Sermons

“We The People”

September 8, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop James 2:1-17 “James’ main focus in this book is about how following Jesus should disrupt and erase the social conventions that socialized people to be deferential to the wealthy and to mistreat, exclude and shame those who were financially impoverished. When he talks about partiality, that’s what he is talking about: favoring the financially resources and disadvantaging those without financial resources. James is speaking to all the Jesus followers of his day . . .

“Homily – Celebration of Marriage of MC Ellis and Trina Jones”

August 31, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 “Trina and MC, what is happening here today is a revolution. And it’s not just about the two of you. It’s about the way God is at work to free us all in a world where injustice and hate and pain and captivity can seem to have the upper hand. Your decision to make promises to each other today in the name of God’s love, in public . . .

“To Trust and To Dwell”

August 25, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 84 “The psalmist sings about a deep sense of home that travels with us through all the changes–it is both a longing, a homesickness and a capacity to be at home in God wherever we are. To trust and to dwell is the thread of faith that teaches us how to be home with ourselves and with God wherever we are.” Watch the full GCPC service on 8/25/24 here (Scripture . . .

“Humility, Mystery, Poetry”

June 23, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Job 38:1-11 “Sweet sojourners on the way This poetry, this mystery, This humility This is why words should not Become gods, this is why Words welcome play, They thrive in fresh resonance In the thrill of trying again In the improvisation of Healing, feeling, wailing, The inhale and exhale, The unveil. The protection, the inflection This genealogy of words is Why we must take care of each other Why we must not hide . . .

“Free the Muses!”

June 16, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 92:1-4; 12-15 “Music can evoke not just feelings, but capacities for connection–music can curate empathy–the sensations of empathy–not simply thoughts, but the embodied sensations of feeling with, feeling alongside, emotional accompaniment. In this way, music can tend our cellular connections and interdependence. Music can teach our bodies the sensations of shared humanity, friendship, love, joy, connection.” Watch the full GCPC service on 6/16/24 here (Scripture . . .

“Belied Belief”

May 26, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 6:1-8; Romans 8:12-17 “The ways we have been colonized in our faith has led us as Christians to betray belief in a liberating God, in the way Jesus taught us about radical love and welcome and speaking truth to power. (belied belief) (belie: fail to fulfill or justify) What is faith for–what are we here for? Are we here to prop up and collude in systems of oppression and . . .

“Dancing Bones and New Beginnings”

May 19, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Ezekiel 37:1-14 “What if our birthright is not about place at all, but about right relationship with whatever our surroundings are, right relationship with death itself, and right relationship with a mysterious God who we barely know? What if God’s instrument of sovereignty is love, not might–love that liberates and breathes and finds ways for dead bones to dance into a new day–seasoned and wise, humble and hopeful, and finally . . .

“Unsee”

May 12, 2024

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks John 17:6-19 “Living into liberating love does not mean we have no responsibility to this world.  It’s actually the opposite.  We have been placed here to live with the understanding that this place is all God’s and we have been trusted to care for it and one another.  This belief is an understanding that this world so desperately needs.  Jesus knew the holy beauty and mystery of liberation but . . .

“Meditation”

May 5, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 15:9-17 “When push comes to shove We’re supposed to choose love Love is supposed to win Love is supposed to spin All of our pathologies and Anthropologies, our biologies And chronologies. The Ontologies and theologies into revolutions That change the world The problem is how love gets Twisted in the spinning, in all This talk about love winning, In all this belief without action In all this beef with each other . . .

“A Bold Fold”

April 21, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 1o:11-18 “Unacknowledged harm is harm that keeps on harming.  And all of us have been wounded by personal and collective unacknowledged harm–we swim in that harm everyday in a country that has actively denied the truth about our history. And we are living through a withering white lash against the truth of our history–just when we were starting to take a look at the truth, the reaction has been all . . .

“All Call”

April 14, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Kings 19:11-16, 19-21; Matthew 6:25-34 “It seems more faithful to be honest that God’s call isn’t about power and influence at all–that seems more true to form for the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer of the universe–who would not have such a limited vision as to think that palace intrigue and military might will be humanity’s path to mutual liberation. Jesus’ instruction to any who . . .

“Living Lost”

March 17, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 12:20-33 “Jesus finds us lost and doesn’t really fix it the way We want him to. We want answers, clarity, companionship that we can trust We want directions, maps, a path that is clear and Unencumbered by cruelty, disappointment, and sorrow. Jesus tells us we’re going to have to lose even more– More frequently, more materially, more spiritually, more humanely. Just more–the less we want to lose, the more . . .

“Rescue Remedy”

March 10, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 3:14-21 “This Gospel was not written for 21st Century Christians or colonized Christians, or Christians with formal political and judicial powers. It was written to 1st Century Jewish people who were in a crisis situation in their Jewish community because of their belief in Jesus. The struggle of the Johannine community was about belonging, it was about identity–and the strong language in John was spoken not from Christians to Jews, but . . .

“Recalculating Route”

February 25, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 8:31-38 “Our brains are made for navigation. Unlike worms and other animals with smaller brains who might just use one thing to find their way around like smell, mammals have complex brains–and we are adept at making spatial maps so that we can figure out alternative routes to places just from the many different parts of our brains that are activated and gathering data when we move around. It’s ancient . . .

“Home By Another Way”

February 18, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 1:9-15 “The life of faith enmeshed in the created world–in the beauty and the brutality–that is the Lenten journey– who are we in relationship to God and to each other and to the rhythms of life and death.  Lent encompasses the whole of human experience–and we remember that Jesus was fully engaged in the cruelty and the courage of what it is to be human, in the shadows that . . .

“Dwelling Well”

February 4, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 84:1-12 “This Psalm is an invitation to a wisdom that expands. It’s a song about being well in the whole wide world. It’s a song about knowing that the whole world is God’s dwelling place and that we can be home with God anywhere we are–dwelling well is about our self-understanding and the ways we see all others. Dwelling well is knowing the difference between those who . . .

“Good Company”

January 28, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 111:1-10 “The psalmists wrote songs in exile, in Betrayal, in pain. Psalmists sang when All was lost, when everything was Going down the drain–everything was Changing. No one knows who to trust. The things we thought we could count on Are gone. They are not coming back. Are we are wandering in a wilderness With no direction to follow No horizon, no landmarks, no pathways. Our ancestors fed on their sorrow . . .

“Divine Intricacy”

January 14, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 139:1-6,13-18 “The revolution was seeded in our purpose—in our form. Pain is a messenger Pain is a way to create right relationship Pain tells us our boundaries Tell us when our bodies need to stretch and grow and when our bodies have been violated, harmed pain is the teacher the litmus paper pain is the barometer the thermometer the odometer of what the speed of trust feels like. The . . .

“Remembering Before We Knew”

January 7, 2024

by Marcia Mount Shoop Acts 19:1-7 “The life of faith is all about God embracing us, claiming us before we even know who we are ourselves.  Our belovedness, our embrace in the arms of Divine love–these realities of who we are–well they are true about us before we have anything to say about it.  And they are true about us when we say we are distanced from God. They are true about us when we . . .

“Christmas Eve Homily”

December 24, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Hebrews 1:1-12 “The early universe was very, very dark. Without all the starlight we see now. The light of all the stars actually makes it harder for new stars to form. So in the early universe without all the light, stars could form more quickly. Scientists are learning that darkness makes room for new creation in ways that too much light cannot. When we look out into the infinite universe, we are peering . . .

“Trusting”

December 17, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 1:46b-55 “It is a testament to Mary’s power, that even her colonized identity found a way to liberate so many.  Even in her concealment she found a way to empower women, even as she was also a tool of oppression. Mary embodies the complexity we all carry in our bodies–we are assimilated into oppressive systems even as we resist, even as we persist in our longing for the world to . . .

“Abiding”

December 10, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 1:1-8 “How ironic that Christianity so early on became the destroyer of indigenous cultures that understood the human place in the created world. What a bitter and destructive and grievous irony that Jesus’ name became the one uttered to justify genocide and colonization. As Christianity became more and more colonized, the Wild Man took to the shadows, and we became ashamed of this part of ourselves. We scoffed at indigenous cultures as . . .

“Encountering”

December 3, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 13:24-37 “Advent is an invitation to this kind of shedding of the sense of self in preparation for God’s incarnation, in preparation for the second coming of Divine Love. If we are so focused on ourselves and are too ego-driven, then the darkness of Advent can feel like something we want to avoid. Darkness disarms and dissolves–we can’t see the edges of things, where things start and stop . . .

“Even So, We Acknowledge”

November 26, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Matthew 25:31-46 “We are learning and growing in being a both/and congregation.  Prophetic and pastoral.  Bold and humble.  Courageous and compassionate. There is a fine line between being a Matthew 25 congregation and being white saviors. There is a fine line between working to make the world a better place and working to maintain the status quo. There’s a fine line between being agents of change and liberation in Christ name . . .

“Even So, We Wake Up”

November 19, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 “Our faith requires the courage to claim Just how awake God needs us to be This kind of woke is wise to the trauma That makes sleep a frightening prospect That tells us the stupor of whiteness is suspect It’s not a catch phrase, It’s an anthem of promise and pain It’s the truth of a people who long to be free Who are seasoned enough to . . .

“Even So, We Remember”

November 5, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Thessalonians 2:9-13 “Today we remember with bread, with good fruit with elevating tones of flute. We remember with fire, with bells tolling, with the faces of saints scrolling before our eyes, with the cadence of names and with sacred ground, with the sensations and sound of marking time and honoring the dead. So we, as the living, can remember the thread that connects to infinite truths, the cords of love that stand . . .

“Even So, We Hope”

October 22, 2023

by Rev. Tamara Puffer 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10 “I believe we can’t be a vital and faithful church to witness to Jesus Christ unless we are open and honest about our vulnerable places. We can’t have steadfastness of hope unless we love and respect each other so we can be the true body of Christ. Even Jesus had vulnerabilities.  He often went away from the crowds to recharge his batteries with prayer and solitude.  If Jesus . . .

“Even So, We Pray”

October 15, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Philippians 4:1-9 “White supremacy tells us there are good guys and bad guys; white supremacy teaches us to demonize and terrorize. White supremacy teaches us to be fragile when we are called in about the impact of our actions and mentalities. White supremacy teaches us to see an either/or world, when the world is just not that at all.  Violence makes everyone less safe, and it feeds the delusions of binaries, the . . .

“Even So, We Press On”

October 8, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Philippians 3:4b-14 “Paul had such a query for the Philippians:  Can we trust each other with the weight, the magnitude of the losses that will become gains?  Can we trust each other enough to take a chance together on this new life that we’re called toward? Paul is pretty ambiguous about what this all means, in terms of being raised to Christ, in terms of Resurrection, but it seems to be something . . .

“Even So, We Practice Accountability”

September 17, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Romans 14:1-12 “Accountability practices are about believing in someone’s best possibilities. Accountability is about love. Accountability is about believing in the strength of love to hold us as we work together to do right by each other. If I let someone hurt me over and over again and don’t hold them accountable, I am struggling to believe in that person’s full humanity and in the power of love, itself, to . . .

“Even So, We…”

September 10, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Micah Hayes, Ray Landis, & Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Romans 13:8-11 “This fall we are going to be reading some love letters together–the letters that Paul or those trading on Paul’s social capital, wrote to the burgeoning Jesus following movement in the decades after Jesus’ public execution at the hands of Empire. These letters are often encouraging words, words that clarify what makes a faithful believer in a world where being . . .

“Love in Public”

September 3, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Romans 12:9-21 “For Jesus followers, love is not a romantic notion, it is a public virtue. Love is the fabric of beloved community–the impulse to care, to be there for someone, to live out of the deep ways we are connected and the ways we need to be able to trust each other to thrive. For followers of Jesus, love is not sentimentality. And love is not reserved for the chosen few . . .

“True to Form”

August 27, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Romans 12:1-8 “Paul’s call to those in the belly of empire is BE NOT CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD! But be transformed by the renewing of our minds. So that we may discern the will of God—and what is good and acceptable and perfect. Paul is not talking about the demonic perfect that whiteness trades on—the hegemony of white bodied superiority, of able bodied, of straight cos gendered bodies, of one . . .

“Watch Your Mouth!”

August 20, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Matthew 15:10-20 “Watch your mouth! And pay attention to what is coming out of your mouth and why. Pay attention to what is not coming out of your mouth and why. We can speak our truth without diminishing other people in the process. Holding people accountable does not mean taking them down a peg, it means honoring their humanity.  And we cannot be co-conspirators in the work of mutual liberation and stay . . .

“Everything Is Holy Now”

July 23, 2023

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Genesis 28:10-19a “Jacob is a migrant, holding the distant memory of home while in exile in a foreign land.  He is on the move, probably wrapped up in the logistics of any given day.  How much daylight is left, how much water is needed, is there food and where to rest safely at night. He is not traveling contemplating his lineage or his position in the grand scheme of God’s Holy . . .

“Go Forth”

June 11, 2023

by Richard Coble Genesis 12:1-9 “Rather, as with Abram and Sara, the church is not a destination so much as it is a journey. It is not a place so much as it is a pursuit and a practice. We will never fully arrive. We will never fully see and know divine love in its fullness, in our life together, in this life. Rather, we are called and called again: Go Forth. Go Forth. Go forth, not . . .

“Goings and Comings”

June 4, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; Matthew 28:16-20 “The scripture passages today may not ring with much inspiration at first hearing – but if you listen closely, they are calling us to enter the song of how the life of faith is a constant series of goings and comings.  And we are called to embrace those rhythm changes, those shifts and movements, those changes in position of our bodies in space and time – we’re . . .

“It Only Takes a Spark”

May 28, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Acts 2:1-21 “The Spirit came into that place of disorientation, grief, expectation, and unknown and gave them the capacity to speak in ways they did not know, to connect with people who they had never been able to connect with, to share the proclamation of God’s love being for EVERYONE, not just a select few, in ways that all people could understand according to their context and experience. That day, all those . . .

“Abandonment Issues”

May 21, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 104 “The sermon this week was extemporaneous. Below are notes and many different links about sacrifice zones and cancer alley for your own learning and research.  You can watch and listen to the sermon here:  https://www.youtube.com/live/GRPF9JdOvKY?feature=share” Watch the full GCPC service on 5/21/23 here (Sermon begins at 46:00 . . .

“Cloud of Unknowing”

May 14, 2023

by Richard Coble Acts 17:22-31 “Idolatry is anything that we put in place of God. Anything that we give ultimate importance to. Anything outside of divine love that we hope will define us, or save us, and give our lives meaning and control. In a fearful and uncertain and mortal life, the tendency toward idolatry is understandable, but it does not lead to life and life abundant. Rather, when something other than divine love becomes ultimate in . . .

“Potluck”

April 30, 2023

by William Hamel Acts 2:42-47 “It’s stone soup, everyone is coming together so that as a community we are stronger than we are alone. Of course, the hardest part is making that first step to get people to start sharing their resources, instead of being afraid they won’t have enough. At GCPC our stone soup might be tend the little things, be willing to change in the small and the big things, care for each . . .

“Rocks and Hard Places”

April 23, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 24:13-35 “Jesus is the model of courage and compassion and truth, he’s the liberator, the freedom-maker, the one who is not afraid to provoke the oppressor, to challenge the transgressor. And he asks us to trust that the Spirit can empower us to heal and to be real about what it is the church is supposed to be about. We’re not about institutional clout–we’re not about buildings . . .

“Tether”

April 16, 2023

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks 1 Peter 1:3-9 “Friends, no matter what has happened – we have this access to joy right here, and WE ARE HERE… Amen? That invisible string, the tether has us connecting here in person or online, we are tethered. And even though we are here some may be starting to feel the familiar tether to our hope loosening, the once, strong pull becomes weaker and our resolve may be waning. The writer of . . .

“We Can Learn to Love Again!”

April 9, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 118; John 20:1-18 “. . . Which brings us to us–to Grace Covenant, this Easter Sunday 2023. When we may be struggling to recognize Jesus because “they” have taken him away yet again. Jesus was taken by white supremacy. Jesus was taken by slave owners. Jesus was taken by domestic abusers. Jesus was taken by the morality police. Jesus was taken by legislators, judges, teachers, preachers, bankers, lawyers, doctors. Jesus was taken and used . . .

“Hosanna”

April 2, 2023

by Richard Coble Matthew 21:1-11 “Is it no wonder then, surrounded by their Roman occupiers, watched over by religious leaders more intent to hold onto power than to care for the community, that the people looked to Jesus, this gentle and humble prophetic figure, proclaiming the coming of God’s peaceful and equitable kingdom, and they shouted Hosanna! Save us! Save us! As Jesus rides through their midst. At the start of this Holy Week, this Holy . . .

“Emerging”

March 26, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 11:1-45 “Perhaps the most important line in this story is not “Lazarus come out,” but maybe it is “Jesus wept.” What does it mean that Divine Love weeps with us in the grief of all the death we walk around with–even as Divine Love breathes new life into death, even as Divine Love wants us to glimpse at the ways we participate in eternity–the ways nothing is lost, nothing is . . .

“Belief”

March 19, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 9:1-41 “When it comes down to it, believing isn’t really about seeing, it’s about being able to change, it’s about being able to be challenged in long held beliefs, it’s about having the courage to tell the truth in our community about what we are learning about the way God works to heal the parts of us we didn’t even ask to be healed. Belief is about . . .

“Boundaries”

March 12, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 4:5-42 “The woman at the well is us–she is you, she is me. She is the whole lot of us, the collective, the we The ones thirsty and tired, the ones marked, the ones barred from knowing our worth comes from God Not from the fathers, not from the banks, not from the ones who close ranks, not from the ones with the biggest tanks. not from the law makers, not . . .

“Puzzling”

March 5, 2023

by Richard Coble John 3:1-17 “Isn’t it interesting, how we can try to force something even so new, into something tedious and predictable. Because we are uncomfortable with mystery, with the unknown. We want it all to fit into our boxes, into our preconceived notions. . . . This is a passage that tells us that the life of faith is not about foreclosing the work, in formulaic ways, in ways that seek to confine the work of God . . .

“Tempted”

February 26, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Matthew 4:1-11 “God doesn’t need us to prove God’s Existence. God needs us to exercise some Persistence when evil has us in the grip. We can abandon ourselves when God needs Us to stay tuned in to the bodies God gave us. Tread carefully with the sire song of Respectablity. God is not a respecter of persons, Nor systems built on stacking persons on top Of persons. Our respectability is missed . . .

“Moving and Proving”

February 19, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Peter 1:16-21 “This is the kind of stuff that the author of 2 Peter was worried about–the co-optation of Jesus’ identity and Jesus ministry and Jesus’ divinity to justify the very harmful and dehumanizing systems and structures and practices that Jesus had come to disrupt.  The author of 2 Peter was onto something–and unfortunately, the author’s writing was co-opted by Empire when scripture was canonized and became . . .

“This Is the Place”

February 12, 2023

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Deuteronomy 30:15-20 “This country has had a history of large monuments. In this century we created monuments of everything. It might be our dependence on energy that keeps us diminishing resources faster than they can replenish in order to be a superpower, or the art piece that has been in the family for years that everyone wants, churches do this with flowers, furniture and designated giving… the lure of ultimate power . . .

“Salt of the Earth”

February 5, 2023

by Richard Coble Matthew 5:13-20 “Jesus calls his followers salt and light, not so that we will rush to easy solutions, or point to ourselves as the answers to the world’s problems, but so that we may always, constantly, and consistently point to and partner with, that Spirit of Love and Liberation that we believe exists and permeates this world. And where we can, we are called to follow that Spirit into street protests, and city . . .

“Remember the Assignment”

January 29, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Micah 6:1-8 “Micah echoes the messages of his fellow prophets–God isn’t interested in your religious rituals, God is interested in how you live your everyday lives, how you build community, how your economy works, how you solve problems with each other, how you treat those who are vulnerable, how you treat the earth and the resources God has given us. There are three words here that Micah uses that give us . . .

“Fearing Well”

January 22, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 27:1, 4-9 “The psalmist knows God’s presence changes the way fear impacts life–at the same time, the psalmist still feels fear–even about the very God who empowers this person to have a different relationship with fear. That’s the thing about fear and faith–they don’t cancel each other out, but without being truthful about your fear and your faith, if their relationship gets skewed or out of . . .

“Seek and Don’t Hide”

January 15, 2023

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 40:1-11 “Psalm 40 is about God’s capacity to surround us with a hedge of protection in a dangerous world–that safety does not keep us from harm or heart-break, that safety keeps us connected to the Divine Love that never leaves us–whether we believe it or not–that hedge of protection is what makes us human beings creatures who embody the necessity of change, the holiness of change, and . . .

“Waters of Baptism”

January 8, 2023

by Richard Coble Matthew 3:13-17 “In the Presbyterian Church, we proclaim this grace is free; it is not earned. God claims you as God’s beloved child before you can ever know God, before you can ever respond, certainly before you can ever repent. It is not about being worthy. It is about being Beloved. That is one reason why we baptize infants along with adults. It is not about a change that we need to make . . .

Christmas Eve Homily

December 24, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 1:1-14 “This is a night when we come together still hoping against hope, still hungry for the miracle of God’s love, still homesick for true belonging, still searching for a way to believe the unlikely story that God loves us so very much, that God chose to come into the world vulnerable, pushed to the margins by Empire, depending on the kindness of strangers and the trustworthiness of friends. This is . . .

Advent Four Homily

December 18, 2022

by Richard Coble Matthew 1:18-25 “This is a story, not just about things going wrong, but of catastrophe, according to the customs and expectations of the day. We must not downplay, then, the radicality of the angel’s words then in v. 20: “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” In that pronouncement, through this incarnation, God breaks apart . . .

Advent Three Homily

December 11, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 35:1-10; Luke 1:46b-55 “Mary can put her vulnerability into a bigger picture–into a major motion picture with a world-changing order of magnitude. This dangerous situation is not a sign of her shamefulness, but a turning point in her blessedness, in her own capacity to be a carrier of Divine Love. Mary sings a lullaby to us across all these centuries and generations about the way God meets us . . .

Advent Two Homily

December 4, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 11:1-10; Matthew 3:1-12 “The kind of love who is coming, John the Baptist says—is the kind of love who can see right through you—straight to your heart—straight to your “alarmed aloneness.”  This good news is not about hellfire, it is about the freedom for us to be who God made us to be and actually trust each other with that self–to be our true selves and . . .

Advent One Homily

November 27, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 2:1-5; Matthew 24:36-44 “We need to admit that Christianity has been and continues to be a powerful driver in the violence that has traumatized generations in this country. And we need to acknowledge that Christianity has especially been and continues to be a key player in fomenting and justifying violence again trans, queer, and gender expanding people. … It is OUR faith tradition that has been weaponized to dehumanize and . . .

“Dwelling Strong”

November 20, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Colossians 1:11-20 “It is hard for me to read this passage in Colossians without the weight of 1500 years of Christian triumphalism. It’s hard for me to read all the ways Jesus is supreme and better and the only, and the beginning and the end, and not feel the tentacles of white supremacy, patriarchy, and capitalism taking Jesus down from the cross and dividing up the spoils of his embodiment of divine . . .

“The Holy Mountain”

November 13, 2022

by Richard Coble Isaiah 65:17-25 “Isaiah’s new creation is a vision of God’s future that has everything to do with our life here and now; it is about the ways we treat one another, and pursue justice, and interact with this natural world. It is a vision of God’s eternal purpose for creation that we are called to embody today. Have you ever noticed, how our vision of the future guides our action in . . .

“Recount”

November 6, 2022

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Psalm 145:1-5, 17-21 “As a people of faith, many times we yield testimony to siblings in the faith who we deem overly emotional.  When we override the emotion of our experience and trade it for intellectual fodder and control, we miss so much of how God’s movement moves inside of us. We need to make sure that we don’t leave the history storytelling to the scholars. We need . . .

“Sought After”

October 30, 2022

by Richard Coble Luke 19:1-10 “Jones’s point is that the hyperfocus on personal salvation has become synonymous with the entirety of Christian faith, and so we have neglected wider histories and social structures of sin. In fact, focusing on personal conversion can work to maintain the status quo in church. It is often those already excluded, those already pushed to the margins by the church and the community who are told they must change and repent . . .

“Itchy Ears”

October 16, 2022

by Richard Coble 2 Timothy 3:14-4:5 “Siblings in Christ, this Epistle’s admonition to stay true to the gospel in light of suffering is not an excuse to cause suffering, but an invitation to stand alongside one another in all that we carry. It is a model for us to be honest about our pain, not leaving our cares and our real selves at the church door.” Watch the full GCPC service on 10/16 . . .

“What is Your Gospel?”

October 9, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Timothy 2:8-16 “What is our gospel? What is the gospel that can truly set us free? The one that is unchained and the one that we can trust to break our chains? What is the gospel that teaches us the ways of the Jesus who is faithful, the Jesus who cannot and will not abandon himself and the truth he lived and breathed in a struggling world. That’s the Jesus who . . .

“Trust Call”

October 2, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Timothy 1:1-14 “God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and love and self-discipline.  The discomfort and suffering that comes when we stretch into the challenges of being a community of faith–those are signs that we are fully alive and engaged in the life God made us to live. We are not made for stasis or for the status quo, we are made . . .

“Before the Work Has Even Begun”

September 25, 2022

by Richard Coble Luke 16:19-31 “But that is not Jesus’s aim in telling this parable. Jesus did not ask us to build higher walls in this world but to tear them down; this story is not meant to give Biblical support to a doctrine of eternal torment; it is rather meant to wake up the believing community from its apathy, its complicity, its collusion with those systems that create suffering today. For we worship a God . . .

“Feeling Our Faith”

September 18, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Jeremiah 8:18-9:1 “A prophet who mourns is the prophet who still Believes that we were made For growing, discovery, for sweet love For dancing around fires that Teach us to watch stars Celestial kin The most ancient light Always traveling, always reaching For us to see, to be true To the wonder of the tiny Rhythms, the drum beats Of life and natural death, Unhastened by the brutal casualties Of war” . . .

“Fast and Furious/Slow and Curious”

September 11, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28 “We need to understand that part of the work is the courage to be curious with each other and with ourselves. To inquire when something lands in a certain way. To ask for a pause when a feeling or an experience needs more of our collective attention. That is a part of the work of ridding the world of white supremacy patriarchal capitalism–because that mess does not want . . .

“Fear and Wonder”

September 4, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18 “You are fearfully and wonderfully made. You and me. Fear is awareness of danger. Fear is awe. Fear is reverent humility and the gift of awareness when something could do harm. Wonder is astonishment, Marveling, admiring A wash of amazement, An infusion of the miracle of infinite unknowns. This is how we are made Fearfully, wonderfully. Full of wonder, and full of fear. You and I are made for . . .

“Is It Well?”

August 28, 2022

by Rev. Tami Forte Logan Psalm 112:5-10 “Giving with CHARITY is just a temporary fix. It is not sustainable. It does not restore the wholeness of that person. It does not build relationship.  It does not shift or share power.  The status quo is not interrupted. And the dependency of those persons on the benevolence of those in power is always sustained. It is often this paternalistic or maternalistic relationship between the giver and the receiver that . . .

“If…”

August 21, 2022

by Rev. Tami Forte Logan Isaiah 58:9b-11 “God INTENTIONALLY put all of creation in this symbiotic, interdependent relationship with one other. ALL God’s creation is connected. If you hurt ME, you are hurting yourself. If you harm anyone, harm will come to you. Because we DO know that we REAP what we sow, RIGHT? What we put out in the universe comes back on us, INCLUDING nature. So, when we poison the water, we poison ourselves . . .

“The Great Divide”

August 14, 2022

by Rev. Tami Forte Logan Jeremiah 23:23-29 “Even though we feel surrounded, sometimes smothered by lies, and deceit and a constant twisting of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, we who believe in freedom and cannot rest, we who have been freed by the Son, who have hidden God’s word in our hearts have to KNOW God’s word holds the answers for us all. And this passage lets us know that amazingly GOD TRUSTS US- God . . .

“By Faith”

August 7, 2022

by Richard Coble Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16 “Grace Covenant do you feel it, this steadfast hope, burning in our hearts? For the longest time, I got faith wrong. I confused it with belief. I thought faith was something I held in my mind, a cognitive agreement with a set of statements: The existence of God The divinity of Christ The resurrection of the dead The life everlasting And while belief is a central part of the Christian . . .

“All That You Can’t Leave Behind”

July 31, 2022

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14; 2:18-23 & Luke 12:13-21 “Grace Covenant.  There is so much worth fighting for and I know you are tired and weary and yet it is our collective call to liberation…. When we come together online or in person WE are resisting the urge to throw our hands up and say it is all pointless, because we know we can do better.  We have to do . . .

“OUR Sin”

July 24, 2022

by Rev. Tami Forte Logan Genesis 18:20-23, 32 (20) NIV “We spend so much time and energy in other people’s bedrooms and totally ignore our own homes, our own lives and our own relationship with GOD. But, what about OUR sins? What about our lies and deceit, what about generations of thievery, what about our participation in the violence of poverty for generations, what about the harm we continue to do to our children by refusing . . .

“Rocket Surgery and Brain Science”

July 17, 2022

by Dr. Jeff Jones Amos 8:1-12; Luke 10:38-42 “Hear this Grace Covenant: God‘s judgment is not a judgment of fear and condemnation but a judgment of a faithful invitation to true hospitality. Does God want destruction? No. God wants to change. God wants engagement. God wants God’s people to extend hospitality and fairness.  To do anything less brings judgment and destruction.” Watch the full GCPC service on 7/17/22 here (Scripture . . .

“Another Opportunity”

July 10, 2022

by Rev. Tami Forte Logan Deuteronomy 30:9-14 “I believe that God is giving us another opportunity to SEE. Because again, our sinfulness is a pattern…our blindness is a pattern, our idolatry is a pattern. We may not be worshipping Baal, aka Ba-ahl, or Asherah Poles or a Golden Calf, but OUR idol God is AMERICA. The so-called American Dream, the American way of life, American exceptionalism and this ILLUSION of American Superiority which is . . .

“Joy Comes with the Morning”

July 3, 2022

by Richard Coble Psalm 30 “Our text today promises ‘Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning,’ and for too long I have taken that to mean I must wait until things are all right in this world to rejoice and have joy in God. If we wait until all is right, we will never get to rejoicing. We will never get to joy. We will never get to praise. If we simply . . .

“The Only One”

June 26, 2022

by Rev. Tami Forte Logan 1 Kings 19:15-21 “And like Jesus, Audre Lorde challenges us to move beyond the silos of our oppression…to recognize that none of us are the ONLY ONES, that all of us need JESUS AND we need each other. So, in order to realize and actualize THAT type of collective-liberation, we all have to SPEAK UP whenever injustice rears its ugly head against ANY of us. AND because we are so . . .

“Returning to the Wilderness”

June 19, 2022

by Rev. Tami Forte Logan 1 Kings 19:1-15a “Some of us are out of place and hiding in caves in our lives, dumbing down, staying below the radar as much as we can. But if we are not standing squarely in the will of GOD we are in the wrong place. And like Elijah we are quick to make excuses, to justify why we don’t do more, that we can’t do more, that we need . . .

“Spirit of Truth”

June 12, 2022

by Richard Coble John 16:12-15 “The Spirit is present when we realize that we are not alone, that we are not in competition with one another in a zero-sum game. The Spirit of truth appears when we realize just how closely we are tried together, that we rise or we fall together. The Spirit is present when we see that the inaction, the stalemates, the unbreachable divides that we hear about every day in the halls . . .

“A Sacred Revolt”

May 29, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 17:20-26 “This sermon is an invitation to a sacred revolt against the tyranny of being told we are one by the powers and principalities who want to be sure we never know the real truth of our oneness. We can only stop being tools in this deadly project if we begin to live out of the oneness that is real, that is life, that is love. Oneness is something we cannot NOT . . .

“Put On Love”

May 22, 2022

by Isaiah Kyremes-Parks and Mary Elizabeth Shoop Colossians 3:12-17 IKP: “These verses from Colossians talk about the golden threads that knit Christains together. I want to go a step further and proclaim that these can be the things that knit us together as humans. Community, whether that be a church family, a small group of friends, or anywhere one can be loved and supported by others, is one of the best things we’ve got. Continue . . .

“All Things New”

May 15, 2022

by Richard Coble Revelation 21:1-7 “It is important to know what Revelation actually says, and why it was actually written, because its obscurity and its stark images are so easily appropriated, misused, and abused. As we heard last week, in our practice of Lectio Divina, many of our experiences with the book have been when it was abused by people saying who is in and who is out, who belongs and who does not. And usually that . . .

“Going Where You Do Not Wish To Go”

May 1, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 21:1-19 “We need Jesus to call us to the ancestral fires once more-where we tell stories and remember who we are and remember what we do when we love God. And like Peter who has no clothes on, like a newborn baby–naked and vulnerable and dependent–like Peter we need to put on our grown up clothes–our big boy and big girl pants on, before we jump into the . . .

“When In Doubt…”

April 24, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 20:19-31 “The growth and transformation that can emerge from collective practices around doubt are a healing balm in this world–where certainty has been a weapon of mass destruction for a long, long time. Doubt is what allows us to interrogate our own cultures, our own systems, our own inner life with the sacred intention of finding our way to a better world together. Doubt is what creates the conditions for us . . .

“Resurrection Road Trip!”

April 17, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Richard Coble and Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Isaiah 65:17-25; Luke 24:1-12 “There is movement in the grief, confusion, surprise and emptiness of the tomb to unbelief and more processing.  It had to be clunky and challenging to wrap your head around- and yet they remained with one another in the feelings and took the time to live into this new space… one full of holy possibility. Upside down, inside out, off . . .

“Crowd Noise”

April 10, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 19:28-40 “What if this story isn’t about God’s will at all–but what if this story is about what the world does to truth tellers, what the world does to liberators? What does that change about how we encounter Jesus coming into Jerusalem again this year? Do we hear anything differently? The crowd? Our own voices? The fake noise piped in for effect? We must bring a power analysis to . . .

“Reciprocity”

April 3, 2022

by Richard Coble Philippians 3:4b-14 “Because this is how God’s love works, not through sainthood, not because you are worthy, but simply and completely because God created you out of love, and God surrounds you with love. And God stays especially close to those who are told they do not belong, those pushed to the margins, those who suffer, those who are alone.” Watch the full GCPC service on 4/3/22 here (Scripture and . . .

“Reconciliation”

March 27, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Corinthians 5:16-21 “Accountability becomes not so much a checkbook ledger as a song we learn by heart–where we can feel the harmony and the rhythm, the vibration of connections brought back together again. Dissonance is not unwelcomed but a necessary way to calibrate to the health of connection.” Watch the full GCPC service on 3/27/22 here (Scripture and sermon begin at 38:35 . . .

“Endurance”

March 20, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Corinthians 10:1-13 “We are trying to get better at metabolizing the stress and strain of being human in a world so prone to harm and so full of sorrow.  God made us for endurance, but not the kind of endurance that tries to take shortcuts when we need to change, when we need to dig even deeper to find the reserves God has given us that enrich our collective life instead of . . .

“Transformation”

March 13, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Philippians 3:17-4:1 “Sometimes I wonder if you are able to see the whole picture–the big, vivid, technicolor picture of our transformation–the way the day in and day out practices and conversations and hard moments and beautiful emerging relationships are unfolding into a new world for us –I wonder if you are able to see the way we are being transformed as a collective. I so want you to be able . . .

“Generosity”

March 6, 2022

by Richard Coble Romans 10:8b-13 “So, ‘If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead,’ the salvation Paul says that you receive is not one that sets you apart, that puts you in a higher rank, that makes you more deserving than the rest of hell-bound, sinful humanity. Rather, what comes from this confession is the salvation of seeing everyone as . . .

“Ash Wednesday Reflection”

March 2, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop “Lent invites our attention to dust– its divinity, its mortality, its eternity, its possibility, its reality. Lent is about belonging to a dusty world and longing for this dust to settle in meaningful, life-giving, peace-finding ways.” Watch the full Ash Wednesday service at 6pm here (Reflection begins at 27:40 . . .

“Transfigured Living”

February 27, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 9:28-43a from Transfiguration: A Proclamation Poem “Transfigured lives Cannot begrudge Grief Forgoing heartbreak for Architecture that soothes Briefly. Joy may be fleeting Hearts beating and Meeting ourselves Coming and seeking There is no such thing As belovedness Without hearts broken and bleeding No luminescent visage Without the frothing The shrieking Your torment Is no deviation Or deviance But it is honest to God True, you transfigured as new” Watch the full . . .

“Golden Opportunities”

February 20, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 6:27-38 “That’s the call that has a hold on all of us, Grace Covenant, the need, the yearning for right relationship–for finding God when we find each other, when we find ourselves. Maybe the hardest part of following Jesus is realizing the depth of how much our lives depend on living this way, this more excellent way. Maybe the hardest part is realizing that depending on each other is not . . .

“Blessings and Woes”

February 13, 2022

by Richard Coble Luke 6:17-27 “First and foremost, these words tell us about God, about who the God of Jesus Christ is: God of those pushed to the margins, God of those who weep, God of those who hunger. God who appears and makes community in the corners, on the streets, in places of liberation and empowerment, rather than among the comfortable and the grandstanders. And second, these words tell us something about our vocation today, about . . .

“Mercy and Mystery”

February 6, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 6:1-13 “The life of faith is a rhythm of living and dying, embracing and letting go–this dance of connecting and awakening, resting and realizing our limitations. We are stumps and shoots of the terebinth tree. We are ashes and we are fruit. Isaiah’s brush with the Holy of Holies is where he found his boldness and his humility. It is where he glimpsed a new heaven and a new earth . . .

“For the Time Being”

January 23, 2022

by Richard Coble Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10 “. . . Ezra reminds the people of the God who was with them, in joy and in hardship, in the unbearable weight of oppression, in the impossibilities of life. But it is not just a reminder of the God who was, but of the God who is in relationship with these people. So, Ezra proclaims, “This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn or weep…Go . . .

“Committed”

January 16, 2022

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Psalm 36:5-10 “So much of the past two years for all of us has been full of letting things go and taking new things up in an attempt to live, so answering the question is more challenging than ever before. In talking with these groups of emerging adults and their leaders it struck me that we are asking the wrong questions.  So, I asked them: What is a better question than “What . . .

“Special Sauce”

January 9, 2022

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 43:1-7; Acts 7 “But maybe, just maybe, the Holy Spirit isn’t about everything making sense or everyone singing in perfect harmony. Maybe, just maybe, the Holy Spirit is way more powerful and mysterious than any one line of scripture or any one way we like to feel about God or Jesus or church. If the Holy Spirit is our special sauce–the ingredient of our faith that gives our faith integrity . . .

“New Year”

January 2, 2022

by Richard Coble John 1:1-18 “. . . For God, in Christ, as depicted in our scriptures, is not of the aristocracy. God does not choose company with the rich and the comfortable. This is the God in the margins, with those pushed to the margins; God in the streets; God with those trampled by empire; God with those cast aside to forgotten hospital corners. This is the “grace upon grace” that Christ brings. This is how God chooses to . . .

“Christmas Sweater”

December 26, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Colossians 3:12-17 “Christmas sweaters are iconography for the ways we project things onto each other.  The ways we try to camouflage our own identities in the uniforms others want us to wear.  They are iconography for the ways we guard our hearts even when it comes to the gifts God gives us in the Incarnation. This beautiful and powerful passage in Colossians is about the new outfit God gives us at Christmas–the . . .

“Reality Shift”

December 19, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 1:39-55 “Mary sings to us about that place in her body where she will go during the labor pains–the place she surrenders to, the capacity that she trusts to deliver her, to deliver God into the world anew. Mary sings to us and through us about the crumbling of empire and the birth of a world finally at peace with itself.” Watch the full GCPC service on 12/19/21 . . .

“Shift Change”

December 12, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 3:3-17 “John the Baptist is clear–everyone has a way to change–and everyone needs to change. And it must be change that is embodied–lived out in right action, in changed behavior, not just changed minds. John the Baptist is telling us–the way you are living is causing harm–and you have time to change. The God of love is coming near–and the . . .

“The Early Shift”

December 5, 2021

by Richard Coble Luke 1:68-79 “And that is why I come back to services like this. Where liturgies and hymns, where sermons and prayers do not pull me from the worries of this world, but rather focus me on “the dawn from on high” that Zechariah sang about, that which “give[s] light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death” and “guide[s] our feet into the way of peace.” Do not . . .

“The Night Shift”

November 28, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 21:25-36 “We begin Advent in apocalypse because we have lost Our connection to the imagination this sacred journey requires. We are not here for the folly of accumulation or recognition, Or the gluttony of possession or power. We are here to welcome the turning of time That never stops inviting us to love. Tender and corporeal. Aching and ethereal. We have forgotten that we dream together In our sequestered night times Our . . .

“Ready, Set, Shift”

November 21, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 18:33-37 “But this moment between Jesus and Pilate–it calls to us today to cut through the delusion that grips all of us who have been socialized by Western culture–to wake up from the fever dream that cast a spell over God’s people and told us we know justice when we see it. This moment between Jesus and Pilate tries to break that spell we’re under and . . .

“Shift and Flow”

November 14, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Hebrews 10:11-25 “Christ shows us the truth about ourselves–the way we brutalize truth tellers, the ways we try to kill the truth with cruelty and violence, the ways we deny and defend, the ways we shame and blame. He shows us all those things in the way powerbrokers and practitioners of piety reacted to him and wanted him dead. In that way he lays bare the sins of the world– . . .

“All Saints”

November 7, 2021

by Richard Coble John 11:32-44 “The Gospel of John offers no systemic account of life after death. The Bible itself offers many and conflicting visions of life after death. The raising of Lazarus offers more questions than it does answers. But the one answer it gives is this: to trust, to trust, that in life and in death, we belong to God. Jesus says, “I am the resurrection and the life…Do you believe this?” he asks . . .

“Love Shift”

October 31, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 12:28-34  “For love to be love, it shifts, it responds. For this love shift to take hold in you, God can’t be some far away judge scrutinizing your every move, moving the chess piece of your life back and forth between punishment and blessing. For this love shift to find life in you and me, we have to believe God loves us fiercely and that God is right here with us . . .

“Be the Shift”

October 24, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 10:46-52 “For us to see Jesus, for us to hear him, and most of all, for us to follow him, then we’ve got to let go of what’s holding us back, what’s keeping us stuck in harmful and hurtful ways of living what we thought was a faithful life. Understanding that Jesus is not a Christian opens up a lot of room for us to finally follow Him. He . . .

“Friendshift”

October 17, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Hebrews 5:1-10 “The same Jesus who is the fellow sufferer, the gentle high priest, the companion on the way, has been appropriated for horrible things.  Jesus got stolen, kidnapped from the place he was calling us from–from the margins of a world hellbent on self-destruction. Somehow Jesus got mistaken for a high priest with a stellar pedigree, an excluder, a power hoarder with a superiority complex. Someone who had all . . .

“Shifting Gears: Help in Time of Need”

October 10, 2021

by Richard Coble Hebrews 4:12-16 “In other words, says Hebrews, in Christ God sees us for who we truly are, in the messiness of our humanness, in our vulnerability, that hurt that we hide from others, that fear that we deny even to ourselves that we carry, and yet, as one commentator puts it, ‘Jesus is not disappointed or saddened by our weakness but empathizes with it.’[1] Do you think when the divine, the . . .

“Rifts and Shifts”

October 3, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Richard Coble, and Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks Job 1:1, 2:1-10; Hebrews 1:1-4, 2:5-12 “RC: The church is a reminder of God’s presence in the midst of this community, an extension of God’s love and care, God’s hands in a suffering world. AKKP: The incarnation-Jesus being fully human and fully God is the most riveting example of God’s understanding and recognition that suffering is . . .

“Shift Happens”

September 26, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop James 5:13-20 “James calls to us from the basement rocks, the foundations of our faith to remind us that our faith will tell the story of its true character in its topography over time, in the stuff that is made from our relationships. We can’t say we are one thing, and then act another way. Our true formation is revealed in the ways we move in relationship to each other and in . . .

“Holy Shift”

September 19, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a “We miss Holy Shifts because we get so twisted about what we really want–what we really, really want in our heart of hearts. What do you want–is coming to church what you want? Or is a closer relationship to God what you want? Do you want comfort or do you want to be more faithful?  Do you want to be around people or do . . .

“In the face of the strongest wind”

September 12, 2021

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks James 3:1-12 “The text of James is right….our words and our teachings matter, the consistency of vision we hold at GCPC is water in the desert of duplicity among the loud voices claiming Christ in our world. Our silence is and will continue to be deadly. We need to reclaim testimony.  The telling and re-telling of how God is showing up and breaking through in our lives.  Sharing accounts, seemingly . . .

“Is Faith Enough to Save You?”

September 5, 2021

by Richard Coble James 2:1-17 “Now, James asks this same question through our lectionary text today to a Christian community, but he does so, because he sees them reflecting the same behaviors of favoritism and elitism as those outside the community. This section of James has been a centerpiece in obscure theological and ecclesial debates over the centuries about the saving power of faith verses works righteousness, but if you read this chapter closely, you’ll see . . .

“Bridled Tongues”

August 29, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop James 1:17-27 “James’ language about bridling our tongues is not a prescription for how to correct bad behavior, but a description of how we can spot someone who is truly living from that soul center–that implanted word, that spark of divinity, that word made flesh. A bridled tongue is not enforced from the outside, but intuited from the inside–from the beautiful garden of God’s love implanted in you . . .

“Whatever Will Make You Ready”

August 22, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Ephesians 6:10-20 “That’s why we need the full armor of God–every part of us covered and sealed by God’s love–covered and sealed by the same cover and seal that Divinity adorns herself with so that She can so intimately and faithfully love a world that desecrates Her dreams for us so consistently. What happens when we see ourselves this way–as covered, as sealed, even as . . .

“Making the Most of the Time”

August 15, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Ephesians 5:15-20 “God is calling us to make the most of the time by simply being here.  Be here with whatever it is that is here and whatever it is that you feel.  The God who called the mighty oceans and these majestic mountains and multiple solar systems into being, is able to bless this very moment with a healing opportunity.   The question is not whether God makes the most of the time . . .

“From Depletion to Renewal”

August 8, 2021

by Erin Tolar, Janice Kominski, Matthew Wiedle 1 Kings 19:4-8 “Janice: GCPC, I wish we were through this wilderness. But, it seems there may be more to come, with COVID and with other challenges. We know you are tired, Matt: We know you are hungry. Erin: But don’t give up in despair. Arise! Matt: Eat! Janice: For the journey will be too great for you without spiritual nourishment. Where will YOU seek to be fed?” . . .

“Draw Near”

August 1, 2021

by Richard Coble Exodus 16:2-4, 9-15 “What would it mean for you to draw near today? It’s striking, if you read the full chapter, that God asks the Israelites to take only what they need. You could not hoard manna. It spoiled as the day wore on. Take only what you need; leave enough for others; what do you need today, to draw near?” Watch the full GCPC service here (Sermon starts at 34 . . .

“So that nothing may be lost”

July 25, 2021

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks John 6: 1-14 “Liberation is ours which means we have to be a part of liberating in order for our own to be sustained.  Letting go of what was for what could be.  Thanking God for the provisions, looking at what we have and making sure everyone can be fed. So why do we get stuck in scarcity?  More than ever we take in the lie that bigger is better, more is more . . .

“Building Together”

July 18, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Ephesians 2:11-22 “How do we work together to equip this community with the tools and the toys to see the world differently, to see the church differently–to see ourselves in community differently? How do we deploy the playfulness and adaptiveness the heritage of this church has given us in the service of following Jesus into a new world–into a new way of being the people of God in the . . .

“Measure for Measure”

July 11, 2021

by Richard Coble Amos 7:7-15 “The bountiful, intricate growth, structure, and shade of trees are omnipresent around us here in Asheville, yet so often go unnoticed. When we pay attention, they remind us that life is more about connection than distance or hierarchy; more about generativity and care than competition. What keeps you anchored? What grounds you to our fundamental connection with one another, and with this earth?” Watch the full GCPC service on 7/11 . . .

“Your Present Abundance”

June 27, 2021

by Richard Coble 2 Corinthians 8:7-15 “What do we owe each other? In June of 2021, this is the question, in uncertain and grief-filled days, in a deeply divided and mistrustful country, in exhausted times. Each of us, out of our own prayerful discernment, must decide when and how to give ourselves fully to community, to this faith community and beyond. Any time you invest your time and your heart to a community, it is a . . .

“Becoming New”

June 13, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Corinthians 5:6-17 “So to get to the new, we have to die, in fact lots of death has to happen–and we have to see the world completely differently than we’ve seen it, and we have to live for different reasons than we have lived. That’s how we get to become new– That difficult road of befriending the stranger in ourselves, finding homeplace in a world where we . . .

“House Keeping”

June 6, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1 “Our community cannot be defined by pride of possession if we want to be faithful. Following Jesus often means leaving things behind–shifting our relationship to the things we thought we could not live without, trusting God to provide, remembering our ancestors learned to be faithful in the desert, in exile, in a life lived in letting go. It is so easy to lose ourselves in the things . . .

“Unassisted Triple Play”

May 30, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 3:1-17 “Why is it so hard to let Jesus love us enough to disrupt us? Why do we think we have so much to lose in this encounter?  What is so precious that we would choose it over what Jesus wants to bring into our lives? Revolutionary love! Jesus is the embodiment of revolutionary love.  Divine love embodied in a vulnerable, resilient, broken, beautiful, engaged, weathered, determined, grief-stricken, passionate body. Jesus . . .

“Faith-Full”

May 23, 2021

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Acts 2:1-21 “To live as Pentecost people means that we live faith – full. We dare to speak the language of the brokenhearted, we dare to challenge the comfortable, we dare to march alongside the marginalized, we dare to venture down the road less traveled, We dare to be the church in a time when the world is so hungry for healing.” Watch the full GCPC service on 5/23/21 here . . .

“Witnessing and Waiting”

May 16, 2021

by Richard Coble Acts 1:1-11 “But do not mistake formation for languishing. Do not mistake waiting on the Spirit for procrastination. Because God takes the time to shape a community, and an individual. The resurrected Christ walked with the disciples for forty days and then asked them to wait even longer before the day of Pentecost, longer still before the days when the church “had all things in common [and] would sell their positions and goods and . . .

“What’s the Buzz?”

May 9, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 15:9-17 “We are called to a way of life that is defined in every way by a love that transforms us and the world. Dismantling white supremacy is LOVE. Laying down our own comfort for the good of the collective is LOVE. Learning new ways to move, to breathe, to work, to dream, to buzz is LOVE. The buzz of bees is the sound of their thriving–it is the sound . . .

“New Horizons”

May 2, 2021

by Frances Barnett, Annie Cole, and Owen Gast Luke 5:1-11 “FRANCES: Grace Covenant Family, the Scripture is speaking loud and clear today. Remember this: OWEN: You are worthy of God’s love. ANNIE: Embrace the miracle of saying yes. FRANCES: Don’t be afraid to leave everything and follow. OWEN: New horizons await.” Watch the full GCPC Youth Service on 5/2/21 here (Sermon begins at 32:10 . . .

“The Bold and the Beloved”

April 25, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 John 3:16-24 “Have you been paying attention, Grace Covenant, to what God is building? Have you been seeing what God is doing? Or just seeing what you want to see. Can you see the intricacy and beauty of what love can create?  God is creating, spinning out breathtaking possibilities–the details of it truly are awe inspiring. If you pay attention you can see Her handiwork all over our community– . . .

“Seeing Yellow”

April 18, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 John 3:1-7 “Jesus came to go into the bones of the skeleton of oppression and dominance–and show us that dominance and violence are not what God made us for–and that dominance and supremacy and violence are killing us–the eternity, the new life he invites us toward is the true body of the cosmos–our interconnected, interdependent multiverse where we find balance and equilibrium together by . . .

“Deep Breath”

April 11, 2021

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block John 20:19-31 “Siblings in Christ, we live in a world where too many lives are constricted, trampled on, silenced, cruelly stolen. We live in a world where there are too many knees on necks and not enough embraces from doulas. We live in a world where we are traumatized by or numb to injustice: we hide behind locked doors, paralyzed by fear, hoping to separate ourselves from truth. But God still finds a . . .

“Lookin’ for Love”

April 4, 2021

by Richard Coble, Samantha Gonzalez-Block, and Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 16:1-8 “MMS: Ambiguity is really a gift of the Spirit–built into the very nature of things. Ambiguity is the condition of possibility required for creativity, for miracles, for Holy moments, and for liberation. RRC: Ambiguity is God’s way of queering the whole world–creation is not about binaries or hierarchies or certainty, creation is about intricacy and intimacy that exceeds our imagination . . .

“Grieving”

March 28, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 12:12-16 “This week our grief must take on the sack cloth of mourning and sorrow for what we have lost, for the harm that whiteness has inflicted, for what the delusion of supremacy has cost the world, what the murderous distortions of dominance have done to God.” Click here to watch the full GCPC service on 3/28/21 (Sermon starts at 38:40 . . .

“Resonating”

March 21, 2021

by Richard Coble John 12:20-33 “Grace Covenant, what we say, and what we believe, matters. We have seen again this week that what we profess as Christians and as the Church matters, in fact, it is a matter of life and death. As we near the end of our Lenten journey this year, let us draw closer to the crucified one, the one who gathers all people to himself, especially those the Church has excluded, marginalized, and . . .

“Cultivating”

March 14, 2021

by Amy Kim Kyremes-Parks John 3:14-21 “It can be so easy to take a moment and believe it is signaling a revolution though nothing in your experience has given you logical reason to believe the relationship is changing. Siblings…. movement is happening but the relationships- they have not fully changed.  Let’s stop focusing on why the monuments are still up when we know that the history and values represented in these monuments still have a . . .

“Metabolizing”

March 7, 2021

by Rev. Dr. Marcia Mount Shoop John 2:13-22 Watch Marcia’s sermon on 3/7/21 here (Sermon starts at 41:30 . . .

“Detoxing”

February 28, 2021

by Rev. Dr. Richard Coble Mark 8:31-38 “Living life through other’s expectations is toxic. Singular images of success, comparisons and the search dominance, wealth and accumulation, are toxic. They can lead to losing one’s life while trying to save it. And letting that go, living faithfully in this moment, with this community around you, in communion with the Spirit that surrounds you, that can mean losing your life to save it.” Watch the full . . .

“Orienting”

February 21, 2021

by Rev. Dr. Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 1:9-15 Watch Marcia’s sermon on 2/21 here (Sermon starts at 34:30 . . .

“Love and Losing”

February 14, 2021

by The Rev. Dr. Marcia Mount Shoop Mark 9 “Transfiguration doesn’t want us to just survive, it calls us to be sanctified–to be transformed in a cellular way–to integrate the promises of our ancestors into a new way of being God’s people–that breaks free of walls, buildings, systems, cultures, spaces we try to say we own.” Watch the full GCPC service on 2/14/21 here . . .

“Love and Knowledge”

January 31, 2021

by Richard Coble 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 “Do not exempt yourselves from this work. Where do you exempt yourself? Where do you say, I possess knowledge, or experience, so I don’t have to do the embodied work of love? Where does your arrogance get in the way of community?” Watch the full GCPC service on 1/31/21 here . . .

“A Little Farther”

January 24, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 23; Mark 1:14-20 “The life of being a Jesus follower is about a road that has lots of twists and turns, potholes, and tempting exit ramps. A road that can seem deceivingly well traveled, but sometimes can mean you and me forging a new path. Growing our faith muscles requires stretching–leaving things behind, letting go of our tight grip, ceasing to grasp at the same time that we strive for . . .

“Counting Sand”

January 17, 2021

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18 “When anxiety tries to imprison you to your ruminations and fears, when doom scrolling and talk radio and podcasts saturate your spirit, when isolation and loneliness and overwhelm holds you captive–breathe in the Psalmist’s invitation to you and to me–we, believers on this journey of life, we are called in each moment to account for the wonder of God’s love in the way . . .

“As the World…”

November 22, 2020

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Matthew 25:31-46 “Just as songs tell stories, Jesus’ words tell the story of a God who seeks to bring us out of our cycles of complacency and blindness, and pushes us to use whatever resources we have: our talents, our voices, our presence, our God-given strength, our prayers, our humor, our hands, in order to reach out to the “least of these” – to those who are hurting most.  This is what matters . . .

“As the World Discerns”

October 18, 2020

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Matthew 22:15-22 “Like a polished teacher, Christ cleverly turns the question back on his challengers – back on us. His response leaves us to sort through our own loyalties, duties and shared calling: What is for Caesar and what is for God? What is our commitment to government and what is our commitment to Church? How are we called to see and value and serve these two powerful entities (that can sometimes feel so . . .

“As the World Unlearns”

September 20, 2020

by Marcia Mount Shoop Matthew 20:1-16 “And Jesus teaches once again that the kingdom of God is not like any of what we have learned in the world. And Jesus whispers to us again about freedom–the freedom that comes from knowing ourselves to be loved. Jesus is so sweetly consistent in his invitation to us–the invitation to unlearn and to let ourselves be loved. Because the truth is, he tells us… The . . .

“As the World Turns”

September 13, 2020

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Richard Coble, and Samantha Gonzalez-Block Romans 14:1-12 “Jesus is a disrupter. Jesus is a truth teller. Jesus is a healer. And if this pandemic has taught us one thing, it’s that Jesus hits his stride when the trappings of religion fall away. Maybe this pandemic has finally been the reckoning that Christianity in America needed. Maybe we’re finally starting to taste and see what Eucharist is really about.” Watch . . .

“Put on the Lord Jesus”

September 6, 2020

by Richard Coble Romans 13:8-14 “We are the Body of Christ, knit together not by brick and mortar but by the Spirit that knows no boundaries as it connects us, and calls us, and challenges us to put on Christ today. That same Spirit calls us to love, not in an empty, feel good way that forgets the time we are in, but to love by doing hard, Spirit filled work in the midst of uncertainty and . . .

“Living the Good Life”

August 30, 2020

by Marcia Mount Shoop Romans 12:9-21 “Racist tropes about law and order, about chaos in our streets–we’ve got to be wiser than to fall for those lies again as a country.  If we’re ever going to discover together what living the good life truly is, then we have to have our power analysis fully deployed.” Watch the full GCPC service on 8/30/20 here   . . .

“Yours, Mine and Ours”

August 16, 2020

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Genesis 45:1-15 “What seems to matter most here for us is not if God caused the pain and suffering, but rather what God has done with this pain and suffering. Joseph’s family – his brothers – sought to destroy his life, yet God charted a new way forward to preserve his life, and through him, the lives of many throughout Egypt. God, through Joseph, is not interested in revenge here, God is interested . . .

“Skeptics and Scarcity”

March 8, 2020

by Marcia Mount Shoop Genesis 12:1-4a; John 3:1-17 “Faith is not the absence of skepticism. It is right relationship with skepticism. Faith means we trust God enough to be skeptical about the things that create distortion in us. Faith means we know we are not in control. We know we don’t have all the answers. We know bad things can happen to us.  We know we need God.” . . .

“Deserts”

March 1, 2020

by Richard Coble Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7; Matthew 4:1-11 “We risk losing sight of our truth, that we and everyone who we meet are beloved children of God.” . . .

“Breadcrumbs”

November 24, 2019

by Richard Coble Jeremiah 23:1-6; Luke 23:33-43 “Christ left us this meal as a way to turn back to him, to one another, to that endless fountain of love and grace that surrounds us wherever we go. Because when we eat this bread, and we drink this cup, together, in Jesus’s name, we remember, and we proclaim the Christ who showed us a different way to be together, a way of love more powerful . . .

“Taste and Be”

November 17, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 65:17-25; Luke 21:5-19 “Excess takes hold when consumption dictates our behavior instead of community.  Excess is a symptom of the disease of individualism. Abundance is a sign of our capacity to be well together, it defines us when we live the truth of our interdependence. The culture change that we are responsible for in this tumultuous and contested world begins right here at this Table.  When we let the things . . .

“Belonging to this Age”

November 10, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Job 19:23-27a; Luke 20:27-38 “Christ calls us to this Table to be put back together, to be re-membered by the truth we carry in our bones, in our bodies, in our common life—that God’s promise of new life is both for the living and the dead, for the stubborn and the willing, for the harmful and the harmed—for all of us belonging to this age.” . . .

“Lost and Found”

November 3, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4; Luke 19:1-10 “Being found means discovering the contours of a faithful life—we seek God even as God seeks us.  We rediscover our identity as God’s people in a world that has lost its way where God can be hard to find.” . . .

“Keeping Faith”

October 27, 2019

by Richard Coble Joel 2:23-32; 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18 “. . . but grace is more foundational than a transaction with a forgiving God. More foundational is the grace of God that names each of us as children of God, of human dignity, the grace of God that calls each of us by name. This grace, freely and abundantly given, stands in such contrast to the world we live in, the world of racist mass incarceration, the . . .

“Got Idolatry?”

October 26, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Samantha Gonzalez-Block and Richard Coble Psalm 84:1-7, Luke 18:9-14 “Normalizing our way of doing things is a part of human nature. We want to know where we stand in the scheme of things. Idolatry takes that natural human tendency and attaches divine mandate and the power of God to its authority and its power. When human’s mistake our own will to power and dominance for a God-given right . . .

“Justice for All”

October 20, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 119:97-104; Luke 18:1-8 “Here we meet a Savior, who is on the side of the vulnerable – no matter what. And like the widow, we can trust that Christ will never stop shouting out our names until we awaken to our shared calling to be builders of God’s kingdom here and now.” . . .

“Gratitude Check”

October 13, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 111; Luke 17:11-19 “Our journey as a white faith community in America right now is to listen and to learn, to dig deep into the ways we have been shaped by white supremacy culture, to trust where Jesus invites us to go with the truth that he promises will set us all free.” . . .

“No Shame”

October 6, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Lamentations 3:19-26; 2 Timothy 1:1-14 “It is a Gospel message really—that invitation for us to get real about the trauma and resilience we have in our bodies, that has been passed down to us and that we carry around the world and pass on to others.  God’s healing opportunities define the story of who we are.” . . .

“The Good Provider”

September 29, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Amos 6:1a, 4-7; Luke 16:19-31 “If having a lot for ourselves is worth the misery and death of others, the Bible is crystal clear—we’ve got a problem.  If having wealth sequesters us from the realities of suffering and injustice in the world, then we’ve got a problem.  If wealth waters down our commitment to equity and economic justice, then we’ve got a problem.” . . .

“Is There a Doctor in the House?”

September 22, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Jeremiah 8:18-9:1; Luke 16:1-13 “Here amongst bread and cup, Jesus invites us into life-saving vulnerability and holy mystery, to remember that his body is broken for us – so they we can be re-membered and live anew as one people who fearlessly work to satisfy God’s hunger for love, justice and tikun olam – the healing of our broken and aching world.” . . .

“A Little Much”

September 15, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Luke 15:1-10 “If we are truly feasting on God’s radical welcome for us, then our lives must communicate such courageous, humble, and consistent generosity.  Remember Jesus’ Table Fellowship was his most radical tool of transformation.  It defined and distinguished him—and it was a big part of what made the powers that be repulsed by him.” . . .

“This Eucharistic Life”

September 8, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Samantha Gonzalez-Block & Richard Coble Isaiah 53:2-5; 1 Corinthians 11:20-26; John 6:32-35 “Let us pray. God our Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, May this table continue to call our name, to invite us in, to offer us a chair, a community and a home. May this table always be a challenge to us, may its abundance confront and critique our ways of living in scarcity; may it empower us . . .

“Mutual Aspirations”

September 1, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Jeremiah 2:4-13; Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16 “When we place Christ at the center of how we navigate the complexities and ambiguities, the injustices and the promising possibilities of the moment in history that is ours, we will have to change, we will have to get better at being faithful.” . . .

“Sabbath Rest”

August 25, 2019

by Richard Coble Isaiah 58:9b-14; Luke 13:10-17 “Sabbath rest is tied to liberation. How strange it is, then, that the laws around Sabbath could have been twisted to such an extent that they would have prevented the liberation this woman experienced by Jesus’s healing.” . . .

“No Laughing Matter”

August 18, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Isaiah 5:1-7; Luke 12:49-56 “Indeed, Jesus did not come to us in order to take a neutral stand, but rather to stand as God here on earth: to turn a broken world upside down, to comfort the afflicted, to afflict the comfortable, to unsettle social norms and systems in order to save us from ourselves.” . . .

“Desiring a Better Country”

August 11, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 1:1, 10-20; Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16 “What does it mean that such a homesickness, such a yearning, defines our spiritual heritage?  Especially as we find ourselves in a country intermittently reeling and then at turns wheeling and dealing about who it is that really has the right to be here in this so-called promised-land anyway.” . . .

“No More Lies”

August 4, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Hosea 11:1-11; Colossians 3:1-11 “The story that defines us began with a strange dream and an unlikely healing opportunity somehow written in those stars. It’s a crazy story really—a baby born in a barn that would save the world, a wandering teacher who spoke truth to power and crossed social boundaries and healed our brokenness ends up executed, life out of death, God amongst humans, compassion in the face . . .

“Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door”

July 28, 2019

by Richard Coble Genesis 28:20-32; Luke 11:1-13 “Prayer is not passive or escapist, a fantasy or a wish-list. Rather, it is what fuels us to work in the name of love and justice another day.” . . .

“Deep Clean”

July 21, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 52; Luke 10:38-42 “Getting clean has thus become synonymous with becoming one with Jesus – a notion that through the years has been used to liberate and empower, as well as subjugate and divide. We know that certain bodies in our society are deemed cleaner and more precious than others. Some bodies have been considered dirty, sinful, sexual, dangerous or even expendable. Darker skinned bodies. Women’s bodies. LGBTQ bodies. Differently abled bodies . . .

“Borders and Thresholds”

July 14, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Luke 10:25-37 “We are simultaneously indicted and invited into a borderless world—where everyone is our neighbor—and where we could be met in our most raw vulnerability with compassion by the one we had considered beyond the pale.” . . .

“Carry On”

July 7, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 66:10-14; Galatians 6:1-16 “Accountability is about trustworthy relationships—relationships that can bear the weight of hard truth, relationships that share the load bearing required for holding each other accountable. The beautiful thing about Paul’s call to mutual accountability here is that he bundles it with self-awareness and self-reflection.” . . .

“Finding Fruit”

June 30, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Kings 19:15-16, 19-21; Galatians 5:1, 13-25 “There was really never a time in the history of people following Jesus when there was not diversity of interpretation.  God doesn’t seem to encourage sameness for any kind of system to be healthy—variety, difference can create fruitful conditions, except when those differences become weapons for breaking community instead of tools for building community.” . . .

“Rules to Live By”

June 23, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 42; Galatians 3:23-29 “Paul invites us to have the courage to question law when it holds us back from each other, when it keeps us from fostering radical community, when it is used to promote anything other than love and justice.” . . .

“Endurance Training”

June 16, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 8; Romans 5:1-5 “Our endurance training is about our relationship with the One in Three—the Creator made us for endurance; our Redeemer shows us how to push beyond our comfort zone; and our Sustainer abides with us with the nourishment that empowers us to endure in ways that are courageous and not fearful.” . . .

“Babel”

June 9, 2019

by Richard Coble Genesis 11:1-9; Acts 2:1-21 “Pentecost is not a call for us all to be the same always, but rather is it a celebration of our abundant particularity, our beautiful diversity, as God calls to each of us in the way and the language we can understand.” . . .

“One-ing”

June 2, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 97; John 17:20-26 “It is Jesus’ life that included the depths of human suffering that brought God into intimate and compassionate one-ness with all of humanity.  This divine one-ing is what allows God to understand us and to never forsake us.” . . .

“Do You Want to Be Well?”

May 26, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 67; John 5:1-9 “Living differently is not out of reach. In fact, it is well within our capability. That is exactly what Jesus is telling us beside that healing pool—you have what you need to be well. But it takes seeing the truth about what ails us, it takes unlearning our delusion of helplessness, it takes being ready for something new and being ready to exert ourselves and move away from . . .

“Leap of Faith”

May 19, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 148; John 13:31-35 “Our young people teach us to take our faith out from the shallow end,  and to dive in deep: to hear Jesus’ call to love as a life-long commandment – one that offers no shortcuts or guarantees, only the belief that radical transformation is possible  – even in moments – especially in moments – of immense brokenness.” . . .

“Get Up!”

May 12, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 23; Acts 9:36-41 “Mothering is an iconic disposition of mutual vulnerability—and this disposition is the heart of the matter when it comes to how we are called to live and die as Christians.”   . . .

“Damascus Road”

May 5, 2019

by Richard Coble John 21:1-14; Acts 9:1-8 “. . . let us live into the uncertainty of this time, and keep looking at how God is calling out to us in the darkness, and keep searching for God today, because God is showing up, again and again and again, sometimes in unexpected places, the places where we might not look, if we thought we already had all the answers.”   . . .

“God’s Grace is a Covenant of Love”

April 28, 2019

by Rev. Jimmie Hawkins Genesis 4:8-16; 1 Peter 4:7-11 . . .

“It Seemed to Them an Idle Tale”

April 21, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Richard Coble and Samantha Gonzalez-Block Isaiah 65:17-25; Luke 24:1-12 “The resurrection will never lose its mystery. And God’s transcendence can never be collapsed into our reality. But we can thank God when we are given just a glimpse of it.” (*There were some technical difficulties with the sermon audio this week, but it is available for listening . . .

“Shouting Stones”

April 14, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Isaiah 50:4-9a; Luke 19:28-40 “With our palms made bare, Luke invites us to make our hands open and visible to God coming into the city, coming into our lives. We can ask for mercy and for challenge and for direction. With hands wide open, we are ready to embrace Christ.” . . .

“Imagination Required”

April 7, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 43:16-21; John 12:1-8 “When’s the last time you really dusted off your imagination and let it run full throttle? When’s the last time you let yourself dream about extravagant love pouring out into the world? When’s the last time you let yourself believe in God’s power to deploy our imaginations in the service of healing the deepest, most shadowy, most stark conditions that afflict our world . . .

“Be the Change”

March 31, 2019

by Paige Kemper, Emma Maney, and Kaegan Parks Psalm 32; Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32 “No matter where we are on our faith path, God in all of his grace accepts us. The son endured fear, but moved forward. The son felt shame, but was greeted with grace. The son was lost, but found he was home.” “The older brother reminds us that even though we think we do everything correctly, we are never too perfect . . .

“Repentance Again?”

March 24, 2019

by Richard Coble Isaiah 55:1-9; Luke 13:1-9 “Grace means you can lay down the façade, the fantasy that you and I are always right, that we have to prove ourselves as better than or perfect.” . . .

“Good Trouble”

March 17, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 27; Luke 13:31-35 “Jesus following is not about safety or acceptability. It is about a way of life that knows and lives and breathes good trouble—trouble that disrupts the powers and principalities, trouble that lets go of fear and takes hold of the freedom we find in Christ’s revolutionary love, trouble that resists the temptation to give up or give in.” . . .

“Dig Deep”

March 10, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16; Luke 4:1-13 “The harsh truth about faith is clear in the wilderness of Jesus finding his Messianic identity—faith is about disrupting the powers and principalities, faith is about one’s core identity truly being that you are God’s very own, faith is about letting your identity as God’s own lead the way when another way is presenting and it is truly enticing.” . . .

“Be Transformed”

March 3, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Exodus 34:29-35; Luke 9:28-36 “Transformation is not just a new attitude or a new perspective. Transformation is a change in form, a material, cellular, radical change that defies our expectations, that doesn’t just change us, but changes the world.” . . .

“Joseph Megamix”

February 24, 2019

by Richard Coble Genesis 45:3-11, 15; Luke 6:27-38 “Forgiveness, real reconciliation, individual and collective, when it is for harms that affect our lives, our communities. . . that takes time; it can take years, or generations, and it takes work.” . . .

“Real Talk”

February 17, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Jeremiah 17:5-10; Luke 6:17-26 “Jesus is declaring a radical, liberating truth: God is on the side of those who suffer. So, if you are feeling comfortable and safe (behind a locked door, or a high wall, or in your silence): ‘Woe to you,’ says Jesus. ‘Wake up and see the world through God’s fresh, wise eyes: a world where the first are last and the last are . . .

“Leave and Follow”

February 10, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 6:1-8; Luke 5:1-11 “Conocimiento begins in pain, in a major life change, in some breaking point—in some situation of rupture that forces us to look deeply into our own identities and reevaluate how we are in relationship with one another and with ourselves. We lay down the parts of our life that are stagnant, that turn us against ourselves. For Anzaldúa, conocimiento, deep knowing that builds community, begins . . .

“Tension Tamer”

February 3, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Jeremiah 1:4-10; Luke 4:21-30 “Part of welcoming conflict is us acknowledging that we must, we must practice (not just value) true power sharing.  And that means we lay down our need to be right all the time. We lay down our need to dominate a conversation. We lay down our need to control, to feel comfortable, or to prove we know everything. Because we don’t know everything.” . . .

“Body Work”

January 27, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Corinthians 12:12-31a; Luke 4:14-21 “This Table is about liberation from oppression—that means the comfortable arrive here confronted with the impact of our comfort on those who are languishing.  The hard reality mirrored back to us is where our freedom lies.”   . . .

“Never Cease to Be Amazed”

January 20, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 62:1-5; John 2:1-11 “Christians must always, already be tuned to that dissonance. God’s abundance gives us the vision, the moral courage, the perseverance to never tire of working for justice and mercy and love.  And the pain we see gives us the urgency, the compassion, and the determination to do healing work.” . . .

“Accompaniment”

January 13, 2019

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Isaiah 43:1-7; Luke 3:15-17, 21-22 “Together, we celebrate who we are and whose we are. We are followers of God’s beloved son “with whom God is well pleased.” And we recognize our mutual responsibility to support each other in our pain, in our joys, in our growth side-by-side – as siblings made one, made whole in Christ.”   . . .

“The Frankincense Diaries”

January 6, 2019

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 60:1-6; Matthew 2:1-12 “You have forgotten how to dream, you have forgotten that you can journey to a place where the truth will change you forever. The truth of God born in you, the truth of God born in resistance to enthroned power, the truth of God born into a world come home to itself.”   . . .

“Be Thankful”

December 30, 2018

by Richard Coble Colossians 3:12-17; Luke 2:41-52 “Love is not a permanent state of being, not a destination that you have to reproach yourself for not already being there. Love, and thankfulness, and compassion are practices.” . . .

“Christmas Eve Homily”

December 24, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 1:1-14 “Each week of Advent, we have together fixed our gaze on an image of redemption—glimpses of God’s love, God’s justice, God’s mercy, God’s welcome home inviting us to come closer, come closer and see what God’s love looks like when it takes on flesh. These glimpses of redemption abide in a world where injustice, hatred, and harm persist.” . . .

“Something is Stirring”

December 23, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Micah 5:2-5a ; Luke 1:39-47 “Yes, in this moment, in this ordinary doorway, Mary affirms Elizabeth’s prophetic witness and Elizabeth affirms Mary’s divine calling. Within both women, God’s joy and hope are already stirring. And in their wombs, something new and transformative is waiting to be born.”   . . .

“With All Your Heart”

December 16, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Zephaniah 3:14-20; Luke 3:7-18 “John the Baptist says forget about relying on your culture, your heritage, your faith tradition, your ethnic origin.  The only sure footing is love that is unafraid to let love be love and to let love do love.”   . . .

“Prep Work”

December 9, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Malachi 3:1-4; Luke 3:1-6 “The big change we are preparing for is that divine justice is coming, right relationship is coming, and the truth is coming.  How are we making room in our communities, in our cultures, in our societies for right relationship with God and with each other?” . . .

“The Days Are Surely Coming”

December 2, 2018

by Richard Coble Jermiah 33:14-16; Luke 21:25-36 “The promise of advent, this season of expectation, is not utopian, or escapist; it’s not an illusion or a fantasy. The promise does not ask you to ignore your grief or the world’s suffering. Rather, the promise empowers you to proclaim, in word, in deed, and in hope: that God is here, that God draws us close . . .

“Across a Crowded Room”

November 25, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block 1 Samuel 23:1-7; John 18:33-39 Vocalist: Jonathan Ross Pianist: Jeff Jones “We must face what is challenging, ask the hard questions, wrestle with discomfort – even in ourselves – in order to make way for God’s truth to be carefully taught and embraced.” . . .

“Birthpangs and Head Games”

November 18, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Daniel 12:1-3; Mark 13:1-8 “Jesus calls us to be present in the anguish, in the turmoil, in the grip of labor’s most intense contractions, with the disposition of faith, not fear.” . . .

“All In”

November 11, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop 1 Kings 17:8-16; Mark 12:38-44 “. . . the one thing that the Bible does not contradict itself about is how people of faith are mandated to treat the most vulnerable in our society. The Bible does not equivocate about economic justice and about how the most at risk in society should be the recipients of the most attentive care by people of faith.” . . .

“Good and Great”

November 4, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Deuteronomy 6:1-9; Mark 12:28-34 “This Table teaches us not to be afraid of the cost of love, not to be afraid of grief. This Table teaches us the beautiful symmetry of love doing what it does best—not giving up. Love doesn’t quit, love doesn’t die—it knows how to hold on, it knows how to let go, it knows how to grow things in hard places and soft . . .

“Even More Loudly”

October 28, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Job 42:1-6, 10-17; Mark 10:46-52 “No matter how many walls we build, or gates we construct, or locks we put on our doors, or judgments we make about “them,” and blind spots we willfully maintain about “us,” we breathe in the same oxygen, we are poisoned by the same toxic anger, we are diminished by anyone’s dehumanization.” . . .

“In-Sourcing”

October 21, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Job 38:1-7, 34-41; Hebrews 5:1-10 “So, why is it so often that our suffering isolates us from each other? Why is it so easy for us to lapse into mentalities of entitlement and blame? The hierarchies of worthiness that define our society of haves and have nots are conspiring to snuff out the flame of Christ that burns in each of us.” . . .

“Threads, Needles, and Camels”

October 14, 2018

by Richard Coble Amos 5:6-7, 10-15; Mark 10:17-31 “It takes work to be a church and a city and a country where people really can lay down their burdens and be who God calls them to be, and not be victimized, not be run over by systems or powerful people who use others for their own gain. It takes work to be a people who actually trust that God really is in this place . . .

Psalms & Reflections – Hymn Festival

October 7, 2018

Psalm 51:1-4, 10-12; Psalm 63:1-7; Psalm 146; Psalm 100 Samantha Gonzalez-Block, Heather Ferguson, Marcia Mount Shoop, & Richard Coble “The centering words of the psalmist are meant to bring us back to ‘what is true.’ Our task is to remember and to return.  This rhythm, this building of muscle memory is what prepares us for the storms and celebrations of life… to remember and return. At the center, we find the . . .

“Trust Fall”

September 30, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29; James 5:13-20 “As people of faith, James reminds us that we do not face life’s challenges or questions alone. Christ calls us to lean on one another: to seek out answers and healing together, to recognize the quality of these relationships, and to commit ourselves to each other for the long haul. This is what it means to be faithful siblings in Christ. This . . .

“Willing to Yield”

September 23, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Jeremiah 11:18-20; James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a Selfish ambition and envy are diseased ways of being in the world. Wisdom from heaven is not arrogant, but gentle, humble, willing to yield. Envy teaches us to hoard. Heaven reminds us nothing we have was ever ours to start with. Envy tells us we’ll never be enough or have enough. Heaven heals us, down deep in our souls—and tells us we are . . .

“Tongue Twisting”

September 16, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Proverbs 1:20-33; James 3:1-12 “In times of tension and stress, honoring the creative and the sacred power of speech requires that we take time to examine our thinking, our feelings, our hearts, our souls, our sensations—the things that give rise to speech.” . . .

“Voice Lessons”

September 9, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop, Richard Coble, Samantha Gonzalez-Block and Jeff Jones Isaiah 35:4-7a; Acts 16:19-34 “Grace Covenant, we sing because we trust the new thing that God is doing in and through us. We sing because God has promised to provide for us. We sing because God is God–because Christ shows us the power of being brave in thin spaces, in spaces of tension, in spaces where things could go either way . . .

“Prophets and Profits”

September 2, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9; James 1:17-27 “We cannot call ourselves Christian and not engage in our economy with an embodied, active, and engaged commitment to economic justice. Prophets and profits do not have equal status—and we are called to active pursuit of social justice even when it is not in our self-interest.”   . . .

“Stay Awake & Pray”

August 26, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 35:15-22; Matthew 26:36-46 “Prayer connects us with the One who will not rest. The one who keeps moving and reacting, listening and understanding, surprising and shifting, radically transforming the lives of those who pray and the world as we know it.” . . .

Questions for God – “Eternity?”

August 19, 2018

by Richard Coble Ephesians 5:15-20; John 6:51-58 “We think of God’s eternity as bearing on our deaths and the deaths of those we love, and while that is certainly true of the promises of God, those promises are much more about the lives that we live today than about the distant future, the end of the age.” . . .

Questions for God – “Triage”

August 12, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Samuel 18:5-9, 15, 31-33; Ephesians 4:25-5:2 “Genuine faith does not flee from such difficult realities, but stays present and open to the growth that truth carries with it. Genuine faith is all about moral triage—about being able to prioritize what faith practices are most life-giving in spaces where competing moralities are in play.” . . .

Questions for God – “Cast Away”

August 5, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 51:1-12; John 6:24-35 “Forgiveness is not about perfection or being able to repair all the harm we’ve done or the suffering we have created. Forgiveness is about trusting God’s grace to do far more than we can do for ourselves. Forgiveness is freedom.” . . .

Questions for God – “Mirror Image”

July 29, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block John 6:1-15; 2 Samuel 11:1-15 “To put it simply, to be made in the Lord’s image is to have the capacity and the faith to recognize that we are broken and we need God.”   . . .

“Why all this Suffering?”

July 22, 2018

by Richard Coble Jeremiah 23:1-6; Mark 6:30-34, 53-56 “If we believe in a God who stands with us rather than over us, who asks us to love as God loves, and who holds us in grief, in the fragility of life, then this God is calling us to something deeper than simple submission to a kingly decree.” . . .

Questions for God – “Conflict and Community”

July 15, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19; Mark 6:14-29 “Without conflict, community is a parody of itself—mimicking relationships that make and give life, while actually trivializing who God created us to be together. With conflict, and the Spirit’s help, community can become a vivid expression of the very nature of God—love that goes the distance healing requires and doesn’t count the cost.” . . .

Questions for God – “Voice Lessons”

July 8, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Ezekiel 2:1-5; 2 Corinthians 12:2-10 “What a beautiful way to orient ourselves to the thorns in our sides—the things that challenge us the most, the things that threaten to destroy us, to discourage us, to isolate and insult us. These thorns are not impediments to trustworthy revelation; they are prerequisites, because they keep us from becoming distorted by our own interpretations and pridefulness, and our own agendas.” . . .

Questions for God Preaching Series: “First Things First”

July 1, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Lamentations 3:22-33; Mark 5:21-43 “In the end, we can never prove the existence of God. We can only let it pour out of the stirrings in our souls.” . . .

“Sea Change”

June 24, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Job 38:1-11; Mark 4:35-41 “These tumultuous times are no time to lose your faith, brothers and sisters. These are the days when faith is our most powerful weapon against violence, against hatred, against the commodification of people, against the criminalization of poverty, against the failure to see and respect the humanity of all people.” . . .

“A Human Point of View”

June 17, 2018

by Richard Coble Ezekiel 17:22-24; 2 Corinthians 5:14-21 “Being invited into the ministry of reconciliation means calling out the human view of objectification, of abuse, wherever it is practiced, when we practice it against others, when we practice it against ourselves, when we see the human point of view in full force in trusted places, like the church, like this country.” . . .

“Branching Out”

June 10, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 121; John 15:1-17 “God calls us to be branches willing to be pruned, to adapt, to reform in order to better create God’s kingdom here on earth.” . . .

“The Potter’s House”

June 3, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 139; 2 Corinthians 4:5-12 “The world does not need our self-righteousness or our feigned perfection, the world needs our clay pots in all their God-infused glory, to tell the stories only we can tell—of how the fragments of our broken lives tell the truth of God’s unparalleled power to raise and redeem the lost and shattered pieces of our pain.” . . .

“Divinity and Darkness”

May 27, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 29; Romans 8:12-17 “The Trinity is about divinity and darkness—the Holy Mystery of a powerful love willing itself into every crack and crevice, every shadow and seed of human existence.” . . .

“Proving the World Wrong”

May 20, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Acts 2:1-21; John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15 “The Spirit was there when the church was born—in tongues of fire, in wounded human beings finding the courage to try a new way of being together. The church was born of the courage to prove the world wrong about the things that seek to divide us.” . . .

“Whose Giving Knows No Ending”

May 13, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 1; John 17:6-19 “God looked out at the world – and all its brokenness – and instead of turning away, God chose to get into the ring like never before – to climb into human skin and walk beside us. God came to empathize and engage and empower, to understand, to upset and to unify.” . . .

“Love”

May 6, 2018

by Richard Coble John 15:9-17; 1 John 5:1-6 “Imperfect, loving people, brought together by God, asked to love one another, empowered to love one another by the example and the Spirit and the Grace of God in Jesus Christ. We come together because we have tasted perfect, and unending love and grace, and we want so desperately to follow it, and to show it to others.” . . .

“Fear and Loving”

April 29, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 22; 1 John 4:7-21 It is only when we look straight on at fear that we can hear the power of the Gospel. In a world that idolizes might and systematizes violence, Jesus comes on the scene with a ridiculous promise: God is love and those who abide in me abide in God and God abides in you . . .

“Traction”

April 22, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 23; 1 John 3:16-24 The salamander is telling us something about ourselves. We are hard on the permeable things—the things that soak up our pain, our greed, our short-sightedness. Salamanders tell us about our out-of-sight-out-of-mind way of avoiding the hard truths we need to look at to heal ourselves, to heal the world. Love needs truth. And love needs action. That’s the only way love . . .

“Dappled Things”

April 15, 2018

by Dr. William Jeffrey Jones 1 John 3:1-7; Luke 24:36-48 “But glory be to God for Dappled things! What some see as an imperfection or blemish . . . God sees as a testimony to the perfect unity and infinitude of His creative power! We are called to celebrate the diversity of God’s creation and Richard embodied that in our midst!” . . .

Homily – Richard Sales’ Service

April 13, 2018

by Rev. Dr. Marcia Mount Shoop “And so those who profess to follow in Christ’s way, must first trust Him, and must next be trustworthy—and not just any kind of trustworthy—the kind of trustworthy that is to life, that is to love, that is to healing.”   . . .

“Resurrection Tales”

April 8, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block, Mary Lou Nash, Elizabeth Propst and Keaton Hill Acts 4:32-35; John 20: 19-31 “Resurrection practice is a mysterious movement, its rhythm echoing the sacred unity of death and life, sorrow and joy.” . . .

“Resurrection Quest”

April 1, 2018

by Richard Coble, Samantha Gonzalez-Block, and Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 25:6-9; John 20: 1-18 “Resurrection is in our bones, in our muscle twitches, in the energy that we share with each other without saying a word, in the deep narratives of broken hearts able to love again. Resurrection is built into the way our bodies are made, that way communities are made—in the ecosystems of God’s good creation, death does not have the . . .

“Of Mirrors, Mocking, and Mindsets”

March 25, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 50:4-9a; Mark 11:1-11 Listen, brothers and sisters, to this profound invitation—to be a source of healing in this world, to be a faithful person in this world, you must open yourself up to become someone you have trouble believing you can be . . .

“Glorified”

March 18, 2018

by Richard Coble Jeremiah 31:31-34; John 12:20-33 God is not the cause of suffering, but rather accompanies us in our suffering, gets lost with us in our suffering, but also, and also, God accompanies us as we grow, and growth is painful sometimes, and necessary. Sanctification, theologians call it, by the power of the Holy Spirit; it’s not for the faint of heart . . .

“Moving Mountains”

March 11, 2018

by Hannah Shealy and Sidney Shoop Psalm 121; Matthew 17:14-20 How does your faith help you move mountains . . .

“Temple Tantrum”

March 4, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 19; John 2:13-22 Righteous anger is a carrier of our deep interdependence. An affront to the humanity of one person is an affront to your humanity, to mine. Righteous anger is an explosion of love—for a world that can never be healed on the backs of the misery of any . . .

“Losing to Win”

February 25, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 22:23-31; Mark 8:31-38 When Jesus says, “take up your cross and follow me,” he is telling us not to pack light on our journey in his service. He is asking us to bring our whole selves. Bring all your shame, your suffering—the suffering you bear and the suffering you cause, the suffering that has made you stronger and the suffering that has left you weary, diminished, not sure if you . . .

“Wilderness”

February 18, 2018

by Richard Coble Psalm 25:1-10; Mark 1:9-15 There is no wilderness in which God does not walk beside us. There is no disillusionment that can make God stop holding on to you. There is no depth that God will not sink with us. No way to get lost where God will not get lost with us . . .

“Souvenirs”

February 11, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop 2 Kings 2:1-12; Mark 9:2-9 Being a person of faith in this tumultuous world is about belief, not certainty. It is about mystery, not mastery. It is about trust, not control. Breathe that in for a minute—these are more than just words. These are dispositions toward human life that call on us to give ourselves to the world with such generosity, with such open hearts, with such confidence in God’s . . .

“Staying Alert”

February 4, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Mark 1:29-39; Isaiah 40:21-31 God is here and now – as God has always been – reaching out in compassion, pushing us from pain to new life, working tirelessly for peace and reconciliation. We need only awaken and see . . .

“Food Fight”

January 28, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Deuteronomy 18:15-20; 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 Food can bring us closer to God. It’s not a legalistic way to control our relationship with God or a golden ticket to achieve righteousness. Food needs love for it to heal us. And God is yearning for us to taste that, to savor that, to cultivate that nourishing, nurturing love deep within ourselves . . .

“As If”

January 21, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Jonah 3:1-5, 10; 1 Corinthians 7:29-31 As Christians we are called to live in time collapsed, time conflated—in the layers of truth that every moment entails—layers of history, generations, layers of present realities, complexities, and perspectives, and layers of future possibilities—full of both promise and peril . . .

“Bodies Matter”

January 14, 2018

by Marcia Mount Shoop Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18; 1 Corinthians 6:12-20 Because you see what Paul is trying to tell us is something we so desperately need to hear. We’ve got the whole “self-care” thing all wrong. When you care for your body you are not just caring for yourself, you are caring for your community. Care of your body is care for our Body. Care of your body is care of Christ’s . . .

“Let the Journey Begin”

January 7, 2018

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block Psalm 29; Luke 2:41-52 Here at the font, our journeys of faith begin. Something old is gone and something new awaits us at the surface. Here we jump into the unknown and immerse ourselves in terrifying, glorious water. We let the danger, the risk of faith wash over because the good news is this: we believe, we know that God is always here – ready to catch us . . .

“Holding On, Letting Go”

December 31, 2017

by Samantha Gonzalez-Block and Richard Coble Galatians 4:4-7; Luke 2:22-40 …faith is not really about expectation, about having all the answers. The essence of faith is trust . . .

“Christmas Eve Homily”

December 24, 2017

by Marcia Mount Shoop John 1:1-14 John’s Gospel doesn’t tell the story of the nativity that Luke’s and Matthew’s Gospels tell—instead this Gospel writer tells us the story of the cosmos—before there was time, before there was anything—this source of all wisdom, the source of light and life, yearned to come close to us—and the Incarnation is that yearning becoming as concrete, as mind-blowing, as world changing as a . . .

“Patience, Probability, and a Panacea”

December 17, 2017

by Marcia Mount Shoop Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11; Luke 1:46b-55 Faith waits like Mary did—with confidence that God can turn the places where we have everything to lose, into a panacea—a remedy for what truly ails us all—not just some of us, but all that lives and breaths—that God is calling you and me to shed the way the world distorts our lives and our life together, that God gestates in our . . .

“Free Spirit”

December 10, 2017

Isaiah 40:1-11; Mark 1:1-8 For when we recognize this brokenness – when we really do – we may also recognize our need for God to help put the pieces back together. We recognize the urgency of Advent. We see the necessity to construct a path for Christ to enter into the wilderness of our lives and to completely shift the world as we know it . . .

“Now Why”

November 26, 2017

Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24; Matthew 25:31-46   The Good Shepherd can separate the sheep and goats with just whistles and sounds, and gentle movements. The sheep and the goats know how to move to each side when the Good Shepherd tells them it is time. Within minutes they will be separated. The Good Shepherd is able to separate the sheep from the goats, from the fat sheep who have been eating more than their share, the . . .

“Toil and Trouble”

November 19, 2017

But in this parable, God does not call us to wait. God does not call us to harbor our gifts. God does not call us to play it safe. God calls us to live with fearless faith: to open our hands and courageously show the talents we’ve been given . . .

Listen Up

October 22, 2017

To be called by God is to be humble and hopeful enough to speak truth out of love without knowing fully how it will be received. To be called by God is to be faithful and foolish enough to follow the path that isn’t safe or secure, but only promises a glimmer of Christ’s hope for the future . . .

“Now What?” Marcia Mount Shoop, Samantha Gonzalez-Block and Richard Coble

September 17, 2017

Exodus 15: 1B-11, 20-21; Romans 14: 1-12 Look at us all, given this thing we call church, that we call tradition, full of histories of love, and struggle, striving and trying. It’s a history of people reaching out to a God who ever always draws near and reaches out to us. Feel this spirit that binds us, that holds us upright, that gathers us just as the skeleton gathers the flesh.  It holds us upright even . . .