Sermons with Reverend Killjoy

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Matthew 11:2-11, Luke 1:46b-55. From Isaiah to Mary to John the Baptist, we have so many expectations of who Jesus is and what he means for us. How do we live out the values we share with Jesus? 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Isaiah 11:1-10. Who is Jesse, and what are all these tree metaphors about? In this season of Advent, what are we really waiting for? 

Trying something new: here is a clip of my sermon from Thanksgiving Eve. What will happen? Will I ever do this again? 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Isaiah 2:1-5, Matthew 24:36-44. Welcome to a new church year and a new opportunity to make fun of "the rapture" while keeping hope alive for this world God loves. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Deuteronomy 26:1-11. This Deuteronomy reading is one of my very favorites, with its ritualized first fruits giving and its "A wandering Aramean was my ancestor" profession of faith. So it was easy to tie many of my favorite themes together before the congregation tucked into a whole lot of pie after worship. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 23:33-43. Jesus on the cross is a great place to start talking about stewardship commitment Sunday, right? With a side of anti-fascist holy day history, what could be better? 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 20:27-38, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17. A short sermon this week to talk about the difference between cleverness and wisdom, and knowing when to trust in God. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 6:17-31. What is a saint? What does it mean to be a saint? How does one become a saint? Why is Jesus blessing and woe-ing people, and why are we loving our enemies? Lots of good questions today, and maybe a few answers too. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: John 8:31-36. This week, with confirmation of four young people, one of whom was baptized earlier in our gathering, it was time to talk about Christian freedom, the freedom God offers us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. I tried to limit my advice-giving while offering our confirmands something to hol...

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Genesis 32:22-31, 2 Timothy 3:14--4:5. Jumping off of 2 Timothy's famous declaration that "all scripture is inspired by God and useful for teaching" and other uses, we dug into the iconic story of Jacob wrestling with the angel and gaining his identity as Israel. I suggested wrestling with the Word of God through Bible...

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4. This sermon highlighted the previous day's installation of Rev. Yehiel Curry as Presiding Bishop of the ELCA. This lesson from Habakkuk always reminds me to lift up my head and watch for the vision that God has for us. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Amos 6:1a, 4-7, Psalm 146, 1 Timothy 6:6-19, Luke 16:19-31. Jesus talks about money, so we talk about money, part two. All four scriptures carry the same theme, that we should trust in God rather than in wealth. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 6:1-13, Amos 8:4-7. Jesus talks about money, so we talk about money. You don't have to like it. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: 1 Corinthians 1:18-24. Today I told a cute story about when my son was young, then talked about the symbolism of the cross across history. Who has used it, and how? What does it mean to you to display a cross now? 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 14:25-33. In worship today we changed a number of things: moved our new chairs for the first time away from being the pattern of the old pews, creating a new center aisle. We also began implementing a new liturgical setting, ELW Setting 4, by doing a full chanted eucharistic liturgy for the first time in a long ti...

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 13:10-17. This one was a lot about the congregation itself, Christus Victor in Apple Valley, and about our upcoming Fall Festival and how we welcome people. Also some good themes about what makes this church - or any church - special. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 12:49-56 . Jesus says he comes to bring division, because he is trying to divide the people away from the unhealthy patterns that have come to govern their lives. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Luke 12:32-40. After missing last week's sermon audio due to technical difficulties / operator error, we're back this week with some good old fashioned stewardship talk, including a hopefully-humorous diatribe about the perils of sports betting. Treasure, indeed. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Genesis 18:20-32. Conflict! Abraham's disagreement with God is a good place to start a conversation about how we disagree in the church, and the Lord's Prayer in our Gospel lesson from Luke is also helpful here. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Genesis 18:1-10a. Amid stories of my summer in Tacoma, WA 20 years ago for CPE, I talked about hospitality and saying what you mean. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Deuteronomy 30:9-13. After last week's technical difficulties prevented me from sharing sermon audio, this week we're back! Our gorgeous reading from Deuteronomy may not be the very most obvious pair with Jesus' parable known as the Good Samaritan, but it still works extremely well. You already know. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 17-18. In which I figure out that how my own history and assumptions were clouding my understanding of the scripture and the message for the day. 

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: Psalm 8. In the wake of yesterday's news of the assassinations of Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark, and the shootings of Sen. John Hoffman and his wife Yvette, along with yesterday's nationwide No Kings protests, plus the recent fifth anniversary of the murder of George Floyd and the upcoming 10th anniversary...

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: John 14:8-17, Acts 2:1-21. Finally a sermon that was only as long as I intended it to be! Look, it's Pentecost, and we're talking Holy Spirit here. At least I did get to talk about one of my favorite songs for a very Spirit-adjacent reason!

Sermon audio at Christus Victor Lutheran Church in Apple Valley, MN. Scripture: John 17:20-26. In which I start with a long story of how I learned to translate churchy language into normal people language, so that I can talk about Jesus praying for us and for the unity of the church.