Sermons with Reverend Killjoy

Fourth Sunday of Easter, Lectionary Year A John 10:1-10 Jesus is the gate, connecting us to God and leading us to abundant life.

Third Sunday after Easter, Lectionary Year A Luke 24:13-35 Jesus' appearance to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus is pretty much my favorite thing ever. This story is as influential in how I live my call to pastoral ministry as anything in the Bible, for starters. How do we experience the presence of Christ among us when we gather in his name? Who does Jesus come to, and when? These and othe...

Second Sunday of Easter, Lectionary Year A John 20:19-31 Today Lutheran Church of the Savior celebrated our annual Earth Sunday by hearing a message from our dear friend and neighbor Sr. Ginny Jones, CSJ. This year Sr. Ginny challenged us to live out our commitment to faithful stewardship of God's creation, beyond words or Earth Sundays to action on behalf of the world God loves.

Easter Sunday Matthew 28:1-10 "Do not be afraid," the angels say to the Marys, and it's one of the more hilariously ridiculous lines in the Bible. Even so, that line, repeated by Jesus in this reading and in other places throughout Scripture, is a vital part of the gospel message. Do we hear it any differently than the Marys did?

Vigil of Easter 2014 Romans 6:3-11 The Vigil is the richest, most Spirit-filled worship experience of our year, and this was no exception. I began our Vigil sermon with some of my favorite stories about Micah, my one-year-old, and the hilariously churchy habits he's already picked up from his parents. (Presumably he'll someday have hilariously healthy habits picked up from the therapist he require...

Second Sunday after Lent, Lectionary Year A John 3:1-17 Continuing our Lenten theme on hunger with the most famous verse in the Bible, vegetarianism, and junk food: what was Nicodemus really hungry for?

First Sunday of Lent, Lectionary Year A Matthew 4:1-11 Jesus' temptation occurs only after he has fasted for 40 days and is famished. For over 1 billion people living today, hunger is not a spiritual practice but a daily reality. This Lent we will explore hunger, both physical and figurative, as we await Jesus passion and resurrection. What do we hunger for, and how can we satisfy our hunger? What...

Ash Wednesday Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21 Jesus' warning “Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them" seems to have guided the famed 20th century poet W.H. Auden, whose good deeds tended to go publicly unrecognized throughout his life. In our own congregation, Forty Deeds in Forty Days is an effort to live out Jesus' teaching this Lent.

Transfiguration of Our Lord, Lectionary Year A Matthew 17:1-9 "Get up, and do not be afraid." Jesus' words to Peter, James, and John on the mountain speak to us today as well, as the take-home message of what the gospel means in our lives.

Seventh Sunday after Epiphany, Lectionary Year A Matthew 5:38-48 After not including a rite of Confession and Forgiveness in our worship during the season of Epiphany, today we used the sermon to institute a different form of confession, and allowed the Eucharist to be our forgiveness. Not sure how effective it was, but a third grader and I did have fun destroying people's sins in a paper shredder...

Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, Lectionary Year A Isaiah 58:1-12 As Lutheran Church of the Savior prepared to hold our Annual Meeting after worship today, this sermon reflects on what faithfulness looks like. For those listening to Isaiah in today's lesson, their traditional practices of fasting had ceased to be a faithful life in response to God's law. What can we learn from the hard lesson Isaiah h...

Presentation of Our Lord Luke 2:22-40 Simeon's prophetic praise about the baby Jesus in the Temple has become one of the most enduring songs in our Christian gatherings. My wife and I sing it to our baby every night as part of our bedtime ritual. Why do we do that? What is it about this song, quoted below, that expresses the deep truth of the Gospel? “Master, now you are dismissing your servant in...

3rd Sunday after Epiphany, Lectionary Year A Matthew 4.12-23 On a Sunday when inclement weather and a brand-new, not-quite-working-at-full-capacity boiler led us to worship in the fellowship hall, so many people pitched in to make worship happen that it gave us a glimpse of the Kingdom of God.

2nd Sunday after Epiphany, Lectionary Year A John 1:29-42 In this season after Epiphany our lectionary stories reveal who Jesus is. Today we hear John the Baptist proclaim that Jesus is the Lamb of God. For those of us who've hung around church long enough, this title is familiar - we sing it almost every Sunday! - and we can fool ourselves into assuming we know what it says about Jesus. As usual,...

Baptism of Our Lord, Lectionary Year A Matthew 3:13-17 Every year we celebrate Jesus' baptism by John at the Jordan River because we need to hear anew that God's words for Jesus are for us also: we are beloved children of God. To make this point, I used one of my one-year-old son's favorite books, Water, Come Down! by Walter Wangerin Jr as the basis for the entire sermon, and afterwards everyone c...

2nd Sunday after Christmas, Lectionary Year A John 1:1-18 On this Sunday of Twelfth Night, I had the privilege of sharing my sermon with Rev. Sarah Friesen-Carper, the North/West Lower Michigan Synod of the ELCA's Assistant to the Bishop for Congregational and Leadership Excellence, and also my amazing wife. We talked about Epiphany traditions. Some of these traditions may seem at first to be quai...

Nativity of Our Lord - Christmas Eve A Luke 2:1-20 Every year we gather on Christmas Eve to celebrate the birth of Jesus, so you'd think we'd have it all figured out by now, but I have a few questions: What, specifically, is the "good news of great joy for all the people?" Why does the answer to that question matter so much to me, personally? Why have we been doing yoga on Wednesdays for the past...

Fourth Sunday of Advent, Lectionary Year A Matthew 1:18-25 Matthew's version of the birth of Jesus is light on details. Jesus was a normal-enough baby, born to a normal-enough family, and somehow God uses these utterly common people - Mary and Joseph - to save the world.

Third Sunday of Advent, Lectionary Year A Matthew 11:2-11 John the Baptist asks Jesus an impatient question: "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?" But does John know what he is waiting for? Do we?

Second Sunday of Advent, Lectionary Year A Isaiah 11:1-10 "A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots." The story of the life of Christian faith is the story of death paradoxically leading to new life. From a pizza pan to a revered world leader to Jesus himself, death leads to new life.

First Sunday of Advent, Lectionary Year A Romans 13:8-14 The new church year starts off with a bang, as we wait for Jesus to return by acting as if he's already here. I talk a lot about the reign of Christ, but it occurs to me that people might just as reasonably think I'm saying "rain of Christ." R-E-I-G-N, reign. Got that? OK, good.

Thanksgiving Eve Worship, Lectionary Year C John 6:24-35 Eucharist is the fancy church word that means "thanksgiving," so when we celebrate the sacrament at our Thanksgiving Eve worship, the sermon practically writes itself!

Reign of Christ Sunday, Lectionary Year C Luke 23:33-43 Doctor Who, Thor, and Jesus. What does it look like when Jesus is king? Hint: he's not saving the world by being clever or wielding a hammer.

26th Sunday after Pentecost, Lectionary Year C Luke 21:5-19 It's stewardship season, and what better way to recognize that than by hearing Jesus talk about the end of the world? Seriously, though I love stewardship, and even though Jesus is talking about some scary things in this lesson, I find his words comforting. We know the world will be a mess, but in every challenge we face, we have the oppo...

All Saints Sunday, Lectionary Year C Luke 6:20-31 Blessings and woes and some of Jesus' most famous words on how people ought to get along, plus the dedication of Lutheran Church of the Savior's new Memorial Recognition Tree. Do you know that you are blessed?