Grace Chicago Church

Leigh preaching our lectionary journey through the Gospel of Luke, as Jesus gets closer and closer to Jerusalem. Homily Preview: Sunday, we continue our lectionary journey through the Gospel of Luke, as Jesus gets closer and closer to Jerusalem. In Luke 18, Jesus tells a parable about a widow seeking justice who does not take "no" for an answer. Despite her powerlessness, she exacts justice - and...

Bob preaching about the text before us recounts the occasion when Jesus healed 10 lepers and only one of them said, "thank you". Homily Preview: This Sunday we look forward to digging back into the Gospel of Luke for our homily. The text before us recounts the occasion when Jesus healed 10 lepers and only one of them said, "thank you". The one who offered thanks and praise turns out to be a Samari...

Bob preaches on Themes of Jesus' teaching. Homily Preview: This Sunday we are back in the Gospel of Luke for our homily. The text before us will invite us to think about some of the themes of Jesus' teaching that Luke has already brought to our attention: namely, faithfulness and generosity. As always, we approach the worship service with complete confidence that God will meet us with a gracious w...

This Sunday we are looking forward to reflecting on another of Jesus' parables. Like the one from last week, this parable deals with money and the way that a "love of money" is destructive to people and their communities. As we ponder the story of the rich man and Lazarus we will talk about the relationship between grace and judgment, and human flourishing and justice. Like all of Jesus' parables,...

Homily preview: Bob preaches on the One theme that pops up again and again in Jesus’ parables One theme that pops up again and again in Jesus’ parables is that people don’t know what time it is. And when I say: “what time it is”, I don’t mean that they don’t know if it is morning, noon, or night. Rather, they don’t understand that with the coming of Jesus and his kingdom, God is doing something ne...

Bob preaches on The Story of the Prodigal Son Homily Preview: We are looking forward to taking a fresh look at a story that is familiar to many: "The Story of the Prodigal Son," perhaps better titled, "The Story of Two Lost Brothers and a Father Who Never Gives up on Either of Them." It is a story that offers new grace to us each time we contemplate it. May the Spirit of Christ meet us this Sunday...

Leigh preaches on the story of the "bent woman" from Luke 13. Homily Preview: This Sunday we will reflect on the story of the "bent woman" from Luke 13. There are many layers to this beautiful healing story, as uniquely told by Luke. I'm so eager to ponder with you - the life of this woman, whom Jesus releases from bondage, the mission and ministry of Jesus and how it uniquely plays out in this st...

In Caleb’s Final homily (for the moment), he reflects on how the Grace Chicago community helped him rediscover and deepen his faith in Jesus. Caleb's Final Homily Caleb Schut Download

Caleb preaches on the Good Samaritan from Luke 10. This homily is particularly addressed to the kids in the service. Good Samaritan Caleb Schut Download

This homily comes at the first week of lent. The Lenten season begins with the story of Jesus squaring off in the desert with the tempter, Satan. In this story, we see the reversal of Adam and Eve giving in to the lies told by the snake in the garden. For the first time ever in human history a human being is completely faithful to God’s gifts, and refuses to believe the dark fantasy that God is ho...

In this homily, from weeks past, Bob dives into the gospel of Luke. Here, Jesus is speaking to the disciples about both being ware and being forgiving. Join us as we explore what it means to forgive as Jesus does and continues to do. Luke Bob Reid

Caleb says that he feels a responsibility to make Christianity seem modest, reasonable, not foolish. He also feels an obligation to retain some of the foolishness of the Christian faith. We are onto our third week of 1 Corinthians 1, where Paul contrasts wisdom and foolishness and embraces the foolishness of the Christian story, particularly the cross. What does it mean to allow our Christian fait...

In this homily we will be interacting with Paul’s concerns about two issues with which this particular church struggled: the cult of personality and being impressed with form over content with regard to the preaching of the gospel. The culture of the city of Corinth was not unlike ours and the struggles they faced as a church to follow Jesus instead of the spirit of the age are similar to our temp...

John 12 Bob Reid

At the second Sunday after Christmas Caleb wonders that if anyone else has trouble contemplating the significance of the birth of Christ during the hustle and bustle of the Christmas season. John 1 is the text for this homily. This is one of the richest, simplest, and most layered texts in all of scripture. In this homily he wonders the question, “How then shall we live?”. John 1:1-14 Caleb Schut

We are getting nearer and nearer to Christmas! This week, we will hear Matthew's account of Jesus' birth and we will light the fourth Advent candle. The theme running throughout Sunday's service is Emmanuel, God with Us. What does it mean for God to be with us? For Joseph and Mary, this news brought frightening circumstances in the form of an unexpected pregnancy. For the wisemen, it meant falling...

This lesson was the the Second Sunday of Advent. The text for the homily is Matthew 3 where we are introduced to John the Baptist. John the Baptist has one main focus: to get people ready to meet Jesus. What does it mean to get ready to meet Jesus then and now? That's what we will ponder during this lesson. Matthew 3:1-6, 11 Bob Reid

On Christ the King Sunday we celebrate that Jesus is the rightful King of this world and that one day his reign over the world and all people will be realized fully. The image of a sovereign ruling over people is a tough image to get excited about given humankind’s history. However, Jesus’s rule is fundamentally unlike the deeply flawed and downright evil rulers that we have known. Jesus is the Ki...

On Baptism Sunday churches all over the world celebrate Jesus' baptism. When Jesus comes for baptism, John the Baptist is shocked. He thinks that Jesus should be the one baptizing him. John's is a baptism where people are coming to confess their sins. Jesus is the lamb of God without sin. But Jesus will go into the water along with the mass of broken humanity not because he needs to but because of...

You choose your friends. You don't choose your family. One of the pillars that we settled on during our branding process was: Grace is committed to cultivating a community that feels like family . But family is hard. Maybe we should just cultivate community that feels like friends? Do we really want to "feel" like family? This week's text from 2 Thessalonians is a complicated one dealing with the...

Each week we confess in the creed that we believe in the world to come. What do we mean when we say that? How does the promise of the world to come inform us in the here and now? We will address these questions as we look at our homily text from Revelation 21. Revelation 21:1-4; 22-27 Bob Reid

This week, guest and friend, Rick Hunter explores a text that may be familiar to many. Here we explore the story of Zacchaeus found in the book of Luke and what we can learn from a man who pushed through the opinions of the crowd. Luke 19:1-10 l Rick Hunter Rick Hunter

You'd think that summing up this week's short parable from Luke 18 would be as simple as saying, "Be Humble." For better or worse, it isn't. The pharisee is the classic antagonist, looking down on others. The tax collector once again plays the protagonist, humbly praying to God. Unfortunately, we don't fit into either role neatly. And actually, I'm not sure the pharisee and tax collector do either...

The text for this homily comes from Luke’s gospel. In the reading from Luke 17, Jesus instructs his disciples about the importance of forgiveness. Here is an excerpt from the text: “... if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven times and says, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive. ”Forgiving those who have wronged us is perhaps the most powerful way that we can be...

The text for this homily is from Luke 16. In this text, Jesus tells a bizarre parable about wealth that ends with the familiar verse, "No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth." This text is about financial wealth, which we will touch on. But its truth gets at something m...