Pr. Cheryl Walenta Gorvie Sermon - blog

Show of hands: who here has ever approached a major life event—and I mean major, like starting in a new school or a new job or getting married or welcoming a baby into your household or retiring from work, you know, major—and because you did all the things to prepare for the big event and because you studied and learned what to do ahead of time, that everything went absolutely perfectly, no surprises, no regrets? Anyone? Is it even possible to ever be completely prepared?

Take this moment to re-center your ideals. Whenever we gather to worship God, we’re not leaving the world behind, but we are gonna zoom out and get the wide-angle view of what God is doing in human history with this incarnation business. We cannot fully understand God’s motives, of course, but we can sit with what God is doing. Every Sunday, we read the Scriptures while asking, what does this have to do with the world I’m living in right now? In these weeks after Easter

How much does anyone worry about what it means to be saved? Saved as in eternal salvation. Okay, maybe it is important, to have a broader sense of time—eternity—and the power of God to bring abundant life. Yeah, but also I’m American and a product of consumer culture and the expectation that whatever I want should already be in my hand right now. Anything with importance at a distant time might as well be imaginary—what relevance does it have for today? Who really care

“ Peas be with you” Digital Artwork by Claude AI, prompted and edited by Eve Cooney, inspired by Matthew 28: 1-10 What’s with all the jokes and silliness today?! Well, sometimes people say that when Jesus was resurrected, then death did not get the last word, or Jesus laughed in the devil’s face, making a joke of death. So: ha ha, we get to laugh about it. That’s the deep theological reason for a Holy Humor Sunday. Also this week after Easter, after all the busy-ness, t

Alleluia! Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia! This is our call-and-response refrain every Easter Sunday. Because we’re not only witnesses of the resurrection. We are more than mere spectators. We are participants in the proclamation! Alleluia! Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia! We say these words even if we’re not sure what they mean! What’s an alleluia anyway? Well, the short answer is: it’s the Latin-ized form of the Hebrew wo

I never imagined John’s Gospel could be a love story. But this is the amazing thing about returning to the same old stories—in God’s Word, there is always something new to learn because the Holy Spirit is always revealing something new. (I’ve been at this pastoring and preaching thing for long enough that maybe I’ve forgotten stuff I used to know, and maybe that’s why it feels brand new again.) But the world is always a little different, and God’s Word is connected with

This year, we already know the bad news. It’s around us every day, the horrors of war, the painful realities of hunger and people losing their jobs or losing their homes, the stress of rising costs for everyday items including gas. So during this season of Lent, we didn’t need more bad news, more focus on sin or penitence or giving up the things that bring us joy. We have focused instead on good news—isn’t that why we’re here, to celebrate Jesus as the Gospel of Good News?

Whenever you hear a refrain, a callback, a repeated reference—this is when you know you’re supposed to be paying attention. The words should stick with you. It’s like when someone dies, someone you really loved, especially if their death was unexpected, or maybe you weren’t ready to say goodbye—you might not remember the last thing you said to that person. You might not remember their last words, the last thing they said to you. But you’re likely to remember the things

God does not see as humans see—God can see and understand the human heart. And as humans, we can barely admit how limited our sight truly is—we think we know everything, or at least we think we know enough to judge righteousness. Jesus reminds us of our limitations, what we cannot know nor understand nor even see. John’s Gospel is full of themes of light and dark, even to the point of mentioning the time of day in stories of Jesus-the nighttime conversation with Nicodemu