“What Is Your Pearl?”
Matthew 13:31-33, 44-46
Preached Sunday, July 26, 2026
One of the games from the New York Times app is “Connections.” I know I have talked with some of you that you play this game - anyone here play it? Now me? I am a big Wordle fan. I do that daily…but Connections? I’m awful at it and so I don’t do it regularly. For those of you not familiar with the game, there are 16 words that you have to sort into four groups of four. You have to figure out what words are connected without knowing the category beforehand. I find it very tricky because - you may think four words are connected but it’s not the category the game used to sort them. There are also four levels of difficulty within the four categories - so the day I went to go do this the categories in rising difficulty were Spherical Things, In An Anxious State, Parts of an Airport, and Ending in Geometry Terms. I…did not get a single category right in the allotted amount of guesses. I’m just no good at it.
But I bring this all up with you to you because I feel like today’s Gospel reading is like a Connections category: Seed, Yeast, Treasure, Pearls. What could possibly be the category that binds these things together? It would be - parables from the 13th chapter of Matthew. We got parable dumped on in this Gospel reading today - and it’s not even all the parables that Jesus offers in this chapter of Scripture!
So this week, I am not going to go in the order that the Scripture goes, but I am going to attempt to bring these four parables together into a category. Each of these parables has rich meaning and interpretation when considered on their own. And - how do they speak to us when grouped together like this?
We’ll start with the treasure in the field and the pearl of great value because those two things make sense together in my mind. A person, upon finding something of great value to them, gives up everything else in pursuit of this treasure or pearl. Now in the parable of the pearl this man is described as a merchant seeking pearls. But upon finding THE most beautiful pearl, singular, he sells everything to buy it. Not just his wares - but all he has. In essence, he impoverishes himself completely for one item. Now, what IS this pearl? Commentators throughout time have called it many things. It’s sacrifice, it’s knowledge, it’s detachment from money or this or that...but my question to you today is not what is this pearl in the story, but what is YOUR pearl?
For this man, he found something beautiful, an item hitherto unknown to him that became all consuming. He found one thing that he believed to have true value and he did whatever he had to do to attain it. And whether we recognize it or not - we all have some sort of pearl, something for which we would sell everything we own to have.
Some of you will be familiar with the book “Short Stories by Jesus” by AJ Levine as we did it as a Wednesday Bible Study several years ago. In that book, she considers the Parable oft eh Pearl. Once, A.J. was teaching the parable of the pearl to a class at Riverbend Maximum Security Prison - the class was made up of half Religion Ph.D. students and half students serving time as inmates. A.J. asked each of them, what is your pearl of supreme value? For what would you sell everything you own?
One student talked about obtaining her Ph.D. She was a professional pastor’s wife and her husband was against her returning to school. Her applying to the Ph.D. program and receiving funding came at the same time her marriage fell apart. Her story reads, “I never expected to find myself here, but when the graduate school offer came, I did what I needed to do to accept it. I gave up my home and my status as ‘minister’s wife’; I took out loans; I took back my original name. I do not know what will happen at the end of this program, but that does not matter. I am doing what is right for me. I have my pearl.”
One student who was an inmate said his pearl was freedom - he would do whatever he had to do, confession, anger management, psychological tests - whatever it took to be released. Still another said safety, he would do whatever he had to do to continue to live each day and not get knifed or attacked.
Another student “said that when he came into prison, he lost all that he had - his prosperity, his clothing, but also his identity, his dignity. He had to construct his own pearl, layer by painful layer, tear by tear, and see what was really important.”
...But our pearls, those things to which we assign ultimate value, or the path we take to achieve them, are not always good things. The word for pearl in Greek is margarita - and one student, a recovering alcoholic, said that a margarita was her pearl. And the search for her great pearl cost her her home, food, family….
Consider this over the top example in Walter White from the popular (if not a little dated) show “Breaking Bad.” When he was diagnosed with cancer, his pearl of ultimate value was making sure his family was well-taken care of after he was gone - not a bad pearl as pearls go...but he would do anything to achieve that goal. And that leads him down a path to becoming a drug lord - a path that destroys him and all of his relationships.
Not all of those things that we consider to be of true value are. Not all pearls are cultured - some pearls are fake, and yet their cost can be quite high. This parable causes us to stop and look at our priorities - and to take a good, hard look. It is often said, if one truly wants to know where their priorities lie, they better take a look at their time and their wallet. Where are you investing your time and your money? What is listed on your credit card and bank statements? What appointments are written in your calendar? What pearl are we investing ourselves in?
And then the question may come - are there things that we need to divest ourselves from? Are there things that we are invested in, pearls in our lives, that are keeping us from investing in the things that God wants us to invest in, like yeast and seeds and the Kingdom of Heaven? Are those things even on our list of priorities? Are they even one of our pearls?
So let us consider yeast and seeds.
All of these parables start “The Kingdom of Heaven is like…” So we must consider - what is the Kingdom of Heaven? The Kingdom of Heaven, the Kingdom of God…these can be obscure terms that people outside the church don’t understand and even people inside the church can struggle with their meaning. And if we don’t understand what the Kingdom is - how can we invest in it? How can we live into it?
The most simple way that I can define it is that The Kingdom of Heaven is just a term for what the world would be like if God was fully in charge - Hence, God being KING of the Kingdom. Now, before any of you call me a heretic for implying that God is not fully in charge, hear me out. We live in this in-between time that we call the already but the not yet. God has already come to us in the form of Jesus and defeated the power of sin & death. Because of this, the Kingdom of God is here. We live into it and catch glimpses of it. And, it is not here fully - yet. Sin and Death still have power in this world. The Kingdom of God will be fully present on that day described in Revelation 21 when God dwells with mortals and there is no more pain, tears, or death.
Another term for the Kingdom of God that many chose to use to help get to its meaning is the KIN (K-I-N)- dom rather than the KINGdom. This is because the Kin-dom of Heaven comes when we treat everyone as kin - children of God.
So the Kingdom of God is like yeast - I told you that I was going to get to it! - so the Kingdom of Heaven is like yeast that gets put into some bread mix and creates way more bread than just one person can eat - assuring that everyone gets fed. And the Kingdom of Heaven is like a small seed that grows into a large bush that gives shelter to all birds - everyone has a home. At a very simple level here, I see through these parables that the Kingdom of God is realized when all people are fed and all people have shelter. For many people, their pearl is simply that - do I have food today? Are my children fed? Do I have a place to sleep tonight? These basic items, these basic needs, are essentials in realizing the Kingdom of Heaven because God CARES for all of creation - and that includes our bodies and our needs. And if our bodies are not cared for, many people will not care for the care that God can give our souls.
And that’s another thing these parables show us - the Kingdom of Heaven looks like nature, all of creation, being able to live and act and be as God created them to be! The yeast, though a small ingredient in small amounts, has a very large impact when used properly! Anyone who has ever baked bread can attest to this. As the dough proofs and rises, it is amazing how it multiplies. And as the mustard seed grows, planted in the ground that God created, watered by the rain God sends, nourished by the sunlight of each created day - the bush grows into a large bush where all the animals and birds find a home and people rest in its shade. The Kingdom of Heaven is like this - when all of creation, Earth and sea and sky and US, you and me, are living as God intends us to be, created us to be.
And so as we consider what we need to invest in, our pearls and treasures, so we can be like the yeast and mustard seed of the Kingdom of Heaven where there is room made for us and for all - we ask, what do we need to divest from? We need to divest from anything that defines us as less than the beloved, created, children of God that we are. Status, power, wealth, accumulation of goods - these are on all of our priority lists - or they have been at sometime. But these things can have negative effects on us and can obscure or corrupt our ability to identify what has true value! Material goods? We never have enough? Status? We never are enough! Power? We never have enough. And just because of the world we live in, we are invested in these messages - hence why we are always trying to improve our lives, our bodies, our incomes - not for the glory of God but to the false satisfaction of the world and to the glory of self!
Henri Nouwen is an example of one who divested from his status and wealth to be who God intended him to be. He was a distinguished professor who gave it all up for life as a priest living in an intentional community for those with physical or mental disabilities. During his discernment of his life change, he wrote his thoughts in a book called “The Inner Voice of Love.” He writes that everyone around him is going to the ballet, going to the theater, going to dinner parties...and it does fill him with sadness that he is leaving that life behind. But he says to himself, “You sense that nothing but God’s love can fulfill your deepest need while the pull to other people and things remains strong…You know that something totally new, truly unique, is happening within you. It is clear that something within you is dying and something is being born.” Nouwen was in the process of divesting in status and investing in God’s love, he was changing his pearl.
And God’s love can be our pearl of great value! We might just have to live our lives in such a way, invest our lives in such a way, that we truly come to believe it and live it out in our day to day lives. Invest in nature - the yeast, the seeds, the pearls of beauty God has given us. Invest in other people, may we see that all are fed and all are sheltered. And invest in YOURSELF, allow yourself to be the person God created you to be, and just as the yeast multiples, and the seed grows, when we allow ourselves to live into who God created us to be, whatever that may look like in your life, the Kingdom of Heaven is revealed.
I also want to say - before I wrap this sermon up - even when we are striving after pearls that aren’t the pearl of great value that is God’s love, even when we are investing ourselves in things that don’t reflect the Kingdom of heaven - God still loves you, is seeking after you, and is inviting you to step into the Kingdom of Heaven. Our reading from Romans 8 today reminds us of this:
“For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Even pursuing the wrong pearl doesn’t stop God from loving us. And because God loves us, God invests us into the Kingdom of Heaven.
And so friends, today I leave you to ponder just a few things things:
What is your pearl?
Who has God created you to be?
And do the two match?
Amen.
Monday, July 27, 2026
Camp Communion Sermon, "In the Wilderness"
Camp ----Communion Sermon
Theme: “In the Wilderness”
Preached Thursday, July 22, 2026
I want to start tonight by telling you a story of a man in the Bible named Nicodemus. Nicodemus was a Pharisee and his group that he was a part of wasn’t supposed to like Jesus very much. But Nicodemus had a lot of questions about Jesus and what Jesus was teaching. So in the middle of the night, Nicodemus snuck out and came and asked Jesus a lot of questions - questions about God and about belief and about Jesus.
Theme: “In the Wilderness”
Preached Thursday, July 22, 2026
I want to start tonight by telling you a story of a man in the Bible named Nicodemus. Nicodemus was a Pharisee and his group that he was a part of wasn’t supposed to like Jesus very much. But Nicodemus had a lot of questions about Jesus and what Jesus was teaching. So in the middle of the night, Nicodemus snuck out and came and asked Jesus a lot of questions - questions about God and about belief and about Jesus.
A lot of people wondered why Nicodemus came to find Jesus at night. Do you have any ideas?
(Solicit responses)
Yeah, I think he could easily sneak around at night. And I also think sometimes our questions, our doubts, our wonderings - are harder to ignore at night time. During the day we are busy and can be distracted by a lot of things. But sometimes, when we can’t fall asleep at night, all these thoughts race through our heads. All these questions, and all these emotions…
That can be like a wilderness. Have you guys…talked about wilderness at all this week? What do you think, is nighttime its own special kind of wilderness? Anyone do a night hike this week? Yeah? It totally changes your perspective.
So nighttime in this story with Nicodemus it’s like two wildernesses. There is the physical wilderness of night time. Or like, we experience the physical wilderness here. Or the physical wilderness of the jungle or a desert… But there is also a metaphorical wilderness, a wilderness of the heart and mind, and that’s that wilderness when you have lots of questions or are unsure or feeling a lot of emotions.
So I want to read this poem to you - I didn’t write it. It’s by The Rev. Sarah Speed Are:
“It’s only in the wilderness that you can see the stars.
That’s what city living has taught me.
We can shine a light on the things we want to see—
Fluorescent and bright, lighting up dark alleys.
However, it’s only in the wilderness that you can see the stars.
And it’s only in the dark of night that the questions come.
What is my purpose here? What does God have to say to me?
What does God have to say to suffering?
The sun falls and my doubt rises,
For it’s only in the dark that the questions come.
So like Nicodemus in the night,
I will throw my big questions at the sky.
And my voice will reverberate among the stars,
And my questions will echo throughout the dark.
For there in the night, my words form constellations.
And there in the wilderness, my prayers form galaxies.
So even there in the unknown, I trust that I am found.
A light shines in the darkness, friend.
So if ever you’re in the wilderness,
Look up and find the stars.”
Have any of you seen the stars at camp this week? I know it’s been a pretty cloudy week. It’s amazing how many more stars you can see here than where a lot of us live. And here’s the thing right - you can’t see the stars unless you go out in the wilderness, where there isn’t a lot of light, in nature, and at night - and look up.
Nicodemus wouldn’t have gotten to know Jesus, wouldn’t have gotten the answers he was looking for, if he didn’t go to Jesus in the middle of the night to ask his questions.
Just as we can see the stars in the night, especially in the night of the wilderness, we can encounter the light of Jesus in the midst of our wilderness experiences.
I want to briefly tell you about two wilderness experiences I’ve had.
One was being a camper and working right here at camp. A lot of this wilderness was the literal wilderness - the physical forest and landscape around us. But it was also the other type of wilderness too because it pushed me to grow - as a person and in my relationship with God. My time here at Camp was a beautiful, if also exhausting and hard, wilderness. Full of friendships and self-discovery - and falling in love with God. Especially falling in love with coming up to this hill every Thursday night, and finding God here, in the bread and the cup. Just as I also found God in the trees, and waters, and campers, and staff at camp. In a time of “wilderness” - I found God everywhere.
Where have you all seen God at camp this week or this summer?
(Answers)
Now my second wilderness experience was actually when I was studying abroad in Japan - I was homesick - a feeling I know some at camp have. Now, I was in a city of one and a half million people (that’s a lot of people!!), but I was still in a wilderness. It wasn’t a wilderness of place like a forest or a desert or a jungle or a camp…it was a wilderness of my heart. And it was there I learned that God can be found anywhere. If we just look, if we just ask, if we just pray for it - we can see signs of God anywhere. So I found a small English speaking church where we weekly broke bread, had Communion, worshiped, and shared together. God was found. And in that wilderness, I found God and learned a lot about myself.
This week (and summer) at camp
Maybe like Nicodemus, you’ve had questions about God - did you find answers? Did you find Jesus? If you did, that’s wonderful. If not, keep searching and keep asking.
Maybe you felt homesick and learned you need Jesus and others to support you and carry you through.
Maybe in the wilderness, you encountered God and God’s love in so many ways - in both the natural world and each other.
Maybe as you leave camp you will go back into a “wilderness” of your everyday life - issues you’re dealing with at home or in your family or friends…
Whatever wilderness you are in,whether it’s physical or metaphorical, know that God is there - and that God is always with you.
And so tonight, you are all invited to come and share in the bread and the cup - share in Holy Communion together. For this is a beautiful way that we encounter God, in this bread and this cup. In the beautiful wilderness of camp. In each other, Around your campfire tonight. When you look up and see the stars. Because wherever you find yourself, even in the wilderness, God is there.
Amen.
(Solicit responses)
Yeah, I think he could easily sneak around at night. And I also think sometimes our questions, our doubts, our wonderings - are harder to ignore at night time. During the day we are busy and can be distracted by a lot of things. But sometimes, when we can’t fall asleep at night, all these thoughts race through our heads. All these questions, and all these emotions…
That can be like a wilderness. Have you guys…talked about wilderness at all this week? What do you think, is nighttime its own special kind of wilderness? Anyone do a night hike this week? Yeah? It totally changes your perspective.
So nighttime in this story with Nicodemus it’s like two wildernesses. There is the physical wilderness of night time. Or like, we experience the physical wilderness here. Or the physical wilderness of the jungle or a desert… But there is also a metaphorical wilderness, a wilderness of the heart and mind, and that’s that wilderness when you have lots of questions or are unsure or feeling a lot of emotions.
So I want to read this poem to you - I didn’t write it. It’s by The Rev. Sarah Speed Are:
“It’s only in the wilderness that you can see the stars.
That’s what city living has taught me.
We can shine a light on the things we want to see—
Fluorescent and bright, lighting up dark alleys.
However, it’s only in the wilderness that you can see the stars.
And it’s only in the dark of night that the questions come.
What is my purpose here? What does God have to say to me?
What does God have to say to suffering?
The sun falls and my doubt rises,
For it’s only in the dark that the questions come.
So like Nicodemus in the night,
I will throw my big questions at the sky.
And my voice will reverberate among the stars,
And my questions will echo throughout the dark.
For there in the night, my words form constellations.
And there in the wilderness, my prayers form galaxies.
So even there in the unknown, I trust that I am found.
A light shines in the darkness, friend.
So if ever you’re in the wilderness,
Look up and find the stars.”
Have any of you seen the stars at camp this week? I know it’s been a pretty cloudy week. It’s amazing how many more stars you can see here than where a lot of us live. And here’s the thing right - you can’t see the stars unless you go out in the wilderness, where there isn’t a lot of light, in nature, and at night - and look up.
Nicodemus wouldn’t have gotten to know Jesus, wouldn’t have gotten the answers he was looking for, if he didn’t go to Jesus in the middle of the night to ask his questions.
Just as we can see the stars in the night, especially in the night of the wilderness, we can encounter the light of Jesus in the midst of our wilderness experiences.
I want to briefly tell you about two wilderness experiences I’ve had.
One was being a camper and working right here at camp. A lot of this wilderness was the literal wilderness - the physical forest and landscape around us. But it was also the other type of wilderness too because it pushed me to grow - as a person and in my relationship with God. My time here at Camp was a beautiful, if also exhausting and hard, wilderness. Full of friendships and self-discovery - and falling in love with God. Especially falling in love with coming up to this hill every Thursday night, and finding God here, in the bread and the cup. Just as I also found God in the trees, and waters, and campers, and staff at camp. In a time of “wilderness” - I found God everywhere.
Where have you all seen God at camp this week or this summer?
(Answers)
Now my second wilderness experience was actually when I was studying abroad in Japan - I was homesick - a feeling I know some at camp have. Now, I was in a city of one and a half million people (that’s a lot of people!!), but I was still in a wilderness. It wasn’t a wilderness of place like a forest or a desert or a jungle or a camp…it was a wilderness of my heart. And it was there I learned that God can be found anywhere. If we just look, if we just ask, if we just pray for it - we can see signs of God anywhere. So I found a small English speaking church where we weekly broke bread, had Communion, worshiped, and shared together. God was found. And in that wilderness, I found God and learned a lot about myself.
This week (and summer) at camp
Maybe like Nicodemus, you’ve had questions about God - did you find answers? Did you find Jesus? If you did, that’s wonderful. If not, keep searching and keep asking.
Maybe you felt homesick and learned you need Jesus and others to support you and carry you through.
Maybe in the wilderness, you encountered God and God’s love in so many ways - in both the natural world and each other.
Maybe as you leave camp you will go back into a “wilderness” of your everyday life - issues you’re dealing with at home or in your family or friends…
Whatever wilderness you are in,whether it’s physical or metaphorical, know that God is there - and that God is always with you.
And so tonight, you are all invited to come and share in the bread and the cup - share in Holy Communion together. For this is a beautiful way that we encounter God, in this bread and this cup. In the beautiful wilderness of camp. In each other, Around your campfire tonight. When you look up and see the stars. Because wherever you find yourself, even in the wilderness, God is there.
Amen.
Wednesday, July 1, 2026
Call to Worship based on Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52 & Romans 8:26-39
Leader: We come together to reflect on God’s Love.
People: May we chase after it.
L: God’s Love -
P: May it grow within us.
L: God’s Love -
P: May it overflow.
L: God’s Love -
P: May nothing separate us from it.
L: Let us worship the God who is Love.
All: Amen.
People: May we chase after it.
L: God’s Love -
P: May it grow within us.
L: God’s Love -
P: May it overflow.
L: God’s Love -
P: May nothing separate us from it.
L: Let us worship the God who is Love.
All: Amen.
Tuesday, June 30, 2026
VBS Sunday “Sermon”
VBS Sunday “Sermon”
Preached Sunday, June 28, 2026
I am going to start by assuring you that I am not preaching a full sermon today. It is a short message following our mini-Sunday VBS with the kids up front.
And, I want to ask you today, who first told you about Jesus? Maybe it was a mother or father, a Sunday School teacher, a pastor, a neighbor, a friend…who first told you about Jesus and helped you know God’s love for you?
I’d invite you to take a moment and either say a name aloud or share it with the person next to you.
We thank God for those people!
And now - who continued to tell you about Jesus? Who continued to make God’s love real for you? Again, perhaps a parent, grandparent, Sunday School teacher, school teacher, neighbor, friend, aunt, uncle…
Think of those people in your life who have continually told you about Jesus - through their words and or actions. Those people that have helped you, since the time you first heard about Jesus until now, continue in a loving relationship with Jesus. Think about those people. I am sure there are many. Because studies show that the longevity of faith in children and teens as they turn into adults is directly correlated to the number of adults in their lives who are spiritual mentors.
Various studies show that 8/10 young adults leave the faith of their childhood in their 20s. Gen Z, who are currently between the ages of 14 - 29, are the least religious generation, with 34% having no religious affiliation.
Statistics like this have caused researchers to ask - what helps make faith “stick” in the life of a child and young adult? The Fuller Youth Institute, which specializes in studies about faith development for children, teens, and young adults, says that it is directly related to the number of adults invested in the life, and faith life, of the child.
If a child has 5 adults, of various ages - multiple generations, who are invested in their life and their faith development, that child is more likely to retain and continue to grow in their faith as they reach adulthood.
Often in youth ministry we ask, what is the minimum number of adults we need to run this program? Volunteers can be hard to find and we don’t want to burn people out. Of course we follow Safe Sanctuaries so we always have at least two background checked volunteers with your children and youth…and this may look something like a ratio of one adult to every five kids. But as people who are committed to following out the Great Commission, and as people who committed to help let children know that God loves them, we really need to flip that ratio around - every child needs at least five adults in their life who they can trust, who care about them, and who help share God’s love with them. Faith development in children is not just the job of parents. It is not just the job of Youth Leaders and staff. It is the job of the whole church.
Our church is invested in being people, being adults, being a community, who invest in the lives and faith of children - and one another. We make these vows when we baptize a child - to love them and to teach them about Jesus. We share God’s love through childcare and Sunday School. Through youth group and children's choir. Through VBS. Through every Sunday - through the children’s moments and just being a community who includes children. I love that on any given Sunday, there is a good chance that we have ages 0 - 90 in this congregation. And we need each other.
Children and youth need us adults to invest in their lives, to get to know them, to care about them, to teach them about Jesus.
And as adults, we need these children and youth - to teach us about Jesus, to show us God’s love and joy through their actions and words, to help us know that whenever we welcome one of them into our midst, we welcome Jesus.
So today - think about the people who invested in your life and told you about Jesus. Maybe you can think of five people, maybe even more. Give thanks to God for them.
And then I want you to think about - who are the people and who are the children and youth that you are investing in, who you care about, who you pray about, who you share God’s love with…
Thank you for sharing God’s love with every generation.
Amen.
Preached Sunday, June 28, 2026
I am going to start by assuring you that I am not preaching a full sermon today. It is a short message following our mini-Sunday VBS with the kids up front.
And, I want to ask you today, who first told you about Jesus? Maybe it was a mother or father, a Sunday School teacher, a pastor, a neighbor, a friend…who first told you about Jesus and helped you know God’s love for you?
I’d invite you to take a moment and either say a name aloud or share it with the person next to you.
We thank God for those people!
And now - who continued to tell you about Jesus? Who continued to make God’s love real for you? Again, perhaps a parent, grandparent, Sunday School teacher, school teacher, neighbor, friend, aunt, uncle…
Think of those people in your life who have continually told you about Jesus - through their words and or actions. Those people that have helped you, since the time you first heard about Jesus until now, continue in a loving relationship with Jesus. Think about those people. I am sure there are many. Because studies show that the longevity of faith in children and teens as they turn into adults is directly correlated to the number of adults in their lives who are spiritual mentors.
Various studies show that 8/10 young adults leave the faith of their childhood in their 20s. Gen Z, who are currently between the ages of 14 - 29, are the least religious generation, with 34% having no religious affiliation.
Statistics like this have caused researchers to ask - what helps make faith “stick” in the life of a child and young adult? The Fuller Youth Institute, which specializes in studies about faith development for children, teens, and young adults, says that it is directly related to the number of adults invested in the life, and faith life, of the child.
If a child has 5 adults, of various ages - multiple generations, who are invested in their life and their faith development, that child is more likely to retain and continue to grow in their faith as they reach adulthood.
Often in youth ministry we ask, what is the minimum number of adults we need to run this program? Volunteers can be hard to find and we don’t want to burn people out. Of course we follow Safe Sanctuaries so we always have at least two background checked volunteers with your children and youth…and this may look something like a ratio of one adult to every five kids. But as people who are committed to following out the Great Commission, and as people who committed to help let children know that God loves them, we really need to flip that ratio around - every child needs at least five adults in their life who they can trust, who care about them, and who help share God’s love with them. Faith development in children is not just the job of parents. It is not just the job of Youth Leaders and staff. It is the job of the whole church.
Our church is invested in being people, being adults, being a community, who invest in the lives and faith of children - and one another. We make these vows when we baptize a child - to love them and to teach them about Jesus. We share God’s love through childcare and Sunday School. Through youth group and children's choir. Through VBS. Through every Sunday - through the children’s moments and just being a community who includes children. I love that on any given Sunday, there is a good chance that we have ages 0 - 90 in this congregation. And we need each other.
Children and youth need us adults to invest in their lives, to get to know them, to care about them, to teach them about Jesus.
And as adults, we need these children and youth - to teach us about Jesus, to show us God’s love and joy through their actions and words, to help us know that whenever we welcome one of them into our midst, we welcome Jesus.
So today - think about the people who invested in your life and told you about Jesus. Maybe you can think of five people, maybe even more. Give thanks to God for them.
And then I want you to think about - who are the people and who are the children and youth that you are investing in, who you care about, who you pray about, who you share God’s love with…
Thank you for sharing God’s love with every generation.
Amen.
Tuesday, June 23, 2026
"I Don't Like It" a sermon on Matthew 10:24-39
Matthew 10:24-39
“I Don’t Like It”
Preached Sunday, June 21, 2026
This is a terrible text for today. It is the assigned lectionary text from the Revised Common Lectionary which has been around for about thirty years - a collection of four texts a week (Old Testament, Psalm, Gospel, New Testament) that repeats on a three year rotation. Trust me, I did not seek out or purposefully choose a text for Father’s Day that says, “For I have come to set a man against his father…”
And I’ll be honest with you. I don’t like this text. Yes - a pastor can say that. A Christian can say that. This text comes to us from our Holy Scriptures, the Gospels no less, red letters from Jesus and - I don’t like it.
And I’ll be honest with you. I don’t like this text. Yes - a pastor can say that. A Christian can say that. This text comes to us from our Holy Scriptures, the Gospels no less, red letters from Jesus and - I don’t like it.
It doesn’t sound like the Jesus I know, love, and preach about.
It doesn’t sound like the same Jesus, the same God, who said “Love one another” or “God is Love.”
And so this makes me stop, pause and ask: What do we do with Scripture that we don’t like? How do we engage with texts that make us uncomfortable?
I am often tempted to ignore them. I will admit that I have chosen, in the past, to choose different Scriptures to focus on in preaching because the assigned text for the day was a doozy.
And this one is a doozy. At times, this choice may be a selfish one from me - that I don’t have the energy or the time to engage with the text in a way that is constructive. And still, not every text from the Bible works well in a sermon. Other texts can be parsed out better in Bible study or conversation. Regardless - my inert inclination is to ignore the texts I don’t like.
Others may take texts like this purely at face value. They may say something like, “The Bible says it. I believe. Period.” And it ends there. But - I also don’t think this is a healthy way to engage with Scripture. Because the Bible does contradict itself. Genesis 1 and 2 have different orders of creation. The history between Judges and Joshua are the same time period but have different versions of events. Some of the commands that the writers claim came from God in the Old Testament, directly contradict not only Jesus’s commands to love one another but the law passed on by God in the Old Testament. If we simply say, “The Bible says it. I believe it. Period.” We will actually end up doing our faith, our relationship with God, and the extremely complex book that is the Bible a disservice. We will tie ourselves in knots trying to erase contradictions. We will even find ourselves excusing behavior that is an affront to God simply because it is “Biblical.” Remember - not everything that is Biblical is Christ-like.
So if we don’t ignore the text. If we don’t just give it a blanket statement of uncritical acceptance - what do we do with it?
We wrestle with the text.
And so today, I was tempted to ignore this text, to pick something else to preach on - and instead, I have chosen for us to wrestle with it together.
First, let’s start with the foundation for wrestling with the Biblical text. The Biblical text welcomes wrestling, it welcomes questions, it welcomes us diving deep - Jacob wrestled with God and was rewarded for it, given the name of Israel. Thomas doubted and was able to touch Jesus. We too can come to know God better, to more closely encounter God, when we wrestle with Scripture.
This is evidenced in Scripture and it is a part of our tradition as United Methodists. United Methodists do not believe that Scripture is innerent - meaning that it is without error. We do, however, believe that as it says in our articles of faith, that the Bible holds everything necessary for salvation. And - The Bible was written by people interpreting God’s actions in the world. There are a myriad of genres in the Bible, vastly different culture concepts, and thousands of years of changing perspectives in the Bible, not to mention it was originally written in three different languages, none of which are Latin or Greek which is where a lot of modern English Bible translations come from. All of this is to say - we are called to wrestle with Scripture. And United Methodists have coined a term for the tools that we use to wrestle with and better understand Scripture and that is called the Wesleyan Quadrilateral.
The Wesleyan Quadrilateral is often presented as a trapezoid where Scripture is the longest, bottom line and then the other lines are Reason, Tradition and Experience. It’s also often presented as a three-legged stool with Scripture being the seat and the legs that hold it up are reason, tradition, and experience. I prefer the example of colored lenses. We read Scripture through the colored lenses of reason, tradition, and experience - those lenses color how we understand and interpret Scripture which is not a bad thing. Because those lenses are always there for every single person whether we realize it or not. There is no such thing as an unbiased reading of Scripture. Instead we need to be aware of the factors that God is using to help God speak to us through Scripture and help make it relevant and applicable to our lives today.
Tradition is the long history of people of faith - from teachings, sermons, creeds, and hymns that have shaped, interpreted, and put our faith into practice. Experience is each and every one of our lived experiences as unique individuals in this world. Our genders, our ethnicities, our family structures, everything that’s ever happened to us - this is our experience of who we are and we cannot read Scripture without it influencing us. We can also learn from those who read Scripture and have different experiences than us. And then there is reason. Reason is our brain’s ability to think, question, and understand. To take into account science, logic, and the growing understanding of human knowledge and how God can use that to speak to us in new ways.
So yes - we wrestle with Scripture, aided by tradition, experience, and reason - so that - so that - we can better know God and be better followers of Jesus.
So whenever I approach the Biblical text - I use Jesus as the anchor of my faith and understanding. Jesus is God revealed to us. God sent Jesus so that we would better know and understand God - so that God would be revealed to us. And so whenever we engage Scripture we should always start with the embodiment of Jesus. And Jesus says that the core of the Gospel, the core of the Good News of God, is the two greatest commandments - to love God, and to love neighbor as self. All other Scripture should radiate out from that center.
Using Jesus and the two greatest commandments of the Gospel. Let's take God’s commandments in Joshua to kill every man, woman and child into account. How do we deal with texts like this that are so deeply contradictory to the life and Good News of Jesus? Many will say “well, that was the Old Testament God, not the New Testament God.” But the tradition of the church has long been considered it a heresy to divide our God into two different gods. We can use reason to see that although the text in Joshua says they killed every man, woman, and child…in Judges and Kings, we see people of the tribes they presumably killed still living in the land. So we can use reason to say there is something amiss in the text here. It doesn’t add up. And then we can use our experiences of the long scope of human history to know that there is nothing new under the sun and since the beginning of time, people have been claiming that God has sanctioned our tribalistic and violent endeavours - even though that is not the person of God. Most people today realize that the Crusades were not blessed by God. They were not a “holy” effort - they were politically motivated wars over resources and borders. Violence that was abhorrent to God was committed. And yet, if they took place during the time of Scripture, and the people leading these wars had written them into the text, they would have been written as ordained by God. People are always looking for God to bless their violence and nationalistic wars - but saying or writing it, even in a book that thousands of years later would be canonized, does not make it so. Taken together, we can say with confidence that the violence in the book of Joshua was not ordained by God and is not congruent with the person of Jesus that we follow.
Okay - I have been talking a lot about things other than our assigned text this morning in order to help us wrestle with the difficult words of Jesus we read this morning. So now let’s do a little bit of wrestling with that text.
This morning’s Gospel text is about being a disciple and Jesus is warning his disciples about what it will be like to follow him - it will not be all sunshine and roses. Jesus is not being prescriptive (that is say that being a follower of Jesus means that there SHOULD be familial strife) but he is being descriptive - saying that, at that moment in time, and throughout times in history, being a follower of Jesus will put you at odds with other allegiances - including familial ones.
This particular teaching to his disciples starts with an admonition that is repeated over and over in Scripture: Do not be afraid. “You will face hardship and be judged…don’t be afraid when this happens!” Don’t be afraid said over and over throughout Scripture, God is comforting and assuring us that no matter what we go through in this life, God will be there.
Jesus says, “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, fear the one who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” - I could give a whole sermon just on the Greek words used for "destroy" and “hell” here which are not direct Greek-English translations, I think this is important to understand when wrestling with the text, we are dealing with different languages, translations, etc - and even scholars don’t always agree on the best English word to use in translation…but this sermon is long enough as it is. But the text always has more that we can explore and wrestle with.
And, basically, what Jesus is telling the disciples is again, “do not fear” - no matter what other people can do to you, no matter how being a follower of Jesus affects your other relationships, God holds your soul in the palm of God’s hands.
Jesus stresses this point again in the next couple of verses: “are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. And even the hairs of your head are all counted. So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.”
And now we come to: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace but a sword.” Yikes.
Many have taken this verse as an excuse for Christian violence which is a complete misunderstanding or even an abuse of Jesus’s words - Jesus, who we call the Prince of Peace, who told us to turn the other cheek, who told us to love our enemies and bless those who persecute us, who told Peter to put away the sword and said that those who live by the sword die by the sword… No, those who want to use the name of our God to commit violence against fellow human beings created by God will always find justification - even if it means misunderstanding and misrepresenting who Jesus is. So using the other red letters of Jesus and our reasoning here, we can know that Jesus means a metaphorical sword, not a physical one.
Jesus is not telling us to commit violence, instead Jesus is saying that choosing to follow Jesus can cause strife in our world and relationships - in fact following Jesus may be the sword that cuts relational ties for us.
Which brings us to the next verses which are just perfect for Father’s Day:
“For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, and one's foes will be members of one's own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”
Jesus is not encouraging familial strife. He was talking to his disciples who were experiencing familial strife because of their decision to follow Jesus.
It doesn’t sound like the same Jesus, the same God, who said “Love one another” or “God is Love.”
And so this makes me stop, pause and ask: What do we do with Scripture that we don’t like? How do we engage with texts that make us uncomfortable?
I am often tempted to ignore them. I will admit that I have chosen, in the past, to choose different Scriptures to focus on in preaching because the assigned text for the day was a doozy.
And this one is a doozy. At times, this choice may be a selfish one from me - that I don’t have the energy or the time to engage with the text in a way that is constructive. And still, not every text from the Bible works well in a sermon. Other texts can be parsed out better in Bible study or conversation. Regardless - my inert inclination is to ignore the texts I don’t like.
Others may take texts like this purely at face value. They may say something like, “The Bible says it. I believe. Period.” And it ends there. But - I also don’t think this is a healthy way to engage with Scripture. Because the Bible does contradict itself. Genesis 1 and 2 have different orders of creation. The history between Judges and Joshua are the same time period but have different versions of events. Some of the commands that the writers claim came from God in the Old Testament, directly contradict not only Jesus’s commands to love one another but the law passed on by God in the Old Testament. If we simply say, “The Bible says it. I believe it. Period.” We will actually end up doing our faith, our relationship with God, and the extremely complex book that is the Bible a disservice. We will tie ourselves in knots trying to erase contradictions. We will even find ourselves excusing behavior that is an affront to God simply because it is “Biblical.” Remember - not everything that is Biblical is Christ-like.
So if we don’t ignore the text. If we don’t just give it a blanket statement of uncritical acceptance - what do we do with it?
We wrestle with the text.
And so today, I was tempted to ignore this text, to pick something else to preach on - and instead, I have chosen for us to wrestle with it together.
First, let’s start with the foundation for wrestling with the Biblical text. The Biblical text welcomes wrestling, it welcomes questions, it welcomes us diving deep - Jacob wrestled with God and was rewarded for it, given the name of Israel. Thomas doubted and was able to touch Jesus. We too can come to know God better, to more closely encounter God, when we wrestle with Scripture.
This is evidenced in Scripture and it is a part of our tradition as United Methodists. United Methodists do not believe that Scripture is innerent - meaning that it is without error. We do, however, believe that as it says in our articles of faith, that the Bible holds everything necessary for salvation. And - The Bible was written by people interpreting God’s actions in the world. There are a myriad of genres in the Bible, vastly different culture concepts, and thousands of years of changing perspectives in the Bible, not to mention it was originally written in three different languages, none of which are Latin or Greek which is where a lot of modern English Bible translations come from. All of this is to say - we are called to wrestle with Scripture. And United Methodists have coined a term for the tools that we use to wrestle with and better understand Scripture and that is called the Wesleyan Quadrilateral.
The Wesleyan Quadrilateral is often presented as a trapezoid where Scripture is the longest, bottom line and then the other lines are Reason, Tradition and Experience. It’s also often presented as a three-legged stool with Scripture being the seat and the legs that hold it up are reason, tradition, and experience. I prefer the example of colored lenses. We read Scripture through the colored lenses of reason, tradition, and experience - those lenses color how we understand and interpret Scripture which is not a bad thing. Because those lenses are always there for every single person whether we realize it or not. There is no such thing as an unbiased reading of Scripture. Instead we need to be aware of the factors that God is using to help God speak to us through Scripture and help make it relevant and applicable to our lives today.
Tradition is the long history of people of faith - from teachings, sermons, creeds, and hymns that have shaped, interpreted, and put our faith into practice. Experience is each and every one of our lived experiences as unique individuals in this world. Our genders, our ethnicities, our family structures, everything that’s ever happened to us - this is our experience of who we are and we cannot read Scripture without it influencing us. We can also learn from those who read Scripture and have different experiences than us. And then there is reason. Reason is our brain’s ability to think, question, and understand. To take into account science, logic, and the growing understanding of human knowledge and how God can use that to speak to us in new ways.
So yes - we wrestle with Scripture, aided by tradition, experience, and reason - so that - so that - we can better know God and be better followers of Jesus.
So whenever I approach the Biblical text - I use Jesus as the anchor of my faith and understanding. Jesus is God revealed to us. God sent Jesus so that we would better know and understand God - so that God would be revealed to us. And so whenever we engage Scripture we should always start with the embodiment of Jesus. And Jesus says that the core of the Gospel, the core of the Good News of God, is the two greatest commandments - to love God, and to love neighbor as self. All other Scripture should radiate out from that center.
Using Jesus and the two greatest commandments of the Gospel. Let's take God’s commandments in Joshua to kill every man, woman and child into account. How do we deal with texts like this that are so deeply contradictory to the life and Good News of Jesus? Many will say “well, that was the Old Testament God, not the New Testament God.” But the tradition of the church has long been considered it a heresy to divide our God into two different gods. We can use reason to see that although the text in Joshua says they killed every man, woman, and child…in Judges and Kings, we see people of the tribes they presumably killed still living in the land. So we can use reason to say there is something amiss in the text here. It doesn’t add up. And then we can use our experiences of the long scope of human history to know that there is nothing new under the sun and since the beginning of time, people have been claiming that God has sanctioned our tribalistic and violent endeavours - even though that is not the person of God. Most people today realize that the Crusades were not blessed by God. They were not a “holy” effort - they were politically motivated wars over resources and borders. Violence that was abhorrent to God was committed. And yet, if they took place during the time of Scripture, and the people leading these wars had written them into the text, they would have been written as ordained by God. People are always looking for God to bless their violence and nationalistic wars - but saying or writing it, even in a book that thousands of years later would be canonized, does not make it so. Taken together, we can say with confidence that the violence in the book of Joshua was not ordained by God and is not congruent with the person of Jesus that we follow.
Okay - I have been talking a lot about things other than our assigned text this morning in order to help us wrestle with the difficult words of Jesus we read this morning. So now let’s do a little bit of wrestling with that text.
This morning’s Gospel text is about being a disciple and Jesus is warning his disciples about what it will be like to follow him - it will not be all sunshine and roses. Jesus is not being prescriptive (that is say that being a follower of Jesus means that there SHOULD be familial strife) but he is being descriptive - saying that, at that moment in time, and throughout times in history, being a follower of Jesus will put you at odds with other allegiances - including familial ones.
This particular teaching to his disciples starts with an admonition that is repeated over and over in Scripture: Do not be afraid. “You will face hardship and be judged…don’t be afraid when this happens!” Don’t be afraid said over and over throughout Scripture, God is comforting and assuring us that no matter what we go through in this life, God will be there.
Jesus says, “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, fear the one who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” - I could give a whole sermon just on the Greek words used for "destroy" and “hell” here which are not direct Greek-English translations, I think this is important to understand when wrestling with the text, we are dealing with different languages, translations, etc - and even scholars don’t always agree on the best English word to use in translation…but this sermon is long enough as it is. But the text always has more that we can explore and wrestle with.
And, basically, what Jesus is telling the disciples is again, “do not fear” - no matter what other people can do to you, no matter how being a follower of Jesus affects your other relationships, God holds your soul in the palm of God’s hands.
Jesus stresses this point again in the next couple of verses: “are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. And even the hairs of your head are all counted. So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.”
And now we come to: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace but a sword.” Yikes.
Many have taken this verse as an excuse for Christian violence which is a complete misunderstanding or even an abuse of Jesus’s words - Jesus, who we call the Prince of Peace, who told us to turn the other cheek, who told us to love our enemies and bless those who persecute us, who told Peter to put away the sword and said that those who live by the sword die by the sword… No, those who want to use the name of our God to commit violence against fellow human beings created by God will always find justification - even if it means misunderstanding and misrepresenting who Jesus is. So using the other red letters of Jesus and our reasoning here, we can know that Jesus means a metaphorical sword, not a physical one.
Jesus is not telling us to commit violence, instead Jesus is saying that choosing to follow Jesus can cause strife in our world and relationships - in fact following Jesus may be the sword that cuts relational ties for us.
Which brings us to the next verses which are just perfect for Father’s Day:
“For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, and one's foes will be members of one's own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”
Jesus is not encouraging familial strife. He was talking to his disciples who were experiencing familial strife because of their decision to follow Jesus.
People who are using this scripture to justify disowning LGBTQ children are again, misunderstanding or even abusing Jesus’s words. We must understand these words alongside Jesus’s commandments to love one another.
If your relationship with Jesus puts you at odds with those in your family or inner circle - you are not alone. Jesus’s disciples from the very beginning have experienced this. Don’t seek it out or be purposefully antagonist. Keep on offering love. Because even if your relationship with Jesus puts you at odds with another, Jesus tells us to love our enemies and above all, to choose love.
After all, in another controversial Scripture, Jesus says “who is my mother?” when his mother is right in front of him. But his mother was still at the foot of the cross and he asked John, the disciple whom he loved, to care for her.
Danny Zacharias is a New Testament professor and an Indigenous Christian. He said this when reflecting on these verses of familial strife and his own relationships with being both Indigenous and a Christian:
“Reading this as an Indigenous man, I cannot help but also think of Indigenous communities throughout much of the world, but especially here on Turtle Island (North America). The church has perpetuated much harm among my people, the First Nations of Canada. Christian theology demonized our culture. Christian teachings like the Doctrine of Discovery bolstered colonial conquest and dehumanization. Christian churches helped to run Indian Residential and Boarding schools, which sought to kill the Indian in the child. It should not be hard for people to understand why there is sometimes such outright hatred toward the Christian church within Indigenous communities.
And yet, the reality is that many Indigenous people are followers of the Jesus Way. And for us, the painful division is sometimes twofold: We are sometimes at odds with our Indigenous communities because of our devotion to Jesus, while simultaneously being at odds with the church because we are proud of who we are as Indigenous people and seek to follow God the way he has made us—something that is often deeply resisted within the wider church that desires more cultural hegemony.”
End quote.
This is a faithful and real life example of what Jesus meant when he said he comes to bring the sword -- being a Christian will put us at odds with those who don’t understand the teachings of Jesus and even those who say they preach Christ but don’t live out his love.
Jesus ends this teaching with these lines: “and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”
In essence - anyone who wants to follow Jesus and also wants power, wealth, or an easy way - they have to make a choice. To follow Jesus means to be crucified with Jesus, to follow Jesus means to lose one’s life, it means choosing love.
Choosing love -
even when relationships are fractured,
even when we’re navigating messy relationships,
even when you’re at odds with other people,
even when you lose power in this world.
Following Jesus is not the easy path, Jesus is letting his disciples know - “at times, it will be hard - do not be afraid, I am with you.”
So yeah, I don’t really like this text because of the way an uncritical reading of it lends itself to abuse and mis-use. I don't even really like it once I dive deep and wrestle with it because it's not an easy message! I wish Jesus could be less esoteric. I wish Jesus could speak more plainly. I wish Jesus always agreed with me… but if that was the case, God wouldn’t be God.
So when there is something we don’t like in the Bible, we don’t have to like it, and we are invited to wrestle with it, and maybe, just maybe, we’ll come to know God a little more for the wrestling.
Amen.
If your relationship with Jesus puts you at odds with those in your family or inner circle - you are not alone. Jesus’s disciples from the very beginning have experienced this. Don’t seek it out or be purposefully antagonist. Keep on offering love. Because even if your relationship with Jesus puts you at odds with another, Jesus tells us to love our enemies and above all, to choose love.
After all, in another controversial Scripture, Jesus says “who is my mother?” when his mother is right in front of him. But his mother was still at the foot of the cross and he asked John, the disciple whom he loved, to care for her.
Danny Zacharias is a New Testament professor and an Indigenous Christian. He said this when reflecting on these verses of familial strife and his own relationships with being both Indigenous and a Christian:
“Reading this as an Indigenous man, I cannot help but also think of Indigenous communities throughout much of the world, but especially here on Turtle Island (North America). The church has perpetuated much harm among my people, the First Nations of Canada. Christian theology demonized our culture. Christian teachings like the Doctrine of Discovery bolstered colonial conquest and dehumanization. Christian churches helped to run Indian Residential and Boarding schools, which sought to kill the Indian in the child. It should not be hard for people to understand why there is sometimes such outright hatred toward the Christian church within Indigenous communities.
And yet, the reality is that many Indigenous people are followers of the Jesus Way. And for us, the painful division is sometimes twofold: We are sometimes at odds with our Indigenous communities because of our devotion to Jesus, while simultaneously being at odds with the church because we are proud of who we are as Indigenous people and seek to follow God the way he has made us—something that is often deeply resisted within the wider church that desires more cultural hegemony.”
End quote.
This is a faithful and real life example of what Jesus meant when he said he comes to bring the sword -- being a Christian will put us at odds with those who don’t understand the teachings of Jesus and even those who say they preach Christ but don’t live out his love.
Jesus ends this teaching with these lines: “and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”
In essence - anyone who wants to follow Jesus and also wants power, wealth, or an easy way - they have to make a choice. To follow Jesus means to be crucified with Jesus, to follow Jesus means to lose one’s life, it means choosing love.
Choosing love -
even when relationships are fractured,
even when we’re navigating messy relationships,
even when you’re at odds with other people,
even when you lose power in this world.
Following Jesus is not the easy path, Jesus is letting his disciples know - “at times, it will be hard - do not be afraid, I am with you.”
So yeah, I don’t really like this text because of the way an uncritical reading of it lends itself to abuse and mis-use. I don't even really like it once I dive deep and wrestle with it because it's not an easy message! I wish Jesus could be less esoteric. I wish Jesus could speak more plainly. I wish Jesus always agreed with me… but if that was the case, God wouldn’t be God.
So when there is something we don’t like in the Bible, we don’t have to like it, and we are invited to wrestle with it, and maybe, just maybe, we’ll come to know God a little more for the wrestling.
Amen.
Tuesday, June 9, 2026
Fourth of July/250 Years Hymn Sing
Fourth of July/250 Years Hymn Sing
This hymn sing is cross-posted on https://asingingpeople.blogspot.com/
It also includes a Native land recongition and this website can be used as a resource to personalize it for your geographical region: https://native-land.ca/
Introduction: Fourth of July in Church?
Colossians 1:15-20:
“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers—all things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.”
Introduction: Fourth of July in Church?
Colossians 1:15-20:
“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers—all things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.”
It is the weekend of Fourth of July, Independence Day, and the milestone of 250 years as a nation today in The United States of America.
The recognition of this day in churches is a controversial decision. There will be churches that are draped in flags, red, white, and blue and full of patriotic hymns and worship services who let this secular, national holiday pass without recognition as it is just that - a secular, non-religious day.
Right now, I believe it is more important than ever to take stock of our whole lives through the lens of our faith and following Jesus. This includes how we engage with and live within our country. Perhaps more than ever, there are many forces which seek to woo us away from Jesus as our primary source of identity, hope, trust, and salvation. Christian Nationalism, which co-opts Christian imagery and ideology to interweave it with political ideology, is one of those seductive heresies. Christian Nationalism places Christ and country as equal powers in our lives, or even country above Christ, distorting the Kingship of Christ. It erroneously places our hope in political power, or in our status of citizens of a Nation, rather than in the life of Jesus. It must cause us to pause anytime we hear of country and God in conversation with one another - does the conversation promote fear and a narrow definition of what it means to be an American and a Christain? Does it cause us to rely on a political candidate or party above Jesus? Or does it generate genuine love of our fellow compatriots, pride in our homeland, and a desire to serve one another in Christian love?
For us in this congregation at this moment, we are all probably Christians and we are all probably Americans and we cannot divorce the two identities from one another. When we claim Christ as Lord, we claim Christ’s lordship over all things in our lives. All relationships and all identities - including country.
This means we should reflect on what it means to be a Christian and an American. We should thank God for the blessings of our home land: the beautiful natural landscape and its resources, from Redwoods to grassy plains to Mountains and sea shores. We can thank God for the freedom of religion, protected in the Constitution that allows us and many to gather to freely worship without fear of persecution or arrest from our government. We can admit love for our homeland, all the people, gifts, and opportunities it has given us. We can celebrate this holiday and this anniversary.
We should also look at our country - in the past and the present - through the lens of Christ’s Lordship and the two greatest commandments so that we may better love and serve God and neighbor as we move into the future. We lament all the times we've gotten it wrong, when the imago Dei, the image of God in our neighbors, has been ignored or debased in the name of Country. We confess the times we've been or are complicit in systemic sins. We also look to the slow and steady arc of Justice and give thanks for all the strides we've made, for times when we have loved one another, for when we have been Christ for one another, and allowed our country to be a place where all people are free and all people are seen as beloved Children of God. When we get the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr. right, echoing his words with our actions in his famous “I Have a Dream Speech,”: "When we allow freedom to ring... we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children—black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics—will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: 'Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!'"
And so, out of love of God, and love for our neighbor, which includes love of country, let us sing “America (My Country Tis of Thee),” UMH 697, vs. 1, 2, 4
Native & Indigenous Recognition
The recognition of this day in churches is a controversial decision. There will be churches that are draped in flags, red, white, and blue and full of patriotic hymns and worship services who let this secular, national holiday pass without recognition as it is just that - a secular, non-religious day.
Right now, I believe it is more important than ever to take stock of our whole lives through the lens of our faith and following Jesus. This includes how we engage with and live within our country. Perhaps more than ever, there are many forces which seek to woo us away from Jesus as our primary source of identity, hope, trust, and salvation. Christian Nationalism, which co-opts Christian imagery and ideology to interweave it with political ideology, is one of those seductive heresies. Christian Nationalism places Christ and country as equal powers in our lives, or even country above Christ, distorting the Kingship of Christ. It erroneously places our hope in political power, or in our status of citizens of a Nation, rather than in the life of Jesus. It must cause us to pause anytime we hear of country and God in conversation with one another - does the conversation promote fear and a narrow definition of what it means to be an American and a Christain? Does it cause us to rely on a political candidate or party above Jesus? Or does it generate genuine love of our fellow compatriots, pride in our homeland, and a desire to serve one another in Christian love?
For us in this congregation at this moment, we are all probably Christians and we are all probably Americans and we cannot divorce the two identities from one another. When we claim Christ as Lord, we claim Christ’s lordship over all things in our lives. All relationships and all identities - including country.
This means we should reflect on what it means to be a Christian and an American. We should thank God for the blessings of our home land: the beautiful natural landscape and its resources, from Redwoods to grassy plains to Mountains and sea shores. We can thank God for the freedom of religion, protected in the Constitution that allows us and many to gather to freely worship without fear of persecution or arrest from our government. We can admit love for our homeland, all the people, gifts, and opportunities it has given us. We can celebrate this holiday and this anniversary.
We should also look at our country - in the past and the present - through the lens of Christ’s Lordship and the two greatest commandments so that we may better love and serve God and neighbor as we move into the future. We lament all the times we've gotten it wrong, when the imago Dei, the image of God in our neighbors, has been ignored or debased in the name of Country. We confess the times we've been or are complicit in systemic sins. We also look to the slow and steady arc of Justice and give thanks for all the strides we've made, for times when we have loved one another, for when we have been Christ for one another, and allowed our country to be a place where all people are free and all people are seen as beloved Children of God. When we get the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr. right, echoing his words with our actions in his famous “I Have a Dream Speech,”: "When we allow freedom to ring... we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children—black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics—will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: 'Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!'"
And so, out of love of God, and love for our neighbor, which includes love of country, let us sing “America (My Country Tis of Thee),” UMH 697, vs. 1, 2, 4
Native & Indigenous Recognition
Psalm 24:1-2: “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it, for he has founded it on the seas and established it on the rivers.”
The story of our nation cannot be told without recognizing the Indigenous peoples who were here before European settlers. The land our church sits on was originally lived on and stewarded by people from the Osage, Erie, and Kaskaskia nations. In fact, even the name of our county, Mahoning, comes from an Indigenous word meaning “salt lick.”
The relationship between European settlers and the Indigenous people in the land was complicated and fraught. So too was and is the Indigenous relationship with Christianity. Cultural genocide was committed to erase Indigineous culture and religion and Christainity was forced upon many native children. And still, to this day, many Native peoples are followers of Jesus.
The Trail of Tears, the forced annexation and movement of Indigenous people from their Native lands, is one of the great blots upon our nation. We recognize that people who confessed the name of Jesus committed this atrocity. We also recognize that non-Native Christians, out of great love of God and neighbor, walked in solidarity with their Native siblings on that dangerous journey. We also know that on that path, many Native peoples called out to Jesus in prayer and sung hymns to God along the way.
As we honor this momentous day in our country, we thank God for the people who came here before us and are still here. We pray for wisdom and hearts to love our neighbors and to continue to learn from them, including and especially our Indigenous neighbors.
Let us now listen to an Alleluia chorus sung in Cherokee. (Heleluyan, UMH 78)
The Moral Arc of the Universe
The story of our nation cannot be told without recognizing the Indigenous peoples who were here before European settlers. The land our church sits on was originally lived on and stewarded by people from the Osage, Erie, and Kaskaskia nations. In fact, even the name of our county, Mahoning, comes from an Indigenous word meaning “salt lick.”
The relationship between European settlers and the Indigenous people in the land was complicated and fraught. So too was and is the Indigenous relationship with Christianity. Cultural genocide was committed to erase Indigineous culture and religion and Christainity was forced upon many native children. And still, to this day, many Native peoples are followers of Jesus.
The Trail of Tears, the forced annexation and movement of Indigenous people from their Native lands, is one of the great blots upon our nation. We recognize that people who confessed the name of Jesus committed this atrocity. We also recognize that non-Native Christians, out of great love of God and neighbor, walked in solidarity with their Native siblings on that dangerous journey. We also know that on that path, many Native peoples called out to Jesus in prayer and sung hymns to God along the way.
As we honor this momentous day in our country, we thank God for the people who came here before us and are still here. We pray for wisdom and hearts to love our neighbors and to continue to learn from them, including and especially our Indigenous neighbors.
Let us now listen to an Alleluia chorus sung in Cherokee. (Heleluyan, UMH 78)
The Moral Arc of the Universe
Isaiah 58:6-10:
“Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you;
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’
If you remove the yoke from among you,
the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
if you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness
and your gloom be like the noonday.”
19th Century abolitionist and minister, Theodore Parker, once said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."
We can trace this moral arc through the history of our nation. Many of our country’s original rights and protections, including the right to vote, only applied to white men who owned land. From women to people of color, we have seen the expansion of rights and protections under the law these last 250 years. We celebrate every time the full humanity and voice of a beloved child of God is recognized.
We celebrate and thank God for all advocates who used their voices and lives to speak up for the rights, protection, and well-being of those on the margins. We thank God for all who stand up for justice and for the protection of the oppressed. We especially thank God for those who loose the bounds of injustice out of love for God - knowing that our God is a God who detests bondage and oppression and longs for all humans to be free. We thank our Exodus God for all who, like Moses, lead God’s people out of slavery and into abundance of life.
Slavery is the original sin of America, present at our founding, that we largely have still not wrestled with.
Enslaved people were often not allowed to have a Bible for themselves or were given a sanitized version of the Bible where stories of freedom and verses against slavery were removed. Many enslaved people rejected Christianity for the hateful religion of the master. Still many embraced the story of Moses, the story of Jesus, the story of a God who cared about injustice and who always acted to free the oppressed and to break any chains that kept people enslaved.
Enslaved workers in the in field would sing Spirituals like Wade in the Water to one another, hymns both about baptism and identity in Christ and coded messages of escape and the underground railroad.
Today we will sing, “Lift Every Voice and Sing” - this is often referred to as the “Black National Anthem.” It recounts the journey of the moral arc towards justice - thanking God for God’s faithfulness through it all.
May we, as Christians and Americans, repent for when we have failed to continue to work of Jesus in letting the oppressed go free, we repent even more for the times we have been complicit in oppression - and we pray that Jesus would use us, here today, to continue to be the hands and feet of Jesus in our world that loosen the bonds of injustice.
Let us sing, “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” UMH 519 - and as we sing it, out of respect for those who view this as a National Anthem of sorts, I invite you to stand in body or spirit as we sing.
Towards a Day of Peace
Isaiah 9:5: “For to us a child is born,
a son will be given to us,
and the government will be upon His shoulder.
His Name will be called
Wonderful Counselor,
Mighty God
My Father of Eternity,
Prince of Peace.”
Two things can be true at once.
Today and every day we can honor and thank those who serve in our military, who protected and protect our country, who have brought freedom to and defeated tyrants in our country and over the world - yes, we thank those who served and serve and thank God for those whose vocation has been in military service.
Would those who have served or are serving, please stand for a moment of recognition.
That can be true - while we also pray and look toward the day when peace reigns as we worship Jesus who is the Prince of Peace. Not the peace of the sword but a lasting peace that knows no ends.
Because both these things are true I want to lift up two American hymns.
First: The Battle Hymn of the Republic.
This hymn was originally written by an abolitionist for Union troops during the Civil War after the hymnist, Julia Ward Howe, visited a Union campsite. The hymn uses military language to recount God’s work in this world. The line from the fourth verse echoes what has been the work and fate of many who have served our country in the military, “as he [Christ] has died to make men holy, let us die to make men free.”
In addition to being an anthem for troops through many wars, this song was also a rallying call for women suffragettes.
The other hymn I want to lift up is “Let There Be Peace on Earth.”
Let There Be Peace on Earth was written by a married couple, Sy Miller and Jill Jackson-Miller.
The song was introduced at a workshop in 1955 - this workshop was comprised of 180 teenagers of all different religions and races - maybe not so strange for us in 2026 but remember, this was 1955. And in singing the song together, walls and barriers were broken down.
Sy Miller shared about this hymn’s impact: “One summer evening in 1955, a group of 180 teenagers of all races and religions, meeting at a workshop high in the California mountains locked arms, formed a circle and sang a song of peace. They felt that singing the song, with its simple basic sentiment—‘Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me’—helped to create a climate for world peace and understanding.
…When they came down from the mountain, these inspired young people brought the song with them and started sharing it.”
This song was born out of the deep love God has for us - that then calls us and transforms us to be agents of peace in this world. Disciples of the Prince of Peace.
As we sing both these hymns today, may we thank God for the freedom we have and those who gave their lives in service of this country - and may we also strive towards Peace in the name of the Prince of Peace.
Let us sing “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” UMH 717, vs 1 & 4, & “Let There Be Peace on Earth,” UMH 431
250 Years: To God be The Glory
Romans 16:25-27: “Now to God who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages but is now disclosed and through the prophetic writings is made known to all the gentiles, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith— to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever! Amen.”
All of the hymns we have sung today have come from the rich tradition of American hymnody. So, too, our last hymn of our Fourth of July hymn sing comes from Fanny Crosby, known as one of the greatest and most prolific American hymn writers.
We have only very briefly been able to look at the span of the history of our country and our identity as citizens of The United States, and, above all, first and foremost, as followers of Christ.
My prayer as we celebrate our Nation, this weekend, and any day the opportunity that is afforded to us, is that we would keep ourselves grounded in Christ and in prayer - in confession, in gratitude, and in earnest service to love all our neighbors, as our God calls us to do.
And for all that is good. For all that is holy. For all that is worthy of celebration. For this land that we inhabit - we lift up this final hymn in praise and gratitude:
Let us sing, “To God Be the Glory,” UMH 98
“Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you;
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’
If you remove the yoke from among you,
the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
if you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness
and your gloom be like the noonday.”
19th Century abolitionist and minister, Theodore Parker, once said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."
We can trace this moral arc through the history of our nation. Many of our country’s original rights and protections, including the right to vote, only applied to white men who owned land. From women to people of color, we have seen the expansion of rights and protections under the law these last 250 years. We celebrate every time the full humanity and voice of a beloved child of God is recognized.
We celebrate and thank God for all advocates who used their voices and lives to speak up for the rights, protection, and well-being of those on the margins. We thank God for all who stand up for justice and for the protection of the oppressed. We especially thank God for those who loose the bounds of injustice out of love for God - knowing that our God is a God who detests bondage and oppression and longs for all humans to be free. We thank our Exodus God for all who, like Moses, lead God’s people out of slavery and into abundance of life.
Slavery is the original sin of America, present at our founding, that we largely have still not wrestled with.
Enslaved people were often not allowed to have a Bible for themselves or were given a sanitized version of the Bible where stories of freedom and verses against slavery were removed. Many enslaved people rejected Christianity for the hateful religion of the master. Still many embraced the story of Moses, the story of Jesus, the story of a God who cared about injustice and who always acted to free the oppressed and to break any chains that kept people enslaved.
Enslaved workers in the in field would sing Spirituals like Wade in the Water to one another, hymns both about baptism and identity in Christ and coded messages of escape and the underground railroad.
Today we will sing, “Lift Every Voice and Sing” - this is often referred to as the “Black National Anthem.” It recounts the journey of the moral arc towards justice - thanking God for God’s faithfulness through it all.
May we, as Christians and Americans, repent for when we have failed to continue to work of Jesus in letting the oppressed go free, we repent even more for the times we have been complicit in oppression - and we pray that Jesus would use us, here today, to continue to be the hands and feet of Jesus in our world that loosen the bonds of injustice.
Let us sing, “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” UMH 519 - and as we sing it, out of respect for those who view this as a National Anthem of sorts, I invite you to stand in body or spirit as we sing.
Towards a Day of Peace
Isaiah 9:5: “For to us a child is born,
a son will be given to us,
and the government will be upon His shoulder.
His Name will be called
Wonderful Counselor,
Mighty God
My Father of Eternity,
Prince of Peace.”
Two things can be true at once.
Today and every day we can honor and thank those who serve in our military, who protected and protect our country, who have brought freedom to and defeated tyrants in our country and over the world - yes, we thank those who served and serve and thank God for those whose vocation has been in military service.
Would those who have served or are serving, please stand for a moment of recognition.
That can be true - while we also pray and look toward the day when peace reigns as we worship Jesus who is the Prince of Peace. Not the peace of the sword but a lasting peace that knows no ends.
Because both these things are true I want to lift up two American hymns.
First: The Battle Hymn of the Republic.
This hymn was originally written by an abolitionist for Union troops during the Civil War after the hymnist, Julia Ward Howe, visited a Union campsite. The hymn uses military language to recount God’s work in this world. The line from the fourth verse echoes what has been the work and fate of many who have served our country in the military, “as he [Christ] has died to make men holy, let us die to make men free.”
In addition to being an anthem for troops through many wars, this song was also a rallying call for women suffragettes.
The other hymn I want to lift up is “Let There Be Peace on Earth.”
Let There Be Peace on Earth was written by a married couple, Sy Miller and Jill Jackson-Miller.
The song was introduced at a workshop in 1955 - this workshop was comprised of 180 teenagers of all different religions and races - maybe not so strange for us in 2026 but remember, this was 1955. And in singing the song together, walls and barriers were broken down.
Sy Miller shared about this hymn’s impact: “One summer evening in 1955, a group of 180 teenagers of all races and religions, meeting at a workshop high in the California mountains locked arms, formed a circle and sang a song of peace. They felt that singing the song, with its simple basic sentiment—‘Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me’—helped to create a climate for world peace and understanding.
…When they came down from the mountain, these inspired young people brought the song with them and started sharing it.”
This song was born out of the deep love God has for us - that then calls us and transforms us to be agents of peace in this world. Disciples of the Prince of Peace.
As we sing both these hymns today, may we thank God for the freedom we have and those who gave their lives in service of this country - and may we also strive towards Peace in the name of the Prince of Peace.
Let us sing “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” UMH 717, vs 1 & 4, & “Let There Be Peace on Earth,” UMH 431
250 Years: To God be The Glory
Romans 16:25-27: “Now to God who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages but is now disclosed and through the prophetic writings is made known to all the gentiles, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith— to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever! Amen.”
All of the hymns we have sung today have come from the rich tradition of American hymnody. So, too, our last hymn of our Fourth of July hymn sing comes from Fanny Crosby, known as one of the greatest and most prolific American hymn writers.
We have only very briefly been able to look at the span of the history of our country and our identity as citizens of The United States, and, above all, first and foremost, as followers of Christ.
My prayer as we celebrate our Nation, this weekend, and any day the opportunity that is afforded to us, is that we would keep ourselves grounded in Christ and in prayer - in confession, in gratitude, and in earnest service to love all our neighbors, as our God calls us to do.
And for all that is good. For all that is holy. For all that is worthy of celebration. For this land that we inhabit - we lift up this final hymn in praise and gratitude:
Let us sing, “To God Be the Glory,” UMH 98
Monday, June 8, 2026
“Follow Me…To the Sick, The Grieving, The Outcast” a sermon on Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
“Follow Me…To the Sick, The Grieving, The Outcast”
Preached Sunday, June 7, 2026
“Follow me.”
Two words Jesus said to Matthew and Matthew got up and followed him.
I gotta wonder if there was some more dialogue in there. If someone came up to me and said, “Follow me.” I would have a lot of questions. Even if I knew the person, even if I had heard of this person, like Matthew had probably heard of Jesus, I still would have lots of questions - like…follow you where?
In the call story of John and Andrew, when Jesus called to them to follow him, they asked where he was staying and he said “Come and see.” And while we don’t have the dialogue between Jesus and Matthew I feel like, if he had been asked, “Follow you where? Follow you to what end? What does it mean to follow you?” Jesus would have answered “Come and see.” Because his immediate actions after inviting Matthew to follow him answer the questions of what it means to be a follower of Jesus - for Matthew and for us today.
I’m going to explain those actions - and - I’m going to go ahead and tell you what it means to be a follower of Jesus as shown to us in our passage of Matthew today. So you can see the theme throughout the different encounters in our Scripture today. Those encounters after inviting Matthew to follow him are:
1. Eating with tax collectors and sinners
2. Healing the hemorrhaging woman
3, Healing or resurrecting Jarius’s daughter (Jairus is named in Mark but not in Matthew)
To be a follower of Jesus means to follow Jesus to the last, the lost, and the least. To follow Jesus to the outcast, those deemed as “unclean” or “other,” to go to those who need the presence of Jesus in their lives - and in doing these things, disrupt the status quo.
Jesus invites Matthew to follow him and goes right to a dinner party where there were tax collectors and “sinners.” Eating with those who were often considered unworthy or not respectable is a hallmark of Jesus’s ministry. In the Gospel of Luke, he is even called a drunkard because of the amount of table fellowship he has and who he shares that table fellowship with.
The Pharisees ask - why do you eat with those people? Jesus answers, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick [do].” In the next couple of verses they ask Jesus about fasting and he tells them he is not putting old wine into new wine skins but doing a completely new thing.
What this means is Jesus is outright telling the Pharisees who would be considered the “respectable church people of the day” that he was going to be doing things in a new way. And that meant going to people who were considered being on the outskirts of society, those who really needed a physician - of body and/or soul.
The tax collectors and sinners were those who needed a physician for their souls. The very next encounter Jesus had was with the hemorrhaging woman who touched the cloak of Jesus to be healed.
This woman had been suffering from hemorrhages for 12 years. The Greek seems to imply that it is a bleeding or menstrual issue. An illness that not only would have been painful. An illness that not only took all her money to try and fix and just made it worse. But also an illness that would have made her ritually unclean - unfit for society - unable to touch others. An illness that would have affected her mentally and emotionally as well as physically - as anyone who has had a long-term illness knows. It’s never just the body - it’s all of you.
So, yes, she needed a physician. She needed Jesus. For her body - and also her soul as well. She needed the wholeness of healing.
She had heard about Jesus - but she didn’t presume she was worthy of his healing. She was not even permitted to touch him. She would make him unclean. She had spent the last twelve years of her life being estranged from others, being an outcast - in pain and made to feel less than. And still - she had faith, that if she could just...touch his clothes - it would be enough - she would be healed…
And so in the crowd, people pushing against each other every which way, a massive throng - she reached out...and touched Jesus - or really just his clothes. And instantly, knew she was healed. And Jesus turns to her and says, “Take heart - you have been healed.”
Just as eating with sinners and outcasts is a hallmark of Jesus’s ministry, so is healing. Jesus heals many people - and often - those who need physical healing, they also need healing in their souls and healing in their relationships within society, their place in community. Because of their sickness, they have been pushed to the side, ostracized, labeled as other or unworthy. And so Jesus offered this woman healing not just of her body but of her soul as well.
And then Jesus goes to the house of the girl who has died, at the bequest of her father. Of course, Jesus says she is just sleeping, but everyone else thinks she’s dead. And he tells her to get up, and she does. A healing has taken place. Life snatched from death - whether in death already or on the edge of it - and comfort brought to the mourning.
This girl, and all grieving her, needed a physician.
Just as eating with sinners and healing the sick are hallmarks of Jesus’s ministry so too is bringing Good News to the mourning - and, of course, resurrection.
Jesus preaches on the Sermon on the Mount that those who mourn will be blessed for they are comforted. Jesus weeps over Lazarus and with his mourning sisters. Jesus goes to the cross and to the grave and defeats the powers of Death.
Jesus goes to the places of no hope, the places where all seems lost - and to the people of no hope and to the people to whom all seems lost - and he brings healing and hope.
These are the immediate actions of Jesus after he invites Matthew to follow him: eating with the outcasts, healing the ostracized, and bringing healing and hope to a hopeless place. Actions that are repeated throughout his ministry. As Jesus showed all who followed him then and us through the ages what it means to be a follower of Jesus - to buck the status quo and to go to the last, the lost, the least, the outcast, the sick, the grieving. To go to those who need Jesus.
And so, I recognize today that I probably fall into the category of those who would be considered more like the Pharisees questioning Jesus - those “respectable church people” - as do most if not all of us in this room - so I have two questions for all of us today, including myself. Those questions are:
1. Do you need Jesus?
And
2. Will you follow Jesus to those who need him?
If we’re being really honest, these are hard questions. We want them to be simple questions. We want them to be obvious “Yes!” answers. And yet, when we live into the questions, they can become something we wrestle with.
When we think of those who need Jesus, do we think of ourselves? Or do we think of them, whoever them might be, everyone but you and people like you, the people whom Jesus would get flack for having a dinner party with.
Or. You might be at a place in your life where you are painfully aware that yes, you need Jesus. You or a loved one might need Jesus the Physician, healing in your life - body and/or soul. It is at life’s hardest moments, that we often come to the realization of our deep seated need for Jesus. The realization that comes from the depth of despair, from a hard to swallow diagnosis, in grief, in a season of loss or listlessness.
Realizing that we need Jesus is often a painful realization that comes to us at times when everything is not going well, when we or the ones we love are the ones in need of healing from Jesus.
And so, if we were being really honest and self-reflective, we may not want to admit that we need Jesus. Because we don’t want to be in those hard seasons of our lives. Or we are lucky enough to not be going through one of those soul-barring seasons. If everything is going well, we can trick ourselves into thinking that we don’t really need Jesus.
Frankly, we may not need or want Jesus if Jesus means disrupting the status quo, not having things our way, and realizing that we are not dependent on ourselves - and that needing Jesus, receiving Jesus, in and of itself, means following Jesus.
Following Jesus to those we might not want to go towards. Following Jesus to those we or society may deem unclean, those we may deem unworthy, those we may not deem “not like us.”
When we open ourselves up to needing Jesus, we inherently also go to those who are also in need of Jesus. This following of Jesus to the outcast, the sick, the grieving, the last, the lost and the least - This is not proselytizing. It is not going to someone and saying “you need Jesus, turn around, repent - and become like me” - because remember, we/you/I are all in need of Jesus too. We can’t proselytize and shame people into following Jesus. We can’t separate ourselves and the world into categories of people who need Jesus and people who don’t. This is not an us versus them. This is a recognition that all of us, including those of us in the pews, are in need of Christ’s love, are in need of Christ’s presence, are in need of Christ’s healing for our souls. We need the Great Physician.
And so, as those who have received and are receiving, the healing and loving presence of Jesus in our lives, we want to share this with others - people who may be different on the outside but inside are all the same, in need of love - sharing Christ’s love wherever we go. Wherever we follow Jesus to.
This can look like a lot of things.
It can look like intentionally forming a friendship with someone who is different from you and/or especially those who may be considered unwelcome or an outcast from those on the “respectable” side of society such as those on the margins due to their race, gender or sexual identity, immigration status, or more. To get to know a person simply as a fellow person.
It can look like a church hosting speakers from all parts of life and all areas of the community so that the church can learn empathy for those whose lives have been different.
It can look like a church having a free little pantry so they are always offering food to their hungry neighbors, no strings attached.
It can look like a church sponsoring a little league baseball team, showing up to cheer on the team, and getting to know their families - not in the hopes they will come and join their church, but simply to be a positive influence in their lives.
It can look like being a hospice volunteer or making a meal for a grieving family.
It can look like becoming more hospitable and welcoming to those on the margins - and becoming an advocate and ally with and for them.
All of these are examples of things that I know churches and Christians are currently doing as they seek to follow Jesus.
It can look like doing whatever it is that God has called you to do - as an individual and as a community - in humble service and love, knowing that we don’t bring Jesus to the last, the lost, and the least - Jesus is already there, we simply follow Jesus there, being his hands and feet.
Open yourself up to needing Jesus - for Jesus will come to you.
Open yourself up to following Jesus - for Jesus will use you to do a new thing.
We live in the messiness of this combination - needing Jesus and going to those who need Jesus on behalf of Jesus - to be clear, Jesus is already with them - and yet we are the hands and feet who actively share the love of Jesus.
And so, I am going to end with these two questions again:
1. Do you need Jesus?
2. Will you follow Jesus to those who need him?
May we answer - yes, and yes.
“Follow Me…To the Sick, The Grieving, The Outcast”
Preached Sunday, June 7, 2026
“Follow me.”
Two words Jesus said to Matthew and Matthew got up and followed him.
I gotta wonder if there was some more dialogue in there. If someone came up to me and said, “Follow me.” I would have a lot of questions. Even if I knew the person, even if I had heard of this person, like Matthew had probably heard of Jesus, I still would have lots of questions - like…follow you where?
In the call story of John and Andrew, when Jesus called to them to follow him, they asked where he was staying and he said “Come and see.” And while we don’t have the dialogue between Jesus and Matthew I feel like, if he had been asked, “Follow you where? Follow you to what end? What does it mean to follow you?” Jesus would have answered “Come and see.” Because his immediate actions after inviting Matthew to follow him answer the questions of what it means to be a follower of Jesus - for Matthew and for us today.
I’m going to explain those actions - and - I’m going to go ahead and tell you what it means to be a follower of Jesus as shown to us in our passage of Matthew today. So you can see the theme throughout the different encounters in our Scripture today. Those encounters after inviting Matthew to follow him are:
1. Eating with tax collectors and sinners
2. Healing the hemorrhaging woman
3, Healing or resurrecting Jarius’s daughter (Jairus is named in Mark but not in Matthew)
To be a follower of Jesus means to follow Jesus to the last, the lost, and the least. To follow Jesus to the outcast, those deemed as “unclean” or “other,” to go to those who need the presence of Jesus in their lives - and in doing these things, disrupt the status quo.
Jesus invites Matthew to follow him and goes right to a dinner party where there were tax collectors and “sinners.” Eating with those who were often considered unworthy or not respectable is a hallmark of Jesus’s ministry. In the Gospel of Luke, he is even called a drunkard because of the amount of table fellowship he has and who he shares that table fellowship with.
The Pharisees ask - why do you eat with those people? Jesus answers, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick [do].” In the next couple of verses they ask Jesus about fasting and he tells them he is not putting old wine into new wine skins but doing a completely new thing.
What this means is Jesus is outright telling the Pharisees who would be considered the “respectable church people of the day” that he was going to be doing things in a new way. And that meant going to people who were considered being on the outskirts of society, those who really needed a physician - of body and/or soul.
The tax collectors and sinners were those who needed a physician for their souls. The very next encounter Jesus had was with the hemorrhaging woman who touched the cloak of Jesus to be healed.
This woman had been suffering from hemorrhages for 12 years. The Greek seems to imply that it is a bleeding or menstrual issue. An illness that not only would have been painful. An illness that not only took all her money to try and fix and just made it worse. But also an illness that would have made her ritually unclean - unfit for society - unable to touch others. An illness that would have affected her mentally and emotionally as well as physically - as anyone who has had a long-term illness knows. It’s never just the body - it’s all of you.
So, yes, she needed a physician. She needed Jesus. For her body - and also her soul as well. She needed the wholeness of healing.
She had heard about Jesus - but she didn’t presume she was worthy of his healing. She was not even permitted to touch him. She would make him unclean. She had spent the last twelve years of her life being estranged from others, being an outcast - in pain and made to feel less than. And still - she had faith, that if she could just...touch his clothes - it would be enough - she would be healed…
And so in the crowd, people pushing against each other every which way, a massive throng - she reached out...and touched Jesus - or really just his clothes. And instantly, knew she was healed. And Jesus turns to her and says, “Take heart - you have been healed.”
Just as eating with sinners and outcasts is a hallmark of Jesus’s ministry, so is healing. Jesus heals many people - and often - those who need physical healing, they also need healing in their souls and healing in their relationships within society, their place in community. Because of their sickness, they have been pushed to the side, ostracized, labeled as other or unworthy. And so Jesus offered this woman healing not just of her body but of her soul as well.
And then Jesus goes to the house of the girl who has died, at the bequest of her father. Of course, Jesus says she is just sleeping, but everyone else thinks she’s dead. And he tells her to get up, and she does. A healing has taken place. Life snatched from death - whether in death already or on the edge of it - and comfort brought to the mourning.
This girl, and all grieving her, needed a physician.
Just as eating with sinners and healing the sick are hallmarks of Jesus’s ministry so too is bringing Good News to the mourning - and, of course, resurrection.
Jesus preaches on the Sermon on the Mount that those who mourn will be blessed for they are comforted. Jesus weeps over Lazarus and with his mourning sisters. Jesus goes to the cross and to the grave and defeats the powers of Death.
Jesus goes to the places of no hope, the places where all seems lost - and to the people of no hope and to the people to whom all seems lost - and he brings healing and hope.
These are the immediate actions of Jesus after he invites Matthew to follow him: eating with the outcasts, healing the ostracized, and bringing healing and hope to a hopeless place. Actions that are repeated throughout his ministry. As Jesus showed all who followed him then and us through the ages what it means to be a follower of Jesus - to buck the status quo and to go to the last, the lost, the least, the outcast, the sick, the grieving. To go to those who need Jesus.
And so, I recognize today that I probably fall into the category of those who would be considered more like the Pharisees questioning Jesus - those “respectable church people” - as do most if not all of us in this room - so I have two questions for all of us today, including myself. Those questions are:
1. Do you need Jesus?
And
2. Will you follow Jesus to those who need him?
If we’re being really honest, these are hard questions. We want them to be simple questions. We want them to be obvious “Yes!” answers. And yet, when we live into the questions, they can become something we wrestle with.
When we think of those who need Jesus, do we think of ourselves? Or do we think of them, whoever them might be, everyone but you and people like you, the people whom Jesus would get flack for having a dinner party with.
Or. You might be at a place in your life where you are painfully aware that yes, you need Jesus. You or a loved one might need Jesus the Physician, healing in your life - body and/or soul. It is at life’s hardest moments, that we often come to the realization of our deep seated need for Jesus. The realization that comes from the depth of despair, from a hard to swallow diagnosis, in grief, in a season of loss or listlessness.
Realizing that we need Jesus is often a painful realization that comes to us at times when everything is not going well, when we or the ones we love are the ones in need of healing from Jesus.
And so, if we were being really honest and self-reflective, we may not want to admit that we need Jesus. Because we don’t want to be in those hard seasons of our lives. Or we are lucky enough to not be going through one of those soul-barring seasons. If everything is going well, we can trick ourselves into thinking that we don’t really need Jesus.
Frankly, we may not need or want Jesus if Jesus means disrupting the status quo, not having things our way, and realizing that we are not dependent on ourselves - and that needing Jesus, receiving Jesus, in and of itself, means following Jesus.
Following Jesus to those we might not want to go towards. Following Jesus to those we or society may deem unclean, those we may deem unworthy, those we may not deem “not like us.”
When we open ourselves up to needing Jesus, we inherently also go to those who are also in need of Jesus. This following of Jesus to the outcast, the sick, the grieving, the last, the lost and the least - This is not proselytizing. It is not going to someone and saying “you need Jesus, turn around, repent - and become like me” - because remember, we/you/I are all in need of Jesus too. We can’t proselytize and shame people into following Jesus. We can’t separate ourselves and the world into categories of people who need Jesus and people who don’t. This is not an us versus them. This is a recognition that all of us, including those of us in the pews, are in need of Christ’s love, are in need of Christ’s presence, are in need of Christ’s healing for our souls. We need the Great Physician.
And so, as those who have received and are receiving, the healing and loving presence of Jesus in our lives, we want to share this with others - people who may be different on the outside but inside are all the same, in need of love - sharing Christ’s love wherever we go. Wherever we follow Jesus to.
This can look like a lot of things.
It can look like intentionally forming a friendship with someone who is different from you and/or especially those who may be considered unwelcome or an outcast from those on the “respectable” side of society such as those on the margins due to their race, gender or sexual identity, immigration status, or more. To get to know a person simply as a fellow person.
It can look like a church hosting speakers from all parts of life and all areas of the community so that the church can learn empathy for those whose lives have been different.
It can look like a church having a free little pantry so they are always offering food to their hungry neighbors, no strings attached.
It can look like a church sponsoring a little league baseball team, showing up to cheer on the team, and getting to know their families - not in the hopes they will come and join their church, but simply to be a positive influence in their lives.
It can look like being a hospice volunteer or making a meal for a grieving family.
It can look like becoming more hospitable and welcoming to those on the margins - and becoming an advocate and ally with and for them.
All of these are examples of things that I know churches and Christians are currently doing as they seek to follow Jesus.
It can look like doing whatever it is that God has called you to do - as an individual and as a community - in humble service and love, knowing that we don’t bring Jesus to the last, the lost, and the least - Jesus is already there, we simply follow Jesus there, being his hands and feet.
Open yourself up to needing Jesus - for Jesus will come to you.
Open yourself up to following Jesus - for Jesus will use you to do a new thing.
We live in the messiness of this combination - needing Jesus and going to those who need Jesus on behalf of Jesus - to be clear, Jesus is already with them - and yet we are the hands and feet who actively share the love of Jesus.
And so, I am going to end with these two questions again:
1. Do you need Jesus?
2. Will you follow Jesus to those who need him?
May we answer - yes, and yes.
Amen.
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