The Lectionary readings this week give us lots of options – as ever. From Jesus withdrawing for a time, his calling the disciples, a controversial healing that resulted in loss of income for a community, a plea for peace in the early church community – all providing rich seams that have much to speak into our many and varied contexts today.
So, are you using the Lectionary texts, or something else? And where are you going in preaching, in praying and with all ages?
In your tradition, do you still have another week before you put the crib away, or is that long gone from your worship space? It’s great to hear how this community communicates the love of God in all our different ways, in all our different traditions. Please share your thoughts for this week, or ask for help with the missing pieces. Share a link to your sermon if you wish. I look forward to reading!
The discussions from earlier in the week, on the Narrative Lectionary and on the Revised Common Lectionary may also be helpful. Whether you’re an 11th Hour writer or whether you’ve been ready from early in the week, bring it here and we’ll encourage one another.
Rev Liz Crumlish is a Presbyterian minister living on the west coast of Scotland. She is a member of the RevGalBlogPals Board, writes for Spill the Beans, blogs at Journalling and contributed to There’s a Woman in the Pulpit.
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My brain is in a tizzy. Three things that must be completed by Sunday morning: my column for today’s e-newsletter, my sermon, and my address for Sunday’s annual meeting. The whole day tomorrow will be spent in a church retreat! Because Sunday’s RCL Gospel is about the calling of the disciples, the themes of all three writings intersect. But I don’t want to repeat myself or be redundant. Having trouble pulling out the individual threads!
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Gloria, hoping the threads are unravelling in a helpful way. Sometimes folk need to hear things more than once!
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Saturday afternoon and I am attempting to write, a draft at least, before dinner. i usually don’t sit down until about 8 pm on Saturday to write the sermon. i am hoping to not be so late to bed, and hence so tired by Sunday afternoon. 300 words so far, another 600 shroud do. Tomorrow is also Australia Day, talking a little about that earlier in the service.
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Patty, Happy Australia Day. Hope the words are flowing earlier than usual.
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Thanks Liz, after dinner started watching the Australia Day awards, they are announced the evening before Australia Day, but they go for 90 minutes – so taping the rest so i can finish the sermon.
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9.30 pm and calling the sermon complete, now to tidy up the section in the service on Australia. I am on the NL and preaching on Demons, names and blessings
any comments appreciated, not sure if there are parts that might be a bit too personal for sharing in a sermon.
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Patty, thanks for sharing. This is really thoughtful and sensitive, naming and bringing into community those things by which we exclude ourselves and others.
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I’ve been working away from home for the last couple of weeks, so I’m enjoying a quiet Saturday morning, making soup, baking bread, just relishing being home with family.
I’ll work on a sermon on the calling of the disciples later in the day.
But, meantime, here is one I preached earlier in the year on the demoniac and the pigs.
http://somethingtostandon.blogspot.com/2019/06/what-is-your-name.html
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Hi, friends. I’m preparing and packing for my trip to Big Event 2020, but wanted to stop by and offer up something I wrote this week about how important the affirmation of gifts is in confirming our calling. https://marthaspong.com/2020/01/22/face-to-face/
Blessings to all who are preaching!
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Martha, thanks. Interesting line of thought – affirming the gifts of those who don’t yet realise they are being called to serve. May BE be a blessed time.
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You will be missed!
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Thank you for the reminder of your reflection and for your ideas. Thinking about whose gifts need affirmed and who needs to be invited inspired me to think about the church I am serving and their need for better hospitality. I am also going to be encouraging them to think about who in the community may be waiting for an invite. Now to figure out how to fill it out for a full sermon…:)
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I’m working on a sermon around Psalm 27. It’s been a long time since I used the psalm as a sermon focus but I was captivated by the Lord’s face in Psalm 27 this week and as I dug more into reading and reflecting on the psalm it really opened up. Now, though, the challenge of a full day and the hopes that a sermon merges and emerges from all of the earlier work on this.
Prayers for all who are preparing this day!
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Prayers for you too Lynn – that what captivated you in the text earlier in the week will emerge in focus as you get around to writing.
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I’m in 1 Corinthians and looking at how community develops and this mistakes along the way. As I was working on my sermon last week (also 1 Corinthians) I thought of the framework for this week which became the sermon title: Big Bang Theory meets Community of Grace. Big Bang Theory is a sit-com which ran for 12 years in the US. I have some tweaking to do but the main ideas are there. And then I am off for a week for study leave…yay.
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Great title Elaine – and Yay for a week’s study leave.
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Psalm 27. I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
I needed to hear these words this week in the middle of the political world in which we live.
Go read the whole psalm. Take a deep breath. Repeat
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Thank you Bobbie- that IS good and necessary news to read/hear.
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Coming back to preaching after two weeks off (vacation) is hard! And its our annual meeting tomorrow and there are difficult issues coming up so my creative spirit is in hiding. Prayers appreciated. My thought is that I will preach on calling, but I also LOVE the psalm. I sat at the bedside of a dying woman (100 years old) and her son and read the opening line of Psalm 27. It was a holy moment.
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Praying Shannon for your post vacation mojo – and giving thanks for that holy moment – may there be more as you navigate tomorrow.
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I am working with the idea of mending our nets, from the gospel passage. James and John were called from their work of repairing their nets to follow Jesus’ mission in the world, but so often the work of being the church is about repairing that which needs mending. How are we being called to the work of mending, in the church and in our world, today?
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Thanks, Trina – those disciples were following Jesus with skills honed in their former lives. That’s resonating with me today. Nothing is wasted in the economy of the kingdom.
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I preached on the calling of the disciples three years ago, and this time I was caught by Karoline Lewis’ column from 2017 (“Mapping God’s Promises”) about the importance of place. I am focused on Jesus’ declaration that the kingdom of heaven has come near/is at hand and what it means that the place isn’t the place of power, wealth or influence.
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Christina, thanks. We often miss the signs because we’re looking in the wrong places.
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Well, the sermon didn’t take quite the direction I anticipated. I’m posing the question: what if the gospel were relevant to today’s world? And finding some uncomfortable truths along the way…
https://somethingtostandon.blogspot.com/2020/01/call-to-repentance.html
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Liz C – A beautifully crafted message! Point on! May the hearers tomorrow be as moved as I was reading it!
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Thank you Kathy.
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