Photo Credit: “The Burning Bush” by Ruben Alexander. License: CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 DID YOU KNOW THAT OUR SERMON PODCAST IS ON ITUNES AND STITCHER? SUBSCRIBE SO THAT YOU’LL NEVER MISS A SERMON!
People have been wrestling for years with the question of who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. On the TV show TheGood Place, there is no heaven or hell. There istheGoodPlace and the Bad Place, and their answer to the question is that good people go to theGoodPlace and bad people go to the Bad Place. But the way that gets lived out on the show makes for an interesting dynamic between good and bad.
Sort of like the Jacob and Esau story from Genesis. Pastor Kate dives into how God seems to play with our understanding of what is good and bad and who is rewarded and punished for their behavior.
Image source: Hollywood Reporter. Screengrab from the NBC Series The Good Place. DID YOU KNOW THAT OUR SERMON PODCAST IS ON ITUNES AND STITCHER? SUBSCRIBE SO THAT YOU’LL NEVER MISS A SERMON!
No one likes loose ends or an unresolved movie ending. Which might be why the story of Abraham taking his son, Isaac, up a mountain to sacrifice him is so unsatisfying. The story reads like a movie plot, seemingly concluding with a happy ending. But a closer look reveals all sorts of loose ends.
Pastor Kate examines these loose ends and what they mean for us as people of God.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”
“Call me Ishmael.”
“It was a pleasure to burn.”
These are all first lines in famous literary works. But today’s sermon is about a different “first line”: the opening to the the book of Genesis. “In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep…”
In baptism and communion, these gifts of the Sacraments, through water, bread, wine and the promises of God, we are joined with God and with the whole body of Christ. We are given the gift and the responsibility of community.
It’s easy to watch Breaking Bad and assume we’d never become like Walter White; to assume that we are not capable of committing the atrocities he does while cooking and selling methamphetamine. Pastor Kate tackles this assumption while also examining our slavery to sin – starting with the disciples and then ourselves. Yet, Jesus wants to save us. Which is part of what communion is all about.
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Part 4 of Such Great Things, a sermon series on the sacraments in the Lutheran tradition.
Pastor Kate revisits a time in her life when she was almost swept away by the wind and her need to have something else anchor her down – just as baptism is the anchor for our lives, especially in the midst of racism and Charlottesville.
Part of Such Great Things: Water, Bread & Wine – A sermon series on the sacraments in the Lutheran tradition.