Haverhill Commons Church

We live in a polarized world where people on both sides of contested issues are convinced they are right and the other side was wrong. Often we’re convinced that the other side isn’t just wrong, they’re evil. Nothing could be more polar opposites than God’s righteousness and our unrighteousness. But the love of God was so great that God crossed that divide, died on a cross, and rose again to save...

We live in a polarized world where people on both sides of contested issues are convinced they are right and the other side was wrong. Often we’re convinced that the other side isn’t just wrong, they’re evil. Nothing could be more polar opposites than God’s righteousness and our unrighteousness. But the love of God was so great that God crossed that divide, died on a cross, and rose again to save...

We live in a polarized world where people on both sides of contested issues are convinced they are right and the other side was wrong. Often we’re convinced that the other side isn’t just wrong, they’re evil. Nothing could be more polar opposites than God’s righteousness and our unrighteousness. But the love of God was so great that God crossed that divide, died on a cross, and rose again to save...

We live in a polarized world where people on both sides of contested issues are convinced they are right and the other side was wrong. Often we’re convinced that the other side isn’t just wrong, they’re evil. Nothing could be more polar opposites than God’s righteousness and our unrighteousness. But the love of God was so great that God crossed that divide, died on a cross, and rose again to save...

The book of Romans is one of the most oft-cited books of the Bible. It’s got a great chorus. It’s the chorus of the song of salvation that completely upended Martin Luther’s world and launched the Protestant Reformation. But do we know the verses? Our hope in this new sermon series, which we’re calling The Romans Road Less Traveled, is to learn the whole song of Romans. We begin by addressing the...

The book of Romans is one of the most oft-cited books of the Bible. It’s got a great chorus. It’s the chorus of the song of salvation that completely upended Martin Luther’s world and launched the Protestant Reformation. But do we know the verses? Our hope in this new sermon series, which we’re calling The Romans Road Less Traveled, is to learn the whole song of Romans. We begin by addressing the...

What keeps you from Sabbath rest? At this special Good Friday gathering, Matthew Grauberger, Mindy Rameau, and Matthew Alaniz share their stories of work, rest, and and restoration. Jesus invites us to rest in the promise that the work is truly finished, not because of what we have done, but because of who he is and what he has done on the cross.

Why Sabbath? In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus heals a man on the Sabbath and then proceeds to question the Pharisees’ who are dismayed by his breaking of the rules and regulations around Sabbath-keeping. He questions the Pharisees’ entire understanding of the purpose of Sabbath and their authority to be the ones to make and enforce the rules about it. Perhaps the man with the physically impaired hand...

Like every good thing, tech is a blessing if we receive it as a gift from God. And like every good thing, tech will enslave us if we worship it instead of God. We don’t need to be afraid of our phones, but we ought to be honest, wise, and Christ-like when it comes to tech. It’s good to be connected. It’s not good to be constantly connected. It’s good to be productive, it’s not good to be enslaved....

God rescued Israel from slavery in Egypt, but just two months later they’re following Moses through the wilderness, somewhere on the Sinai peninsula and they’re hungry. Even though they’d witnessed God’s saving power, five times in this chapter alone they “grumble, complain, whine” against God. Despite this, God gives them the food that they need. Day after day, week after week, year after year in...

Resting on the Sabbath isn’t supposed to be a burden. It’s not a religious duty, or something we should do to try to look like a good Christian. It’s not about spiritual posturing. It’s an invitation from God to delight in resting. To gain pleasure from it. When was the last time you felt truly delighted about something? Truly satisfied and happy? Especially when our lives are full of stress from...

On the seventh day, God created, blessed and set aside a period of time for rest. On the seventh day, God stopped, and it was good. This rhythm is good: Work, stop working. In this sermon we kick off our Lenten series on Sabbath with an exploration of what rest is, what rest isn’t, and why it’s so hard for us to stop.

Do we have a place because we’re wanted, or do we need to earn the space we take? At this special Ash Wednesday gathering, Susan Sharp shares her story of burnout and restoration. She reminds us that we matter to God, not because of the offerings we bring, but because of who we are.

What does love look like when we examine it on a granular level? Does loving one another really make difference in the world? And even if it did, how does one demonstrate the love God demonstrates to us? Love is from God because God is Love. Love isn’t simply something God does, it’s who God is. God is other-oriented, self-giving love. Love is revealed through action. In 1 John 4:11, John writes,...

If you were to boil a Christian down to one distinctive thing that identifies them, what is that thing? Who are Christians? Christians love. The one thing that defines and differentiates Christians is an ability to reflect Jesus’ unconditional, sacrificial, charity based, other-oriented love. Do you want that? Are you growing tired of giving that? Do you wish for that? Are you cynical about that?...

Mary Speta is a researcher, educator, speaker, and advocate in the movement to end commercial sexual exploitation. She serves as Executive Director of Amirah, Inc., a Massachusetts-based nonprofit providing exit and aftercare services to women who have experienced prostitution, sex trafficking, and commercial sexual exploitation. The church is called to partner with Christ, believing God has a pla...

John presents us with two ideas about living in the light: understanding our own sinfulness and actually loving each other. We like to rank our sins. Some of them we find pretty acceptable—buying or taking more than we need, judging others quickly, “little” lies, gossip, the pride of thinking we’ve earned what we have. Others, we can be prone to judging quickly and harshly. We so often want to min...

It’s getting harder and harder to tell what’s real from what’s not. The question, “What is real?” isn’t a new one. As best we can tell, John wrote this letter because Christians in the house churches he was overseeing near the ancient city of Ephesus were in crisis, the church dividing into rival factions with different ideas about what was real about the Christian faith.  And one of the most impo...

Every now and then I’ll go to the attic to dig out a box of some of that good stuff and just like Clark from Christmas vacation I’ll pour over the memories. And I’ll start to feel a strange feeling. I’ll feel happy. And I’ll feel sad. At the same time.  It’s the feeling of nostalgia. Nostalgia is powerful—which is why we have so many boxes in the attic. And nostalgia is complicated—which is why we...

When’s the last time you just played? Kids are experts at this! We can tell a kid to “go play”, and they innately know what that means. We adults can be quite good at finding reasons not to play, not knowing how to play, or frankly, being too busy to play.  In 2 Samuel, David manages to bring the Ark home to Jerusalem and a huge celebration ensues. Harps, tambourines, cymbals. Even David is in the...

Do you ever have those moments where the world actually feels like Silent Night – all is calm and all is bright? What do we do with the nights that don’t feel quite so peaceful? The ones where it’s 9:00 p.m. and you’re still working because you have a deadline. Or when it’s 2:00 a.m. and your child wakes you up for the third time.  Exercise, study, practicing a new skill–they all require sleep for...

Jesus arrived at a village where a woman named Martha “opened her home to him” and his disciples. “Opened her home” is a term of hospitality. So when Jesus shows up, Martha got to work, unlike her sister Mary who was not helping at all!  Jesus says, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things”. The problem here isn’t that Martha is serving, it’s that she’s worried and upset, consu...

The holidays are one of the busiest, most stressful, most complicated times of the year. Our lives can often feel like a dead sprint from Thanksgiving all the way through New Year’s Day. Christmas is just full. And if it’s full, where is Jesus in the midst of all this Christmas chaos? Is there any room for him in an already full season? When we study Luke 2:4-7 more closely, we discover it’s possi...

God’s design for Ancient Israel was for them to observe a year of Jubilee every 50 years. It was intended to serve as a hard reset, a recalibration, that brought Israel’s society back into alignment with God’s intent, so that they would be a healthy people, able to better represent God to their neighbors. Generations later, when Jesus pronounced the Year of the Lord’s favor in Luke 4, he was usher...

Estimates say in Jesus’ time, Jews were paying anywhere from fifty to eighty percent of their income to the Roman government. This was the result of a corrupt system in which tax collectors took some off the top to enrich themselves and their superiors. In Luke 19, a crowd gathers to listen to Jesus who is passing through. Everybody wants to see Jesus, including Zacchaeus, a tax collector. Only, Z...