[RCL] Amos 7:7-15; Psalm 85:8-13; Ephesians 1:3-14; Mark 6:14-29 Note: During the 2024 Season after Pentecost, Sermons That Work will use Track 2 readings for sermons and Bible studies. Please consult our archives for many additional Track 1 resources from prior years. Fairytales and happy endings play a significant role in shaping us and our…

RCL: 2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19; Psalm 24; Ephesians 1:3-14; Mark 6:14-29 Fairytales and happy endings play a significant role in shaping us and our expectations about life. We are inundated from birth by themes and images of the way life “should” play out by the storylines provided us in fictional accounts – in books and…

Ever wondered, even for a moment, what it would be like to be royalty? Ever indulged in a daydream that you’re really the child of a king or a queen? Did you watch even a few minutes, maybe even just the sermon, of the recent royal wedding and wonder what it would be like to…

“John, whom I’ve beheaded, has been raised!” Herod must have been terrified. A man like Herod, who relied on treachery, questionable political moves, the power gained through wealth, is confronted with his worst nightmare. He knew John was dead. He saw his head – yes, through a haze of drunkenness – but he saw the…

What does our culture, our society, tell us about dancing? Does it celebrate it? Does it embrace and expand upon it, helping it to infuse our movements through the world? Does it teach us to inhabit the expressive potential of our bodies, coordinated and rhythmic? Or does it narrow it, relegate it to the back…

William Sloane Coffin, Jr., who recently died at the age of 81, was an honored scholar, civil rights leader, antiwar activist, and a prophet. He summed up his faith by saying, “I believe Christianity is a worldview that undergirds all progressive thought and action.” He also said, “The Christian church is called to respond to…

People don’t like to hear bad news. That’s so obvious it almost seems funny to say it. Bad news is depressing. It’s the sort of thing we want to avoid if we can. In the Broadway show The Wiz one of the characters sings a song whose title is “Don’t bring me no bad news.”…

Today’s Gospel picks up where last week’s left off. If you remember, last week Jesus was not having one of his best days. Those people who knew him best, his neighbors and kinfolk, heard him preach in the synagogue and, instead of being proud of him, they said, “Isn’t this the carpenter, the son of…

In a few days the Seventy-second General Convention of the Episcopal Church will convene. This will be the last General Convention of this century even as it stands perched on the beginning of the new millennium. For our consideration, I have selected a passage from the sixth Chapter of the Book of Amos: “Woe to…