Dave Buerstetta on striving to do justice and love others while walking humbly with God
If that title suggests to you that this sermon might be trying to do too much...well, I probably can't argue with you. It's probably not my best. Still, though, I thought the conclusion was actually pretty good. Poignant, even. I'm not sure my congregation agreed. Maybe it was too on the nose? (If so, just …
Continue reading ‘Time to Go!’: a sermon on Mary’s song, Joseph’s census, & ‘Children, Go’
Merry Christmas! The closest thing I have to a tradition on this blog is this Christmas day offering. Each Christmas I post the Isaiah passage below (which is a reading for Christmas Eve worship every year); John Lennon's "Happy Christmas (War is Over)", which I find the world's best and most challenging Christmas song; and …
"Some things are worth losing for." I was driving, listening to a podcast (my current preferred in-car entertainment) when I heard that statement. It was arresting. Almost literally. I was so struck by that thought that I had to pull over to process it for a moment. "Some things are worth losing for." Ta-Nehisi Coates, …
To paraphrase one of our great musician-philosophers, “Infinite war, what is it good for? Absolutely nothing!” But in the whole of human history, what has been more constant than war? Further, many of us were taught history, both of our country and of the world, through a series of wars. War seems to define us. …
Continue reading ‘Infinite War or Excelsior!?’ a sermon on Isaiah 36
...(said in Jim Nantz voice, of course). A peek into our office today: That's Lead Pastor the Rev. Danita R. Anderson with me preparing for our church's preschool to parade by our offices. It's a tremendous gift to work with Danita, who is always ready to laugh. One of the reasons we work well together …
Yesterday, a white supremacist, neo-Nazi walked into Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh and murdered 11 people as they worshipped. This terrible, tragic, heart-breaking, hateful, and hate-filled act must be renounced -- especially by Christians. Our faith has for too long and too often been used to justify violent anti-Semitism. I hope resistance to such …
Hey look, I can post something other than sermon audio and accoutrement. Stories are powerful. That's not revelatory in any way. I know this. And yet, for months now, I've really wrestled with how we interact with stories: what stories do for us, what they do to us, how they define us, how they restrict …
For most weeks this fall, we're following the Narrative Lectionary. Because the best narratives -- the best stories -- are powerful, moving, inspiring, and endlessly fascinating. (More on that in upcoming, non-sermon posts.) I usually chaff when the assigned readings skip over the difficult parts, so instead we read almost all of Exodus chapter 14. …
Our Ruth trilogy comes to an end this week as we look at the last two chapters of this fantastic and, as it turns out, fantastically relevant story. I feel like there is still so much to be said about the book of Ruth. Which, I suppose, is part of what makes it so great -- …
Genre matters. We know this. Almost instinctively, we know this. Genre helps determine what we expect from a story and how we understand that story. We read and react much differently to, say, an issue of National Geographic than we do to an issue of a superhero comic. Sometimes it only takes a few words …
All That I Can't Leave Unsaid 