep. In the particular. Who are they? Who are WE? [Photo by Jose Francisco Morales on Unsplash.]
Pastor Megan reflects on fearful disciples gathered behind locked doors in Jerusalem. Through the locked doors of their fear, in strides Jesus. Speaking a word of peace, in strides Jesus. [Photo by Bogdan Dada on Unsplash]
Pastor Jonathan reflects on when life goes sideways and finding hope amidst the impossible and fearful. Sharing stories of the unexpected uprising of life in our own community, this sermon is not to be missed.
Jesus' carefully calculated and lampooning political march into Jerusalem helped ensure that he would need to be crucified, along with many other brave prophets before and after him. Pastor Megan reflects on James Cones' eye-opening theological work in "The Cross and the Lynching Tree." Like lynching in our own country, crucifixion was a public act of terror designed to intimidate a subjugated people into silent compliance, meaning that all who processed with Jesus - his co-conspirators and fellow marchers - did so as an incredible act of bravery. Listen in as we take a good hard look at white supremacy in the U.S. and reflect on whose resistance marches we might be called to join with our palms and cloaks and shouts of "Hosanna - Save us!" (Also: the slithering slew of venomous vipers from a few weeks back make an encore appearance as we gaze on that which is killing us in order to find our healing!)
Jason Rust preaches for us - reflecting on glory and death and earthiness and bodies and Mary Oliver poetry and unplanted seeds and lassitude and recklessness in love. You'll just have to listen to how these delightful strands are woven into an intricate whole...!
[Photo by Nico dit l'Ours on Unsplash]
What to do with the story in Numbers of God sending poisonous snakes to mortally wound the Israelites in the desert? What on earth could this story have to say to us? Listen as Pastor Megan takes a crack at seeking understanding and a word of good news in this strangest of biblical tales.
As Christians we've inherited a rather confused message about "The Law." Historically Christians have loved the Ten Commandments, even advocating for their physical presence at our public places (hello ... separation of church and state??), while dismissing the rest of The Law as made irrelevant in light of the freedom offered by Jesus (hello ... Christian supersessionism??). Listen as Pastor Megan wades into the very tricky territory of exploring with the Hebrew Law might mean for us as Jesus-followers.
Pastor Amy tells anew the story of a queerly named God who gives new names and new identities to Abram and Sarai and calls them into new identities in ways they cannot comprehend. Like them we are called to understand that our bodies and biology do not determine the path and promise God has for us. As a welcoming and affirming church, can we think anew of how our queer kindred receive as a gift the blessing of church community affirming names, pronouns and gender even when biology might say something different?
Pastor Megan leads us in lament for victims of gun violence, specifically the 17 precious youth and adults gunned down by a teenager with an assault rifle in Parkland, Florida this past week. And then she reflects on the very first covenant described by the Bible - a unilateral covenant God makes to all creation to never again destroy, even when fed up with humanity's unquenchable thirst for violence. ... Sung hymn is a "hymn lamenting gun violence" - Tune: Jean Sibelius, 1899 (“Be Still, My Soul”). Text: Copyright © 2015 by Carolyn Winfrey Gillette. All rights reserved, New Hymns: www.carolynshymns.com. Email: bcgillette@comcast.net. Permission is given for free use of this hymn for local church use and by ecumenical groups by those supporting efforts to end gun violence. ... “In October 2015, we attended a church conference in Portland, Oregon. Days before there was a mass shooting at Umpqua Community College near Roseburg, Oregon. A 26-year-old student there had fatally shot an assistant professor along with eight students in a classroom; nine others were injured before the wounded shooter killed himself. This was the deadliest mass shooting in Oregon’s modern history. Carolyn wrote [this] hymn while we were in Oregon. In the last full decade between 2000 and 2010, a total of 335,609 people died from guns—more than the population of St. Louis, Mo. (318,069), Pittsburgh (307,484), Cincinnati, Ohio (296,223), Newark, N.J. (277,540), and Orlando, Fla. (243,195) (sources: CDF, US Census; CDC). This hymn was sung the following month at the Washington National Cathedral and featured in a Religion News Service article published by Christian Century.” (“Gun Violence and Peacemaking,” Bruce Gillette and Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, www.journalforpreachers.com/Lent-2017-Gillettes)
Pastor Megan invites us - like Jesus did when he retreated for prayer in the dark early morning hours - to dwell with the Psalms as we begin to process together having heard a challenging word from our Peace Lecture guests last Sunday, Waziyatawin and John Stoesz.
WHAT DOES JUSTICE LOOK LIKE? The Struggles for Liberation in Indigenous Homelands. Speakers Wazitayawin and John Stoesz shared with us the experience of the Dakota struggle for land justice in Minnesota, and explored its application for communities like ours in the Pacific Northwest. In their morning presentation, "Naming Injustice to Find Justice," Wazitayawin and John Stoesz' question for settler communities was: What does it mean to benefit from genocide, forced removal and stolen land? What is a justice response? (Part 4 of 4: Land Theft & Return)
*There are some silences in the audio recordings when we were making technological adjustments.
WHAT DOES JUSTICE LOOK LIKE? The Struggles for Liberation in Indigenous Homelands. Speakers Wazitayawin and John Stoesz shared with us the experience of the Dakota struggle for land justice in Minnesota, and explored its application for communities like ours in the Pacific Northwest. In their morning presentation, "Naming Injustice to Find Justice," Wazitayawin and John Stoesz' question for settler communities was: What does it mean to benefit from genocide, forced removal and stolen land? What is a justice response? (Part 2 of 4: Ethnicide)
*There are some silences in the audio recordings when we were making technological adjustments.
WHAT DOES JUSTICE LOOK LIKE? The Struggles for Liberation in Indigenous Homelands. Speakers Wazitayawin and John Stoesz shared with us the experience of the Dakota struggle for land justice in Minnesota, and explored its application for communities like ours in the Pacific Northwest. In their morning presentation, "Naming Injustice to Find Justice," Wazitayawin and John Stoesz' question for settler communities was: What does it mean to benefit from genocide, forced removal and stolen land? What is a justice response? (Part 3 of 4: Ecocide)
*There are some silences in the audio recordings when we were making technological adjustments.
WHAT DOES JUSTICE LOOK LIKE? The Struggles for Liberation in Indigenous Homelands. Speakers Wazitayawin and John Stoesz shared with us the experience of the Dakota struggle for land justice in Minnesota, and explored its application for communities like ours in the Pacific Northwest. In their morning presentation, "Naming Injustice to Find Justice," Wazitayawin and John Stoesz' question for settler communities was: What does it mean to benefit from genocide, forced removal and stolen land? What is a justice response? (Part 1 of 4: Genocide)
*There are some silences in the audio recordings when we were making technological adjustments.
Pastor Megan preaches about Zebedee left standing in the boat when his sons leave to follow Jesus. [Please note there's a long silence in the middle of this recording. It is not accidental.]
Photo by Trevor Cole on Unsplash
Pastor Amy explores the way the 'light' of empire, exemplified by the violent and cruel reign of Herod is of a fundamentally different nature than the light of the star guiding the magi. Like the song says, "Jesus is now our star divine, brighter and brighter he will shine." May Jesus be our guiding star.
How to preach joy on the week when one of our beloved friends has died ... and far too young?
Advent, again, begins with a bang. An apocalyptic bang. We are welcomed into this season with the startling yet strangely familiar words of Jesus from Mark's "little apocalypse." Pastor Megan invites us to consider how we simultaneously inhabit two entirely different seasons in this month: Advent with our faith community, and the "holiday season" with the rest of the world outside the walls of our church, and invites us to consider where we might find hope in the midst of the chaos of our world and our lives.
We look at Micah 6 – the full chapter in which beloved verse 8 (“What does God require of you? But to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.”) finds a home. Pastor Megan invites us to reflect on the heart of God’s Jubilee vision, found in these familiar and beloved words of the prophet.
We look at Micah 6 - the full chapter in which beloved verse 8 ("What does God require of you? But to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.") finds a home. The setting for that most familiar and beloved verse - a verse that beautifully and aptly describes the heart of God's Jubilee vision - is a courtroom drama. Listen as Pastor Megan invites us to reflect on the first 5 verses of this chapter.
When you learn to follow Jesus, you might act a little strange. As we celebrate All Saints day, we look to the strange saints and weirdos who followed Jesus against what our culture tells us is normal and right.
Pastor Megan wraps up our worship series with Paul's letter to the Corinthians by reflecting a bit on Paul's final messages to his friends in Corinth.
Pastor Megan continues our worship adventure with the church at Corinth with a reflection on chapter 12, Paul's use of the familiar Greco-Roman body metaphor with a significant subversive twist for the church, and his call for the church to not just be LIKE family, but to actually BE family. Listen to hear more about unique manifestations of the Spirit and knife sharpeners.
Pastor Amy reflects on men and women, hair and head coverings, praying and prophesying. What does it mean to be faithful?
Pastor Megan continues our adventure with the congregation at Corinth by reflecting on Paul's mixed metaphors (are we God's field or God's building?!), and the distractions that keep us from claiming our foundational unity.
The communion table has greater implications than just the gathering on a Sunday morning. The way we share food together around the Lord's table should be reflective of the way we share all our resources in community and with our neighbors.
Pastor Megan kicks off our 6-week series on 1 Corinthians reflecting on what it's like to read someone else's mail from 2000 years ago and across the globe, what resonance there might be between ancient Corinth and our own contemporary Seattle, and what it means for Paul (and us!) to proclaim "Christ crucified."
Pastor Megan reflects on the parable of the day laborers from Matthew 20.1-16, the lack of fairness in life (no one said it would be...), and the (sometimes annoying) generosity of God.
Rex Rempel auctioned off a sermon on the topic of bid-winner's choosing to support our youth traveling to Orlando for the Mennonite Church USA gathering. Pete Lagerwey won the bid and set him up with two stories from Matthew of God naming Jesus "My Beloved" (baptism and transfiguration), as well as the story of Abraham and Isaac from Genesis, and some Isaiah for good measure. Listen to the beautiful result of this Spirit-collaboration...
Pastor Megan reflects on packing for a 7-day backpacking trip, Isaiah's prophetic encouragement to eat what is good and delight in rich foods, the life (and imminent death) of one of our own SMC saints, and our tendency to overpack for meeting God.
The reign of the loving God sneaks in and gets in the way and grows and is a nuisance. But it’s so sweet!
A rich time of storytelling about God’s heart for the refugee, foreigner, and immigrant! We heard from our own Caitlin and Zach, as well as Caitlin's co-worker Alex. We were treated to stories about the epic state-crossing biking fundraiser known as Sea-Tri-Kan, as well as the work World Relief is doing in our community to empower all of us to welcome the stranger in our midst. You can watch the full video featuring the story of mutual transformation through the Women's Sewing Class here... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qq_KrwXwtnc
Pastor Megan shares some stories and initial reflections from her time at the biennial gathering of Mennonite Church USA in Orlando, July 4-8.
Pastor Amy reflects on our interdependence in this weekend of celebrating July 4th and the nation telling us how independent we should be.
Pastor Megan reflects on the compassion Jesus has for the "helpless, harassed, oppressed, and discarded" crowds of his day as well as our day. What compassion is stirring and rising from deep within you; sending you to proclaim the good news of the Compassionate One come near?
Remembering the childhood enchantment of lying under a quilt in its frame while her grandmother quilted, Pastor Megan reflects on the magic of forever binding together three disparate pieces into a single whole. Jesus, breathing the Holy Spirit into his fearful disciples, forever bound them into a Spirit-breathed, Christ-centered community. A sermon for our annual Pentecost Covenanting Sunday.
"Wait. Do it actively and with intention and expect the Holy Spirit to show up. Worship. Refocus on loving and being loved by God. Witness. Tell the story of Jesus. Enact the story of Jesus. Be the body of Christ. He left in order that we could be."
Jesus said that the sheep know the shepherd's voice. Pastor Megan reflects on her experience as a farmhand on a Swiss dairy farm - calling cows in from pasture who knew the voice of their actual farmer - and wonders how we might discern the voice of God from the many other voices that surround us.
Pastor Amy explores the place between disappointment and hope with the disciples who encounter the risen Jesus on the road and at the table.
Pastor Megan reflects on the untimely and violent death of dart-throwing, prankster peacemaker MJ Sharp, Mary Magdalene weeping at the tomb of Jesus on that first Easter Sunday morning, and proximity that leads to proclamation.
An undomesticated look at the Palm Processional and just how funny, just how serious, and just how dangerous it was for Jesus to ride a baby donkey into the eastern gate of Jerusalem while Pontius Pilate was riding a stallion into the western gate. Which procession will we join?
Pastor Megan interviews Sarah Sommers from Christian Peacemaker Teams, asking her to reflect on the actively nonviolent way of Jesus as it connects with the gospel story of encountering Martha and Mary in the their grief, and calling Lazarus from the tomb.
Pastor Megan tells the story of the man born blind who has a healing encounter with Jesus and then tense encounters with some would-be prosecutors in John 9, and reflects on her own experience with a prosecuting attorney after having been arrested at Raytheon, third largest defense contractor in the U.S.
Pastor Jonathan reflects on Jesus encountering the woman at the well and offering her living water. What harsh stories do we tell about ourselves and what self-judgments do we hold onto? How might Jesus receive us and invite us to receive the transformative power of living water?
Nicodemus comes to Jesus under cover of night. Pastor Megan preaches the third Sunday of Lent
Jesus is tempted in the wilderness and then attended to by angels. Pastor Megan preaches the first Sunday of Lent.
Pastor Megan preaches the final sermon in our 4-week "A Place We Love" series, all about Watershed Discipleship. Having moved from learning to knowing to loving, we conclude with "protecting," making links with the story of the Transfiguration.
Pastor Megan reflects on how we come to know our waters as our neighbors and, as such, to love them as ourselves. The third Sunday in our Watershed Discipleship worship series “A Place We Love.”
The first in our worship series "A Place We Love," Pastor Megan reflects on where we find hope and nourishment in gloomy times, and how disconnection from our watersheds and bioregions may contribute to that gloom.
Pastor Megan tells the story of her week: listening to her favorite of Martin Luther King Jr.'s speeches, "A Time to Break Silence" delivered at Riverside Church, listening to a public reading of King's powerful Letter from a Birmingham Jail addressed to white clergy, pondering Matthew's take on the beginning of Jesus' public ministry - beginning with the jailing of John the Baptizer and quoting from Isaiah who was writing to those living in the deep anguish of exile, and finally marching with millions on Saturday.
In her final sermon before being sent with our blessing into her sabbatical, Pastor Amy reflects on the Epiphany story of the magi, power and kingship, and remembering the future of who Jesus will be.
Pastor Megan preaches on the fourth and final Sunday of our Advent "Revolutionary Songs" worship series. She reflects on overhearing someone else's good news - both biblical and contemporary exiles - and joining our voices with Revolutionary Mama Maria's song (Magnificat - Luke 1.46-55), singing ourselves home to God's irresistible shalom vision.
Pastor Megan preaches the second Sunday of Advent, reflecting on hot fires, bouncy anvils, and - of course - revolutionary songs.
Pastor Megan opens our Advent season of Revolutionary Songs with a sermon reflecting on how singing has sustained movements of just peace across time and place. Encounter the story of Bernice Johnson Reagon, founder of the Freedom Singers during the Civil Rights Movement and Sweet Honey in the Rock since then.
Pastor Amy discussed how the understanding of what it means to be blessed has been misunderstood. In our weakness and vulnerability, there is more room for knowing God's presence, and that is #actuallyblessed
Pastor Megan invites us to kneel at the feet of Jesus and hear just the word we need to hear on this hard post-election week.
Pastor Megan offers a brief homily, reflecting on the introspection of this season, the intimacy of joy and sorrow, and invites the living saints of SMC to remember with candlelight and word those beloveds who have died in the past year.
Pastor Megan preaches the final in our Just Peace series, reflecting on Jesus' teaching to pray for and love our enemies, and telling a story of the prayerful communing of tea-drinking in Israel-Palestine.
Pastor Amy continues our series on Just Peace with a sermon that highlights the community-ist vision of the early church and challenges us to communal and individual discernment of how we share resources. We are particularly challenged to think about our heritage as settlers on indigenous lands and how relationship accompanied by reparations might be a way toward a Just Peace ‘that all might live in dignity.’
Our honored guest speaker is Edie Loyer Nelson, member of the Duwamish Tribe, first people of Seattle and the land on which our church building sits.
...so that all may live free from fear. Pastor Jonathan preaches the first in a 4-week series on Just Peace, based on the 4 pillars established in the World Council of Churches document, "An Ecumenical Call to Just Peace." Can anything at all new be said about the Parable of the Good Samaritan?? Indeed! Check it out...
Pastor Megan preaches the final in a 3-week series on Biblical Jubilee. Featuring "The Parable of the Grand Dinner," also known as "The Parable of the Lame Excuses!" How might we be compelled beyond what blocks us and into the joy of Jubilee?
Pastor Megan preaches her first ever sermon on the riveting and inspiring (ahem) book of Leviticus. Dive in to the Levitical vision of Jubilee, with its roots in the Exodus and its implications for us today.
Pastor Amy preaches the first in a series on Biblical Jubilee. Jesus proclaims Jubilee in the synagogue, calling on the tradition of the prophets. We are called to live Jubilee now and for all the years to come.
Pastor Megan reflects on Jesus returning to his hometown in Luke 4, and marking one year of her ministry at SMC, for our annual Ingathering Sunday celebration.