title: Wherever You Go

themes: friendship self-giving-love ruth-and-naomi christian-community love-of-neighbor loyalty

text:
**Scripture:** Ruth 1:8-17; 1 Samuel 18:1-4; John 15:13; Leviticus 19:9-10; Acts 2:44-46
**Series:** 2021

> Part of the 2021 'Songs of the Bible' series, this sermon on Ruth 1:8-17 explores what true, deep friendship looks like through the bond of Ruth and Naomi, expanded by Jonathan and David and by Jesus and his disciples. Pruitt distinguishes shallow 'affinity-group' friendship (sharing hobbies while sacrificing nothing of yourself) from sacrificial friendship that wills the good of the other above oneself. He argues the church is called to this new kind of friendship grounded not in shared interests or politics but in the sacrificial love of Christ, who seeks not only our salvation but our friendship.

**Illustrations:** bff-best-friend-forever, preachers-younger-nieces, gleaning-orchard-edges, affinity-group-hobbies, online-niche-affinity-poetry, aggies-in-the-building, jonathan-david-harp, peter-draws-sword

---

# July 11
## Wherever You Go

Naomi said to her daughters-in-law, “Go, turn back, each of you to the household of your mother. May the Lord deal faithfully with you, just as you have done with the dead and with me. May the Lord provide for you so that you may find security, each woman in the household of her husband.” Then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept. But they replied to her, “No, instead we will return with you, to your people.” Naomi replied, “Turn back, my daughters...” Then they lifted up their voices and wept again. Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth stayed with her. Naomi said, “Look, your sister-in-law is returning to her people and to her gods. Turn back after your sister-in-law.” But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to abandon you, to turn back from following after you. Wherever you go, I will go; and wherever you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.  Ruth 1:8-16

My nieces are 18 and 21 years younger than me. I'm the youngest in my immediate family, but they are pretty close to the oldest of the next generation. One of the things I noticed in their generation is this new term of art called a BFF. When I was a child, there were no BFFs. You maybe had a best friend, maybe not, but somewhere between 1990 and 2010, this term BFF came up: best friend forever. It wasn't enough to be a best friend. Anybody could be a best friend. You meet someone on the playground and play with them for five minutes. You're my best friend. You're my best friend. But a best friend forever was a next level. Now be BFFs also change. The concept of forever for an 11 year old girl is, you know, different than my concept of forever. It's also different than someone in their nineties. It's different from God's concept of forever. There's this aspect, though, that is rather beautiful. Even with the cliched nature of BFF, the concept of friendship as this eternal relationship is beautiful.  What is true friendship? What is deep friendship? How does God describe friendships or BFFs?
My brothers and sisters, we are continuing our series on songs of the Bible that looks through the scriptures in a way guided and retold in music. There are a lot of explicit songs in the Bible, but it all can be turned into song. For God’s love for us is so great that we cannot help but sing.

Today, Ruth and Naomi.

Ruth is one of my favorite books of the Bible. It is clear. It is direct. It is a narrative with a great point to it. There's a great story. I could read the whole story of Ruth on a Sunday morning and that'd be the sermon. And it is beautiful. It is about a woman named Ruth and she is married to a man and he dies and his brother dies and so Ruth and her sister-in-law become widows.
And their mother-in-law, Naomi, is living with them. But Naomi soon realizes, with both her son's gone, that she doesn't have anyone left in the area. So she decides to go back to her homeland, which is in Canaan, or ancient Palestine.

“ Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go, return each of you to her mother’s house. May the Lord deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me. The Lord grant that you may find rest, each of you in the house of her husband!” Then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept. And they said to her, “No, we will return with you to your people.” But Naomi said, “Turn back, my daughters; why will you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may become your husbands? Turn back, my daughters; go your way, for I am too old to have a husband. If I should say I have hope, even if I should have a husband this night and should bear sons, would you therefore wait till they were grown? Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, for it is exceedingly bitter to me for your sake that the hand of the Lord has gone out against me.” Then they lifted up their voices and wept again. And Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her.”
Ruth 1:8-14 ESV

But Ruth responds in a different way:

“But Ruth said, “Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.””
Ruth 1:16-17 ESV

It points to a great idea of what friendship can best be.

Ruth goes with Naomi and Ruth becomes a believer. Ruth followed Naomi back and ends up gleaning from the land. Gleaning is an ancient practice. Sometimes you still see it practiced today in Israel and in California, places with orchards where they don't fence in the edge of the orchard. You can stop and have an orange. You're not going to live off of gleaning completely, but it's allowed. The edge of the boundary is for the people. God is explicit about this in the Bible. The edge of the property is to remain for the wayfarer, as it says in Leviticus 19.
And so Ruth gleans. And then she goes and listens to Naomi and connects with Boaz, the man who owns the field and redeems Naomi’s family property. Property wasn’t bought in sold in ancient Israel. It always went back to the original owners eventually. And so Boaz participâtes in this process and ends up falling in love with Ruth. But the heart of it is not the relationship between Boaz and Ruth, but between Ruth and Naomi, the trust built between them. The power found in that deep friendship that is willing to go across the world for each other.
And then in 1 Samuel, the next book of the Bible, we have this other  example, we have David and Jonathan, the son of king Saul; Jonathan, the prince, Jonathan, the heir to Saul. And yet he does not betray David to his father. He cares for him. They spend time together. They talk together, they share together. They model for us what friendship could be. People who are not related by blood or marriage, but share life together.

We have these examples of Naomi and Ruth and Jonathan and David. But Jesus, as well, shows us deep examples of friendship when he calls his disciples. Discipulus means student. They call him Rabbi or Master again and again, sometimes Jesus even stops them from doing this. The point is not found in the power asymmetry. Jesus doesn't treat them like objects, but as friends. We also see, in the gospel of John, Jesus define friendship in a new way:
There is no greater love than this, that one lay down one's life for one's friends.
Friendship in the ancient world was divided into a number of categories. There was friendship of mutual interest or affinity. You know, like, “You like CrossFit, I like CrossFit. Let's go do that together. Hey, we'll have a beer afterwards.” “You like composting, I like composting. You like shopping? I like shopping.” We have these affinities that connect people. The internet has really shifted the geography of affinity groups, because you can find people online that like really niche things in a way that you used to not be able to. So this gets far nichier. “You like 17th century, century satirical poetry. I like 17th century satirical poetry. Awesome. Let's let's talk about it.”
You can have these affinity groups that even give a veneer of true friendship. And there can be a danger with going too deep into affinity, in that the only people who you think understand you are people who like the same things you like or dislike the same things you dislike. Friends are the ones who like what you like, right?
This is not what's going on with Naomi and Ruth. In some way, you can imagine it with Jonathan and David, but the friendship becomes deeper. It starts off with Jonathan's hearing David play the harp and saying, “This guy's really awesome. This guy is really cool.” We see, though, the depth of friendship by their actions. Again and again, Jonathan sacrifices himself for David. He sacrifices his own self interest. You don’t lose anything in an affinity group. This is the thing about mutual interest and affinity groups: the point of it is that you can be with this person or these people without sacrificing your interest. You can do the things you would do anyway, and be with another person or share that time together. You don't lose any part of what you would do by yourself. If you are only with people who like the same music or the same shows or the same teams or the same politicians, you end up staying in the same place. There is no expansion of your heart. You don't lose any of your selfishness by doing this activity or being with these people.
With Ruth and Naomi, with Jonathan and David, with Jesus and the disciples, what they show us, again and again, is that true friendship, deep friendship is the giving of ourselves.
The deepest friendship is found in wanting the good for another more than for yourself. And this is what we see most clearly in Jonathan and David and Ruth and Naomi and the Jesus and the disciples

wherever you go, I will go
and your people will be my people

I want your good. I want you to be happy. Naomi wants Ruth’s happiness. She offers and gives advice and helps Ruth find her happiness with Boaz. And so Ruth seeks the happiness of Naomi with her own people and Naomi seeks the happiness of Ruth.
David seeks the happiness of Jonathan and Jonathan seeks the happiness of David. Even when it goes against his own self interest. Jesus seeks the happiness of the disciples. He seeks their joy; that is why he calls them into this new life. And they seek the happiness of Jesus, even when it means they don't understand what is going on. This is why Peter pulls his sword and why Jesus has to make him put it away.
In Acts 2, after Pentecost, there's this one moment when the church is all together. It is beautiful. It is powerful. They are all of one mind of mutual sharing and understanding, and it is beautiful. This is what the church can be when we live for each other. It is not impossible but we need the Holy Spirit to live this way. We need God.
When our primary desire is to be entertained or to be satisfied, we insulate ourselves from others more and more. God, though, calls us to seek the good in those around us, to seek the good in our community, to be willing to make mistakes for the good of our neighbor, to be willing to make mistakes for the good of those around us, to realize that we are not here because we all like the same things. We all didn't vote for the same people in the past election. We don't like all the same sports teams. We don't go to the same places on vacation. I hear there are even Aggies in this building. We aren't from the same town. We don't have all the inside jokes. And yet to be the church is to be called to a new kind of friendship within the sacrificial love of Jesus Christ that you are offered this day. Not only does God seek your salvation, God seeks your friendship.
My brothers and sisters, may you be willing to seek new forms of friendship in the name of Jesus Christ. May you be willing to forgive others in the name of Jesus Christ, may you be willing to seek forgiveness. We seek to build a church of deep and mutual understanding in the name of Jesus Christ, where we understand why we have come together.
God has called us together. Not for interest convergence, but because of the blood of Jesus Christ. You are a friend of God, and God is a friend for you. God has offered himself for you. Let us offer ourselves to others.
In the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit.
Amen.


site: sermons

title: 12 Ways to Avoid Resurrection

author: Wilson Pruitt

church: bee-creek-umc

themes: bodily-resurrection resurrection scandal-of-particularity death-and-resurrection discipleship victory-over-death

text:
**Scripture:** Luke 24:1-12; 1 Corinthians 15:32; Matthew 5:3-5
**Series:** 2022

> An Easter Sunday sermon on Luke 24:1-12 structured around 'twelve ways to avoid resurrection'-six ways of answering 'no' (myth, swoon theory, bias, empiricism, Hume, mere metaphor) and six ways of answering 'yes' yet still evading its claim. Drawing on Paul Simon's '50 Ways to Leave Your Lover,' Pruitt argues that avoiding resurrection means leaving the God who loves us. Against spiritualizing or metaphorical readings (countered with Ratzinger, McCabe, and Updike), he insists on the scandal of particularity and a literal bodily resurrection that makes everything new, calling hearers to the change of discipleship and the Beatitude kingdom.

**Illustrations:** fifty-ways-to-leave-your-lover, hercules-myth-comparison, burgess-kingdom-of-the-wicked, david-hume-miracles, ratzinger-faith-stands-or-falls, mccabe-easter-not-cancellation-of-cross, updike-seven-stanzas-at-easter, chrysostom-christ-is-risen, instagram-worthy-meals

---

# Easter Sunday
## 12 ways to avoid resurrection

Very early in the morning on the first day of the week, the women went to the tomb, bringing the fragrant spices they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they didn’t find the body of the Lord Jesus. They didn’t know what to make of this. Suddenly, two men were standing beside them in gleaming bright clothing. The women were frightened and bowed their faces toward the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He isn’t here, but has been raised. Remember what he told you while he was still in Galilee, that the Human One must be handed over to sinners, be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” Then they remembered his words. When they returned from the tomb, they reported all these things to the eleven and all the others. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles. Their words struck the apostles as nonsense, and they didn’t believe the women. But Peter ran to the tomb. When he bent over to look inside, he saw only the linen cloth. Then he returned home, wondering what had happened. Luke 24:1-12

Every year, I’m getting older. But I like to stay relevant with my cultural allusions. So I’ve got a great one today. It comes from the geologically very recent year of 1975.

>The problem is all inside your head She said to me
The answer is easy if you Take it logically
I'd like to help you in your struggle To be free
There must be fifty ways
To leave your lover…
You Just slip out the back, Jack
Make a new plan, Stan
You don't need to be coy, Roy
Just get yourself free

>
That’s right, Paul Simon’s, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover, a song Mr. Simon never expected to be preached on Easter Sunday. The song is cheeky but the point should be serious today. This is what we do when we avoid Resurrection. We leave our lover. Not our lover as a fling with whom we've grown tired, but the lover who seeks us when we are lost, who comforts us when we are broken, who created us for life and love. We leave the one who loves us and gave everything for us when we avoid resurrection.

Today, I want us to think about 12 ways of leaving our lover. 12 ways of avoiding resurrection. These ways aren’t exhaustive but specific for today.

Did Jesus really rise from the dead?
Here are six ways of answering no.

1. No, just a myth like Hercules (Joseph Campbell and Hans Urs von Balthasar)
2. No, because he didn't really die (Anthony Burgess Novel Kingdom of the wicked)
3. No, the only evidence is from Christians and they are biased, confirmation bias (attestations)
4. No, can't be empirically proven (empiricism history)
5. No, nothing supernatural exists so it couldn't have happened (David Hume)
6. No, not literally, but he did metaphorically rise in the hearts of believers (a resurrection in our hearts cannot defeat death or wipe the tears from our eyes)

Now, there six ways to answer yes to the question of resurrection and yet to still avoid it.

1. Yes, but I learned about it as a kid and never really thought about it. it happened a long time ago so it can't effect me now
2. Yes, but the world is still a nasty place so it must not have mattered
3. Yes, but it only matters on Easter
4. Yes, but Jesus isn’t the only way to get to God so resurrection is not that big of a deal
5. Yes, but just to save me and people like me, not for all people. We change.
6. Yes, but Jesus' resurrection doesn't effect my pain

These are ways of avoiding resurrection. These are ways of leaving our lover.

Resurrection is not just a metaphor or myth but the action of the God of all Creation to reveal that life conquers death. To claim that love conquers evil and that everything is different now.

The Christian faith stands or falls with the truth...that Christ is risen from the dead. If this were taken away, it would still be possible to piece together from the Christian tradition a series of interesting ideas about God and men...but the Christian faith itself would be dead. Jesus would be a failed religious leader who...remains great and can cause us to reflect. But he would then remain purely human, and his authority would extend only so far as his message is of interest to us...Only if Jesus is risen has anything really new occurred that changes the world and the situation of mankind. (241-42)

In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul says, if there is no resurrection of the dead, let us eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die. But if there was, everything changes. The resurrection is either a nice idea to share between instagram worthy meals on a Sunday, or all of cosmic reality being overturned.

## The Disciples had moved on
On that first Sunday, the disciples thought it was over. They had moved on with their lives, but not everyone did.

Mary Magdeline came to the tomb early on the first day. She was expecting nothing more than to honor the man who had shown her mercy. She had not forgotten what was lost on Good Friday. She cried and continued to cry once she encountered the risen Christ. He had died on the cross and then he was there before her.

"Easter is not a cancellation of the cross. It does not...celebrate anything different from the cross. It is the meaning of the cross...Because this man Jesus carried his obedience and love to the point of accepting destruction (not just the torture of the cross, but death, and ending, a total failure), because of this, he has been raised up beyond death to love which is the life of God. The resurrection of Jesus was the creation of the new bodily world, the new way of being human, the new way of being bodily. The risen Christ did not enter paradise. He is paradise...it is because we belong to this bodily world of the risen Christ] that we conquer death, that we are able to live not for ourselves but by love, the love that Christ brings to us from God.”[^1]

Easter is the miracle that in the absolute depths of pain, we are not lost. In the depths of grief, we are not forgotten. In the depths of fear, we are not alone. God has done all so that we can have abundant life. God has given all for you, for us. God has given a way to follow, a means to see God and live joyfully in this broken world despite its brokenness. We do this through prayer and praise, service and study. God offers us new life together, not as metaphor or parable or idea. Christianity is not just a universal morality. Jesus was a particular man at a particular time. It can seem scandalous. It is easier to speak of generalities than particularities.

Easter is not a salve on your conscience. Easter is about a world made new. Resurrection is not about a philosophy or worldview but the particular action of God to become flesh, a particular kind of flesh, Jewish flesh, in a particular time and place. To serve humbly, to love, and to be killed for it. Then to rise again, defeating sin and death and claiming all for love.

We need not avoid the scandal of particularity. Jesus didn't rise spiritually but bodily, totally. We need not avoid scandal of resurrection, of the resurrected flesh of Jesus Christ.

As John Updike writes,

> Make no mistake: if he rose at all
It was as His body;
If the cell’s dissolution did not reverse, the molecule reknit,
The amino acids rekindle,
The Church will fall...

>Let us not mock God with metaphor,
Analogy, sidestepping, transcendence,
Making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the faded
Credulity of earlier ages:
Let us walk through the door.

In order to not avoid resurrection we must confront it, we must truly encounter the risen Christ. We cannot look away. We cannot dismiss it as something old or irrelevant to our lives. If it is true, if Jesus rose from the dead, everything is different. The resurrection is the scandal that hope is not just a nice idea but a person, that love is not a sweet thought but a person willing to die for us, to take from us our sin and self-destruction, and to give us friendship and love and joy and peace.

We avoid resurrection when we love ourselves and nothing more. When we love those who love us back and no one else. We avoid resurrection when we avoid the cross. We avoid resurrection when faith is about maintaining the old ways. Resurrection brings about something new.

This new life is offered for you this day. The angels said to the women, why do you look for the living among the dead? Life is offered. Grace is offered. You don’t have to look for the living among the dead anymore. Christ meets you here. You don’t have to be your old self. You can start on the road to life we call discipleship.

To be a disciple is to be confronted by the reality of the cross, to be confronted by the reality of resurrection and to realize that everything has changed. We must change also. We must be a people who live into this new kingdom where the poor are blessed where those who mourn are comforted, where the lost are found, where no matter my sin or past, there is room, there is comfort, there is love. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the meek. This is the kingdom of heaven here for us, offered for us because of resurrection. Death is not the end point so life can be more than just avoiding death. Life can be about sacrifice and gift because of resurrection.

Or as John Chrysostom said 1600 years ago,
>Christ is Risen, and you, o death, are annihilated!
Christ is Risen, and the evil ones are cast down!
Christ is Risen, and the angels rejoice!
Christ is Risen, and life is liberated!
Christ is Risen, and the tomb is emptied of its dead;
Let us pray,
Heavenly Father, may we feel the warm embrace of your love on this sacred day. May the glory of Jesus’s resurrection remind us that with You, nothing is impossible or without hope. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

[^1]: Herbert McCabe, 90-91.

method: authored, not translated

license_apparatus: CC BY-NC 4.0


title: Aerodynamics

themes: word-of-god holy-spirit disordered-love sin-as-distorted-gift new-birth in-the-world-not-of-it

text:
**Scripture:** Hebrews 4:12-13; John 3:1-7
**Series:** 2022

> Part of the 'How to Build a Car' series, this Mother's Day sermon uses Formula 1 aerodynamics (drag vs. downforce, from Adrian Newey's book) as an extended metaphor for how the church meets the world. The Holy Spirit pushes the church to move and change; our assumptions and disordered attachments create drag, while surrender creates downforce. Drawing on Hebrews 4:12-13, Pruitt frames God's word as a two-edged sword that cuts through self-deception, and on C.S. Lewis's The Great Divorce (the possessive ghost mother Pam) to define sin as a good gift—like a mother's love—distorted into possession and control. He closes with Nicodemus and new birth, calling the church to be a people of the book who let go of everything but love.

**Illustrations:** aerodynamics-drag-and-downforce, adrian-newey-how-to-build-a-car, f1-regulated-parts-pirelli-tires, methodist-laywoman-founded-mothers-day, apostles-laying-down-nets-and-past, great-divorce-pam-possessive-mother, nicodemus-born-again-question, house-on-sand-versus-rock, ut-f1-pickleball-not-the-bond

---

# May 8
## Aerodynamics
### Mother’s Day

“because God’s word is living, active, and sharper than any two-edged sword. It penetrates to the point that it separates the soul from the spirit and the joints from the marrow. It’s able to judge the heart’s thoughts and intentions. No creature is hidden from it, but rather everything is naked and exposed to the eyes of the one to whom we have to give an answer.”
Hebrews 4:12-13 CEB

Aerodynamics are complex. Some of you are engineers and worked on aeronautical or aerospace projects, and in your time, you have dealt with some of the complexities of aerodynamics. Aerodynamics in a car is different from aerodynamics in a plane, but the same basic concepts still apply. Same with aerodynamics in a bird, even aerodynamics in a person. All of our interactions with reality have an aerodynamic component. We hit air: we change the air and the air changes us. Our speed and mass can make these changes more or less dynamic.

Today is Mother’s Day. A dynamic day. A day started by a methodist lay woman over a hundred years ago to honor her mother. Mother’s day is not about yourself. Sorry mom’s, you’re great, but you can’t say to yourself, “It’s all about me!” It is always about reaching out to another. Not every woman has a child but every person has a mother. Mother’s handle everything for foetus’s as they develop. They, as well, handle the aerodynamics. Our mother’s pushed back the wind for us and took care of us and taught us to navigate the world. In the church, every woman is a mother to our community. Every mother helps us navigate the aerodynamic pressures of the world. How should the church navigate the world? How should the church respond to the wind and downward forces pressing upon it?

We're continuing our series on How to Build a Car, how to build the church as an active presence in the world at its best. Last week, we talked about the chassis, the foundation of the car. Our foundation is not just to be in Christ, but our foundation is in doing the things of God; that is when we are at our best. This week, we’re looking at aerodynamics.
Adrian Newey, who wrote the book, How to Build a Car, is the chief designer for red bull racing in Formula 1. He Talks in his book about the importance of aerodynamics again and again. He writes in his book,

>“I’m known chiefly as an aerodynamicist, but that’s a product of the fact that aerodynamics is the biggest single performance differentiator. Therefore, I tend to spend most of my time looking at aerodynamics, with the mechanical layout a close second, in order to make sure the two complement one another in a package. In fact, my sole interest lies in improving the ability of the car to score points, and what helps me do that is my experience across the disciplines.”

When there's 10 racing teams and drivers, the biggest differentiator is the aerodynamics of the car. The power unit is under a ton of regulation. All the tires are made by the fancy Italian brand, Pirelli. They are nice, but they are not manufactured by the teams themselves.

How do you maximize the aerodynamics of the car for a season? The two big ways that aerodynamics effects the car is through drag and down force. You want to avoid drag and increase downforce, which is the pressure pushing the car down. Downforce helps on turns at these high speeds and helps the drivers handle the car.
Here is a brief video on downforce.
play video
The church always interacts with the world. The church cannot avoid the world. So the question is how to maximize beneficial downforce and minimize harmful drag, or conflict with the air.

Conflict itself is not a negative. Conflict happens with every true encounter when we encounter the world.

This is where the aerodynamics of the church comes in. The Holy Spirit is going to push us as a church to be the hands and feet of Christ in the world. When Christ ascended and sent the Holy Spirit to the disciples at Pentecost, the people got the spirit but not everyone moved with the spirit. Movement means change. For Peter And James, to lead the church meant laying down their nets and letting go of their old life. For Paul to lead the church, it meant letting go of his past life as a persecutor and accept his future as a church planter. So really the question is: are we going to cause drag on the Holy Spirit or are we going to let it enable downforce so we can move better in the world? Are we getting in the way of the Holy Spirit's actions because of our assumptions about what the church is and what the church should do, or are we creating downforce so that God can transform more lives into Christ’s image? The image of God and Jesus can heal broken people.
CS Lewis, in his great book, The great divorce, gives us a set of examples of how people respond to God after death. It is a brief book that I highly recommend, but one section is especially challenging to mothers. The narrator is on this journey towards the presence of God and he overhears various interactions with those who are either turning more towards God or more away from God.

> "Oh ... Reginald! It's you, is it?"

> "Yes, dear," said the Spirit. "I know you expected someone else. Can you ... I hope you can be a little glad to see even me; for the present."
> "I did think Michael would have come," said the Ghost; and then, almost fiercely, "He is here, of course?" "He's there-far up in the mountains."
> "Why hasn't he come to meet me? Didn't he know?"
> "My dear (don't worry, it will all come right presently) it wouldn't have done. Not yet. He wouldn't be able to see or hear you as you are at present. You'd be totally invisible to Michael. But we'll soon build you up."
> "I should have thought if you can see me, my own son could!"
> "It doesn't always happen like that. You see, I have specialised in this sort of work."
> "Oh, it's work, is it?" snapped the Ghost. Then, after a pause, "Well. When am I going to be allowed to see him?"
> "There's no question of being allowed, Pam. As soon as it's possible for him to see you, of course he will. You need to be thickened up a bit."
> "How?"
> "I'm afraid the first step is a hard one,""But after that you'll go on like a house on fire. You will become solid enough for Michael to perceive you when you learn to want someone else besides Michael. I don't say 'more than Michael,' not as a beginning. That will come later. It's only the little germ of a desire for God that we need to start the process."
> "Oh, you mean religion and all that sort of thing? This is hardly the moment... and from you, of all people. Well, never mind. I'll do whatever's necessary. What do you want me to do? Come on. The sooner I begin it, the sooner they'll let me see my boy. I'm quite ready."
> "But, Pam, do think! Don't you see you are not beginning at all as long as you are in that state of mind? You're treating God only as a means to Michael. But the whole thickening treatment consists in learning to want God for His own sake."
> "You wouldn't talk like that if you were a Mother."
> "You mean, if I were only a mother. But there is no such thing as being only a mother. You exist as Michael's mother only because you first exist as God's creature. That relation is older and closer. No, listen, Pam! He also loves. He also has suffered. He also has waited a long time."

The conversation goes on and the narrator and his guide leave before they are finished.
>”It might take a long while, that conversation," said my Teacher. "And ye have heard enough to see what the choice is." "Is there any hope for her, Sir?" "Aye, there's some. What she calls her love for her son has turned into a poor, prickly, astringent sort of thing. But there's still a wee spark of something that's not just her self in it. That might be blown into a flame."
And then later, the Teacher goes on when asked about it again and whether the mother had too much love,

>”Excess of love, did ye say? There was no excess, there was defect. She loved her son too little, not too much. If she had loved him more there'd be no difficulty. I do not know how her affair will end. But it may well be that at this moment she's demanding to have him down with her in Hell. That kind is sometimes perfectly ready to plunge the soul they say they love in endless misery if only they can still in some fashion possess it."

She can't let go of her son and enter into the arms of Jesus. She has distorted that which is good and beautiful, her relationship with her son, and twisted it into only something about possession and control. She didn’t love her son for his own sake but for hers. And in that, her affection is like a house on sand or mulch. When we define ourselves, when we build ourselves on the sand of our relationships, the sand of our hobbies, we are going to give the Holy Spirit some major drag. We are going to avoid the rock that is hearing the word of God and putting it into practice.

The reason why the story is so tragic is because she takes something that is good and beautiful the love of a mother for a child, and distorts it. And that's really what sin is from top to bottom. Sin is taking something that is good, it’s taking a gift of God and distorting it, changing it.
Sin is not about good people, and bad people, that is not how God sees the world. Sin is a gift that has been turned into a chain, a weight, something that causes drag.
But the word of God cuts right through that. As it says in Hebrews, the word of God is active and living and two edged. The word of God is not a sword to cut other people down. It is a sword that cuts right through the lies we each tell ourselves. It cuts through the ways we neglect our neighbors. It cuts through the ways we cause drag to the Spirit.
And so my brothers and sisters, in this day, may we honor mother’s as an active practice. We each have a mom, whether they are with us or not. They are our gateway into this world, where we encounter love, joy, peace, comfort, but where we also encounter hurt, pain, sorrow, tragedy. A mother’s love does not keep those things from us but to offer us the world at its best.
In John 3, Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night to ask him the question You say, I must be born again. Does that mean I need to go into my mother’s belly?”
It is a good question. If you hear the words, born again, and have not been a part of a church, it is a funny question. It is also serious question.
Birth comes from a mother into the world. New birth is through the Holy Spirit so that we can be a part of the world made new now. So we need not be dragged down by sin or guilt. You don’t cease to be a child. You are free and called to be a part of a larger family where people live freely together, the family we call the church. A family drawn together not because we all like UT or Formula 1 or boats or knitting or work outs or pickle ball. The word of God cuts through the drag of the world. If we read it and study it together. If we are a people of the book together, who continuelly return to scripture, not with assumptions or expectations but faith in what God is doing, we will be stable and strong, moving aerodynamically through the sin of the world. Let us do that together. Let us take the time to read scripture together. Let us take the time to commit to new life together. Let us not be afraid of God’s word. Let’s not abuse it. Let us receive the truth of our need for God and the power God gives us to interact with the world through the Holy Spirit, with enough downforce to move mountains.

Let us pray,
Heavenly Father, we thank you for your Spirit and your Word. May we be open to the movement of the Spirit as a church and as individuals, and when we cause drag to your Spirit, may we be ready to be cut by the Word of God like a sword so that we can let go of everything in our life but love. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.


title: Alpha and Omega

themes: identity-in-christ interpreting-revelation alpha-and-omega eschatology sabbath holy-communion freedom-in-christ

scripture: Revelation 1:1-6

text:
**Scripture:** Revelation 1:1-6
**Series:** 2022

> Opening sermon of a four-week Revelation series, preached on Revelation 1:1-6. The preacher dismantles popular end-times readings (Hal Lindsey, Left Behind, Darby's rapture/dispensationalism) as a modern innovation foreign to the early church, and reframes 'apocalypse' as unveiling present reality. Drawing on Richard Bauckham, he argues Revelation counters the Roman imperial worldview and is fundamentally about Christian identity: Jesus as the Alpha and Omega, our beginning and end, Lord of the Sabbath and our coming rest. Communion is a foretaste of the heavenly feast. The sermon closes with an interactive ritual: writing down preconceptions of Revelation and of God's limits on one's life, then dissolving them in water to enact God's offered freedom.

**Illustrations:** hal-lindsey-late-great-planet-earth, left-behind-series, john-darby-rapture-origin, interpretation-chart-atom-diagram, dropping-curtain-revelation, dissolving-preconceptions-in-water

---

# February 6
## Alpha and Omega

A revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. Christ made it known by sending it through his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the witness of Jesus Christ, including all that John saw. Favored is the one who reads the words of this prophecy out loud, and favored are those who listen to it being read, and keep what is written in it, for the time is near. John, to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace and peace to you from the one who is and was and is coming, and from the seven spirits that are before God’s throne, and from Jesus Christ—the faithful witness, the firstborn from among the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To the one who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, who made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father—to him be glory and power forever and always. Amen. Revelation 1:1-6

In your bulletin today, there was a small piece of paper. I hope you still have it. If you don't, our ushers will be able to give you another one. On this paper, I want you to take some time to write down what you think of when I say the word apocalypse or revelation. Or when you hear the Book of Revelation. What is the first thing that comes to your mind? Maybe an image? Maybe a book? Maybe a series. I want you to pray about it and write this down.
We are going to have a brief moment of reflection now. We are also going to do something with this piece of paper at the end of the message.
(30 second)
Like many, my preconception of Revelation has to do with the end of the world, the end of time. It has to do with the book by Hal Lindsey, The Late Great Planet Earth, which was a big sensation in the 60s and 70s. I read part of it a few years ago and it is mostly not about revelation but how the Soviet Union was predicted in the book of Daniel, as well as the rise of China, etc.
I grew up around the fervor of the Left Behind series of books. A long series with talk of the Rapture and the Anti-Christ and as I studied theology, I learned about Dispensationalist theology which informed the series. The idea that history is fixed with a certain set of dispensations beginning with innocence under Adam, and continuing from the Fall to the Great Flood and on and on until the dispensation of grace in which we currently live, which will be followed by the Millennial kingdom (which is not a kingdom of millennials, though I wonder what that would look like).
These ways of reading the book of revelation are found in many places. We cannot dismiss them. If you look at a chart of this interpretation, this is as complex as a diagram of an atom or a protein molecule.

This way of reading Revelation, though, is very modern. It began in earnest in the early 19th century with a man named John Darby. The idea of the rapture comes from Darby, as well as the detailed assumptions of what revelation means. These readings do not go back to the 1st century. This is not how the earliest Christian read this book. Whether you grew up in the church or you are still not sure about this God thing, there is something in this book for you. Revelation is about our identity more than anything else. What is the source of our identity?

### Series Intro
My friends, over the next few weeks we are going to have a sermon series on the book of revelation. I am going to try to explain it. It will not be entirely explained. That is a goal. Some people obsess over Revelation. Others avoid it because it seems like a scary book.

This is not a scary book. This is a beautiful book. Over the next four weeks, we will give an overview of the book. I encourage you, if you have a chance, to read the whole book as we go along, but I am not checking your homework on this.

So we are going to look at how the book of revelation is both in the future but already present. It is soon and near but has, in part, already occurred in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
This isn't just about the future but about reality, our reality right now. It is about contrasting true and false views of reality. As Richard Baukham writes, "The book of revelation counters that false view of reality by opening the world to divine transcendence." It comes back to our identity. Are we primarily citizens of the world, citizens of the US, citizens of Texas, or are we primarily citizens of heaven. There is a destiny beyond the present. And, can we start living into that destiny now.
In the Gospels, we see that Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath, and this gets us to the title of this message. Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega. That is a beautiful phrase but what it means is that Jesus is our beginning and Jesus is our end. The first and last letter of the Greek alphabet. When Jesus says 'l am the Lord of the Sabbath' he is saying that I am the one who created. I am over creation. The first sabbath takes place in creation and is practiced by God. God doesn’t need to rest in order to conserve energy. God is the source of all energy and life. When we practice sabbath, we admit this and offer ourselves to our creator. Thus the importance of sabbath rest. Jesus is staking his claim as Lord of heaven and earth. God doesn’t rest on the 7th day to get ready for the week ahead. God rests to enjoy what has been done. The early church also understood Sabbath rest as our future with God. Now, in this life, we labor in the fields of this world, but when we are present with God, we shall have our true sabbath rest. All rest here is a foretaste of that heavenly rest. God is the Lord of our time, our rest, our work. Revelation is not just our future but our present. As Richard Baukham says,
> "Revelation is John's readers concrete, day-to-day world seen in the heavenly and eschatological perspective (eschatological means last things. The perspective of the last things, that is what is going on in this book. Continuing on...) As such, it functions as a counter to the Roman Imperial view of the world."
In the Roman view of the world, you have to give sacrifices to the Roman gods, you have to give fealty as well as to the emperor, the governor, the army, etc.. Let us contrast this with the Christian view of the world. The view of the triune God. The view that you were created in the image of God for something more.
Before it mentions anything about Jesus coming again, the Book of Revelation is first a series of letters to seven churches: to Ephesus, and to Smyrna, and to Pergamum, and to Thyatira, and to Sardis, and to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea. Here is a map of where this churches were.

Map

So the Book of Revelation is a series of circulating letters, it is also a prophecy of what can happen. It is also an apocalyptic. Apocalypse means what has been revealed. This is the title of the book in Greek. Apocalypse means revelation. It does not mean the end of the world. If I hold a curtain in front of you and then it drops, that is revelation. That is what is going on in this book. It is not just that the time is set in the future, but that our eyes are being open to reality, to the act that Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega, our beginning and our end, and that the forces of destruction do not have final say over us and offers us that rest.

As well, we are offered the body and blood of Christ at this table. We are also offered the bread of heaven and the cup of salvation at this table. At this table, we have a foretaste of our heavenly feast, as well as food for the heavenly kingdom here. This world is being made new. This world is being made holy. This meal is more than our present. This meal is our future.
And over our next few weeks, as we look at this challenging book of the Bible together, each week we are going to focus on a different aspects of worship. What we call the liturgy.

Revelation is full of songs of praise to God.

The basic structure of the book is important. In between a brief introduction and conclusion, there are six vision cycles:
- Christ and the Seven Assemblies
- The Seven Seals
- The Seven Trumpets
- The Dragon, the Beasts, and the Faithful
- The Seven Bowls and the Fall of Babylon
- From the Beast’s Demise to New Jerusalem.[^1]

Each of the visions begins in the presence of God, reveals threats of some kind, and then returns to the presence of God. Almost every vision includes a song.

The timing of revelation is what most people focus on. When is this going to take place? Since the 13th century, many have tried to piece together the precise timing. Most famously with dispensationists and rapture theology, which didn’t exist before John Darby. And yet the desire is there. How long, O Lord, is a common refrain throughout the bibles.

One of the interesting things about revelation itself is that there is no claim about the end of time or the end of the age, like there is in Daniel or even in the Gospels to some degree. In Revelation, stuff is happening soon. John comes right out and says it in the first verse. “The revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place.” The word translated here as soon is  τάχει  which could mean speed or haste. These visions are taking place soon. They are taking place soon for the early church that read these letters. They are taking place soon for us. But how can something happen with haste if it hasn’t happened in two thousands years?

Like I said earlier, revelation isn’t just about our future or about predicting the future. What if the book of revelation helps to understand what we are living in today, not as signs of the end but as signs of God.

The very first line of the book is sometimes translated as the Revelation from Jesus Christ. It could also be the revelation of Jesus Christ. The point is not as much the message but the messenger. It is not about John but Jesus. Who God is for us. God is not on the side of destruction but the side of life. In the midst of literal tribulation, God is here for us.

But today we are setting the table. A few minutes ago, I asked all of you to write your preconception down of the book of revelation. Now, I want you to think about a preconception of what God can do with your life. What is a limit that you have put on God in your life? What is a limit Of the expectation? As we close, I want you all to take a time in prayer. On one side we have our preconception of the book of revelation, on the other side we have our preconception of God in our life.

 Maybe it is a preconception of how often you can pray. I can't pray that much. I can't give that much. I can't serve that much. I can't share my faith. I can't be forgiven for that.
God offers us freedom from those limits. God shows us and tells us that those limits are from our head and from the world, there are not from God. That nothing is impossible for God.
When you are done, there are two stations with water. After communion, I want you to go as you feel led to put your preconceptions in the water and watch as they dissolve away.
God offers us freedom. Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega. Our end is not in destruction but in the God who is love.

Let us pray,
Heavenly Father, thank you for revealing yourself to us in Jesus. Help us to understand our identity in you so that our lives may reveal your love to others. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

[^1]: Koester, 112.


title: Ash Wednesday

themes: repentance fasting hidden-piety spiritual-discipline forgiveness treasures-in-heaven patience-as-faith

scripture: Matthew 6:1-21; Matthew 13:1-9

text:
**Scripture:** Matthew 6:1-21; Matthew 13:1-9
**Series:** 2022

> An Ash Wednesday sermon on Jesus' teaching in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6) about practicing righteousness in secret rather than for public praise, and laying up treasures in heaven. Drawing heavily on Alexander Schmemann's Great Lent, the pastor frames Lent as liberation from enslavement to sin through fasting (freeing the spirit from the dictatorship of flesh) and forgiveness (breaking sin's division). Fasting is not a cleanse diet or self-improvement but participation in Christ's own liberation and a means of grace to draw closer to him. The Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13) underscores that being tilled by God is costly but necessary to bear fruit. The aim of Lent is not formal obligation but a softened heart that hungers for communion with God, sustained by patience with ourselves through inevitable failure.

**Illustrations:** parable-of-the-sower, schmemann-fasting-as-fight, media-broad-way-vs-narrow-way

---

# Ash Wednesday

“Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. “Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. “And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. “And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Repentance, above everything else, is a return to the genuine order of things the restoration of the right vision. -20

It is not easy, indeed, to reject a petty ideal of life made up of daily cares, of search for material good, security, and pleasure, for an ideal of life in which nothing short of perfect is the goal: “be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.” This world through all its “media” says: be happy, take it easy, follow the broad way. Christ in the Gospel says: choose the narrow way, fight, and suffer, for this is the road to the only genuine happiness. And unless the Church helps, how can we make that awful choice, how can we repent and return to the glorious promise given us each year at Easter?

Sin is not only the transgression of a rule leading to punishment; it is always a mutilation of life given to us by God. (81)

Parable of the sower

That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. 2 Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. 3 Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4 As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. 5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. 8 Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. 9 Whoever has ears, let them hear.” (Matthew 13:1-9)

It is costly to be tilled by God, but only then can we bear fruit.

Lent is the liberation of our enslavement to sin, from the prison of the world. The Gospel lesson from Matthew sets the conditions for that liberation.

1. fasting: the refusal to accept the desires and urges of our fallen nature as normal, the effort to free ourselves from the dictatorship of flesh and matter over the spirit.
2. forgiveness: The triumph of sin, the main sign of its rule over the world, is division, opposition, separation, hatred. Therefore, the first break through this fortress of sin is forgiveness: the return to unity, solidarity, love. To forgive is to put between me and my “enemy” the radiant forgiveness of God Himself.
(28)

“What then is fasting for us Christians? It is our entrance and participation in that experience of Christ Himself in which He liberates us from the total dependence on food, matter, and the world. (96)

The lenten fast is not a cleanse diet or an attempt at self-actualization. The goal is not to improve yourself but to grow closer to Christ as Christ's body the church.

We should not ignore the challenges of fasting nor speak glibly of it. And fasts aren't just for some people. We do not fast for God as a sacrifice to him. God gives us the fast for our own benefit. We don't earn our salvation, we experience grace.

After all this is said, one must still remember that however limited our fasting, if it is true fasting it will lead to temptation, weakness, doubt, and irritation. In other terms, it will be a real fight and probably we shall fail many times. But the very discovery of Christian life as fight and effort is the essential aspect of fasting. A faith which has not overcome doubts and temptation is seldom a real faith…Too many people start fasting with enthusiasm and give up after the first failure. I would say that it is at this first failure that the real test comes. If after having failed and surrendered to our appetites and passions we start all over again and do not give up no matter how many times we fail, sooner or later our fasting will bear its spiritual fruit. Between holiness and disenchanted cynicism lies the great and divine virtue of patience—patience, first of all, with ourselves. There is no short-cut to holiness. (98-99)

The purpose of lent is not to force on us a few formal obligations, but to “soften” our heart so that it may open itself to the realities of the Spirit, to experience the hidden “thirst and hunger” for communion with God.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit
Amen.


title: Christmas Eve: Is Reality Flat or Overflowing?

themes: incarnation materialism-vs-meaning comfort-in-grief magnificat-reversal light-and-darkness new-creation

text:
**Scripture:** Luke 2:1-11; Isaiah 9:2; Luke 1:46-53
**Series:** 2022

> A Christmas Eve meditation framed by one recurring question: is reality flat (a thing is only a thing, we are only cells and cosmic dust) or overflowing (each moment is sustained and made meaningful by God's love)? Pruitt grants that the materialist account is not wrong but limited—it fails to describe the grief, joy, and longing we actually experience. Through Isaiah's light in the darkness, Mary's revolutionary yes and her Magnificat, and the 'turtles all the way down' anecdote of infinite regress, he argues that Christmas answers the question: not turtles all the way down, but a God who created everything yet refuses distance, entering human flesh as a child to overcome the gap between creature and Creator, heal brokenness, and make our love and dreams point to an ultimate future when all shall be well.

**Illustrations:** turtles-all-the-way-down, john-green-novel, bertrand-russell-russell, 3am-nights-10pm-calls, star-of-bethlehem-planets

---

# Christmas Eve
## Luke 2:1-11

Is our world flat or overflowing? A flat world is about how we understand what is true or not. It means a thing is only a thing. A chair is only a chair. A moment is only a moment. History is in the past and may give us tips to our present but it is only in the past. We are not our past or our present. We are, individually, the sets of cells and organs which make up the body and take up the space in which we occupy. We can be described in other ways, but those ways are extraneous.

Is our world flat or overflowing?

Isaiah says that “The people who walked in darkness
    have seen a great light;”

How many of us have walked in darkness without seeing a light? All of us who have had moments of darkness eventually realized that those moments were not eternal, and moments of darkness assuredly do not feel flat. When you are in grief or feel lost or depressed, if someone tells you it doesn’t mean anything because we are all simply cells in the universe evolved from cosmic dust, that doesn’t make you feel better.

And they’re not wrong. The problem with a flat world is not that it is in error but that it is limited. It doesn’t describe the reality we experience. We can be evolved from cosmic dust and still grieve. And we can grieve not only as an evolutionary development for the perpetuation of the species but because we miss people who are gone. Our emotions can be chemical reactions and also be emotions.
Is the world flat or overflowing?

Mary is not the kind of figure found in ancient stories. She is young and a woman. The most amazing thing about Mary is not that she becomes pregnant but that she says yes to God. But it is also amazing that she becomes pregnant. It is also amazing that Joseph still loves her and believes her. More than one thing can happen at the same time.

And Mary sings a revolutionary song. The magnificat is not a simple prayer but an acknowledgement that the powers that be need to be shaken and thrown out.  God scatters the proud, she sings. God brings down the mighty from their thrones, God exalts the humble. God fills the bellies of the hungry with good things and the rich he has sent away empty. Yes!

Should you live for something more than yourself or should you just live for yourself? Should you eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow you die? Or can you imagine a more just and beautiful world and think that that matters? Do you ever cry when you hear of the tragedies of others? To you ever weep for joy when you hear of parents reunited with their children.

Your joy and sorrow and grief and laughter and friendship and hope and comfort and anger. Those 3am nights with your kids and those 10pm phone calls from friends crying uncontrollably because their spouse left them, those matter because the world is not simply the sum of the cells and atoms moving around.

Or maybe we think the world isn’t flat and the earth is moving on the back of a turtle. There is a story of told of William James, that takes place after a public lecture he gave.

"Your theory that the sun is the centre of the solar system, and the earth is a ball which rotates around it has a very convincing ring to it, Mr. James, but it's wrong. I've got a better theory," said the little old lady.
"And what is that, madam?" inquired James politely.
"That we live on a crust of earth which is on the back of a giant turtle."
Not wishing to demolish this absurd little theory by bringing to bear the masses of scientific evidence he had at his command, James decided to gently dissuade his opponent by making her see some of the inadequacies of her position.
"If your theory is correct, madam," he asked, "what does this turtle stand on?"
"You're a very clever man, Mr. James, and that's a very good question," replied the little old lady, "but I have an answer to it. And it's this: The first turtle stands on the back of a second, far larger, turtle, who stands directly under him."
"But what does this second turtle stand on?" persisted James patiently.
To this, the little old lady crowed triumphantly,
"It's no use, Mr. James — it's turtles all the way down."

Turtles all the way down is a wonderful John Green novel about grief and mental illness. It is a clever retort of Bertrand Russell in “Why I am not a Christian”. It is a shorthand for an infinite regression which challenges the idea of the question. If it is impossible to answer the question where did everything come from, then should we ask it?

But this gets back to my first question this evening the question most beautiful answered by Christmas. Is reality flat or overflowing? Is the world all that seems to be from the most neutral position or do I have a place and do my experiences matter? Am I a collection of atoms or Wilson Pruitt or more radically, can I be both?

Is the universe turtles all the way down or is there a God who created everything, a God that cannot be described materially, and yet a God who refuses to maintain distance. A God who hears the cry of the weary. A God who sees God’s people walk in the darkness. It is not turtles all the way down because each moment and level of existence is sustained by the God who is love. We see this at Christmas that God became human and flesh. And our moments of love and joy and pain. Our histories and stories. Our past and present and future are not simply dust in the wind. Each is pregnant with the song of love that is God’s love for you. And the star of Bethlehem can be two planets aligning and can be a sign that God loves you. You are not foolish for dreaming of a world healed of pain. You are not foolish for desiring an end to your own pain. You are wise to dream and God dreams with you. You are wise to take joy in the people of your life.

The God who created everything is not waiting around for us. Instead, God enters our life through the flesh of a child so that the infinite distance between creature and creator can be overcome. So that the brokenness and darkness we see can be healed. So that the joy and happiness we feel can point to something more than momentary and fleeting bliss, it can point to our ultimate future when all shall be made well.


title: Christmas Eve Service: Is the World Flat or Overflowing?

themes: incarnation materialism-vs-meaning magnificat-reversal light-and-darkness comfort-in-grief mary-says-yes

text:
**Scripture:** Luke 2:1-7; Luke 1:46-55; Isaiah 9:2
**Series:** 2022

> A Christmas Eve sermon built around the question 'Is the world flat or overflowing?'—contrasting a purely materialist view (humans as merely cells and cosmic dust) with the reality of meaning, grief, and joy. Pruitt argues materialism is not wrong but limited; it cannot describe lived experience. Drawing on Isaiah's great light, Mary's revolutionary Magnificat, and the 'turtles all the way down' infinite-regress anecdote, he proclaims that the incarnation answers the question: God, who cannot be described materially, refuses to keep distance and enters human flesh as a child, so each moment is sustained by and pregnant with God's love.

**Illustrations:** turtles-all-the-way-down, john-green-novel, flat-world-metaphor, 3am-nights-10pm-calls, star-as-planetary-alignment

---

# December 24

## Christmas Eve Service

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

Is our world flat or overflowing? Is all we can understand on the surface of the world or does it go deeper. A flat world is about how we understand what is true or not. It means a thing is only a thing. A chair is only a chair. A moment is only a moment. History is in the past and may give us tips to our present but it is only in the past. We are not our past or our present. We are, individually, the sets of cells and organs which make up the body and take up the space in which we occupy. We can be described in other ways, but those ways are unncessary.

Is our world flat or overflowing?

Isaiah says that “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.”

How many of us have walked in darkness without seeing a light? All of us who have had moments of darkness eventually realized that those moments were not eternal, and moments of darkness assuredly do not feel flat. When you are in grief or feel lost or depressed, if someone tells you it doesn’t mean anything because we are all simply cells in the universe evolved from cosmic dust, that doesn’t make you feel better.

And they’re not wrong. We are still a bunch of cells in the universe. That is one way to look at human existence. The problem with a flat world is not that it is in error but that it is limited. It doesn’t describe the reality we experience. We can be evolved from cosmic dust and still grieve. And we can grieve not only as an evolutionary development for the perpetuation of the species but because we miss people who are gone. Our emotions can be chemical reactions and also be emotions.
Is the world flat or overflowing?

Mary is not the kind of figure found in ancient stories. She is young and a woman, a girl, really.  The most amazing thing about Mary is not that she becomes pregnant but that she says yes to God. But it is also amazing that she becomes pregnant. It is also amazing that Joseph still loves her and believes her. More than one thing can happen at the same time. We don’t know how long it took Mary to explain the situation to Joseph but he eventually understood.

And Mary sings a revolutionary song.

“With all my heart I glorify the Lord!
    In the depths of who I am I rejoice in God my savior.
He has looked with favor on the low status of his servant.
    Look! From now on, everyone will consider me highly favored
        because the mighty one has done great things for me.
Holy is his name.
    He shows mercy to everyone,
        from one generation to the next,
        who honors him as God.
He has shown strength with his arm.
    He has scattered those with arrogant thoughts and proud inclinations.
    He has pulled the powerful down from their thrones
        and lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things
    and sent the rich away empty-handed.
He has come to the aid of his servant Israel,
        remembering his mercy,
    just as he promised to our ancestors,
        to Abraham and to Abraham’s descendants forever.”
- Luke 1:46-55

The magnificat is not a simple prayer but an acknowledgement that the powers that be need to be shaken and thrown out. God scatters the proud, she sings. God brings down the mighty from their thrones, God exalts the humble. God fills the bellies of the hungry with good things and the rich he has sent away empty. Yes!

If the world is flat and we are nothing more than cells, why should we care about anyone but ourselves? Should you live for something more than yourself or should you just live for yourself? Should you eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow you die? Or can you imagine a more just and beautiful world and think that that matters? Do you ever cry when you hear of the tragedies of others? To you ever weep for joy when you hear of parents reunited with their children.

Your joy and sorrow and grief and laughter and friendship and hope and comfort and anger, those 3am nights with your kids and those 10pm phone calls from friends crying uncontrollably because their spouse left them, those matter because the world is not simply the sum of the cells and atoms moving around.

Or maybe we think the world isn’t flat but that the earth is moving on the back of a turtle.

There is a story of told of William James, that takes place after a public lecture he gave.

“Your theory that the sun is the centre of the solar system, and the earth is a ball which rotates around it has a very convincing ring to it, Mr. James, but it's wrong. I've got a better theory," said the little old lady.
"And what is that, madam?" inquired James politely.
"That we live on a crust of earth which is on the back of a giant turtle."
Not wishing to demolish this absurd little theory by bringing to bear the masses of scientific evidence he had at his command, James decided to gently dissuade his opponent by making her see some of the inadequacies of her position.
"If your theory is correct, madam," he asked, "what does this turtle stand on?"
"You're a very clever man, Mr. James, and that's a very good question," replied the little old lady, "but I have an answer to it. And it's this: The first turtle stands on the back of a second, far larger, turtle, who stands directly under him."
"But what does this second turtle stand on?" persisted James patiently.
To this, the little old lady crowed triumphantly,
"It's no use, Mr. James — it's turtles all the way down."

Turtles all the way down is a wonderful John Green novel about grief and mental illness. It is a clever retort of Bertrand Russell in “Why I am not a Christian”. It is a shorthand for an infinite regression which challenges the idea of the question. If it is impossible to answer the question where did everything come from, then should we ask it?

But this gets back to my first question this evening the question most beautiful answered by Christmas. Is reality flat or overflowing? Is the world all that seems to be from the most neutral position or do I have a place and do my experiences matter? Am I a collection of atoms or Wilson Pruitt or more radically, can I be both?

Is the universe turtles all the way down or is there a God who created everything, a God that cannot be described materially, and yet a God who refuses to maintain distance. A God who hears the cry of the weary. A God who sees God’s people walk in the darkness. It is not turtles all the way down because each moment and level of existence is sustained by the God who is love. We see this at Christmas that God became human and flesh. And our moments of love and joy and pain. Our histories and stories. Our past and present and future are not simply dust in the wind. Each is pregnant and full with the song of love that is God’s love for you. And the star of Bethlehem can be two planets aligning and it can also be a sign that God loves you. You are not foolish for dreaming of a world healed of pain. You are not foolish for desiring an end to your own pain. You are wise to dream and God dreams with you. You are wise to take joy in the people of your life.

The God who created everything is not waiting around for us. Instead, God enters our life through the flesh of a child so that the infinite distance between creature and creator can be overcome. So that the brokenness and darkness we see can be healed. So that the joy and happiness we feel can point to something more than momentary and fleeting bliss, it can point to our ultimate future when all shall be made well.

If your life feels flat, God is there for your. If your life feels empty, God is there for you. God is not far away but here in our midst, present


title: Don't Panic

themes: facing-fear wilderness-provision pilgrim-people fatherhood-of-god trust-in-god faithfulness-amid-trials anxiety

text:
**Scripture:** Psalm 27:1-14; John 14:1-2
**Series:** 2022

> Opening a new 'Survival' series on Father's Day, Wilson argues the number-one survival rule is 'Don't Panic.' He moves from Douglas Adams's nihilistic version and Kipling's virtue-based manliness to the deeper Christian ground in Psalm 27: courage and security rest not in ourselves but in God, who is our light and fortress. Faith does not promise comfort or escape from hunger, persecution, or pain—Jesus faced all of these—but frees us from needing to fear them. Christians are a pilgrim people whose final home is prepared by God (John 14), so no enemy, boss, or hater can take the soul. Fatherhood means caring for and modeling faith to the next generation. The practice of not panicking is loving neighbor, getting outside one's own head, and hoping in the Lord.

**Illustrations:** colorado-backpacking-fresh-snow, yoni-romanian-army-camping, hitchhikers-guide-dont-panic, kipling-if-poem, frederick-great-defends-nothing, mattress-company-comfort, highway-620-traffic, fathers-day-screwdrivers, journaling-shrinks-fears

---

# June 19
## Father’s Day
## Don’t Panic

The Lord is my light and my salvation.
        Should I fear anyone?
    The Lord is a fortress protecting my life.
        Should I be frightened of anything?
When evildoers come at me trying to eat me up—
    it’s they, my foes and my enemies,
    who stumble and fall!
If an army camps against me,
        my heart won’t be afraid.
    If war comes up against me,
        I will continue to trust in this:
    I have asked one thing from the Lord—
    it’s all I seek:
        to live in the Lord’s house all the days of my life,
        seeing the Lord’s beauty
        and constantly adoring his temple.
Because he will shelter me in his own dwelling
    during troubling times;
    he will hide me in a secret place in his own tent;
        he will set me up high, safe on a rock.
Now my head is higher than the enemies surrounding me,
    and I will offer sacrifices in God’s tent—
        sacrifices with shouts of joy!
    I will sing and praise the Lord.
Lord, listen to my voice when I cry out—
    have mercy on me and answer me!
Come, my heart says, seek God’s face.
    Lord, I do seek your face!
Please don’t hide it from me!
    Don’t push your servant aside angrily—
        you have been my help!
    God who saves me,
        don’t neglect me!
        Don’t leave me all alone!
Even if my father and mother left me all alone,
    the Lord would take me in.
Lord, teach me your way;
    because of my opponents, lead me on a good path.
Don’t give me over to the desires of my enemies,
    because false witnesses and violent accusers
    have taken their stand against me.
But I have sure faith
    that I will experience the Lord’s goodness
    in the land of the living!
Hope in the Lord!
    Be strong! Let your heart take courage!
        Hope in the Lord!
- Psalm 27

Not everybody enjoys camping. I have to admit that. I don't understand it emotionally, but it is reality. I don’t expect everyone to enjoy what I enjoy. However, some people have better reasons than others for not enjoying it.
My father-in-law, Yoni, was born and raised in communist Romania. He had to do mandatory service in the Romanian army in his twenties. That was the last time and the only time he really went camping. Camping reminds him of the Romanian army. And I think that's a really understandable to not like camping. God bless you, Yoni. I'm not going to ask you to sleep in a tent ever again.
People who like to camp like it for different reasons. They may enjoy the great outdoors. Some like their recreational vehicles. They like to be outside, but they just need a little more comfort in order to do it. My favorite kind of camping is backpacking. It is getting everything in your pack, putting it on your back, and taking it with you to places you could not access without the pack.
I've had times backpacking in the mountains of Colorado, where in the mornings I would wake up to fresh snow all around me and the only tracks were birds dancing. The only sounds were the snow cracking, the birds singing, and the mountain stream gurgling past. Mornings with fresh coffee from a mountain stream. Did I sleep great? Not really. I don't sleep great camping. I don't do it for the sleep or the comfort.

Camping, though, is different than survival. There are some skills you can gain camping that help you to survive in the wilderness, but they are not the same thing. Survival is about how to live when everything has gone wrong. What should you do trapped on a desert island? What should you do if your plane crashes in the Alaskan wilderness.
Friends, we are starting a new series on this father's day about Survival, about survival in the wilderness and survival in the world. About what it means to survive As a human in the wild, and what it means to survive as a child of God in this broken world.
Now there's a few key aspects to survival. Different experts focus on different ones. The basics are shelter, water, and food. We will get to those, but for me, I think the most important thing, the number one thing to survival is the simple phrase: Don’t Panic.

I first encountered the phrase Don't Panic reading the old Douglas Adams novel A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but it gets to the heart of surviving in any circumstance. Don't panic. Whether you are in the wilderness, in the desert, in the ocean, or struggling through life. Don't panic. Very few people, looking back on their life, think to themselves. “Gosh, I wish I panicked more.”

An important question should also be: why not? Why shouldn't we panic? Douglas Adams, the science fiction writer, recommends people not to panic from a sense of nihilism. Nothing matters, so what's the point of panicking. Panicking has little marginal utility so we shouldn't do it. This is one way to look at it.

Rudyard Kipling, in the poem, If

If you can keep your head when all about you
    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
   But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

The poem offers a different reason not to panic. It speaks of Fatherhood and manhood and the estimable qualities in a person. Panic is a sign of a weak leader who doesn't have virtue.
The word virtue literally comes from the Latin word for man, vir. Virtue, in a classical sense, is manliness and one of the principle virtues is courage. Courage is something you need in every aspect of life. Courage doesn’t mean someone who lacks fear. That person is foolhardy. The foolhardy person runs into a battle that they know they're going to loose. It's useless. It's a waste of life. The courageous person knows where the true enemy lies. Because they know what to fear, they know what not to fear.

These notions aren’t quite Christian. They still focus on me and mine. How I live and what I do, but they start us on the journey that may get to the heart of courage revealed in Scripture. Our courage, our hope, our everything is not found within ourselves but with God. It is found powerfully in Psalm 27, one of my favorites,

The Lord is my light and my salvation.
        Should I fear anyone?
    The Lord is a fortress protecting my life.
        Should I be frightened of anything?

The most frightening thing about survival situations is the wide variety of problems that can take place. If you are in a desperate situation where your life and the life of others is on the line, there's a different moral calculation going on in your head then if you were in a situation where you're stuck in traffic on 620 because the high school just let out.
When we talk about survival, the stakes are very high; as high as they can be. When the stakes get higher, certain kinds of decisions are made. And if you're afraid of everything, you aren't fearing the right fear. As Frederick the Great said, he who defends everything, defends nothing.
If you're afraid of everything, then you're missing half the reality that God Is your light. Whom shall you fear? Though stuff happens, God is there.
We can distort our understanding of God in this way, as well. If we get into a survival situation or a challenging situation, and think to ourselves, “Well, I'm a Christian. So God's gonna take care of me.” When in reality, especially if we're looking at the Scriptures, God taking care of us doesn't always turn out the way we would like. God taking care of us may not mean we live long lives on earth.
God taking care of us may not mean we don't suffer pain. Jesus says the rain falls on the just as well as the unjust. Faith is not a way to avoid bad things from happening. Christianity is not about living more comfortably. Comfort is lovely, but that is not the goal of faith. That is the goal of a mattress company. Faith offers something more.

What is offered through the Psalms and the scriptures, and especially through the person of Jesus Christ, is that the things we were taught to fear in this world, we need not fear.
We need not fear hunger. We need not fear persecution. We need not fear struggle. We need not fear pain. We need not fear fear.
We see, in the life of Jesus, that he did not avoid these things. Jesus boldly faced persecution and hunger and the fears of others. And he shows us that a life fully lived does not avoid these things. The blessedness offered to us by Christ is not a blessedness of mild amusement, but the flourishing and purposeful life of a follower of Jesus called to holiness. Called to a life where sacrifice Is greater than comfort. Called to a life where giving is greater than receiving. Called to a life where justice for all is greater than justice for myself.
Not everybody is going to enjoy camping or the outdoors, but we are a pilgrim people in this world. When we are out, walking, hiking, moving, camping, swimming, traveling, boating, flying, we are reminded of this reality.
I love the hill country. I love the lake, but this is not our final destination. This is not our ultimate end. There is more to life than avoiding dying. There is more to life property taxes and vacations. We are a pilgrim people in this land. You are loved. You are forgiven. You do not need to be afraid. In John 14, Jesus says, “““Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?”
John 14:1-2 ESV

As Psalm 27 says, I have asked one thing from the Lord—it’s all I seek: to live in the Lord’s house all the days of my life, seeing the Lord’s beauty and constantly adoring his temple.

This is what I mean by a pilgrim people. We are on a journey to the place God prepares for us. Not our bucket list. Not our dream home. Our final home. We do not prepare it. Jesus does. We do not have to pay the rent and property tax and insurance on it. Our home is insured by God’s love. Our peace is in God and not ourselves or our circumstances. We can find flickering moments of peace here and we should be joyful for them, but our hearts are restless until they rest in the God who restlessly sought us out from the brambles of this world. You are loved. You are forgiven. God has made a place for you. Don’t panic.

That person who bothers you cannot take your soul. That person who hates you cannot take your soul. Your boss who belittles you cannot take your soul. You are forgiven. Don’t Panic.
You may think, “Easy for you to say, Wilson.” And that is fair. It takes practice. It takes practice to see our souls rightly in this world. The practice is doing the things of God. The practice is loving our neighbor. The practice is getting outside of our own heads. My fears are always greater in my head than in reality. When I am afraid or anxious, I try my best to talk to some or to journal and write it down because on a page, my fears are tiny. In order to survive, don’t panic.

I am grateful to be a father. Fatherhood in the church is not just about biological or adopted children. It is just how we care for the people around us and what we share with the next generation. It takes practice and persistence. It takes realizing that you have been called for something more than yourself.
Our Fathers’ Day gift this year are these little screwdrivers, Some of you probably have a billion of them. Some of you may know what to use them for, others may have a drawer where you put stuff like this and it functions as a black hole only to be dumped into a box the next time you move. Fathers can be handy or not handy, but you all have a responsibility. Whether you have kids or not, you have a responsibility to the children and youth around you, to the people around you. And you are already doing it. You are already showing people around you what God is doing in your life. People look up to you. If that causes you nervousness, “Don’t Panic.” Psalm 27 guides us in this, as well. It guides us in what to do when we are unsure.

Lord, teach me your way;
    because of my opponents, lead me on a good path.
Don’t give me over to the desires of my enemies,
    because false witnesses and violent accusers
    have taken their stand against me.
But I have sure faith
    that I will experience the Lord’s goodness
    in the land of the living!
Hope in the Lord!
    Be strong! Let your heart take courage!
        Hope in the Lord!

May we all seek this sureness of faith, may we remember in good times and bad, to hope in the Lord. May we take courage in the Lord. Our survival is not based on ourselves but on the Lord of Heaven and Earth. Don’t Panic. God is with us.

Let us pray,
Heavenly father, we thank you for this day, this chance to be called together, to learn how to live fully for you. Help us to remember not to panic. Help us your love revealed in Jesus Christ, and how we are called to show that love with our transformed lives.
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.


title: Easter Sunrise Service

themes: resurrection victory-over-death harrowing-of-hell empty-tomb radical-welcome

text:
**Scripture:** Luke 24:1-12; 1 Corinthians 15:55; 1 Corinthians 15:20; Isaiah 14:9
**Series:** 2022

> An Easter Sunrise liturgy from Bee Creek UMC built around Luke 24:1-12 (the women at the empty tomb) and the ancient Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom. The service moves through the lighting of new fire, Charles Wesley's 'Christ the Lord Is Risen Today,' the Gospel of the resurrection, and the Easter Proclamation, which announces God's gracious welcome to laborers of every hour and Christ's harrowing of hell. The dominant note is the victory of the risen Christ over death and the grave, with Christ become the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep.

**Illustrations:** chrysostom-paschal-homily, laborers-different-hours, hell-swallows-christ, christ-the-lord-is-risen-today

---

# Easter Sunrise Service

Grace and peace to you from Jesus Christ our Lord.
My brothers and sisters in Christ:
On this most holy morning
	in which Jesus Christ passed over from death to life,
We gather as the Church to watch and pray.
This is the Passover of Christ,
	in which we share in Christ’s victory over death.

Alleluia!  Christ is risen!
	All:  The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!
Alleluia!  Christ is risen!
	All:  The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!
Alleluia! Christ is risen!
	All:  The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!

Let us Pray
God of life, Through Jesus Christ, You have bestowed upon the world the light of life. Sanctify this new fire, and grant that our hearts and minds may also be kindled with holy desire to shine forth with the brightness of Christ’s rising, that we may attain to the feast of the everlasting light; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

HYMN		Christ the Lord is Risen Today verses 1-3

1 Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!
Earth and heaven in chorus say, Alleluia!
Raise your joys and triumphs high, Alleluia!
Sing, ye heavens, and earth reply, Alleluia!

2 Love's redeeming work is done, Alleluia!
Fought the fight, the battle won, Alleluia!
Death in vain forbids him rise, Alleluia!
Christ has opened paradise, Alleluia!

3 Lives again our glorious King, Alleluia!
Where, O death, is now thy sting? Alleluia!
Once he died our souls to save, Alleluia!
Where's thy victory, boasting grave? Alleluia!

GOSPEL					 Luke 24:1-12

Very early in the morning on the first day of the week, the women went to the tomb, bringing the fragrant spices they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they didn’t find the body of the Lord Jesus. They didn’t know what to make of this. Suddenly, two men were standing beside them in gleaming bright clothing. The women were frightened and bowed their faces toward the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He isn’t here, but has been raised. Remember what he told you while he was still in Galilee, that the Human One must be handed over to sinners, be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” Then they remembered his words. When they returned from the tomb, they reported all these things to the eleven and all the others. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles. Their words struck the apostles as nonsense, and they didn’t believe the women. But Peter ran to the tomb. When he bent over to look inside, he saw only the linen cloth. Then he returned home, wondering what had happened.

EASTER PROCLAMATION

Are there any who are devout lovers of God? Let them enjoy this beautiful bright festival!

Are there any who are grateful servants? Let them rejoice and enter into the joy of their Lord!

Are there any weary with fasting? Let them now receive their wages!

If any have toiled from the first hour, let them receive their due reward; If any have come after the third hour, let him with gratitude join in the Feast! And he that arrived after the sixth hour, let him not doubt; for he too shall sustain no loss. And if any delayed until the ninth hour, let him not hesitate; but let him come too. And he who arrived only at the eleventh hour, let him not be afraid by reason of his delay. For the Lord is gracious and receives the last even as the first. He gives rest to him that comes at the eleventh hour, as well as to him that toiled from the first.

To this one He gives, and upon another He bestows. He accepts the works as He greets the endeavor. The deed He honors and the intention He commends. Let us all enter into the joy of the Lord!

First and last alike receive your reward; rich and poor, rejoice together! Sober and slothful, celebrate the day! You that have kept the fast, and you that have not, rejoice today for the Table is richly laden!

Feast royally on it, the calf is a fatted one. Let no one go away hungry. Partake, all, of the cup of faith. Enjoy all the riches of His goodness!

Let no one grieve at his poverty, for the universal kingdom has been revealed.

Let no one mourn that he has fallen again and again; for forgiveness has risen from the grave.

Let no one fear death, for the Death of our Savior has set us free. He has destroyed it by enduring it. He destroyed Hell when He descended into it. He put it into an uproar even as it tasted of His flesh.

Isaiah foretold this when he said, “You, O Hell, have been troubled by encountering Him below." Hell was in an uproar because it was done away with. It was in an uproar because it is mocked. It was in an uproar, for it is destroyed. It is in an uproar, for it is annihilated. It is in an uproar, for it is now made captive.

Hell took a body, and discovered God. It took earth, and encountered Heaven. It took what it saw, and was overcome by what it did not see.

O death, where is thy sting? O Hell, where is thy victory?

Christ is Risen, and you, o death, are annihilated!
Christ is Risen, and the evil ones are cast down!
Christ is Risen, and the angels rejoice!
Christ is Risen, and life is liberated!

Christ is Risen, and the tomb is emptied of its dead; for Christ having risen from the dead, is become the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep.

To Him be Glory and Power forever and ever. Amen!

TIME OF REFLECTION

HYMN verses 4-6

4 Soar we now where Christ has led, Alleluia!
Following our exalted Head, Alleluia!
Made like him, like him we rise, Alleluia!
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies, Alleluia!

5 Hail the Lord of earth and heaven, Alleluia!
Praise to thee by both be given, Alleluia!
Thee we greet triumphant now, Alleluia!
Hail the Resurrection, thou, Alleluia!

6 King of glory, soul of bliss, Alleluia!
Everlasting life is this, Alleluia!
Thee to know, thy power to prove, Alleluia!
Thus to sing, and thus to love, Alleluia!

SENDING

We are sent forth in the power of Christ’s resurrection. Alleluia!
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ,
and the love of God,
and the communion of the Holy Spirit
be with you all.  Amen.