University Presbyterian Church, Chapel Hill, NC

The disciples went out two by two — and Scripture is full of partnerships that drew out something in each other that couldn't emerge alone. Elijah & Elisha, David & Jonathan, Moses & Aaron, Mary & Martha, Paul & Silas — each pair made the other more fully themselves, and more fully faithful. In a world that keeps telling us to go it alone, two congregations are choosing a diffe...

The disciples went out two by two — and Scripture is full of partnerships that drew out something in each other that couldn't emerge alone. Elijah & Elisha, David & Jonathan, Moses & Aaron, Mary & Martha, Paul & Silas — each pair made the other more fully themselves, and more fully faithful. In a world that keeps telling us to go it alone, two congregations are choosing a diffe...

"We will rejoice. Not when this chancel is finally accessible to all. Not when the paint has stopped chipping. Not when this [sanctuary] is the right temperature. We will rejoice now." In the final sermon of the series, "A Blessing Before We Go", Rev. Meg Peery McLaughlin preaches from Habakkuk 3:17-19. As we temporarily relocated our physical place of worship, we are charged to go and "Love and s...

As we prepare to leave our building for a season of renovations, our sermon series, A Blessing Before We Go, aims to leave us blessed, hopeful, and connected. In the fourth sermon of the series, Rev. Meg Peery McLaughlin preaches on John 4: 1-42.

As we prepare to leave our building for a season of renovations, our sermon series, A Blessing Before We Go, aims to leave us blessed, hopeful, and connected. In the fourth sermon of the series, Rev. Jarrett McLaughlin preaches on selections from Acts 4:1-31.

As we prepare to leave our building for a season of renovations, our sermon series, A Blessing Before We Go, aims to leave us blessed, hopeful, and connected. In the third sermon of the series, Rev. Jarrett McLaughlin preaches on selections from Genesis 44 and 45.

As we prepare to leave our building for a season of renovations, our sermon series, A Blessing Before We Go, aims to leave us blessed, hopeful, and connected. In the second sermon of this series, "Hold Fast to What is Good," Rev. Meg Peery McLaughlin preaches from Romans 12:9-21.

We live in a culture that often views aging as a problem to be solved and brain changes as a purely medical crisis. Yet, for followers of Jesus Christ, the journey of growing older is a profound and sacred part of discipleship, a season that challenges, refines, and deepens our faith: we are called to embody God’s love in every stage of life. Whether you identify as one who is experiencing brain c...

Sermon by Jarrett McLaughlin from John 20: 19-29 As we prepare to leave our building for a season of renovations, this sermon series draws from the benediction frequently said at the end of worship: "Go out into the world in peace. Have courage. Hold on to what is good. Return no one evil for evil. Strengthen the fainthearted, support the weak, and help the suffering. Honor all people. Love and se...

We live in a culture that often views aging as a problem to be solved and brain changes as a purely medical crisis. Yet, for followers of Jesus Christ, the journey of growing older is a profound and sacred part of discipleship, a season that challenges, refines, and deepens our faith: we are called to embody God’s love in every stage of life. Whether you identify as one who is experiencing brain c...

We live in a culture that often views aging as a problem to be solved and brain changes as a purely medical crisis. Yet, for followers of Jesus Christ, the journey of growing older is a profound and sacred part of discipleship, a season that challenges, refines, and deepens our faith: we are called to embody God’s love in every stage of life. Whether you identify as one who is experiencing brain c...

Sermon by Meg Peery McLaughlin from John 21:1-19 Peter has seen the risen Lord, twice, and still ends up back on the water at night, catching nothing. The Easter flowers have wilted. The world feels heavy. John doesn't rush past any of it. Instead, Jesus shows up on the beach, not waiting for Peter to have his act together, and the smell of betrayal slowly becomes the smell of breakfast. Resurrect...

We live in a culture that often views aging as a problem to be solved and brain changes as a purely medical crisis. Yet, for followers of Jesus Christ, the journey of growing older is a profound and sacred part of discipleship, a season that challenges, refines, and deepens our faith: we are called to embody God’s love in every stage of life. Whether you identify as one who is experiencing brain c...

Sermon by Hadley Kifner from Luke 24:13-28 Two disciples walk away from Jerusalem, carrying grief and dashed hope, certain they know how the story ends. A stranger joins them, asks what happened, and somehow they still don't recognize him. The resurrection isn't explained to them. It's walked with them, shared at a table, broken open in bread. Walter Brueggemann argues the church is called not to...

Sermon by Jarrett McLaughlin on Easter Sunday Easter is usually framed as God's answer to death. But Matthew frames it differently, with earthquakes plural, an empty tomb, and a strange detail no other gospel includes: saints rising from their sleep and walking into the city. The question Matthew keeps pressing, across every page of his telling, is whether the church will do the same.

Meditation by Nancy Myer on Good Friday Good Friday asks us to stay in the dark before we run toward the light. It asks us to sit with the weight of the crucifixion and the strange, suspended grief of Holy Saturday. Jesus says "it is finished," not as surrender, but as completion. What might it mean to trust that something new can begin precisely where the light goes out?

Meditation by Meg Peery McLaughlin on Maundy Thursday Jesus kneels on the floor and washes the feet of his friends, including the one who will betray him. It is a picture of love that does not add up, that keeps no tab, that asks nothing back. Philosopher Emmanuel Levinas called this an infinite obligation to the other. Jesus called it a new commandment. What would it mean to receive a love that e...

Sermon by Meg Peery McLaughlin from Luke 19: 28-44 Palm Sunday is a parade with grief running through the middle of it. Jesus rides in on a borrowed donkey while the crowd cheers, and then stops to weep over a city that cannot recognize the things that make for peace. The liberation being offered turns out to be bigger than anyone wanted: not just freedom from empire, but freedom from the logic of...

Sermon by Jarrett McLaughlin from Mark 8:31-37 At the structural center of Mark's Gospel, Jesus makes clear that following him means carrying a cross — not as an endorsement of abuse or passive suffering, but as the cost of living love openly and protecting the vulnerable. What does it mean to follow someone when the road they're taking is not the one we would choose?

Sermon by Meg Peery McLaughlin from Matthew 7: 13-14 The Sermon on the Mount ends not with comfort but with a choice: the wide road or the narrow one. Jesus is clear that following the way of love means some options simply fall away, not because they are forbidden, but because we have already given our hearts to something. What if the narrowing of our choices is not a constraint on life, but the v...

Sermon from Youth Sunday 2026 by youth group member Adrienne Cook This sermon invites us to reconsider who our neighbors are and how easily we overlook the needs around us. What does it mean to move from simply feeling empathy to practicing compassion? And how might small acts of attention and care make the world—even just a little—better?

Sermon by Meg Peery McLaughin from Matthew 14:22-33 In Matthew 14, the disciples are caught in a boat in the middle of a storm. Peter steps out of the boat, begins to sink, and hears Jesus ask, “Why did you doubt?” What if that question isn’t a rebuke but a window into the way faith actually works? In Matthew, doubt and worship appear side by side. Not as opposites, but as companions. In a season...

Sermon from Matthew 4:1-11 by Jarrett McLaughlin In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus is led by the Spirit into forty days of hunger and temptation, rejecting shortcuts to comfort, spectacle, and power without suffering. This is a call to follow him into the hard places, trusting that the One who walked into the wild is still with us.

Meditation from our Ash Wednesday service by Hadley Kifner What if the most faithful thing you could do right now is let your heart break? The prophet Book of Joel sounds an alarm in a world that feels chaotic and loud: return to God, rend your heart, and trust the One who is gracious and compassionate. This is an invitation to hold urgency and surrender together—and to step forward marked not by...

Preachers from our 2026 Presbyterian Campus Ministry Sunday: Satchel Walton Grace Kromke Nikki Byrne Anna Page Lancaster Scott Groome Courtney Parrish