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The Lord Needs It: Lessons From A Donkey

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This Sunday is Palm Sunday---the beginning of Holy Week.

It's also one of those Sundays when you can't ignore the church calendar and just preach whatever you want.  I am sure that some people do just that, but they probably aren't Presbyterian, and I am sure that the liturgical rhythm of the Church is not first and foremost in their mind.

And they probably have had no trouble at all working on their sermon this week.

I'm not one to blindly follow tradition, but there are some things that you just don't do---and you can't just ignore the story of Jesus' Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.  


But this leads to a bit of a quandary...  In the short time I have been doing this whole preaching thing I have gone through the Palm Sunday story a few times.  After a while you sort of wonder if your congregation has heard your Palm Sunday riff a few too many times.

That sermon needs to get preached, though.  While we celebrate the cheers and palm waving …
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Stop Apologizing For A Church You Don't Belong To

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I was reading an online news story today about a disgraced and dismissed seminary president from one of the largest Christian denominations in America.  

A lifetime of boorish and chauvinistic behavior toward women finally caught up with him, and he'd finally done something that even the male-dominated establishment of his tribe couldn't ignore and he was asked to "retire." 

And then I made the mistake of reading the reader's comments below the article.  

Along with the scores straight up messages of support for this leader, there were also more than a few accusations that the whole thing was a web of conspiracies against him because of his commitment to the "truth." 

I had to wonder how people who aren't Christians read those kinds of responses, and the wondering made me feel kind of weary.

I'm tired of apologizing for a church I don't belong to.    

I bet there are a lot of Jesus-followers out there who are feeling the same way.  

The kind of chu…
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The Light & The Darkness: A Christmas Eve Sermon

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It's Christmas Eve, and once again our community of faith is gathered to celebrate the birth of the Christ child.

There's something about this night that brings us together---even those of us for whom church is not part of or regularly scheduled programming.

I have a soft spot in my heart for the non-Church-y people who find their way to church on Christmas Eve.  There were a lot of years when I wasn't really the church going type, you see.  In fact, not only was church not part of my regularly scheduled programming, I had pretty much cancelled it from my life altogether.  But when Christmas Eve would come around again, as it seems to do each year, I'd discover myself sitting in a pew, showered, shaved and wearing somewhat respectable church clothes.

I think the reason why I showed up was because there was part of me that wanted to believe everything that everyone around me was singing and praying. I wanted to believe in the story of Hope that the various pastors I …
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