christianity

Sermon 08/02/2026 – Eat What is Good

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Isaiah 55:1-5

Hear, everyone who thirsts; come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your earnings for that which does not satisfy?

Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David. See, I made him a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander for the peoples. Now you shall call nations that you do not know, and nations that do not know you shall run to you, because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he has glorified you.

Sermon Text

            Imagine a perfect world. What images come to mind? I’m sure for many of us we imagine a world with no violence or disease. Summers that are not too hot and winters that are not too cold. We dream of a Utopia and see in it the perfection of our present world. We are right to do so. Scripture is clear again and again that the next world, perfected by God and bringing together Heaven and Earth forever, will not be the erasure of what currently is – but a continuation and rebirth of it in totality.

            I think our dreams often reflect an understanding of the privileges we have known in life as well. Sometimes we fail to mention things that a perfect world absolutely would have, or else we imagine our own desires carrying over into heaven in a way that misses the point. Ask any teenager struggling through puberty what their worry about Heaven is and they will probably point to sex, because that is the occupation of a teen’s mind. Ask an older person and their focus will be on reunions and the cessation of pain, because that is the occupation of their minds. Our images of Heaven are as dependent upon our own cognition and concerns as any writ of scripture.

            This was true of Ancient Israel too. In the pre and post exilic period, the writers of the Bible seldom talk of what happens after we die. They just weren’t worried about that in the way we typically are. For them, they imagined what a perfect world on this earth looked like. This is why the New Testament does both – it addresses our spiritual existence beyond physical death and that the spiritual and physical will one day rejoin in the resurrection. When God speak to the prophets, however, the image that is painted is strictly terrestrial. The Divine Truth of the New Jerusalem and the marriage of Heaven and Earth is not denied or contradicted, but it is not fully revealed. The Old Testament speaks of God’s final victory in earthly, national terms.

            There are a few key points to these prophecies. Firstly, the lost people scattered across the earth will return to the Land.[1] Secondly, the land will be healed and never again suffer invasion or blight or famine.[2] Finally, the land will be so wonderful that all people will seek to come and enter into it, either for worship or to enjoy the fruits of the land.[3] A person who lives to be one hundred will be considered young.[4] It is a beautiful dream, limited only by an imagination that did not have subsequent revelation to build upon. God showed the people what they could handle of the perfect world that was to be born, and they would have plenty of gaps to fill in themselves.

            Of all the promises that I see in scripture, one returns again and again. That is that God will create a world where no one goes hungry. Food takes a primary focus time and time again in God’s work. When God comes to Abraham, Abraham shows his righteousness by making God a meal. Moses instituted a memorial in the form of the Passover dinner, a recreation of their hasty preparation for the flight from Egypt. Joseph fed the world and was declared its savior. Again and again, food is a way that God’s kindness, and the kindness of God’s people is shown.

            We are blessed that we do not know hunger. Our neighbors do though. It seems impossible, in the wealthiest country in the world that anyone could go hungry, but they do. Things will only get worse as time goes on. Jobs are getting scarcer, but there’s still people who need to eat. Food scares increase as FDA funding is cut. Global conflict and changing climate make prices climb such that people cannot afford their daily bread. Globally, locally, as near as our next breath – a food crisis persists in this world. The table of God, set so beautifully in front of us today, cannot be the only food and drink we offer to the people around us.

            Locally we have two food banks that help make sure people have what they need. Some of their goods are sourced locally, some are supplied by the state. Feeding America, through Mountaineer Foodbank and similar entities, has made sure folks here in West Virginia have access to food. However, the Federal dollars were cut down in 2025. One billion dollars, were cut from TEFAP and from subsidies that let food banks buy from local farmers.[5] Based on the numbers provided by Feeding America, that’s equivalent to three meals a day for 4,563,084 families of four. So much was lost when that spending was cut.

            In West Virginia, we see a horrific dichotomy. The average income for the state is (I think generously,) reported at about $60,000.[6] Care to guess how much the cost of living for a family of four is? About $65,000-$70,000 on average.[7] Lest we get excited and hope that folks have hope of government intervention at that range, I am sad to report such a household is at 150% of the Federal Poverty Level, and so will have few, if any, aid programs they qualify for, unless there is a local or state organization that allows that threshold.

            Times are tough and I think we are foolish to imagine they are going to get better. There is only one thing that we can do in the face of a world that hostile to existence. Take care of each other. God’s people had feasts, festivals, and public worship spaces so that they could share resources as much as celebrate God’s goodness. When you sacrificed an animal, you took some of the meat home with you to eat, or else ate it there at the temple. You, the Priest, and God, were sitting and having a meal – that’s what sacrifice meant in those days. When you held a feast, everyone was invited, relative, neighbor, friend, even people you didn’t like, because God’s gifts were meant to be shared.

            For us, we can keep a close eye on the people we know. Step in and help when they need it, even if sometimes we have to fight for a while to get them to accept that help. It means that we support local nonprofits doing good. When the government cuts one billion dollars, we cannot give that much, but we sure can give some more time and energy to making sure our pantries never empty. We can have events here, like our hot dog cookout, where we offer food to people, regardless of anything except the fact that all people can eat, should eat, and that we who have are obligated to help those who do not.

            I have never gone hungry in my life. Even when the pantries would go empty at home, there was always a little something for us to throw together into something that kept us going. My grandparents did not have that luxury. Yet, looking back, they tell similar tales. That they always had just enough, because they had family that stuck together and helped them in the thick of it all. For us, now, we can be that family, that support to our community which needs us to reach out a hand and help to fill hungry bellies.

            How fitting this be our scripture, and that this be our lesson, on the day we offer up praise and thanksgiving, and likewise receive the grace from God’s offering of Christ. God could have chosen anything to be a memorial of Christ’s passion, yet he chose bread and wine. Bread which is a means by which we are sustained – full of nutrients we need to live. Wine, a sign of celebration and as Ben Franklin put it, “Proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.” Today we take spiritual food and drink to the preservation of our bodies and souls, but do not think our responsibility to set a table ends with this paten and chalice. The world is hungry, and the Church must feed it. – Amen

[1] Isaiah 11:11, Ezekiel 37:21, Jeremiah 23:7-8, etc.

[2] Amos 9:15, Jeremiah 42:10, etc.

[3] Isaiah 2:3, Zechariah 14:18, etc.

[4] Isaiah 65:20

[5] https://www.ipm.org/news/2026-03-05/food-banks-short-on-food-amid-stall-in-federal-funding

[6] The difference between a true “average,” vs. Median income is a matter of debate among statisticians I do not have a firm grasp on. However, census data supports that ca. 46% of family households in West Virginia are below the $60k earnings point, so I feel that the median income reflects a good idea of the upper limit of most “average,” West Virginians. https://www.neilsberg.com/insights/west-virginia-median-household-income/

[7] Simulator from https://livingcostindex.com/regions/west-virginia-us/, calculated to exclude recreational spending.

Sermon 07/26/2026 – Family Messes – A Lament Reflection

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Ephesians 6:1-4

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother”—this is the first commandment with a promise— “so that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.”

And, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Sermon Text

The reality of our world is that family is not guaranteed to be good. People have children who have no ability to raise them or no desire to care for them. Children can grow up and, regardless of raising, make decisions that are cruel or uncaring, or that simply break a parent’s heart in any other number of ways. C.S. Lewis once said, “To love at all is to be vulnerable,” and in the case of family we are already made vulnerable by our relation to one another. The pile of complications only grow deeper as the tangled mess of our own choices, and the choices of others, pile up on top of each other.

One of the most dangerous things we can do as a Church is stand up and read scripture without reading the world around us. The words of God are indeed unchanging, and they contain truth that is valuable to us at all times, but without a willingness to engage them directly in our own life, we will lead ourselves astray. No verse is more fraught that the one we read today. “Honor your father and mother,” is something that has been used as a weapon for centuries. No matter the offense, no matter the horrific things done to a child, this verse is pulled out as if it magically makes all things better. A child is reduced to their parent’s property and the consequences of the parent’s bad behavior erased… All by those few words.

The context of scripture is twofold. Firstly, that those scripture was being written to were always oppressed by the powers and people around them. There was an understanding that if you went out on the street and offended a Roman Citizen, you could be dead that same day and you had no legal right to do anything about it. If they found out you were a Christian, forget it!

The teaching of the Church, therefore, was that in a world where you are going to be oppressed by the powers that be, it is better to suffer and to die at their hands, and show the insanity of their cruelty, than to resist them. A Christian was to be all forgiving, all loving, and all suffering, on behalf of the people who would kill them without a second thought.

There was a second context for these writings though, the community of the faith. Within this community, Christians were called to be all loving, all forgiving, all sufferings… Together. In other words, a person could not abuse another person and expect forgiveness without consequence, because as a member of the Church they were responsible not to hurt that person in the first place. The early Church would expel people for violating the trust of the community, for mistreating their family, for failing to act as Christ called them to act. A Christian is not allowed to sin and then ask for forgiveness without changing their behavior, because they know better.

Our families, an extension of our reality as Christians, are likewise meant to be reciprocal places. If a parent has no love for their child, or that love becomes destructive, and that parent does not change – then the child cannot be expected to suffer. The parent is not given a universe excuse to do their child harm because scripture tells their child to “honor their mother and father.” Likewise, a child who is old enough to know better cannot hurt their parents and not expect that their be some amount of distance or consequence. “Parents, do not provoke your children to anger,” is not an excuse for them either. We are all trying to figure out the right way to act, to be, to live.

Today, as we come into this room, we are taking time to acknowledge the hard things about our family situations. Maybe you had a parent that never treated you right. Maybe a child who has grown distant. Maybe one who is making all the wrong choices and you cannot help them. I’m not here to baptize those situations and call them secretly good. I’m not here to tell you that you have to ignore those very real problems in the name of Jesus. I’m not here to tell you why things are the way they are… I’m here to tell you that it is ok, that things are not ok.

As a Church, we often let ourselves become absorbed into a terminal positivity. We cannot say one negative thing without following it up with, “But that’s fine!” We feel like we need to make everything a lesson, everything must have a cure, a punchline to take away the sting… Yet, we know that’s not true. Scripture, likewise, knows it is not true. The Bible is full of chapters, and books, and entire tracts about how human suffering is real, and bad, and it does not always make sense that things happen the way they do. So what does the sum of those scriptures lead us to understand?

Firstly, that we have ever right to weep, to mourn, to be upset about the way things are. Don’t feel like you need a mask of positivity to cover every bad thing in your life… Let the bad be bad, and feel that fully. Secondly, God listens to our tears. Jesus wept at Lazarus’s tomb, Jesus was rejected by his family, and Jesus prays for us still today. Let God know that you are upset, there’s no point hiding that fact. Finally, and most importantly, there is always hope. Things may not come back to what they once were, or what we ever wanted them to be, but God has a way of finding us reaching something new, and different, and often better.

Sometimes we get a second change to set things right – to make amends to the children we’ve hurt, the parent’s we’ve wronged. Sometimes people set things right with us – they come and seek forgiveness and truly do change, or at least actually try to… Sometimes, the situation is just what it is… All these things are blessed, not because they are good, but because God sees, hears, cares, and gives grace for us to face them. Offer up your troubles to God today, and ask for direction on what you can do, or should refrain from doing, but more than anything… Just say it to God, and be set free. – Amen.

Sermon 07/19/2026 – Weeds among Wheat

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Matthew 13:24-30

He put before them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field, but while everybody was asleep an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?’ He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The slaves said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he replied, ‘No, for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. Let both of them grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’ ”

Sermon Text

Two weeks in a row where Jesus wants us to talk about gardening. I could not feel more out of depth. Yet, if the Lord thinks it is an image we need to keep in our head… Who am I to disagree?

Like last week, Jesus is asking us to see the Kingdom of Heaven as an agricultural experiment. God has gone out and planted, but alongside the good seed that God has planted, weeds have been thrown. The workers of the field ask if they should start pulling the weeds, but the farmer in his wisdom tells them to wait. When the time for the harvest comes, the wheat will be separated from the tares, and one will go into storehouses and the other into the fire. Yet, to keep the wheat safe, there must be a period in which the two grow together.

This parable provides one of scriptures more unsatisfactory explanations for a real problem we face. If you look around you in this world, and even in the church, you will see people doing what they ought not to. This is not always just self-destructive acts, but real and serious evil toward others. We often ask, “God why could you not just get rid of all this evil?” And the answer we see, in this parable at least, is that there would be no way to do that that would not harm innocents as well.

God is a God who is not restrained by anything, God has the divine freedom to act upon anyone and anything how God likes. Yet, we know that God has created this world with certain rules. We have free will to do good and bad. God respects this innate will and does not force changes upon us, we must accept and follow God’s leading. Likewise, God in God’s abundant patience, gives people the opportunity to repent, to change, and to try to make right the things they have done wrong. God could change all evil with a snap, but it would not be consistent with the world God has created, therefore only forceful removal would be possible.

A person may say, “Well, how bad could it be! If God could just wipe out evil people, then let God do it.” Well, God did do that once… And God chose never to do so again. The Flood, in all its brutal terror, is a story about God wiping the sleight of creation clean, except for a small subset of humans and animals preserved out of mercy. The story of the Flood is not just a story of wrath or mercy though, it is an object lesson in why “eradicating evil,” cannot be done through violence. The Flood happens, Noah and his family exit, and within a single chapter we are told they go back to the ways of their neighbors. War continues, theft continues, violence of all kinds continues, the Flood did not work to end evil.

I do not believe, fundamentally, that God’s intent with the Flood was to end evil forever, that is what Christ’s incarnation was for. Yet, the fact that God took steps like that at all serves as an eternal reminder that redemption, and not destruction, is the essence of God’s mission in creation. While I cannot give a completely coherent explanation for why God allows evil to exist in the way it does, I do know that God has told me through scripture that if God were to eradicate by force, that eradication would be complete and total and would not leave anything on the earth. God has said that the evil and good must coexist for a time, to spare the good until the time comes for the evil to be erased.

I was curious, as I read this parable, if there was a specific kind of weed involved in this story. Sure enough, the “tares,” that the enemy planted are a specific plant. It is called, “darnel,” and it is a plague on wheat farmers even till today. Darnel is a weed that mimics the appearance of rye, and so it grows in rye fields and propagates. It looks just like rye, until the very moment it produces corns. When the fruit of the plant shows itself, then one can be told from the other, not a moment before.

I read this truth to suggest that maybe God is not saying, “I have plans to take care of all this evil, deal with it until then.” I do think that God is asking us to trust that all evil will be punished someday, but I do not think that God is abandoning us to just sit and deal with this either. The weeds that are in this parable are revealed by one specific thing – their fruits. The things that come from a person, the things that their actions produce, are a valid means to evaluate their nature. This is the lesson of this parable as much as any end times hope it provides.

Do you know someone whose actions you have tried to excuse based on some appeal to their core nature? Maybe it is time to stop. I’m not saying they’re beyond redemption, or that they are without any sort of hope or need for compassion, but I am saying that if someone shows themselves to be consistently in the wrong… Maybe we should acknowledge them for what they are. Call a spade a spade, and do not excuse wrongdoing just because it is easier to tolerate it than to speak to it.

We are not like wheat, we can change what our fruits are. I know I have had times in my life where I have been more trouble than help to the people around me… But it did no good for those people to ignore that I was going down the wrong path. Looking back, I wish more people had called me out for my behavior – not in anger or to reject me – but out of the concern I needed to hear to know I needed to change. Not that I would have listened necessarily…

Next week, we will look at how we can mourn situations we have no control over, specifically family situations. Yet, before that week where we hand so much over to God, I want us to remember our part. Find the tares in your own heart, and start pruning them back so that the fruits of the Spirit can grow. Do not be afraid, if fruits of evil have shown in your life or in another person’s to do something about it. In all things, remember, resemble, and give thanks for the God that gives us time to be transformed, and does not burn the innocent to spite the evil. – Amen.

Sermon 06/28/2026 – What Shall I Offer?

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Matthew 10:40-42

“Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous, and whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple—truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.”

Sermon Text

The gifts we offer to God allow us to receive gifts in turn. To give to God is to receive, in due measure, the same value of our gift again. Scripture is clear that God does not neglect the work or resources we invest into the work of God and God’s church. Yet, I think, our worldly view of the matter often corrupts our vision of what God is willing and capable to do with our gifts and with the reward that is owed to us. We hear the promise Jesus makes in our scripture, that helping a righteous person means we will be owed the rewards of the righteous, and that the same is true of someone who helps a prophet, and as a result we dream of every dollar we give being multiplied and ever hour of work repaid with two more of leisure. We assume what our reward looks like and we neglect what we are truly being given.

There are many ministers who preach many sermons encouraging people that if they give their money freely, then God will bless them with expansive bank accounts and no worldly troubles. There are many people who, in order to try and leverage God’s goodness, will cut checks to charitable causes to try and tip the scales in their favor. There are many who, when told not to lay up treasures on earth, put a large asterisk next to it and say, “Unless you write it off as a gift from God.” We have decided that God wants us rich, healthy, and equipped with all worldly happiness – but I am convinced that the God who offers us that easy road is not the God of scripture.

What we have read this morning is Jesus sending his disciples off with one last instruction. After telling them to work without pay, to trust in God’s protection, and to expect a great deal of opposition, Jesus tells his disciples that anyone who helps them will be blessed. As they work as prophets, God will reward those who help them to speak God’s word. As they work righteousness, God will reward those who help that justice roll down like water. Even the simple act of giving a child a glass of water, when done in the name of Jesus, is transformed into something far greater.

The disciples were the righteous, they were the prophets, and if we want to see what sorts of rewards they received for their work we just have to examine their lives. They were not rich, in fact they lived in poverty. They were not powerful, they were trampled on by everyone they ever met. They did not know peace, they were persecuted and killed and maimed, all because of and not despite their devotion to God. The reward that Jesus promises for our participation in God’s good work is not plenty nor power, but goodness, mercy, and, in eternity, the fullness of God’s presence.

As the Church grew and someday found a home in the upper classes of Roman Society, aspects of its teachings were subdued. Jesus’s insistence that we are to live a life rooted in care for others at the expense of our worldly goods is not popular with the rich in any time or place. Likewise, the idea that generosity is expected and does not correspond to immediate and reciprocal rewards is not going to sell many books. We expect a transaction out of our faith and God is offering us something far less concrete and far more relational. God, who offers to us the full abundance of eternal life, does not try to win us over with petty gifts, but invites us to be truly transformed by the work we embark upon.

If I give to those who are in need, I will not in turn be made rich – I will be made more generous. If I support those who are doing what is right, I will not be given power and fame, but I will be more like those righteous people. If I help facilitate the preaching of God’s word and the rebirth of souls, then I will benefit from that life giving word in due time. When I give water to the thirsty and food to the hungry, Christ will not forget the kindness I have given to them. God is not offering us a personal development plan, God is offering to make us new.

I do believe that God will not punish us for earnest and good stewardship of our gifts. If we give to those in need, we will find enough to feed ourselves. If we support the work of the Church, the Church will support us in due time. If we devote ourselves to the work of ministry and the alleviation of pain for others, we will find comfort in our times of need. This is only possible if we learn to do two things well. Firstly, to give without expectation of tangible reward and, secondly, to steward our gifts reasonably and with a mind toward generosity.

The first is self-explanatory. If we give, we should not expect immediate rewards of money, power, or circumstances. That second one is harder though. If we are to give properly, then we need to actually keep track of our money so that we can give freely. We need to deny ourselves and live simply, so that we can always have the money available to help others. I’m not saying we need to get rid of every comfort or every amusement, nor that we need to go without essentials, I simply mean we need to budget so that giving is one of the first things we plan to do and not the very last thing.

As I have said previously, I am on a pretty rigorous program to pay down my debts from seminary, and that prevents me from giving as much as I would like to. However, I still make a definite plan each month for my expenses to always allow me to give to worthy causes. Sometimes that means I get to give toward someone’s GoFundMe or meal train, sometimes that I get to put money in the plate toward something this or another church is working on, and sometimes it means that I can simply bless someone with some small kindness. If we are to be blessed, in any form, for our generosity, then our generosity cannot be an afterthought.

I encourage you, therefore, to take an accounting of your expenses from this month. Review everything you bought and did not buy, those subscriptions you don’t use… Etc. Look at each aspect of your life, and see what you can do to better steward your generosity. – Amen.

Sermon 06/07/2026 – Who is Invited?

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Matthew 9:9-13

As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax-collection station, and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he got up and followed him.

And as he sat at dinner in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came and were sitting with Jesus and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” But when he heard this, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous but sinners.”

Sermon Text

Who is invited to sit at God’s table? Who makes the guest list for the grace of God? Is it you or me? The Magisterium of the Church? Who has authority to pull up a seat and say, “Tuck in!” Our lips may immediately say, “Only God! Christ alone! Whoever the Spirit calls!” but I am skeptical that we are committed to that truth. I am skeptical because I’m sure if I ask a different question we would probably have different answers. “Who isn’t invited?”

“Who isn’t invited?” That is a question that tantalizes more than any other. At first we may, again with a pious heart, say “All people are invited! None are barred!” Yet, our actions suggest differently. Look around this room and ask yourself how diverse a body we truly are in this congregation. I’m not just speaking in terms of race or place of origin, I mean in dress or attitude or disposition. Our incomes are not so varied as to shock, our manner of dress is comparable if nothing else, and we all have our Ps and Qs so aligned as not to distress our neighbors with too great a varied response to worship.

We are not alone in our homogeneity. The most segregated hour in America, along all lines, is a Sunday Morning. Churches attract their own little niche of people and they do so subconsciously. In the mode of worship they employ, in the time they offer it, and in the way they act throughout it. Some of this is inevitable. Though we wish to “be all things to all people,” at the end of the day there is only so much we can do in the bounds of our order of worship and within an hour and change on a single day of the week. There are different churches because there are different people and sometimes God needs us to employ our differences to save people with different needs. Yet, I feel, if we take that line of thought too far then Church becomes a place you have to shop around for, a thing you consume rather than are consumed by, it becomes a place we go to receive and not a place we become a symbiotic whole with.

Our Scripture today captures the scandalous nature of Jesus’s ministry well. Calling his disciples as he goes, he finds Matthew the Tax Collector. We do not know if Matthew was a Roman transplant into Judea or a native Judean who took on a Roman job but either way we know what his reputation was. Tax collectors in his day were seen as traitors and crooks – taking money to support the soldiers and empire that would throw you in the gutter for fun and crucify you for talking back. Matthew, Judean or Roman, was seen as someone working against the people of God, robbing them for his own health and for the good of their enemies.

Yet, when Jesus sees him, he knows what Matthew is to become and not what he is. He does not see a Roman traitor, he sees an Apostle, or someone who will become one at least. He calls for Matthew to follow him and Matthew follows immediately. Then, either at Matthew’s house or someone else’s, Jesus has dinner. People are coming to hear him speak anyway, so a crowd begins to gather. Yet, the people who are invited to be at Jesus’s table, those who he wants closest to him, are the rejects. He has the tax collectors and “sinners,” a catch-all term here meaning, “those people,” sit down right beside him.

As Jesus breaks bread and eats, some of the crowd gathered around the house leans in to ask his disciples a question. These are the local pastors of the area, the Pharisees and Teachers, and they’re concerned about this traveling miracle worker. “He does these wonderful things, teaches these wonderful teachings, but now he is sitting and eating with these people? Make that make sense to me.” The disciples do not get a chance to answer for Jesus, because he publicly answers their private accusation disguised as a question – “A doctor does not attend to people who are well, a doctor is called to heal the sick!”

Here enters in the contradiction that Jesus always leaves in the midst of his teachings. Jesus is saying that the folks he is sitting with need him more than the people coming in and criticizing him. Does that mean that the Pharisees and Teachers aren’t sinners in need of salvation? Of course not! They are, however, people who should know better. They have received God’s grace through the established means of the Temple and the fellowship provided by the Synagogue and the tutelage of the law. They are folks who are not “cured,” of sin, if such a thing is possible, but they are folks on their way to recovery.

They have, however, forgotten that they are only where they are by the grace of God. Only the accidents of how they were born and how the cards have fallen in their life to this point has allowed them to be Pharisees and Teachers rather than tax collectors and publicly known profligates. They have allowed themselves to forget that anything they do right they were taught and supported into doing and all they do wrong has left their mind is a sea of perceived righteousness. They may not break the rules as readily or as often as those they now criticize, but they have not been transformed by God’s grace – they have let their hearts harden if anything.

There are two main things that keep people from coming into Church, and neither of them have anything to do with Jesus. The first is past hurt from the Church, ways that the people of God have actively harmed them – that is a talk for another time. The second, however, is still tied to the failing of the Church. We stand on a hill of perceived holiness, we spread our arms out to the world and say, “We’re here if you want us!” Then we shake our head at all the people who don’t waltz into our sanctuary. We do not go out into the world and bring the Gospel with us, if we did that we’d lose control. We do not invite folks in with a wild and uncompromising invitation, because it would ask too much of us and our habits and expectations.

Christ our Lord not only sat with sinners when he found them, but actively sought them out. He did not ask them to get clean and perfect immediately. The Pharisees were not shocked by their sudden repentance or holiness, they still viewed them as sinners and thieves. It is unlikely that the people gathered around Jesus that night, sin sick their whole life long, were suddenly and permanently changed in that one night… Yet I’m willing to believe that several of them started the long, hard road of discipleship after coming close to Jesus that night.

The Disciples that night were serving a role that we often neglect in our role as Christians. They were standing around the table, letting people come to Jesus, and answering the questions of the people who would doubt the validity of the people coming to eat with him. They were not interrogating people to see if they were worthy of God’s grace, but refuting those who questioned it. The Pharisees could not get close enough to browbeat those seeking Jesus, because the Disciples stood in the way. What would it look like for us to do that? To be the sort of people who kept the judgmental eye off of those seeking Christ, and spared no expense in bringing his table to those who most earnestly wanted to eat from it.

People of God, the table of Grace is set before us. As we approach to take part in Christ’s passion, let us let this grace transform us. Let us become defenders and advocates for folks to make their way to this place of grace. Christ has come to save sinners, and that definitely includes us. Are we willing to let it stop with us? – Amen.

Sermon 05/31/2026 – In the Beginning

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Genesis 1:1-2:4a

When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

And God said, “Let there be a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” So God made the dome and separated the waters that were under the dome from the waters that were above the dome. And it was so. God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.

And God said, “Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, “Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it.” And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.

And God said, “Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, and let them be lights in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. God set them in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.

And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.”

 So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.

And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.” And it was so. God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind and the cattle of every kind and everything that creeps upon the ground of every kind. And God saw that it was good.

Then God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over the cattle and over all the wild animals of the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.”

So God created humans in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the air and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all their multitude. On the sixth day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation.

These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created. In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens…

Sermon Text

 Trinity Sunday is one of the more difficult Sundays of the year. Every day that we gather together as the Church, we are celebrating a triune God. This means that God is three persons but still one complete entity. God the Father is distinct from the Son and the Spirit, but all three are still one God. This is complicated and mystical and generally not something we often try to put into words as a Church because there are several million ways of teaching it incorrectly and only a handful of ways that begin to approach the truth.

Yet, across the history of the Church, there has been a repeated call by ill informed people to do away with the concept of the Trinity. They will point to the fact that the word does not appear in scripture and then find ways to formulate a world where God exists in all sorts of inferior ways to the truth of the trinity. Some say God the Father became Jesus Christ who, upon his ascension became the Spirit. Others say Jesus was merely adopted by God and given a special place in creation, but is not actually God in the same way God is. And so on and so forth, the truth of the Trintiy is lessened until God is broken apart and diminished into something far different than what scripture reveals.

Scripture is clear that Christ is God, having full equality with God since before creation.[1] Scripture is likewise clear that the Holy Spirit is God, revered and honored in equal measure.[2] If we believe that these two are treated as God, and we believe that there is only one God, then God must exist as three persons – Father, Son, and Spirit – and still remain the singular God who we worship and adore. To be united as one, while remaining distinct, is not something that we can picture in our own human existence, but it is fully possible for God.

Our scripture today does not provide a view of the Trinity, except through the lens of our Christian faith. No person reading this scripture before Jesus walked the earth would believe God was a Trinity just by reading Genesis 1. Yet, for the Christian, our faith gives another reading.

In the Creation of the world, all three persons of God were fully present, active, and in sync with one another. God the Father, who exists in Spirit above and beyond all things, breathes the Holy Spirit onto the uncreated universe. The movement of the Spirit causes the waters to be troubled, the uncreated mass suddenly begins to contemplate the potential of order. When God speaks, the Word of God is sent forward, the only and eternally begotten Son creates at the behest of the Father’s words. “Let there be,” is followed immediately by “Here it is.” The Father sends, the Son creates, the Spirit enlivens. Across Genesis 1 and 2, nothing becomes something at the behest of the Trinity which forever existed in isolation.

The reason for the creation is never given in scripture. The closest we come is to the general theme expressed in several places – all things exist to glorify God, and so all of creation exists to glorify its creator. I would add to this a second, more relational note. As all things exist to glorify God, so all things exist to glory within what God has done, is doing, and will do. In other words, the existence we have with God is reciprocal. God does not stand on high and demand worship, building a universe for Divine Adulation, without making the creation benefit from the arrangement. The universe is created for God and God offers the fullness of the Divine Being for the creation to enjoy.

Scripture has a word that is used to describe the three persons of the Trinity, they are all participants in Θεοτης  (theotēs,) a word that is usually defined as “Godhood,” “Divinity,” or “The Godhead.” Personally, I like to describe it as God’s “God-ness.” To be a being of theotēs is to be equally part of the thing which is called “God,” to participate in that unique existence.

We are then pleased to see that, throughout all of scripture and all of history, God has made this “God-ness,” available to those who seek after it. When Adam and Eve are thrown from the Garden, God does not leave them behind, but allows them to continue worship. When Cain kills Abel, God shows him love and spares him. Across centuries of violence, the Ark is built. God the Father exists in covenant with this world, through Noah and from the time of Noah until today, always working toward reconciling the world back to its creator. In due time, God sent the Spirit to rest upon certain people called, “Prophets,” and ensured that through them the eternal Word of God was made known.

All this would be sufficient and good, but God is not one to settle for “Good Enough.” In a backwater part of the world, in a strange confluence of history, God sent the Word to become flesh and dwell among us. In the person of Jesus of Nazareth, the fullness of God-ness dwelt. Jesus was fully God and fully human, his human-ness and his God-ness in perfect harmony despite being distinct. Christ lived, died, rose again, and ascended all so that we could receive the Spirit into ourselves. To this day, we are houses for the Holy Spirit, and through Christ’s participation in humanity, we are able to participate in the unity of God. Though we are never recipients of the “God-ness,” that defines God apart form creation, we are able to enter into the perfected, divine, humanity of Christ but being subsumed into his body, the Church.

The Trinity is complicated, the celebration of it ever incomplete as we struggle to imagine the kind of unity that can exist perfectly across three persons. Yet, gathered here as the people of God, we are likewise participating in a strange contradiction. You and I are distinct, you are distinct from the people around you, and yet we together are the Church, and therefore we are made into the Body of Christ. If Christ’s body was raised, the we too can be lifted from our current state. Because God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are together lifting us up. – Amen

[1]

[2]

Sermon 05/24/2026 – Abundant Prophecy

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Numbers 11:24-30

So Moses went out and told the people the words of the Lord, and he gathered seventy of the elders of the people and placed them all around the tent. Then the Lord came down in the cloud and spoke to him and took some of the spirit that was on him and put it on the seventy elders, and when the spirit rested upon them, they prophesied. But they did not do so again.

Two men remained in the camp, one named Eldad and the other named Medad, and the spirit rested on them; they were among those registered, but they had not gone out to the tent, so they prophesied in the camp. And a young man ran and told Moses, “Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.” And Joshua son of Nun, the assistant of Moses, one of his chosen men, said, “My lord Moses, stop them!” But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put his spirit on them!” And Moses and the elders of Israel returned to the camp.

Sermon Text

Pentecost! The day we celebrate as the “Birth of the Church,” when the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples and blessed them with a multitude of languages, allowing them to communicate the gospel to any and all people who came near to them. Folks looked at them like they were drunk, some accused them of general indecency, but the truth was all the more fantastic. Christ, who had ascended some days earlier, had kept his promise and sent the Spirit down to rest on the disciples. The men and women in the upper room were out in the streets telling the story of Christ’s death and resurrection and the whole of Jerusalem was amazed.

The Spirit is something that we in the mainline churches are often accused of lacking. We do not often engage in ecstatic worship – we aren’t dancing in the aisles or speaking in tongues. We do not do much extemporaneously, “in the present moment,” instead leaning on our liturgies and hymnals. To many in the modern milieu of American Religion, we are placed at odds with our Denominational Descendants in the Holiness and Nondenominational churches and a line is drawn between us. In one corner there are the staunch and boring traditional folk and in the other the ecstatic and lively contemporary worshippers.

These are not new distinction, every period of history has shown worship taking these forms. One the formalized and measured, the other the spontaneous and free. The difficult thing that we must assess as Christians, people practicing our faith now, is how we need to apply these broad categories to our life. Is it better to be free completely? Or is it better to do what we know works and guarantee our presence before God through ordinary means of grace? Today I want to offer a far more true to life option, one that is complicated as only truth can be. The Spirit of God is not constrained to one method of worship or the other, it is above, beyond, and through them all.

We have already addressed that people responded to God’s Spirit being poured out on Pentecost with skepticism. “What are these drunk fishermen yelling about? And why are they yelling it in Latin, Gallic, and Persian?” The people were gathered in Jerusalem that day to celebrate “The Feast of Weeks,” which commemorates God’s gift of the Torah to the people of God and the yearly harvest. This dual celebration ended the festive season that followed Passover, much like how Pentecost ends our celebration of Easter today. They were worshipping God as God had commanded, and in so doing received God’s goodness, yet God was also at work through those who were receiving the Spirit in a new and different way, the Church.

This mirrors the story told in our scripture for the day. The Sanhedrin, the seventy elders of Israel, had gone to meet with God and received the Holy Spirit. They prophesied before God, speaking deep spiritual truths in a way they never would again. They did so at God’s command, in the God sanctioned way of approaching the Tent of Meeting which housed God’s throne – the Ark of the Covenant. Yet, as they proclaimed truth by gathering around the Tent, God was not limited by the “sanctioned,” way of doing things. While the Elders gathered there, the Spirit rested on two men, Eldad and Medad, who spoke God’s truth without the metrics and means the Elders had used. Yet, Moses assures us both means are valid, true, and fully under God’s control.

As is obvious to most anyone who sees me, I am a huge proponent for the “ordinary,” means of God’s grace. Gathering in churches, receiving the sacraments, and praying as we read the scriptures are sure ways to come close to God. I go further in my personal application of them, trying to steep what we do here in the traditions and methods of the Church which stretch back, in some cases, to Christ’s disciples themselves. In this ancient ways, and in my gift of them to the congregations I serve, I seek to give us a sure path to God’s grace. I consider it one of my duties as an elder to relate, preserve, and innovate upon the ancient work of the Church.

Yet, God is never limited by the ordinary. I knew a godly woman (and mucked out her horse stalls once a year,) who could pray like nobody else I knew. More than that, she also prayed in a way I had never seen, speaking in a language only she and God knew. In this conference I know someone who, though he has now begun the process of ordination, did more work as a lay person and a licensed minister than most any ordained elder I have ever seen. Truth is spoken, miracles performed, and good work down outside of the hierarchy and usual means of the Church every day.

The problem comes, inevitably, that we prioritize one thing over the other. We look at people doing things in fresh and new ways, and so neglect the foundation that makes those new things possible. Likewise, we get so caught up in the way things are, we fail to see what God is]’ doing beyond our walls and outside the usual way things are done. Pentecost is the day God tore down the separation between old and new forever, creating a kingdom that is eternal and that simply “is.” In this new world, we are constantly bringing out treasures “old and new,” to God’s glory.[1]

We are blessed this Pentecost to baptize young people into this world. We are likewise blessed to welcome a family into our Church. As they grow, they will challenge us to do new and different and better things. As we welcome them into our family of faith we will offer a foundation that makes these new works possible. The Spirit, alive and moving, seeks to make prophets of us all – people who speak the word of God as if it were our own. Let us follow that Spirit, to the font which was poured out centuries ago, and to the springs that appear without warning. Old and new, planned and unplanned, God is at work. Let us be at work too. – Amen

[1] Matthew 13:52

Sermon 04/05/2026 – Go and Tell

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Matthew 28:1-10

After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And suddenly there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow. For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay.

Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ This is my message for you.” So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers and sisters to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

Sermon Text

Easter is a day of transformations. It is a day when the past falls away and reveals, not just the present, but the brilliant future that God has inaugurated around us. The light of what will be bursts out and makes the world shine, even just for a moment, with a light only Heaven can bring about. The glory of Christ resurrected, the fullness of God represented in the fullness of a perfected humanity, this is a glimpse of what we all will someday know when God’s perfected world is established and Christ returns in final victory.

For the women at the tomb that day, the emptiness of their friend and teachers resting place was a cause for extreme alarm. Was the body stolen? Did the Romans dispose of it somehow? What caused them to be deprived of this one bit of peace, properly burying their beloved companion as all people deserved to be buried. The alarm they felt melted through the words of a mysterious stranger – “Be not afraid… He is not here. He is raised from the dead.” The reality of his absence was met with something new, the reality of his continued life. Christ had been raised, not by another prophet or miracle worker, but of his own power, a master over life and death, Christ showed us what he will do for all of us someday.

Across Lent we at Grace talked about… Well, Grace. The gift of God to all of us which allows us to live a life like what Christ called us to. This free gift, offered to every person who calls out to Jesus to be saved, is more than just a “Get out of Hell free card.” It is more, even, than a guarantee of Heaven. Grace is the ability to live a life like Jesus’s. A life where we can serve others, love others, deny ourselves and our tendency to sin, and all the while find enjoyment in the goodness that we are taking part in. Grace, poured out freely from the cross, through the sacraments, and in our mutual presence today. That grace is why we are able to say we trust that as Christ was resurrected in Glory, so will we experience the same.

As people who have this trust, we must also know that when people ask where Jesus is, the answer must be, “He is not in the ground or far, far away. He is raised from the dead and he remains present through his Church.” We do not have the immediate consolation of Christ standing, bodily just a little ways off to meet us, reassure us, and comfort us. However, we are given the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, to settle in our hearts. The presence of God, until that day comes where all is accomplished, sits within us. The light of Easter, of the resurrection, is ours to share, if we are willing. The light shines in the darkness, and shines out most brightly when we gather as we do this morning. The people of God, looking into the darkness of our fallen world, proclaiming the resurrection, and the hope it gives. We are Christ on earth today, go and tell of the resurrection wherever you go, in whatever you say, and in whatever you do. – Amen.

Sermon 04/02/2026 – Taking Unworthily

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Romans 7:21-8:8

So I find it to be a law that, when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched person that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, with my mind I am enslaved to the law of God, but with my flesh I am enslaved to the law of sin.

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law—indeed, it cannot, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Sermon Text

 Today, we gather to remember Christ’s final meal with his disciples. As he sat in their midst, in a room prepared by hands that did not know who the table was even meant for, he worked a wonderful thing. There, with friends and with foe, Christ celebrated God’s deliverance one last time.

This meal was not the only time this meal would be celebrated. With and through the Spirit, Christ sits down with all who take the time to remember his story. In breaking bread, in taking up a cup, we declare Christ’s deliverance until we see it fully perfect through his physical, and not just real, presence.

Yet, as we remember this eal, we will be joining in another rite of the Church. We will eat and enjoy fellowship, we will thank God for the true abundance set before us. In this way, we remember that we, having been delivered by Christ, are his presence in this world.

This meal sits before us, all the same, alongside the words of Paul. A reminder that as we gather for food and fellowship, not just in this meal but all our gatherings, we do so with an eye toward service. We should not feast and give thanks without also thinking of the hungry. We should not celebrate communion without thinking of those who do not know the taste of God’s deliverance and who have drank deep of his presence.

We are warned not to take of God’s feast unworthily, but the definition of “unworthy,” is not left to our imagination. Sin and failure are cured by this table, and so are not obstacles to it. Fitness to receive God’s grace is a fond fantasy. No, Paul is clear, to take unworthily is to lock away access to food people need to live. It is to bar them from the table of Grace. To say God’s deliverance is ours, and his presence reserved only for our table.

What are we to do with a God who came to serve, except to serve him in return? The presence of Christ is revealed to us in two ordinary ways. The first is in the eucharist, the bread and cup which we break and bless. The second is in the people we see around us in need. Those who we are called to walk alongside and to serve. Every hungry, addicted, marginalized, or forgotten person is Christ here with us. They cry out for deliverance, that we may be the presence of Christ to them and they to us.

The table of our Lord is set, with both bodily and spiritual sustenance. Let it show us the road toward right action, toward service, toward the full embrace of God’s presence in all its forms. Let us be delivered by our God, who brought us here today to remember. – Amen.

Sermon 03/29/2026 – Amazing Grace

/ John Langenstein / Leave a comment

Romans 7:21-8:8

So I find it to be a law that, when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched person that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, with my mind I am enslaved to the law of God, but with my flesh I am enslaved to the law of sin.

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law—indeed, it cannot, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Sermon Text

 This month has been a lot. We’ve looked at how Jesus’s death, the sufficiency of that death to cleanse of our sins, and the need for us to truly put away sin to live our life in Christ to its fullest. Grace, it turns out, is not just something that we say before a meal or write on our sign. Grace is the lifegiving gift of God that invigorates every aspect of who we are. To be a Christian is to be a recipient of Christ’s goodness, and in the goodness that God has given us, we have a great deal to give praise for.

As we gather today for Palm Sunday, we do not tell the story of people gathered outside Jerusalem, as we usually do. We do not recount our humble Lord riding into the city on a donkey. Instead, we gather to be that crowd. We who have seen Christ’s salvation, having been reminded over the course of Lent what it means to receive grace upon grace, have a prerogative toward singing of God’s goodness. We declare, today and always, that there is power in what Jesus did two thousand years ago precisely because Jesus is still saving us today.

The Church year begins with Advent, just a month ahead of the secular calendar. In that season we await Christ to be born into our hearts once again. Christ, living in the flesh, is an inspiration to us across our walk through January until the end of Lent. Those forty days of preparation begin with the reminder that we are just ash given life for a time. They conclude today with the cheers we raise to our one true savior who has never stopped saving us. Today as we sing “Hosannah!” I hope you are not just doing it because it is in the hymnal or written on the bulletin, but because you truly feel that call in your Heart. “Save us, O God!”

Today, though we are in Keyser and not Jerusalem, we remember the truth that Paul restates in our scripture for today. “There is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.” We are rescued from our “body of death,” which chooses sin over righteousness again and again, not through anything we do, but through the all sufficient and wonderful sacrifice of Christ. We see, with the benefit of hindsight, what the crowd gathered that day never could. We know that Christ’s crucifixion waits on the horizon. It is a dark and cruel day on which the price of our salvation must be paid. We celebrate today more fully than they ever could have, and yet we also are bound up with the weight of Good Friday’s terrible cost.

We ought to wave the palm branches we have, because we are alive and more than that made fully alive by what Christ has done. Sin has no power over us, nor does death keep its sting. For even as our flesh fails, we have the promise of a future resurrection. The wonder of God is not limited only to the three score and ten of a human life – it stretches into eternity through the wonderful work of our Lord Jesus Christ. Today is a day to praise God for all God has done.

We end our series on grace with a simple declaration. Grace is truly amazing. Whether it is the grace which calls us to be part of God’s church, or the grace that allows us to get rid of sin, it is that grace which makes this life we live in Christ possible. The same grace equips us to move from evil and into good, a move we would never make on our own. Grace, the blessing of God delivered to us through the work of Jesus Christ, is always available and always at work. All things are reconciled to God through this force of good and all good is made possible through the same.

As we wave our palm branches, especially here in a moment as we bring forward the elements for Holy Communion, I hope you will be able to reflect on God’s grace in your own life. Maybe you have just started a serious walk in faith, God’s grace just now bringing you into understanding what it means to be saved. Maybe you have faith, but have not yet chased off the lingering sin you hate in yourself. Maybe the next step of developing goodness is where you are. Maybe your somewhere in between any and all of these stages of life. Wherever you are, as we gather to celebrate our coming salvation, the grace that God offers us is here, ready for you to receive.

We read through the book of Romans throughout Lent. A book written by a man who devoted his life, at one point, to the persecution of Christians. It was written to Roman citizens who had celebrated the expulsion of Jews from the city, and now were being asked to welcome them back into the congregation. It remains for us today as a book that tries to make sense of God’s grace by specifically looking at how it interacts with the real lives of God’s people. The righteous, the wicked, Gentile and Jew, killer and healer, all are invited to a table that can set all things right… If only we can take seriously our call to make use of it.

If God’s grace is sufficient for all people, then it is certainly sufficient for us individually. If we are so saved by so amazing a God, then I hope that we can truly celebrate the work of God today. Let those palms wave, let your voice rise up, let your praise be true! For God’s grace is amazing, and it is given freely to you and to me, to all flesh that we may be saved. – Amen.