Most weeks, our worship leader offers a 15–20 minute sermon based on the Scripture texts for the day.
Our regular preacher is pretty versatile. She’ll tell stories, pull together different ideas, lead a meditation, give the congregation an “assignment” to talk about in twos or threes, show a slide show or video, or sometimes even sing to the congregation. The sermon functions to deepen our reflection on the Scripture themes of the day, and often leaves us with a challenge or a question.
Scripture texts are outlined in the Revised Common Lectionary.
Divine Child Abuse???
The Stump the Preacher request that instigated this sermon was, as Rev. Cari says in the opening moments of it, that she “please talk explicitly about substitutionary atonement” in such a way that exposes it as ‘old paradigm’ – and then offer a constructive theology of God’s love pouring out. So part lecture, part sermon,…
I Doubt It
A team of lay leaders led worship at Crossroads today, and Bruce Holvick was our preacher. Listen as he explores the story of Jesus walking on the water found in Matthew 14:22-33.
Swords to Ploughshares
Our friend (and former student minister) Craig Perry was up for a Stump the Preacher challenge and goes after a funny discrepancy in the prophets in today’s sermon… Why does Scripture say “beat your swords into ploughshares” in one place and “beat your ploughshares into swords” in another? And furthermore, when Scripture speaks out of…
Responding Faithfully
Reflecting on some of the parables in Matthew, Gabrielle raises the question of what might we do as individuals and/or the community of faith to bring us closer to living in God’s Kindom.
Why do we sing in the church
Why do we sing in the church? Dr. Bruce Harding answers the question variously in this sermon: We sing because singing is a cultural universal – something common to all cultures, and therefore in our DNA All three of our founding traditions in The United Church of Canada were important contributors to the repertoire of…
Forgiveness and Reconciliation
The third Stump the Preacher sermon of the summer of 2017 is focussed on Matthew 18:21-34, Peter asking Jesus how many times he must forgive, and then the parable of the unforgiving servant. Rev. Cari opens up forgiveness, recites a poem by the Polish poet Wislawa Szymborska, A Contribution to Statistics, and then takes a…
What the Hell!?
The second Stump the Preacher sermon was on the topic of “heaven, hell and the existence of the afterlife” and she chose to open it up with part of the first chapter of the book of Job, and part of the 12th chapter of 2 Corinthians. (Psalm 121 was also read during worship.) The sermon…
What Would Jesus Tweet?
This first “Stump the Preacher” sermon from July 2, 2017 tackles the question of Jesus and technology. After hearing texts from Genesis 11:1-11, Psalm 14 and Matthew 7:24-29, Rev. Cari opens up a time in history which proved to be a “hinge” in how Western Civilization views the alphabet as a tool. In her discussion…
Wanted: Dead and Alive
Preaching on the epistle text for the day (Romans 6:1b-11) Rev. Cari opens up the counter-cultural notion of being “baptized into Jesus’ death.” In the course of the sermon, she talks about baptism, refers to her colleague (recently retired) the Rev. Dr. Ed Searcy’s blog, talks about the theology of glory and the theology of…