We ARE Justified by Faith A placeholder entry for commentary on the sermon offered May 26, 2013 at Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Church (ELCA) in Sylva, NC. Romans 5:1-5 The general idea is that being justified by our faith gives us freedom to act, to follow through and be confident of our place as… Continue reading We ARE Justified by Faith
Category: Sermons
What Winning Looks Like
What Winning Looks Like Sermon text: Acts 9:1-20 Preached April 14, 2013 at Cullowhee Baptist Church This a rich text. It provides us with two different call narratives. The first and most famous is the call to Saul on the road to Damascus. This is, arguably, the second most important passage in the New Testament… Continue reading What Winning Looks Like
When to Walk Away
I hit all the points I wanted to hit, and yet I felt that I did not do justice to the urgency of the message I was preaching–that we so often look at the past and wish we could have been there to commit some violent act to prevent an injustice, that we forget that we have the opportunity to insist on peaceful solutions every day. We find it so easy to tell a story and have no sympathy for the characters we recognize to be “bad,” that we get used to thinking about life in that way, rather than as the complicated, messy milieu we encounter every day.
A Loved Child of God
https://www.nathanwillard.com/sermon_vid/ALovedChildOfGod_091212.mp3 Preached at Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Church in Sylva, NC Sermon Text: James 3:13-4:3 No text again today, though I have (scratchy) audio to post later. Perhaps the most important aspect of Christian life, for me, is finding people who are trapped in a narrative of hopelessness, and bring them back from that… Continue reading A Loved Child of God
Here is the Steeple
Preached July 22 at the Congregational Church in Iowa City. Again, no final sermon text. Speaking somewhat extemporaneously seems to be working, I finally felt comfortable and in my groove again for the first time since, really, Beverly. But this week’s sermon had to do with the temple of Solomon, and the disconnect between the… Continue reading Here is the Steeple