10Dec 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for December 1, 2019

Advent, Discipleship, Faith, Pastor, Sermons
First Sunday of Advent, Thanksgiving weekend Gospel: Matthew 24:36-44; First Reading: Isaiah 2:1-5; Second Reading: Romans 13:11-14 The lectionary seems to have bad timing. We’ve just had what might be the most universal celebration of a holiday in our country. Many of us have stuffed ourselves, had some time off for relaxing, did some shopping, we’re starting to get geared up for Christmas. And you come to church over Thanksgiving weekend, and you get to hear this gospel reading from Matthew that neither sounds hopeful nor is what we wanted or were expecting to hear. It’s bad timing. Though we might say that any time these apocalyptic texts come up. We just had another one, out of Luke’s Gospel, two weeks ago. There is a temptation today to jump right to Isaiah where there is hope and peace. We’ll be making that jump, but let’s sit…
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10Dec 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for November 24, 2019

Faith, Grace, Pastor, Sermons
Christ the King Sunday Gospel: Luke 23:33-43; First Reading: Jeremiah 23:1-6 This seems like an odd gospel for today. We’re almost gearing up for Christmas, the birth of Christ, and today we hear the story of his crucifixion. It feels like odd timing. But maybe it’s the perfect gospel for today.  “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah, the son of God!” “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself!” “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us! These three statements hearken back to the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness (Luke 4) where the devil tempted Jesus with three questions, the last of which was to throw himself off the top of the temple and save himself. And then, in that story, since Jesus doesn’t give…
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10Oct 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for October 6, 2019

Creation, Deacon, Discipleship, Sermons
Many scholars consider the first 2 chapters of Genesis as two separate creation stories because they have such different styles, structure, and emphasis. Genesis chapter 1 follows an obvious pattern throughout its 7 days: God Speaks, It is so, God saw it was good, There is evening and morning. Genesis chapter 2 lacks that structure and seems to be “another look at creation” (from the New Interpreters Bible). It seems intended to describe in detail several parts of chapter 1, particularly the day we are focused on today – Day 6, the creation of the land creatures. These two stories are different, yet in both God is the sole creator of a good and purposeful world, with humankind in a key role. These two stories stand together as a coherent…
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09Oct 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Graciousness in our Language

Deacon, Discipleship, Faith, Grace, Newsletter, Welcoming
Part of my morning routine is to read a daily devotion from Father Richard Rohr.  One devotion in particular, featuring excepts from Howard Thurman, has stuck with me.  Thurman was an African-American author, philosopher, theologian, educator, and civil rights leader. As a prominent religious figure, he played a leading role in many social justice movements and organizations of the twentieth century. What I found most enlightening amid the very thought provoking writing, was a footnote.  It read: A note on language from Thurman’s editors: “We realize that inclusive language is noticeably absent in Howard Thurman’s writings. As gifted and prophetic as he was, Thurman was also a product of his times, and inclusive language was not a part of the social consciousness. Regardless of language, the substance of Thurman’s work…
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19Sep 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for September 15, 2019

Creation, Discipleship, Pastor, Sermons, Worship
Season of Creation 1 - OCEAN Gospel: Luke 5:1-11 Other Readings: Job 38:1-18; Ps 104:1-9, 24-26; Eph 1:3-10 It is a little strange to be doing this Season of Creation. I am usually so tied to the lectionary, which is where we usually get our readings from. I like staying tied to it because I think there is a gift in exploring so many different texts in a 3-year cycle. And having texts assigned means we’re sometimes doing texts that I wouldn’t have chosen myself, and that’s a good thing. I heard a colleague once describe the lectionary not as a circle that we repeat over and over again, but as a spiral, where each subsequent cycle draws us deeper and deeper in faith. I have found that to be true for myself. Doing this Season of Creation will take us a bit…
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05Sep 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for September 1, 2019

Communion, Faith, Grace, Pastor, Sermons
Gospel: Luke 14:1, 7-14; First Reading: Jeremiah 2:4-13 A couple of years ago, there was an article that came out on the Kitchn, a website full of recipes and articles to inspire every aspect of home cooking. The title of this article is “5 Rules for Hosting a Crappy Dinner Party (And Seeing Your Friends More Often).” In it, the author talks about her stress toward inviting friends over for dinner in the midst of her life with three kids. She would stress over cleaning, including snapping at her kids to do their share, and the added time for shopping and preparing a special meal.  A friend of hers moved back from a small community where she said the people would just show up at each other’s houses, unannounced, and feed each other whatever happened to be in the fridge. Inspired by this, they decided to…
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05Sep 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for August 25, 2019

Baptism, Pastor, Sermons
Gospel: Luke 13:10-17 Our gospel this morning has me thinking about rules. In this text we have another example of Jesus pushing boundaries and breaking the rules of his day. I’m thinking especially of a certain 5-year-old in my house who is starting to push boundaries, and of kids going back to school, maybe relearning the rules, or at least learning what rules will apply to their new classrooms.  Rules are important. We all know that. They are put in place to keep us safe, or to keep others safe. Living by them will often help our lives be more fulfilling and enjoyable, and they typically help the life of the community - of all of us living together - to thrive instead of just survive.  Now I imagine there are some of you who are saying to yourself - yeah, but rules were meant…
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01Jul 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon from June 30, 2019

Discipleship, Pastor, Sermons
Gospel: Luke 9:51-62; Epistle Reading: Galatians 5:1, 13-25 The Gospel today is a bit over the top. I told a couple people this week that we get mean Jesus today, not the loving, compassionate Jesus that we like. Maybe Jesus was just having a bad day. Whatever it is, since it’s written in the Gospel, we’re left to wrestle with it. That’s a good thing for us to do - wrestle with scripture, especially scripture we don’t like. It would be naive for us to only read and look at passages we were comfortable with, and doing that would kinda go against everything Jesus was about. Jesus certainly wasn’t about making sure people were comfortable. In fact, he made a lot of people quite uncomfortable, and still does today, even almost 2000 years after his death.  “Let the dead bury their own dead.” “No one who…
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25Jun 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for June 23, 2019

Discipleship, Faith, Pastor, Sermons
Gospel: Luke 8:26-39; Epistle Reading: Galatians 3:23-29 This text has me thinking about the labels we put on other people. Often we create labels for the purpose of distancing ourselves from others. Possessed was the label endured by the man in today’s gospel. We use many others: Homeless, addict, crazy, mentally ill, uneducated, educated, poor, rich, gay, immigrant, woman, man, young, old, conservative, liberal. Some of those labels might be true, but sometimes they are used to create distance. They are used to remove the sense of being just another human being so that we can ignore, discount, look the other way, and disengage. Each of us uses different labels for this purpose.  This past week I was in Spokane with the Mission Possible group, our annual mission opportunity at Lord of Life. The day I was there, some of us got to interact with Kathy, Devin, and Alicia…
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18Jun 2019 by Kirsten Sauey Hofmann

Sermon for June 16, 2019

Faith, Pastor, Sermons, Spirit
Gospel: John 16:12-15;First Reading: Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31;Second Reading: Romans 5:1-5 The Holy Trinity. If there was ever a church day where everyone scheduled nap time during the sermon, this might be it. Who wants me to lecture about the Trinity for a while up here? No amount of explaining and analogies will all of a sudden make this all clear. But there are some important things to know and learn, so I want to raise a couple of important points to help you engage with the mystery that is the Trinity. The Trinity is how we’ve come to understand or talk about God as three persons revealed in scripture - God the Creator, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. They are all their own thing, but they are…
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