Sermons

Truth be told, I don’t know when or if a time like this will come for us. There’s plenty of stuff for us to be worried about on the horizon. It’s hard to say. Maybe there won’t be one. I pray there won’t be one. But Jesus says that when that time comes, we don’t have to be afraid. We don’t have to drop the ball, or toss out our deepest convictions. Because Jesus says that it’s when the whole world’s falling apart. It’s our time to shine. Or more precisely, time for him to shine through us, by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus is kind of like a new baby. We all love the idea of welcoming a new life into our own. But when it finally happens it turns everything upside down. When Jesus walks into Zacchaeus’ home, when he walks into his life. He gets so much more than he bargained for. Because Jesus ruins everything.

the spiritual life, Way of Jesus Christ is not our way to get a leg up a ladder to the heavens. Or to get a leg up on others. It’s a way to come to terms with the darkness in ourselves. So it can be illuminated by the love of Christ. And we can carry that love to the world’s dark places.

If you know what it’s like to long for more in life. To have your heart so on fire with truth, goodness, and beauty, that other people in your life wish they were more like you. If you know what it’s like to want that, you know what it means when the apostles say to Jesus “increase our faith!” You know what it’s like to ask for enough faith… to be faithful.

Like the rich man, we can spend our whole lives putting up a gate between us and suffering. Without even knowing it. Even in church. We do our best to separate ourselves from the suffering of others—especially the weak, the oppressed, and the lost. But Jesus says when we do this, we are like the rich man hiding himself from Lazarus. We are actually hiding ourselves from God.