Have you ever thought about where you intentionally go to meet God? Can you remember the times or places where your spirit awakened to the presence of God perhaps more than any other time or place? Perhaps without even knowing that you were going to have an encounter with the Holy One? We are entering […]
It used to be in the Seattle Sunday paper, there would be an article contrasting somebody’s first job experience with the job that individual currently has. I always like reading about people’s early experiences and where that ultimately led them. Do you remember your first job? (Elicit stories from congregation…) What about the first […]
These two words appear together more than 100 times in the Bible. One another. Apparently each other refers to TWO. But one another is like the southern way of saying All Y’all. These “One anothers” are often repeated by different authors in the Bible, or similar ones appear in different books of the Bible. Greet […]
Can you remember the top 100 “best meals of your life”. Those moments when the company and the food was so good; you felt satisfied; perhaps you were so full that you thought, “I don’t think I could ever eat again.” But, inevitably, your tummy starts rumbling again – usually a few hours down the […]
Would you rather be the one who messes up, lacks self-awareness, then needs to be confronted? Or would you rather be the one who realizes SOMEONE ELSE messed up and needs to be confronted and the short stick falls to you? Is there a third option or would you like to have one of those […]
Last week we got a glimpse of Dancing King David who brought the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem, which would also become known as the City of David. King David might have been “a man after God’s own heart,” but he also had his dark side which we read about today. David’s army was […]
Can you remember a time when you danced with such wild abandon that most of your clothes fell off? Me either. Have you ever thought about dancing before God? Does worship ever inspire such passion and ecstasy that we can’t help but throw our bodies into a dancing prayer? The reading from Samuel describes David […]
If I started this sentence, could you fill in the blank? “We the People…” Who had to memorize the Preamble to the Constitution? That was my 8th grade history task. I succeeded because of SchoolHouse Rock. Those of us who lived our formative years in the 1970s remember it well. We the people, In order […]
June 2002 – 13 years ago. I had just graduated from seminary, and I was attending Annual Conference to be commissioned for Probationary Ministry, which would be a three year process before I could be ordained. Parading on to the Bishop’s podium with the other candidates, we answered questions before the entire conference. One of […]
My plans for this Sunday was to preach a Father’s Day sermon with a few lame golf jokes – given that the US Open is concluding just a mile away from here. But many in our nation are still reeling from the horrific news of a racist hate crime at The historic downtown church AME Church […]