Douglass Church - Douglass Blvd Christian Church

Maybe God’s trying to tell you something at this very moment. Maybe there’s not some big PowerPoint pitch to lay out all the pros and cons, not some incentivized benefits package, not some assurance that everything’s going to turn out right, and you’ll become famous, have wonderful, well-adjusted kids, and escape the ravages of arthritis. Maybe it’s just a tug, a gnawing at the edge of your mind t...

Herod resides in regal luxury in the thriving metropolis of Jerusalem; Jesus begins his life relying on the generosity of visitors in a modest dwelling in Bethlehem. Herod has access to the most influential leader of the time; Jesus, a mere infant, doesn’t even have access to the local Red Roof Inn. Yet, what’s truly captivating in this narrative is the fact that Herod, embodying power and affluen...

In a world that feels increasingly out of control every day, we’ve been given glad tidings that sound unrealistic at best and downright deranged at worst. We live in a world that has a way of grinding people down, making them beg for their bread, and judging them by the color of their skin, the country of their origin, the fullness of their bank account, and the people they love. In short, we live...

God created and loves individuals. No doubt. But God didn’t create us to remain focused on our individuality. In God’s new realm, freedom doesn’t just release individuals from their own private bondage; it also sets individuals and communities free for others so that all God’s children can flourish. "=Why does 'freedom' in so many people's mouths appear to mean little more than 'freedom to feel su...

Why does God identify so strongly with these, the powerless? Well, for one thing, God created us … all of us. And afterward, God paused to consider the fine craftsmanship of God’s hands. Apparently, God was heard to say, 'That’s pretty dang good! No … Yeah, that’s excellent!' So, it stands to reason that God might take more than a little exception to watching those whom God has so lovingly called...

When we read about vulnerable people being evicted and left to survive in the streets, we find a way not only to help feed and shelter but to agitate for justice in housing. When we witness White nationalists openly advocate bigotry and threaten violence, we don't sit idly by and hope everything turns out all right; we take sides. We followers of Jesus not only sound the alarm, we figure out a way...

But God says, “If everything else you do isn’t motivated by your love of the imperiled and unremembered, then it’s worse than if you’d done nothing at all. If you’d done nothing, at least that would be an honest admission that you don’t understand. As it is, you take for granted you already know what I want. But that’s the thing: there’s no way to know what I want without looking into the eyes of...

Guest Preacher: David Conway David Conway

Caesar’s always going to want what Caesar wants. Wall Street. Madison Avenue. They vie for our attention like it’s their birthright. There are so many claims placed upon our loyalties ... from every direction. And, sometimes, that which pursues us most relentlessly is our own desire to be in control, to be ourselves, gatekeepers of God’s mercy. We in the church have been guilty of spurning the gif...

Unlike Matthew's original readers, when Jesus started talking about a King giving a wedding banquet, his audience wouldn't have immediately made the connection between the King in the parable and God. They would be much more likely to see their own cultural struggles in this King—who, let's be honest, seems pretty vindictive and pouty. No, “vindictive and pouty” would have described not their visi...

Jesus heads into the vineyard to cheers of “Hosanna. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” But he can read the political tea leaves. He’s got a pretty good idea where this story is headed. So, it should be no great surprise to learn that Jesus is a little testy—even in the face of the palm branches. He knows which way the political wind is blowing—but he walks into the vineyard anyway....

If you’re starting a revolution, you don’t have to follow the same rules designed to keep power in the hands and for the benefit of those convinced the world was made for them . You don’t have to live in fear—the kind of fear necessary to make a world where some have and some do not, where some get justice, and some silently cry themselves to sleep at night, certain that justice is just a word use...

Real-life virtues—the ones that help us live real lives and not just "impressive” lives among those closest to us—are the kinds of virtues necessary for us to live together in community. These soft virtues like the ability to live and speak truthfully, to be a person others consider trustworthy (and not just being reliable about taking out the garbage, but about being worth the trust necessary to...

In embracing the cross, Jesus’ followers can say of empire at its most blood-thirsty, “Is this the best you’ve got? God’s got an even more astonishing trick up God’s sleeve. It’s a little something we call ‘Easter.’” Subscribe to us on iTunes ! Sermon text: web | doc Didn’t See That Coming (Matthew 16:21-28) Derek Penwell

Guest Preacher: Paul-Anthony Turner Paul-Anthony Turner

Guest Preacher: Dawn Wilson Dawn Wilson

Guest Preacher: David Conway David Conway

Guest Preacher: Dick Burks Dick Burks

My first reaction is to want Jesus to pray for it to be easy. I want him to protect me from the world by installing some kind of force field, some heat shield around me that won’t allow the slings and arrows to touch me. But he doesn’t do that. Instead, he prays not that there be a protective wall around me to guard against the damage life can cause but that I can endure the damage, that I can emb...

In other words, if you love one another, you’re already doing the works that I’ve done—and you won’t have to question the “way to the Father,” about whether you’re following the step-by-step directions since everyone will already know who you belong to. If you condemn a system that allows police officers to kill a Black man in cold blood … on video … you and everyone else will know you’re followin...

In other words, the people tasked with watching over the most vulnerable of the flock have proven themselves sightless. They care more that the sheep don’t jaywalk than about the fact that the way they run things has created even more vulnerable sheep. The trouble with the folks in charge is that being in charge isn’t the point; it’s about what kind of world we want to live in. Does it create spac...

We heal the sick; we bind up the broken-hearted; we comfort the grieving; we pick up the downtrodden; we fight for justice … not because it makes for good strategy, but because we follow Jesus, which means we’re prepared to walk with him down any dark alley he enters—in search of those the rest of the world would just as soon leave behind. We do it because it’s right . And because God loves us eno...

“Love your neighbor as yourself," as an ethical system, does have the drawback of relying entirely on me as the reference point—which, frankly, feels like something of a flaw in the system. I mean, what if I don’t love myself very much at all? What if I happen to be self-destructive? Does the golden rule relieve me of any duty I have toward another person beyond what I might expect from myself? Th...

But the real question to us is, “Now that you’ve got this shiny new resurrection, what’re you going to do with it? Are you going to hang out with it, set up a shrine to it and serve lattes, thinking all the work’s been done two thousand years ago? Or are you going to realize that the freedom the resurrection brings is the freedom to back out of the tomb, walk down the road, and get back to work?”...

Death too often calls the tune to which, sad to say, so many of us feel compelled to take the dance floor. But I’ve got news for you—regardless of how it looks to you at present or who you think is in charge, Jesus is almost finished with his Lenten journey. And while the path he takes will ultimately lead him to a garbage dump on the edge of town called the “place of the skull,” the truth of the...