Words of Welcome

  Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29   The time has come to join Jesus in the festal procession to Jerusalem. Let us wave our palm branches and sing “All glory, laud, and honor, to you, Redeemer, King, to whom the lips of children made sweet hosannas ring!” Yes, “You are a child of Israel, Great David’s greater son; you ride in lowly triumph, Messiah, blessed one!”  [ Glory to God, 196] If we take the 118th Psalm as our guide, our parade of palms serves to welcome Jesus not only into Zion but also into our lives. As we do this, we can give thanks to God who is good and whose steadfast love endures forever. The reading from the Gospel of John tells us that a crowd greeted Jesus as he approached Jerusalem. They waved palm branches and shouted out “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord the King of Israel!” ( Jn 12:12-16 ) When Jesus rode into the city that day mounted on a donkey, many in the crowd believed that Jesus was the one who would throw out the Romans and l...

2 Corinthians 13:11-13 “So long, farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, goodbye.” With those words, the children said good night to the partygoers in the Sound of Music. Today I join them in that refrain as I say goodbye to you as your pastor. When it comes to preaching your retirement sermon, what should you say? I could have gone with Moses’ final message in Deuteronomy, but Moses dies at the end and that didn’t seem right. I thought about using something from Revelation, so I could expound on the subject of eschatology. While that might work, it might take too long to get to the main point. So I turned to Paul’s closing words in his second letter to the Corinthian church. In these verses, Paul offers words of encouragement and blessing. This seems like a good way to close out a ministry.  Since Paul likes things to be done decently and in order, the first thing he does is tell the Corinthians to “put things in order.” That sounds like a good word for a season of transition. One reason...

Psalm 111 “Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, who rules all creation. O my soul, worship the wellspring of health and salvation. All ye who hear, now to God’s temple draw near. Join me in glad adoration.”  With this hymn, we lift up praise to God our creator who is the “wellspring of health and salvation.” We celebrate the one who “o’er all things so wondrously reigneth.” We do this in a time of pandemic when we might feel more like singing a lament than a song of praise. Nevertheless, we hear the call to sing praise to God in this word from Psalm 111 .  The psalm begins with a “Hallelujah” and concludes with a declaration that God’s “praise endures forever.” This song of praise invites us to give thanks to God with our whole heart because “great are the works of the Lord.” Scott Hoezee captures the feel of this Psalm when he writes: Psalm 111 is a shook-up bottle of champagne when the cork flies off: it is effervescent, effusive, and thus it is delightfully over th...

  Psalm 148 The joyous strains of the angel voices singing praise to God can be heard echoing from the heavens and across the mountains. They invite us to join in singing  “Gloria in Excelsis Deo!” Yes, “Glory to God in the Highest!” And as Isaiah declared: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my whole being shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness” ( Is. 61:10 ). Let us, therefore, join this joyous chorus that brings together the voices of heaven and earth and all that dwells within them, in shouting “Praise the Lord!” Or, if you prefer the Hebrew, we can shout “Hallelujah!”   This morning we gather on the third day of Christmas, which means our true loves should give us “three French hens, two turtle doves, and a partridge in a pear tree!” That means there are still nine more days of Christmas before the season closes on January 6, the Day of Epiphany. January 6 is the day western C...

Entry into the City - John August Swanson Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29  Last Sunday we joined Jesus on the pilgrim trail, marching to Zion and singing  “Bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves, we shall go rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves.” As we took this journey toward Zion, we heard the call to sow seeds of kindness in a world filled with anything but kindness. Sowing seeds of kindness might seem like a small and insignificant effort, but when we bring in the harvest and gather up those sheaves of grain and take them to the Temple something powerful could happen. That pilgrim train we joined last Sunday has reached the gates of Zion. It’s Palm Sunday, and Jesus is in the lead. We wave palm branches as we sing “All glory, laud, and honor, to you, Redeemer, King, to whom the lips of children made sweet hosannas ring!” Yes, “You are a child of Israel, Great David’s greater son; you ride in lowly triumph, Messiah, blessed one!”  Some of us lay our palm b...

Psalm 34:1-8 Taste and see that the Lord is good! Taste and sight are two of the senses that help make life what it is. For instance, when we sit down to a meal, we take in the smell, the sight, and then the taste. It might be sweet or savory. Some like the sweetness of cake and others like the savoriness of chips. Some like kale and others don’t. So, when it comes to taste, we’re all different.  If you want to know more about such things, I suggest watching episodes of Good Eats with Alton Brown. He makes a big deal about how our taste buds work. He likes to illustrate his message, since the viewer can’t smell or taste the food he is demonstrating. He might show a chart of the tongue, pointing out the  different sensory areas found on the tongue. There is sweet, salty, savory, sour, and even bitter. Yes, there is a sensor in our tongues that looks for bitterness.

Psalm 138 Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote a brief introduction to the Book of Psalms. He titled it The Prayerbook of the Bible, because he believed that these prayers form the foundation for all our prayers, especially when we offer them in the name of Jesus. This is what he wrote:   God’s speech in Jesus Christ meets us in the Holy Scriptures. If we want to pray with assurance and joy, then the word of Holy Scripture must be the firm foundation of our prayer. Here we know that Jesus Christ, the Word of God, teaches us to pray. The words that come from God will be the steps on which we find our way to God. [ Life Together/Prayerbook of the Bible, DBW , 5:156]. We approach God with prayers and hymns drawn from Scripture, offering words of praise and thanksgiving, as well as lamentation and complaint.

1 Thessalonians 5:12-28 We have reached the Third Sunday of Advent. We have lit the rose-colored candle, which symbolizes the message of joy. The Psalm for the day declares that “The Lord has done great things for us, and we rejoiced.” Then in the closing verses of the Psalm, the people sing: “May those who sow in tears reap with shouts of joy. Those who go out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, carrying their sheaves” ( Psalm 126:5-6 ). As we gather to celebrate this message of Joy, we hear the words of Paul to the church at Thessalonika. If you want to get a sense of what the church looked like in its earliest days, this letter to a Macedonian church is a good place to go, since this is believed to be the oldest part of the New Testament. What we have read are Paul’s final exhortations and benediction. There’s a flurry of information here that can overwhelm the reader and leave the preacher puzzled as to how to deal with it. Fortun...

Matthew 25:14-30 Since today is Thanksgiving Sunday, we gather to “raise a song of harvest home” for “all is safely gathered in.” Yes, “God our maker does provide for our wants to be supplied.” So we “come to God’s own temple,” to “raise the song of harvest home.” [Henry Alford, "Come, Ye Thankful People, Come,"  Chalice Hymnal , 718] We will have a number of opportunities over the next few days to give thanks for God’s abundance. Last night several of us attended the Turkish American Society of Michigan’s Thanksgiving Dinner. We got to share in fellowship with our friends from Turkey, and help them celebrate the season. Tonight there is the annual Troy-area Interfaith Group Thanksgiving Service, and then on Tuesday evening there is the Troy Clergy Group service. Then on Thursday many will gather with family and friends to share in fellowship, offering thanks for God’s provisions. Let us, therefore, “make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth.” Let us “serve t...

Luke 7:36-8:3 This morning we’re taking a short break from our summer trek through the Psalms to focus our attention on the call to stewardship. The Stewardship committee has already decided to accept the stewardship theme offered by the Disciples’  Center on Faith and Giving.  That theme is  “Go and Do the Same.” The Center also encouraged churches to expand the stewardship conversation beyond the usual stewardship campaign, which we conduct in the fall. That campaign is centered on putting together a budget for the coming year, and convincing you to support it by making a pledge. We took up the suggestion to use some time this summer to think about stewardship as a spiritual discipline and not simply as a means of fund-raising. This is the first of three sermons, one each month, that will draw from the Gospel of Luke and touch upon stewardship. 

Revelation 1:4b-8 Over the next few days we’ll have an opportunity to consider the blessings that have been poured out upon us by God. It really doesn’t matter where we gather. The important thing is to stop and offer words of praise to God, “from whom all blessings flow.” We’ll have at least two community opportunities to share in words of Thanksgiving before Thursday. Tonight the Troy-area Interfaith Group is hosting a service at the Islamic Association of Greater Detroit in Rochester Hills. Then on Tuesday evening the Troy Clergy Group is sponsoring a service at Northminster Presbyterian. We also have the opportunity this morning to offer up symbols of gratitude to God through signs of our commitment to the life and ministry of this congregation. These celebrations occur under the shadow of the recent terrorist attacks in Mali, Beirut, Nigeria, and Paris, that have raised our anxiety levels. Fear seems to be taking hold of many in our midst, and there are people and grou...

Psalm 148 Just a few days ago many of us opened presents that were laid out under a tree or perhaps hanging in a stocking.  So, here’s my question – when you were opening gifts did you show proper gratitude?  Were you exuberant in your declarations or did you mumble a word of thanks, even as you were thinking – “I'm not sure what to do with this sweater? There is a reason why it’s easier to give a gift card than pick out a gift.  Even if you have a list, you could come home with the wrong thing, and that doesn’t lead to much happiness on the part of the recipient!   Parents often require their children to say thank you for gifts received.  Call Grandma, we tell them, and tell her how much you love that sweater she knitted for you.  You know, the sweater you wouldn’t be caught dead wearing outside your bedroom.  But whether you liked the gift or not you have to muster enough enthusiasm to thank the giver.  Saying thanks for gifts s...

Hebrews 10:19-25 Some families have a little Thanksgiving ritual when they get together.  Everyone goes around the table and shares something for which they’re thankful. Now, this can be a rather uncomfortable ritual for some, since they’re not really sure how to answer the question.  Unfortunately, you usually can’t pass, so you have to make something up.  Since it looks like the Lions won’t be going to the Super Bowl this year, you might say –  “I’m thankful that the Lions will get a good draft pick.”  That would be a safer answer than saying that I’m thankful that a certain team that can’t be named won the World Series.  If we were to extend this ritual to this morning’s worship service, and went around the room, asking each of us to stand up and give an answer to the question of what we’re thank for, what would you say?  Don’t worry, we don’t have time to go around the room, so you’re safe.  But, what would you say?   ...

Psalm 30 There was a time when many churches frowned upon dancing.  That’s because they considered it too sensual.  This was especially true of mixed dancing, which might lead to promiscuity. That’s why we didn’t have dances at my college.  We had “stand up concerts.”  Although they looked a lot like dances, we could pretend they weren’t.  After I graduated, things loosened up, but there was this concern that people might think these Christian college students were up to no good!   Now, as for me and dancing, you probably won’t catch me out on the dance floor very often.  It’s not a theological thing.  But, as Cheryl will attest, I can’t dance!  My feet and my arms and my body will not move with the music in an appropriate fashion.      Although Psalm 30 speaks of God taking us from mourning to dancing, the Psalmist isn’t referring to a Valentine’s Dance.  Instead, the Psalmist is calling for us to celebrat...

Ephesians 1:11-23 You may have seen a very large RV traveling down the highway.  In the driver’s seat is a senior citizen, and emblazoned on the back of that RV is a bumper sticker declaring that this now retired couple is spending their children’s inheritance.  Now, they have every right to spend their money any way they please, and the kids have no legal means of stopping them from doing this, but this declaration seems rather bold, maybe even brazen!    They have decided to spend the inheritance before it gets passed on to the next generation.    Warren Buffett, as you may have heard, has decided that the bulk of his fortune won’t go to his children, but rather to charity.  It’s not that the kids won’t get anything, but  most of the inheritance is going to be shared by a much broader group of people.  Jesus once told a parable about inheritances.  In this parable a son demands his share of the inheritance now. ...