Sermons at The Episcopal Church of Our Saviour
By Episcopal Church of Our Saviour, Mill Valley, California
To listen to an audio podcast, mouse over the title and click Play. Open iTunes to download and subscribe to podcasts.
Podcast Description
Sermons delivered at The Episcopal Church of Our Saviour, Mill Valley, California: A welcoming community for those seeking to deepen their relationship with God, and to journey in faith with God’s people through the breaking of bread and in service to others, in Christ’s name.
| Name | Description | Released | Price | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
1 |
CleanIn Elisha's Steps | (The Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Annette Rankin) When Naaman comes seeking healing from God's prophet, there is more than simply his warrior's pride on the line. | 2/12/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
2 |
CleanPrayerful Practice | (The Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Isaiah calling us to recognize the unimaginable breadth of God's power, and Jesus' example of praying in the pre-dawn darkness together remind us of the humility a life of prayer demands, and the radical freedom it brings. | 2/5/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
3 |
CleanA Loving Accountability | (The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany - Jason Lucas) Paul reminds the Corinthians that knowledge by itself is not enough when it comes to ethical matters in Christian community. Love demands accountability. | 1/29/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
4 |
CleanAnswering the Call | (The Third Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) God's call radically re-configures our priorities and overturns our lives. Are we ready to let go of everything for the sake of the Gospel? | 1/22/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
5 |
CleanWith You I am Well Pleased | (The Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In Mark's Gospel, no one speaks before God does, and the first words we hear from God -- at Jesus' baptism -- are of love. Our response is one of wonder. | 1/8/12 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
6 |
CleanBaby Jesus and the Zero Sum Game | (Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In the Christmas narrative, no words are wasted, and no detail can be tossed aside -- not even the cloth swaddling the baby Jesus. . . | 12/24/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
7 |
CleanGod Undomesticated | (The Fourth Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) While our commemorations of Christmas tend to lead us towards domesticity, the stories themselves -- if we read them clearly -- are meant to unseat us and lead us into the wildness of God's loving gift to us in Christ Jesus. (This sermon was delivered during the annual Lessons and Carols service. Readings included John 1:1-18) | 12/18/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
8 |
CleanAre You Ready? | (The Second Sunday of Advent - Jason Lucas) Advent involves preparation, which means acquiring the patience that welcomes in God's love in Christ. | 12/4/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
9 |
CleanAdvent Seeking | (The First Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus tells us to "keep awake," and many of us are wide awake this time of year with overstuffed schedules and a world of distractions. But are we keeping awake for the right thing? | 11/27/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
10 |
CleanThe Hope of Christ the King | (Proper 29 - Jason Lucas) Christ the King evokes many images for us, and not all of them are immediately understandable or helpful. But each one as we grapple with it, shows us a new glimpse of the promised reign of God. | 11/20/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
11 |
CleanGospel Investments | (Proper 28 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Scholars are not always agreed that the gospel authors use Jesus' parables as he originally intended, but the Gospel truth still rings true: Jesus' words challenge us to be prepared for the in-breaking of God's reign. | 11/13/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
12 |
CleanLessons in Sainthood | (All Saints' Sunday - The Rev. Br. Richard Edward Helmer) It's very easy to fall into the trap of performing for our God, in the hopes of earning our sanctification and salvation. But this notion turns the Gospel on its head: a Gospel that "comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable..." A Gospel that calls us simply to be how God made us, and find ourselves transformed not by our action, but by grace. | 11/6/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
13 |
CleanGrace to Serve | (Proper 26 - Jason Lucas) Micah challenges us with a warning about false prophecy. How easily we mistake our voice for God's! Jesus, likewise, calls us from a life of easy self-serving hypocrisy to one of humble action based on service to others and abounding with God's grace. | 10/30/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
14 |
CleanNot What We Deserve | (Proper 20 - Br. Thomas Bushnell BSG) Jesus' parable of the workers and the vineyard overturns our sense of fairness and challenges us to set out in pursuit of a new economic model: one that reflects God's kingdom. | 9/18/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
15 |
CleanThe Way of Forgiveness | (Proper 19 - The Rev. Beth Kelly) Beyond all clichés about "forgiving and forgetting" is the hard, powerfully transformative work of Christian forgiveness, a way of life which has nothing to do with forgetting, but rather embraces God's call to a radical remembering. This remembering ultimately comprehends the pain of the entire human family and calls us to a way of life in divine love and compassion that changes not only us, but the world beyond all imagination. | 9/11/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
16 |
CleanTrusting Christ | (Proper 17 - The Rt. Rev. Diane Jardine Bruce) When Jesus discloses the journey to Jerusalem and the inevitability of the cross, the disciples, and Peter especially, react with fear. As guest preacher, Bishop Diane Bruce from the Diocese of Los Angeles, reflects on our need to find trust that we are never alone in the journey ahead. | 8/28/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
17 |
CleanJesus Undomesticated | (Proper 16 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When Peter proclaims Jesus as Messiah and Son of God, does he know what he's getting? Come to think of it, do we? | 8/21/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
18 |
CleanA Measure of Faith | (Proper 15 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In a world of giving and taking offense, a Canaanite woman teaches us a measure of faith. | 8/14/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
19 |
CleanWalking on Water | (Proper 14 - The Rev. Beth Kelly) In the story of walking on water, we too often focus on the miraculous acts of Jesus, rather than on the example of Peter stepping out of the boat and walking with his Teacher and Messiah. | 8/7/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
20 |
CleanOn to the Gospel | (Proper 13 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Our frustration at our own government is a symptom of a deeper frustration at our human failure to give thanks for the abundance we have already received: the abundance of God's grace. | 7/31/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
21 |
CleanFive Parables, One Sermon | (Proper 12 - The Rev. Beth Kelly) The lectionary gives us five parables to chew on in a short passage from Matthew -- so much to pack into one sermon -- but with a single purpose: to disclose the Good News of God's kingdom. | 7/24/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
22 |
CleanThe Harvest that You Are | (Proper 11 - The Rev. Beth Kelly) With the wheat and the weeds growing up together, how do we make sense of living in a messy world? | 7/17/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
23 |
CleanSeeds of Glory | (Proper 10 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In the parable of the seed sower, Jesus discloses the seemingly profligate way God distributes grace in our lives -- and the hope God is holding for us. | 7/10/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
24 |
CleanConundrums of Adulthood | (Proper 9 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus and Paul both pose the conundrums of the adult spiritual life, and our calling to return to a simplicity that many of us may recall from our childhood. | 7/3/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
25 |
CleanA Dangerous Trinity | (Trinity Sunday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) An old story of Augustine at the seashore illustrates not only the mystery of the Trinity, but our spiritual childhood before an infinitely gracious God. | 6/19/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
26 |
CleanOut of this World | (Pentecost - The Rev. Beth Kelly) Pentecost is a story of falling in love again: explaining what it's like to actually experience the wonders and glory of God appearing unexpectedly in our midst. | 6/12/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
27 |
CleanOpening Ourselves to the Spirit | (The Sixth Sunday of Easter - Willie Van Doren) What would it look like for Jesus' promise to be fully realized in our lives? | 5/29/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
28 |
CleanRapt with Certainty | (The Fifth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Recent media attention on a prediction of The Rapture intersects with the disciples' quest for certainty as they face Jesus' impending departure. Rather than offering them a road-map and a calendar, Jesus offers himself as the Way, the Truth, and the Life of faith. | 5/22/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
29 |
CleanChoosing Worlds | (The Third Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The Risen Christ presents us with a world that completely supplants and recasts the one we inhabit. It is a world that demands of us a fundamental choice: a choice of faith. | 5/8/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
30 |
CleanWhom are you Looking For? | (Easter Day - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Butterflies and Easter eggs are just two of the myriad symbols of Easter. But at the heart of the Easter Day Gospel is a question posed to us by the Risen Christ. | 4/24/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
31 |
CleanVoices of Easter | (Easter Vigil - The People of Church of Our Saviour) Voices of Church of Our Saviour share the story of salvation and the Easter message. Readers include Caroline Gibbs, Scott Hayes, Charlaine Shackelford, Nancy Cone, Vyvien Gear, and Terry Peck. Willie Van Doren and The Rev. Beth Kelly offer reflections. The Rev. Richard Helmer sings the Exsultet and reads the Easter sermon of John Chrysostom. Dan Hoggatt is at the organ. Recorded live at the Easter Vigil. | 4/23/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
32 |
CleanHealing Broken Hearts | (The Fifth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Beth Kelly) Mary, Martha, Lazarus, and Jesus: In one of the climactic stories of the Gospel According to John, we see our calling to solidarity with the world's broken-hearted for strength, healing, and new life in Christ. | 4/10/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
33 |
CleanFully Seen | (The Third Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) While Nicodemus had much to lose in his conversation with Jesus, the Samaritan woman has nothing at all to lose, and so everything to gain by being fully seen by Christ. What flows from that experience is radical transformation for both her and her community. | 3/27/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
34 |
CleanGiving Ourselves Over | (The Second Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) At first glance, it seems like Nicodemus is just being dense. But there is a sense in which Nicodemus, a religious leader, has jumped right into the game with Jesus, and is reflecting the metaphorical language right back to him. He could be asking Jesus a fundamentally spiritual question: How can we change our habits once we are set in our ways? | 3/20/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
35 |
CleanImages of the Wilderness | (The First Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The wilderness experience is not just for the spiritual athlete or the Son of God, but is where we find ourselves sooner or later, and seldom by choice. It is the danger there that we are faced with our most primal temptations and selves, and where God's grace can transform us. | 3/13/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
36 |
CleanThe Bells of Servitude | (The Eighth Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rt. Rev. Marc Handley Andrus) It's confusing to be a Christian in this world that has not only worries enough for today but allures enough for today and tomorrow. | 2/27/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
37 |
CleanA Subversive Love | (The Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus' call to his followers in the first century rings down to ours with unnerving clarity -- his followers, Christians, are called to be counter-cultural. And counter-cultural movements are dangerous, unpredictable, and often vulnerable. | 2/20/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
38 |
CleanIn Memorian: Graeme L. MacDonald | (Memorial Service - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Graeme's God, our God, Jesus tells us in the gospel this day is the host of a house with many rooms, many dwelling places. Jesus' Way reflected in Graeme's own unique, characteristic fashion is not found in a book or distilled into doctrine, but is rather lived in the ups and downs of relationships; it unfolds in the context of generous hospitality. Graeme showed us that life is indeed "a feast of rich food, a feast of well-matured wines." Perhaps our only challenge is that we all too often claim that we are too busy to stop and partake. Graeme refused to fall into that trap. What a great witness to all of us. Without him the world is a far less interesting place. Perhaps that calls us all to take up his work of making it more interesting again together. | 2/18/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
39 |
CleanGrowing Up in Faith | (The Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) God's grace is generous and bountiful and radically free. But how we receive it matters just as much in our engagement in the life of the kingdom. We receive it week after week as an invitation to grow in our faith journey, to take ownership not of ourselves, but of the truth we have been given: to grow up in faith. | 2/13/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
40 |
CleanThe Poor in Spirit | (The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) It is our Christian story that speaks not when we are powerful and in charge or control, but when we are emptied of power, when we behold for a moment the shattered remains of dreams, the often hollow nature of our own material fortunes, the reflection of ourselves in the least among us. | 1/30/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
41 |
CleanThe Story that Saves | (The Third Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Carol Luther) Early Christianity came of age amid a conflicting sense of influences. The call to discipleship arises out of these influences and calls forth the incarnation -- the bringing together of flesh and spirit -- to manifest itself in the midst of our communities. | 1/23/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
42 |
CleanThe Call of God's Beloved | (The Baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ (tr.) - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Baptism is the primordial act of our tradition. It goes back to the very roots of who we are as Christian community. | 1/16/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
43 |
CleanSetting Aside Fear | (Epiphanytide - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We hear this Gospel story today against the backdrop of national tragedy - the shooting of a congressional representative, a federal judge, of citizens out to learn more about their government or simply to buy groceries to feed their families, of a nine-year-old girl who tragically will not in this life experience the self-discoveries of turning twelve. We recoil at this blight on our open society, and agree wholeheartedly with the universal condemnation of it as we pray for the survivors and the families and friends of all the victims. But it is not enough, it seems to me, to simply call this act "senseless" as one prominent politician did yesterday, and then move on with life as usual. The shooting yesterday embodies the division, distortion, and demonization that has come to dominate and dehumanize our national conversations over the past few years. | 1/9/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
44 |
CleanIn the Bleak Midwinter | (The Second Sunday after Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We reckon during this journey with the all the business-as-usual that re-enters our lives and threatens like a storm cloud to cover that fragile light of hope and truth the Christ child has brought. We may feel at times we have to fight for a glimpse of the star to keep ourselves properly oriented, we may need to struggle to find the hope that Christmas brought - or that we thought Christmas was meant to bring. But it is the wise men who teach us how to approach this journey, melancholic or not, struggling as we do with the unmet expectations and the long paths before us guided by the flickering light of a distant star. | 1/2/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
45 |
CleanOddities of Incarnation | (Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We Christians have wrestled with the oddity of the incarnation for as long as we've called ourselves "Christian." The stories of Luke and Matthew and the theologizing of John are not finished bits of history or well-studied, carefully weighed measurements of empirical science. They are communities of Christians wrestling with the meaning of Jesus Christ and the stories that surrounded him and how he touched and continued to touch generation to generation the lives of people on spiritual pilgrimage. Atheists are right to refer to them as "myth," but we understand it as myth in the very best sense of the word. They embrace one of the deep mysteries of our faith - a profound sense of "God with us" in the muck and straw of our stabled lives, in the fleshy, fallible and sometimes stinky nature of human existence. . .God with us in our best moments and - perhaps even more importantly - in our worst. | 12/24/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
46 |
CleanLessons and Carols | (The Fourth Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Highlights from the Advent/Christmas Service of Lessons and Carols at Church of Our Saviour, featuring the Choir of Our Saviour, Dr. Dan Hoggatt and Rev. Jack Hoggatt at keyboard, and Chaplain Michael Cobbina, drum. Readers: Kitty Hayes, Vyvien Gear, Nancy Cone, Mark Tarpey-Schwed, Scott Hayes. Homilist: Richard Helmer. | 12/19/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
47 |
CleanA Deacon's Witness | (The Third Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen reads the gospel and then delivers this farewell sermon to Church of Our Saviour, sharing wisdom for life she has gained from many years of ministry with congregations as a deacon, hospital chaplaincy, and life itself. | 12/12/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
48 |
CleanBearing Worthy Fruit | (The Second Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) John the Baptist's words are fiery to provoke us to move forward. They remind us that Advent is not fundamentally about us, but about the coming of Christ into our midst to make us anew. | 12/5/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
49 |
CleanA Thief in the Night | (The First Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Keep awake for the unexpected and the unusual, for the thieves of grace. God's grace is out to surprise each of us in ways and at times we have not yet imagined. | 11/28/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
50 |
CleanKing of Kings? | (Proper 29 - Christ the King - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Our gospel today reminds us that Christ is King not because he rules from a throne, or a gilded hall, or a great castle in the sky or otherwise. Christ is King, because he rules from the cross and, then, the empty tomb. | 11/21/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
51 |
CleanScary Jesus and the Kingdom | (Proper 28 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) God is with us, most of all in the throes of death,just as God was with our spiritual ancestors and our sisters and brothers today facing persecution. And what news more than that threatens to undo our best plans. . .so that we are undone. . .and then open for Life itself? | 11/14/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
52 |
CleanZacchaeus and Vocation | (Proper 26 - Br. Karekin Yarian) Zacchaeus is in crisis. He lacks for community, he is an outcast, captive by the choices that he made along the way of accumulating his wealth and status. Zacchaeus has constructed for himself a lofty tower of security and power at the expense of his community. And now he finds it deeply dissatisfying because he is alone and separated from the fellowship of his own people. | 10/31/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
53 |
CleanThe Wrong End of the Telescope | (Proper 25 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus knows how easily our religion can slip into religiosity, how our spirituality can morph into sectarianism. | 10/24/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
54 |
CleanPersistence in Prayer | (Proper 24 - Willie Van Doren) The amazing thing about walking with Christ is no matter how deep we go, how far we think we've come, we can go much further. | 10/17/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
55 |
CleanGenerosity, Power, and Poverty | (St. Francis - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) It was Francis who re-discovered, in a radical move that echoes Jesus' teachings in the Gospel, how to undermine the whole argument. He ran after the beggar in the marketplace in Assisi, and when he caught up with him, he emptied the entire contents of his pockets into the beggar's hands. It would be like handing a panhandler your entire wallet or purse - an invitation to a complete stranger to run through your whole credit line, empty your bank account of cash, or give away the power of your identity. | 10/10/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
56 |
CleanOn Deacons | (Proper 21 - The Rev. Betsy Rosen) Betsy Rosen shares her experience in becoming a deacon of the Church, and her formation at the School for Deacons. | 9/26/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 57 | CleanContemplating a Subversive Jesus | (Proper 20 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) If truth be told, most of us come to Church most of the time to be comforted. . .to be told that we've been good boys and girls this week and then receive our reward. Or, if we've been bad boys and girls, we come to confess that and be told we're still loved. Either way, worship is about one thing to most of us most of the time: comfort. Few, if any of us come to Church to hear the Gospel and be subverted. | 9/19/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 58 | CleanReal Humility | (Proper 17 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Pride, the subject our wisdom reading this day from Sirach, is the primordial sin of the Judeo-Christian tradition. We could argue it is THE sin of our tradition, the willful setting aside of God for our own ambitions and pursuits. | 8/29/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 59 | CleanTrue Religion | (Proper 16 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The real difficulty is that neither the laissez-faire "do whatever" nor harsh legalisms about a life with God serve us at all well as religion. One refuses the discipline of accountability. The other holds up of the finger of accusation, wagging at us continually. | 8/22/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
60 |
CleanNecessary Suffering | (Proper 15 - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) If the good news can only come after the bad news has broken through, then no matter how alluring the dream may have seemed while we were lost in it-the dream of uninterrupted prosperity, of frictionless family relationships; watching the future roll out in front of us at the top of the curve, as if no bottoms existed--it's still better to be awake. Still better to live in kairos time, one foot here and one foot in eternity. | 8/15/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
61 |
CleanIn God's Good Pleasure | (Proper 14 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus says, "Do not be afraid little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." We are blessed by a God who loves us better than we love him, and this is good news for us, and for a world desperately in need of that kind of love that takes us and remakes us for greater life. | 8/8/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
62 |
CleanThe Riddle of Riches and Grace | (Proper 13 - The Rev. Carol Luther) Deathbeds change things. Jesus not only knew that, he staked his very life upon it. This very night your life is being demanded of you. The end matters and the end makes us equal. | 8/1/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
63 |
CleanIn God's Counsel | (Proper 12 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Abraham lived in a world where the best way to relate to the gods was through appeasement,by offering sacrifice. It was a universe, if you will, of capricious and angry deities who constantly demanded animal and sometimes even living human offerings. But through the covenant, Abraham is drawn into an entirely different relationship with his God, with our God. | 7/25/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
64 |
CleanThe Gift of a Stranger | (Proper 11 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) It is easy to lament the loss of hospitality in our own time, especially to the stranger. Whether it's the controversial laws in Arizona or the broader anti-immigrant sentiment that always seems to materialize during hard times; or the natural suspicion we all feel when someone different or unknown appears in a place familiar to us. How easily we find the stranger dangerous, threatening, upsetting. As human beings, we must be reminded repeatedly just as our spiritual ancestors were that hospitality to the stranger is not a luxury or a choice when convenient, but a necessity. | 7/18/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
65 |
CleanEthicists, Heroes, and Neighbors | (Proper 10 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus offers up examples of the priest and the Levite -- among the keepers of righteousness of his day. It is not that the priest and the Levite are mean people for passing by on the other side of the road. What they are doing as good ethical people is quite natural: They have responsibilities, obligations, and rituals to uphold. The man was left for dead -- touching a potentially dead body or even the blood of the injured would have likely rendered any priest or Levite ritually unclean and unable to attend to their socially sanctioned duties for a time. So busy were they in attending to their good, ethical righteous tasks that they had no time to stop for an errand of mercy. | 7/11/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
66 |
CleanNaaman Meets the Fourth of July | (Proper 9 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) What do we mean by "God bless America?" Is it just a patriotic sound bite or something more? This is where the history takes a back seat and the sermon begins for me this morning, and where we come face-to-face with our ancient Scriptural texts written in anything but a democratic milieu. They have something profound to tell us about why we invoke a divine blessing on our country this day - and it may not be for the reasons we think. | 7/4/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
67 |
CleanHands to the Plow | (Proper 8 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We wrestle, as followers of Christ, with the same things Jesus' would-be followers wrestled with. We have obligations - obligations to family, to tradition, to institution, to the pressing needs and concerns of our worldly lives. We spook easily at change, we blanch at difference, we resist the challenge those outside our doors pose to us, we seek safety in what we know and fear what we don't. Jesus deliberately shakes up his hearers and us, shocks us out of our comfort and into a vulnerable, itinerate place - the place of ongoing journey, the fragility of raw humanity on a dusty road, even staring into the face of darkness, death, and dissolution. Only in that way will we "get" - both literally and figuratively - the Gospel. Only in that way, he reminds us, will we fully find God. | 6/27/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
68 |
CleanWhat Are You Doing Here? | (Proper 7 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) "What are you doing here?" This is the question of our loving God in the still, small, gentle voice that meets us in our darkest hours and worst moments, when we are caught up most in our worst fears, when everything we thought we knew is overturned, our strengths are for naught, and our efforts feel most in vain. God refuses to abandon us to leave us in our fear. | 6/20/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
69 |
CleanTackling Gnosticism | (Proper 5 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Our Christian faith embeds us in the relational challenges and hardships of community, it embraces and transforms the realities of pain and suffering, which are made divinely real and prescient in the cross and passion of Jesus Christ. It gives tangible reality to our confession of what we have done and left undone; our call to set aside selfish ambition that exploits -- to embrace instead the service that attends to the pressing needs in the world around us: in our neighbors, in our homes, in our selves, and, yes, very much in our bodies. | 6/6/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
70 |
CleanTutu's Ohana | (Memorial for Patricia Weissich - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When I first visited Hawaii several years ago, I was most impressed and challenged by the understanding of ohana, of family: that recognition that we belong one to another --- something that the island peoples taught us and still embody today. This is in stark contrast to the great individualism of the American West, particularly here in California, and most strikingly here in the Bay Area and Marin County, where it's so often "my way or the highway. . ." | 6/6/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
71 |
CleanCardinal: The Rack! | (Trinity Sunday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We pray the Creed not simply to offer our intellectual assent to it, but to come into relationship with the "who we are" and the "who God is" the Creed reflects. | 5/30/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
72 |
CleanBabel, Oil, and Pentecost | (Pentecost - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Lest we think God "fixed" us as a human family, neutered our pride in the primordial story of the Tower of Babel. . . the story continues to stand for a world still very much a part of our lives -- one with which we are very much mixed up, whether we are still sorting out the mess brought upon us by the economic and financial crisis, or filling up at the gas pump as we all must while wrestling with our driving addiction to the black goo. | 5/23/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
73 |
CleanWalking into the Wilderness with God | (The Seventh Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Carol Luther) Jesus is suggesting that to be fully human is to be fully divine. . . That glory comes from living and dying and living again. . . | 5/16/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
74 |
CleanLiving in the City of God | (The Sixth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) I urge you to look around you and to give thanks for this community to which, under the Mercy, you have been invited by the Holy Spirit of God. It is a community with no entry requirements except the desire to be here -- to be a part of something bigger than ourselves. | 5/9/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
75 |
CleanIndefatigable | (Memorial for Connie Rider - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) One of our members describes Connie as a "pillar of the church." And she notes that we don't use that language so much anymore to talk about God's people. Maybe that in part reflects the age in which Connie was in her prime -- an age where strong leadership was looked to and trusted for command and direction. Where a watchful shepherdess on the green was there to keep everybody, including the other leadership (the clergy most particularly!), in line. But more importantly it reflects Connie's living into the call of Isaiah to live into our anointed nature as God's people. To be as Connie was; to be an "oak of righteousness," a "planting of the Lord," where a mantle of praise has replaced a faint spirit, garlands are given in place of ashes, and the oil of gladness rushes down in abundance. | 5/7/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 76 | CleanLove and the City of God | (The Fifth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We avoid the language of discipline when it comes to love, because love is truly a frightening thing. | 5/2/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
77 |
CleanIf You Meet Jesus in the Temple | (The Fourth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) I do wonder if we sometimes have the tendency to worry too much about our reputation as Christians. For instance, we find ourselves often at a loss to describe in positive terms our own peculiar brand of Christianity -- something we generally call Anglicanism. We find it easier to describe what we are not, caught as we sometimes feel between Christianities of inerrant biblical fundamentalism on one side, and scandal-ridden hierarchies on the other. | 4/25/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 78 | CleanOn Christian Service | (The Third Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Carol Luther) Today's activists talk not about serving but about "making a difference." Service, on the other hand, is about giving oneself to others. | 4/18/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
79 |
CleanThe Wisdom of Magdalena | (Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) As always in the Gospel of John, nothing can be boiled down to one, simple meaning. In today's Easter reading from the gospel, that Mary "mistakes" Jesus for the gardener is a case in point. What could be more natural? For if this Christ truly is God's Word, as John's prologue declares, then he is the Great Gardener, the Creator tending creation, nurturing the rootstock, turning the soil, caring for the very basis of the great chain of life. | 4/4/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
80 |
CleanJust Another Good Friday | (Good Friday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) For centuries, we have struggled to make sense of this visage, this cross, the self-offering of our beloved Savior to a most gruesome and tragic end: An end that is as visceral as it is spiritual, as anchored in the harsh realities of pain as it is elevated to the giddy heights of symbol, as centered in a passing moment as it is eternal. | 4/2/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
81 |
CleanWho are these Robed in White? | (Oscar Romero - Peter Menkin) Does Romero's life have lessons for us? Perhaps the most important is that God still works wonders with weak and imperfect human beings like us. | 3/24/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
82 |
CleanHeads in the Sand | (The Fifth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Judas' words reflect our own judgments about the way things should be in the world, and, indeed, the church. How we expect things ought to be and with some good reason - our own thievery aside. We have to wonder regularly if our operating budget leans too heavily on maintaining an institution, from staff salaries to upkeep, and whether or not we allocate enough to serve the poor. | 3/21/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
83 |
CleanGrumbles of the Older Brother | (The Fourth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Kate Baird) Are we grumbling as the Pharisees and scribes of old, judging who is and who isn't worthy of eating at our table? Are we acting out of a theology of scarcity as the elder brother seeing the resources given to the other as a personal loss, somehow diminishing us rather than an opportunity to celebrate family and the enrichment of all including ourselves? | 3/14/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
84 |
CleanRules of the Henhouse | (The Second Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In Jesus, the old rules of the henhouse are being overturned, and he serves as the fulcrum. So Herod's threat is ultimately moot. Even death itself is soon to be overruled. The fox himself will soon be running for cover, and the henhouse itself will be remade from top to bottom. | 2/28/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
85 |
CleanThe Heart of Temptation | (The First Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The problem for us and for Jesus is once we start testing God's love for us, we might never stop. What if Jesus doubts his anointed calling or God's love for him again? Will he find a higher pinnacle from which to throw himself? He knows the truth - that certainty about anything in this life, whether the mystery of God or the secrets of our own hearts...certainty about these is an illusion. Doubt is not the true enemy of faith. Certainty is. | 2/21/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
86 |
CleanA Life of Prayer | (The Last Sunday after Epiphany - Willie Van Doren) Jesus is reorienting all of us - his parables jar us into a different way of viewing the will of God in our world. It is a completely different hierarchy of what's important, and it flips the values of the world on its head. In his day, they were expecting an army and he gave them a mustard seed. But this mustard seed would grow into the most sublime expression of God the world has ever seen. | 2/14/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
87 |
CleanThe Golden Mouth Chrysostom | (John Chrysostom - Peter Menkin) Let us remember that John Chrysostom set about reforming the church and exposing corruption among the clergy and in the Imperial Administration. "Mules bear fortunes and Christ dies of hunger at your gate," he is reputed to have cried out. | 1/27/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
88 |
CleanCounting Blessings | (The Third Sunday after Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Christian communities make things happen. We forge ahead even with meager resources. We become the justice and the change we want for the greater world. And Paul reminds us today in this great introduction to his song of love in First Corinthians, that we do this together - never alone. It might matter that we need each other. Indeed we do. But more importantly, God needs us, and needs us together, shoulder to shoulder, cheek by jowl, laboring for the communion of divine grace and favor in the world. | 1/24/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
89 |
CleanFirst Miracles | (The Second Sunday after Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We don't get a God who, like Superman, shields the faithful from our vulnerability or swoops in to fly us out of harm's way. Nor do we get a God who deliberately shakes the earth and wields indiscriminate death like the angry spirits of old. Instead, we get our God in Christ, who embraces our suffering, who brings water to the thirsty and food to the hungry and calls us to do likewise; who blazes trails through our devastations to bring us the balm of compassion, who weeps with us on the streets of death and shows up even at our feasts when the wine has run out. | 1/17/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
90 |
CleanBaptismal Uncertainty | (The Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The power of Christ's and our shared baptism is not something we are ultimately in control of. We can only tell story about it, sit in awe of it, reflect on it, act on it. But to talk about the rush of the Spirit in our hearts and its unpredictable ways is like trying to catch the wind. | 1/10/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
91 |
CleanSanctifying Conflict | (The Second Sunday after Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Mary, no doubt, has been watching her first-born son carefully all these years. We can remember her treasuring the strange portents and encounters that marked his birth. We can imagine her anxieties and brooding over what this child will become as he grows into a man, as he sheds the innocence of childhood and begins to assert his own identity. And how does she discuss with Joseph the peculiar identity he is destined to carry? When does he cease to be their child and truly become God's child? And do they have any say in the matter? | 1/3/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
92 |
CleanLight in the Darkness | (The First Sunday after Christmas - The Rev. Carol Luther) I cannot hear today's Gospel without remembering Christmases past. . . | 12/27/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
93 |
CleanChristmas for the (Un)Closeted Christian | (Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) How embarrassing it is - especially in a post-Christendom era like the one we live in; in a diverse and secular era where being Christian is becoming increasingly unusual and slightly odd - that we - conservative, liberal, and in the middle alike - gather together this evening and call this fragile, gurgling child "God," revere him, give him every accolade we can imagine. | 12/24/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
94 |
CleanThe Scandal of Advent | (The Fourth Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The whole notion that God is going to be born in the mess of a stable in a dusty little town - that the God of all Creation, the Maker of the Cosmos, is about to appear through all the pain and blood of childbirth, is a scandal of theological, if not cosmological proportions. | 12/20/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
95 |
CleanGrace and Sight | (Memorial of Pat de Fremery - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Pat witnessed to us the profound truth at the heart of our shared spiritual tradition that it is through our very human, physical frailties that we are most vulnerable to the actions and grace of our God. It is through our weaknesses that we are given spiritual strengths.Readings: Wisdom 3:1-5, 9; 1 John 3:1-2; John 6:37-40 | 12/16/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
96 |
CleanThe People of Advent | (The Third Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We have been taught to embrace a Gospel of grace, yes indeed. But it is never enough to simply say, "I believe," and then get on again with our busy lives as though nothing has changed. It is never enough to say simply, "I belong," and then avoid the hard work of relationships that belonging to Christian community and taking on our citizenship in the wider world demand. | 12/13/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
97 |
CleanThe Threads of Advent | (The Second Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) I imagine many of you feel at times like I do during this period of the year - a bit harried, a bit bedeviled by the countless little things that must be done before Christmas is upon us. Last-minute planning, preparing for a New Year only weeks away even though it feels as though it should be months, thinking about gifts, an exploding social calendar. We get in a real soup when we add in all the extra stresses this past year has wrought with its uncertainties and dizzying, bewildering twists and turns. | 12/6/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
98 |
CleanMissionary: Evangelist and Herald | (Channing Moore Williams - Peter Menkin) Missionary work has changed in 150 years in our Church. No longer is it colonialist, no longer does it attempt to change people to the supposed better ways of our own culture. The missionary takes the people who they are, where they are, and settles with them in their indigenous culture. Yet much is unchanging in missionary work, for it is based in tradition and in the Bible. | 12/2/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
99 |
CleanThe Grace of Advent | (The First Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) I need a God, who, according to the prophet Amos, "made the Pleiades and Orion," who set the universe not only in motion, but abides in the very laws that govern it, who rests in every particle and in the fabric of the cosmos - who not only surprises me moment-to-moment, but meets me, as Christ says, in the signs of the sun and the moon and the stars, and the roaring of the seas and the waves. | 11/29/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
100 |
CleanFar More than These | (Thanksgiving - The Rev. Robert Gieselmann) The truth is we have been afraid this past year: we have been sore afraid during this global recession. . . But Jesus reminds us that fear is unacceptable: Don't you know how much God cares? | 11/25/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
101 |
CleanChrist the King and the Prosperity Gospel | (Proper 29 - Christ the King - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Pilate just doesn't get it. Nor, quite frankly, do we much of the time. Jesus' truth often eludes us in our widely pragmatic and carefully compromised lives. We, like Pilate, live in a world of choices, none of which are perfect, and which are often governed by the rules of a kingdom akin to his. | 11/22/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
102 |
CleanThe Last Days | (Proper 28 - Willie Van Doren) "The Last Days" has a lot of currency in our time, whether it is in popular culture, or in religions around the world. How do we understand this idea in a faithful way? | 11/15/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
103 |
CleanPicking Up Sticks and Offerings | (Proper 27 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) This is a peculiar kind of faith that both the nameless widows in our readings today possess: a faith of embracing reality,however hard it might be, with a trust and an acceptance that are unnerving to the Scribes within all of us. | 11/8/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
104 |
CleanFor All Saints' | (All Saints' - The Rev. Kate Baird) These people were not good, polite or well behaved and they were most assuredly not well scrubbed. By societal standards these people were bad: they broke the rules, they were loud, sometimes bordering on obnoxious. Beyond being unpopular, they were mavericks,liberals and in many cases considered dangerous. Let's be frank, they are the kind of people society shuns and many of us try to ignore. Often, it is only after their death (and the deaths of their critics) that they are redeemed and recognized as saints. | 11/1/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
105 |
CleanA Rap for All Saints' | (All Saints' Day - EPIC Youth and Willie Van Doren) Rap by the EPIC Youth Group of Church of Our Saviour.Vocal by Willie Van Doren. Instrumental by Dow Brain. | 11/1/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
106 |
CleanWe Reflect on Two Apostles | (Simon and Jude - Peter Menkin) They are Apostles who spoke of God, spoke to and into the world, and gave us hope, having been commissioned by Christ himself when alive. | 10/28/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
107 |
CleanThe Suffering Servant: Sufficiency, Servitude, Species | (Proper 24 - The Rev. Carol Luther) It is not in the glory of my intelligence, but in the suffering of my ignorance, that I find God. God, you see, is all that I am not. | 10/18/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
108 |
CleanThreats, Gratitude, and Generosity | (Proper 23 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) For all of us who live in the materially abundant West - where all of us, even the least among us, have more resources than the vast majority of human beings - we know that we are no closer to God's reign simply by virtue of our wealth than the poorest of the poor. In truth, many of us wrestle with the teachings of our tradition: the promised divine favor for the least of these, the nameless at the gate, the destitute. | 10/11/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
109 |
CleanPeacemaker Blessed | (Michael and All Angels - Peter Menkin) I believe angels help us to believe, not because we believe in angels, but because angels believe in us. | 9/29/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
110 |
CleanThe Gospel and the Ouroboros | (Proper 21 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Envy appears in a number of vice lists in the earliest Christian writings. And it is a mainstay in the old classical list of the seven deadly sins. It was obviously a problem for our spiritual ancestors as much as it can be for us. So Jesus follows Moses in making it clear to his followers then and now that there's little time and even less room for it in God's promised reign. | 9/27/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
111 |
CleanTransience | (Proper 20 - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) For better or for worse, most of us are not at liberty to leave the world behind us so totally. We have given hostages to fortune, as they say. We have formed ties that bind--ties that bring us both satisfaction and an element of irksome restraint. | 9/20/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
112 |
CleanCrosses and Obedience | (Proper 19 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. When Jesus drops this teaching on his disciples, and, by extension, us this day, we are cast into perhaps the greatest mystery and greatest challenge of our walk with our Savior. | 9/13/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
113 |
CleanKeeping Up Appearances | (Proper 17 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus instructs his disciples and us twenty centuries later to set aside the comparisons and social striving that are so much a part of worldly culture, and instead seek that inner integrity that comes when we read, mark, and inwardly digest the Gospel in word and sacrament. | 8/30/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
114 |
CleanChoice, Control, and Salvation | (Proper 16 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We reckon that we are not individuals, atomized and fragmented, struggling for control, but rather a household together - the Household of God, working to build new life with our Creator. | 8/23/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
115 |
CleanHoliness and Bernard of Clairvaux | (Bernard of Clairvaux - Peter Menkin) A Prayer attributed to Bernard goes: Jesus, the very thought of Thee With sweetness fills the breast; But sweeter far Thy face to see, And in Thy presence rest. | 8/19/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
116 |
CleanChildren of Wisdom | (Proper 15 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Again, like Jesus' hearers in today's Gospel, we are called into a unique wisdom teaching about the nature of Christ's gift for us - a self-offering that the rest of the world might view as foolishness. | 8/16/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
117 |
CleanStarting Over | (Proper 14 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When so many of us reach such existential turning points in our lives, we feel like Elijah. It is indeed tempting - if only for a few moments - to find our own broom tree, lay down, and swear off the whole thing. | 8/9/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
118 |
CleanFood for our Craving | (Proper 13 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) As inspired as we might be by clever discourse, and erudite answers to life's most intractable questions, our deepest answer is not in intellect or words or even on the pages of a book. It's in the person of Jesus Christ. | 8/2/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
119 |
CleanOn Scarcity | (Proper 12 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) God's Eucharistic economy is not built on scarcity or cold, calculating distribution of goods by a higher power. Nor is it ultimately constructed on competition or supply-side studies. It is built on an abundant love that refuses to give in to the voices that say that there is never enough. | 7/26/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
120 |
CleanShe Has Always Spoken to My Heart | (Mary Magdalene - Peter Menkin) Mary Magdalene's life is a fascination and inspiration regarding the power of the Christian faith, the illuminating power of the Gospel, and simply that of a life of miscast values or even that of a lost person reformed. | 7/22/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
121 |
CleanA Whole New Life | (Proper 11 - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) You could say that the various people who approach Jesus with their pressing concerns are what some teachers of the Bible call "importunate"--or as the dictionary would put it, persistent even to the point of annoyance and intrusion. | 7/19/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
122 |
CleanProphets, Truth, and Independence | (Proper 9 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) It's easy to forget, with the way we romanticize the Declaration of Independence, that those signing it were putting their lives squarely on the line. In this way, they were stepping very much into the prophetic tradition. | 7/5/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
123 |
Clean(More) Lessons in Faith | (Proper 8 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) So many who approach Jesus for healing in the gospels demand some action from him - whether it's instruction, a visit, or a prayer of the Son of God. In this way, the contrast between Jairus, a faithful leader of the local synagogue, and the woman suffering for so long at the margins of her community, could not be more striking. | 6/28/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
124 |
CleanFeisty with Roots | (Memorial for Phyllis Staton - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) It was this life that, in the words of today's Gospel, Christ welcomes in her and will never drive away. A life feisty and rooted at the same time! | 6/28/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
125 |
CleanGrowing Up in Faith | (Proper 7 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) There is little room for whining and complaining - or perhaps a lot of room, if you take the proportions of the Book Job at face value. But it avails us little. God still expects us to grow up. | 6/21/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
126 |
CleanCurmudgeons, Saints, and the Harrowing of Hell | (Memorial for Frederick Allen Cone - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) If we dig into the lives of those we remember as saints, what do we find? Curmudgeons. Faithful, opinionated folk like Fred who brazenly call out truth, even when it is unpopular. | 6/20/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
127 |
CleanCaveats and Green Shoots | (Proper 6 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) God, in radical opposition to our problem-solving, wood clearing nature, simply seeks out the green shoot of new life and replants it. Or, in the language of Jesus in today's Gospel, causes the greatest of all shrubs to arise from the tiniest of seeds. | 6/14/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
128 |
CleanOf Bishops, Creeds, and Nicodemus | (Trinity Sunday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Nicodemus, a member of the Sanhedrin, the highest court of ancient Israel, comes to Jesus under cover of darkness and seeks explanation for the signs Jesus is performing. Jesus responds by inviting Nicodemus to look beyond the signs and into deeper and abundant life in God's Spirit - the life that comes from above. | 6/7/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
129 |
CleanWhat Does This Mean? | (Pentecost - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) This Holy Spirit, like the Holy Spirit at the first Pentecost, seems to care little about the way we think things ought to be, and is infinitely more interested in bringing together the people and the gifts that make up who we are becoming. | 5/31/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
130 |
CleanRiddles of Ascensiontide | (The Seventh Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Frankly, of all the stories about the person we call Lord and Savior, Messiah and Teacher, Truth and Friend of Friends, it's the ascension that is most likely to make me blush with some embarrassment. | 5/24/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
131 |
CleanThe Gift of Friendship | (The Sixth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The solid spiritual food that Christ re-introduces to us in today's Gospel is the concept of becoming friends with Christ. More than the People of God, we are invited to grow up and become the Friends of God. | 5/17/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
132 |
CleanThat God is Love | (John 15: 1-8 - Peter Menkin) That Christ invites us: it is an enormous hospitality of God that is extended anew through Christ. We are invited, and this is Grace--for we are accepted. | 5/13/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
133 |
CleanLearning to Abide | (The Fifth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We are called to abide. Many of us, in a highly mobile world where walking away is made easy can forget how to abide, but the truth is that we all know how in our bones. | 5/10/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
134 |
CleanPracticing Easter | (The Third Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In today's gospel from Luke, the first disciples are discussing resurrection, batting back and forth the experiences some of them had of encountering the Risen Christ on the road to Emmaus. . . when Jesus suddenly appears among them - unexpected and uninvited - and he talks of peace. | 4/26/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
135 |
CleanEaster Perfection | (Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Easter, the Resurrection, is God's gift to us,offered whether we or ready or not. Just as it was offered, ready or not, for the first followers of Jesus, surprised at the door of the empty tomb. | 4/12/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
136 |
CleanThe Undefended Heart | (The Fifth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) The heart that is opened up. . .the heart that has let go of fear. . .the heart upon which God can write her holy law. . . | 3/29/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
137 |
CleanHail, Thou That art Highly Favored | (The Annunciation - Peter Menkin) Let us imagine together this event, so awesome and holy, so large and cosmic as to create in us the need to recognize that God's ways are not our ways. | 3/25/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 138 | CleanStrange Portents | (The Fourth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The cross is the Christian answer to the need for a scapegoat, a strange portent, a healing talisman when the snakes are loose and the People of God suffer. | 3/22/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
139 |
CleanInto Fuller Life | (The Third Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) Disciplines, if we agree to submit to them, lead us through a narrow place and to a place much bigger than we have known before. | 3/15/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
140 |
CleanSkin in the Game | (The Second Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Ours is a God who engages our sufferings and shortcomings with a tangible spirituality, our entire life at every level with a grace that refuses to leave us where we are, a blood and flesh religion that demands we get our skin in the game of salvation. | 3/8/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
141 |
CleanSome Rainbow Theology | (The First Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Should we wonder why rainbows captivated the imagination of our spiritual ancestors - became the subject, if only for a moment, of a great prehistoric, cosmological story about floods, arks, evil, faith, and God? | 3/1/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 142 | CleanMartin Luther: Reformer, Hymnist | (Martin Luther - Peter Menkin) Whether you believe all or part of Martin Luther's statements, his influence and thought, his ideas and faith, his life of believing changed the world. | 2/18/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
143 |
CleanWhen Jesus Heals | (The Sixth Sunday after Epiphany - Carren Sheldon) When Jesus touches us, we are changed -- yet again. | 2/15/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
144 |
CleanDemocracy, Demons, and Darwin | (The Fifth Sunday after Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We are not alone historically or spiritually. In a way, that's good news in and of itself. Ours remains a question of survival -- a perennial question -- and whether survival is good enough. | 2/8/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 145 | CleanBusiness or Family? | (The Fourth Sunday after Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) You know the old dynamic. It's very human. We all have the tapes that play in our heads: Who's that sitting in my pew? | 2/1/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 146 | CleanMan of Holiness, Head and Heart: Thomas Aquinas | (Thomas Aquinas - Peter Menkin) As we think of Saint Thomas, we have much in common as Christians, and it is in part that which we have in common that is also indicative of our living Communion with the Saints. Is this not a miracle of Christ? A miracle of love? | 1/28/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
147 |
CleanJonah and the Blue Screen | (The Third Sunday after Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In the midst of an increasingly sour economy, we wrestle with the call of Jonah. | 1/25/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
148 |
CleanWhich Way is Up? | (The Second Sunday after Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We wrestle with faith, because we often convince ourselves that faith is about being correct. But faith has so much more to do with simply showing up and being present. | 1/18/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
149 |
CleanPrimordial Signs | (The Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Through the primordial sign of water, baptism reveals that there is more to life than simply being alive. | 1/11/09 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
150 |
CleanA New Thing | (Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Sermon for Christmas. | 12/24/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
151 |
CleanReady or Not | (The Fourth Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When Mary agrees to carry the Christ child, her life is changed forever. When we agree to welcome the Christ child, our lives, like Mary's, are permanently and irrevocably transformed. | 12/21/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
152 |
CleanWisdom to Be Still | (The Third Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) The desire for God to appear becomes the overriding theme of our lives this time of year. Our challenge is to wait for it and embrace the stillness that true waiting requires. | 12/14/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
153 |
CleanThe Son of Man | (The First Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) The new Church Year opens with a demand that we be wakeful, alert, and conscious for the in-breaking of the Kingdom of God. | 11/30/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
154 |
CleanJesus for President? | (Proper 29 - Christ the King - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The name of the last Sunday of the church year, "Christ the King Sunday," evokes images of a triumphant Jesus. But does Christ really fit into our romanticism of political power? | 11/23/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 155 | CleanThe Poor, the Widow, the Hungry | (Elizabeth of Hungary - Peter Menkin) Elizabeth, young, unafraid, steady in her faith, gave succor to so many, and was a self-sacrificing woman who began living a life of Holy denial. | 11/19/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
156 |
CleanLet's Build a Church | (Proper 27 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The church as an institution has often behaved badly. We are called by Christ to build a different kind of church. | 11/9/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
157 |
CleanSoften Our Hearts | (Proper 21 - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) Even in the face of financial crisis and economic turmoil, we are called to remember those who are hungry. | 9/28/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
158 |
CleanAn Unfair God | (Proper 20 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When faced with crisis, we are called to remember what is truly important to our salvation. | 9/21/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
159 |
CleanLetting God Go | (Proper 19 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Judgement and withholding forgiveness are both ways we try to play God. The trouble is, when we play God, we often end up with a God who mirrors our own worst selves. | 9/14/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
160 |
CleanA Play-Date with Creation | (Remembering Creation - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Our anxiety about addressing our own needs is destroying the natural world, and, in turn, threatening our own survival. Jesus points to the lilies and sparrows as teachers of a profound faith that could help heal our fragile world: absolute trust in God's grace through all of Creation and the promise of God's kingdom. | 9/7/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
161 |
CleanChrist, Peter, and Suffering | (Proper 17 - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) When Jesus rebukes Peter for trying to lead him away from the cross, we are reminded of our call to move through suffering as Christ did, and to find the hope of resurrection in the face of tragedy. | 8/31/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
162 |
CleanA Messiah for Characters | (Proper 16 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Delivered in the context of a baptism, this sermon explores what we as Christians mean when we claim, as Peter did, that Jesus is the Messiah. | 8/24/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
163 |
CleanFaith in the Raw | (Proper 15 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The Canaanite woman, with her wit and insistence, is commended for her profound trust in what Christ can do for her -- a deep faith that even Jesus' closest followers can only marvel at. | 8/17/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
164 |
CleanStepping out of the Boat | (Proper 14 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The story of Jesus walking on the water, more than a display of the miraculous, reveals how God reaches and trasnforms us, despite our fickle faith. | 8/10/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
165 |
CleanWrestling out of Scarcity | (Proper 13 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jacob's story epitomizes our spiritual journey as we strive with each other, and even with God. | 8/3/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
166 |
CleanThe Unexpected Kingdom | (Proper 12 - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) A pilgrim's journey reveals the life of deeper and transformative hospitality -- one more befitting the Kingdom of God. | 7/27/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
167 |
CleanGrandpa in the Weeds | (Proper 11 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus challenges his followers to leave the sorting out of good and evil to God. We are called to recognize the field of the kingdom, as mixed up and jumbled with weeds as it might be, continues to produce good fruit in our midst. | 7/20/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
168 |
CleanA State of Consuming | (Proper 10 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Our contemporary wrestling with everything being treated as a marketable commodity, even human life, hearkens back to Paul's ancient warning about pursuing things of the "flesh" rather than things of the Spirit. This sermon is subtitled "Some iPhone Theology." | 7/13/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 169 | CleanSacrifice and Scapegoats | (Proper 8 - The Rev. Dr. Jay Emerson Johnson) The story of Abraham preparing to sacrifice his son, Isaac, remains as shocking and bewildering to us as it must have seemed millenia ago. | 6/29/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
170 |
CleanBiblical Family Values | (Proper 7 - The Rev. Dr. Jay Emerson Johnson) Jesus' harsh words about family throw a huge question mark into assertions today about "biblical family values." We are challenged to remember God even above our most cherished societal institutions. | 6/22/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 171 | CleanRacism and the Shepherd's Gate | (The Fourth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Racism is alive and well, even in our most cherished communities and institutions. Confronting and then dismantling it demands the utmost commitment to relationship and a willingness to seek the Good Shepherd at work in our midst. | 4/13/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 172 | CleanLazarus | (The Fifth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) Like Lazarus, we have been called out of the tomb by Christ. Part of our work as Christians is to bring this resurrection to the lives of others. The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen reflects on her experience as a hospital chaplain in this sermon exploring one of the most beloved passages of John's Gospel. | 3/9/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
173 |
CleanAt the Well of Life | (The Third Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) A Samaritan woman, nameless and shunned, meets Christ at the well of life, and like all of us who come face-to-face with God, encounters a judgment beyond her imagination. | 2/24/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
174 |
CleanVulnerable Wings of Power | (The First Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Driven into the wilderness, Jesus confronts a darkness that quotes Scripture and uses a language all too familiar to us: the language of power. How should the Anointed One of God and we, his followers, respond? | 2/20/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
175 |
CleanThe God Who Sees us Whole | (The Second Sunday after Epiphany - The Rev. Payne Rosen) Recognizing that God looks at us with a vision that exceeds our imagination, we are invited into the life of light, even in the face of great darkness. Betsy Rosen offered this message through the story of Martin Luther King, Jr., in this sermon delivered on the weekend set aside in his honor. | 1/20/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 176 | CleanWe Three Kings from the East | (Epiphany - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) Este Cantor offers a story of the magi's journey, as given through their own eyes. | 1/6/08 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
177 |
CleanAnd the Darkness Shall Not Overcome It | (The First Sunday after Christmas - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) In the face of world-shaping tragedies, we must seek to manifest the "light shining in the darkness" for the greater world, beginning first within ourselves. | 12/30/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
178 |
CleanThe Tapestry of a Holy Night | (Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Poetry in this sermon is from Libera: "Far Away" | 12/24/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
179 |
CleanThe Power of Joseph | (The Fourth Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Behind the story of Joseph being confronted with a difficult choice is a lesson in what it means to be powerless when God acts. | 12/23/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
180 |
CleanReeds Shaken | (The Third Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) As we face the hard reality that not everything will be done in time for Christmas, Jesus reminds us that he is coming into our midst, anyway. Our only job is to show up completely. There are no half-ways when it comes to metanoia. | 12/16/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
181 |
CleanWatching and Waiting | (The Second Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) With little time remaining before Christmas, we are left wondering how we become part of the arrival of God's promised transformation in our lives and relationships. Isaiah describes this transformation as the dissolution of prejudice in favor of communion. | 12/9/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
182 |
CleanRedeeming Stumps | (The Second Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The cry of John the Baptist, and no less than his implied threat, reminds us that God is in the habit of making much out of little, and little of much. For the stumps, the places in our lives that we thought were dead, Christ is coming. | 12/9/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
183 |
CleanAn Unexpected Advent | (The First Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Advent opens with startling and, in many ways, frightening words from Jesus. How do we, as Advent Christians, learn to live with the promise of an imminent return of Christ? | 12/2/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
184 |
CleanThe Promise of Christ | (Proper 29 - Christ the King - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) The story of Christ's words with a thief on the cross underscores a promise of forgiveness that closes our church year and reminds us of the primary work of the Gospel in our lives and relationships. | 11/25/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
185 |
CleanJudgment for Stepping Into It | (Proper 28 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) As our readings at the end of the Church year turn towards the apocalyptic, we are called as a community of Christians to respond to the burning conflicts of our age with faith. | 11/18/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
186 |
CleanAdikia and Generosity | (Proper 20 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In the parable of the "dishonest" manager, Jesus holds up to us an example of how we might work out our own salvation, even with our wealth as tainted as it remains with injustice. | 9/23/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
187 |
CleanHeaven, Hell, and a God who Comes after Us | (Proper 19 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Are heaven and hell simply metaphysical abstractions or realities we can touch and feel? The visions of Jeremiah and Jesus sharing table fellowship with sinners and outcasts serve to illustrate the eternal in the present. | 9/16/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
188 |
CleanRedeeming Sabbath | (Proper 16 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The ancient tradition of keeping Sabbath needs redemption not for its own sake, but for the sake of a people caught in the excesses of our always "on" society. Nothing less than our spiritual well being and the health of Creation is at stake. | 8/26/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
189 |
CleanPleasure Leads us Where we Go | (Proper 15 - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) Christ's message to us is not simply about a nice, loving God, but a Creator closer to us than a parent, passionate beyond words about our well-being. Betsy Rosen invites us to gaze unabashedly at this spiritual reality through the lens of one of Jesus' more fiery teachings and reminds us of what God intends for the human family. | 8/19/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 190 | CleanHeavy Laden | (Proper 14 - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) Living into transformative grace is key to Christian spirituality and following after God in Christ. But this way of life inevitably calls us to to live in the gap -- to let go. Through the lens of a series of challenging readings, Este Cantor examines the timeless question: What does it mean to be truly free? | 8/12/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
191 |
CleanThe Eighth Day | (Feast of the Transfiguration - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In reflecting on completion of his first year at Church of Our Saviour, Richard Helmer looks to the opening of the Transfiguration story in Luke. Its reference to the eighth day points to the way God's glory and grace are revealed to us outside of the cycles of time. | 8/5/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
192 |
CleanThe God of the Lord's Prayer | (Proper 12 - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) God's capacity for mercy and forgiveness is reflected both in the story of Abraham pleading to God and Jesus' revealing God as an intimate parent, protector, and bringer of good gifts to our lives, even ones we don't expect. | 7/29/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
193 |
CleanSome Harry Potter Theology | (Proper 12 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Harry Potter has captured the popular imagination, drawing the ire of some Christian critics. So is the series mere "pagan" entertainment, or does it embrace the ancient themes of our Christian heritage? | 7/29/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
194 |
CleanOpen Eyes, With Wonder | (Proper 11 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) From Abraham and Sarah camping under the oaks of Mamre to Jesus at Mary and Martha's home at Bethany, we see a God offering grace for which we can offer no work in return. So why do we toil so hard? | 7/22/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
195 |
CleanInspiring the Family of God | (Memorial for Barton Warren Shackelford - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) A Christian life well lived provides inspiration for the family of God. | 7/18/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
196 |
CleanAn Ocean of Suffering by the Side of the Road | (Proper 10 - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) In exploring the parable of the Good Samaritan, we are brought back to the work of the Millennium Development Goals, as we are called to cross the road and help our neighbors in need.No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind: and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. - John Donne (from Meditation XVII) | 7/15/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
197 |
CleanFor Special Christians | (Proper 9 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The story of Elisha and Naaman reminds us that God's grace is ever available to heal and transform us, if only we will not let pride get in the way. | 7/8/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
198 |
CleanJesus and Company | (Proper 8 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In a profound sense, we are all made rootless and homeless by our baptism -- drawn as we are into a new family of God, a family with Christ at the center. | 7/1/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
199 |
CleanWhat are you Doing Here? | (Proper 7 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The stories of Elijah and the demoniac amongst the tombs illuminate the unique stories of refugees: the millions around the world who flee war, oppression, famine, and ruin. | 6/24/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
200 |
CleanTaste and See | (Proper 6 - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) Through the eyes of Sara Miles in Take this Bread and the story of the woman who washes Jesus' feet with her tears, Betsy Rosen illustrates the sometimes offensively open hospitality of God in Christ, and the radical commitment of Christianity to feed all who are hungry. | 6/17/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 201 | CleanBullet Train Theology | (Proper 5 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When a foreigner standing on a train platform in Japan, Richard Helmer reflects on how liminal space opens us to the presence of the Spirit and the transformational presence of God's grace. | 6/10/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
202 |
CleanTrinity and Baptism - Children's Sermon | (Trinity Sunday - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) Using a Godly Play Story, Este Cantor explains the Trinity to children through the tangible signs of baptism. | 6/3/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
203 |
CleanThe Mirror of the Trinity | (Trinity Sunday - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) Este Cantor explores the biblical roots of the ancient Christian understanding of the Trinity and some of the early church texts that undergird this theology. In these cases, and in contemporary ways of explaining one of the most arcane parts of the Christian faith, relationship seems to be key to better understanding the mystery of God: Creator, Redeemer, and Spirit. | 6/3/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
204 |
CleanHubris, Babel, and the Spirit | (Pentecost - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) From the Tower of Babel to the disciples on the streets of Jerusalem, God upends our notions of power and control and ushers in a new community through the gift of the Spirit. | 5/27/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
205 |
CleanThat We All May Be One | (The Seventh Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Jesus' prayer for his disciples to be one speaks to the very heart of our often divided, polemical, and fractious world, and to the heart of our divisions as Christian communities and even our own divided hearts. What we share in common is so much more important in God's universe. | 5/20/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 206 | CleanPeace I Leave with You | (The Sixth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Dr. David T. Gortner) With ascension approaching, Jesus is departing. As visiting preacher, David Gortner, Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology and CALL Director at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, reflects on how Jesus' departure marks the beginning of our new journey as God's people. | 5/13/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
207 |
CleanBeyond the Tribal Church | (The Fifth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The Good News that Peter takes back to the apostles in Jerusalem reveals that Christ is much bigger than originally thought. We are called with them beyond the boundaries that describe our shared identity as church and tribe. | 5/6/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
208 |
CleanBelieving in the Good Shepherd | (The Fourth Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When Jesus is asked to "plainly" disclose whether or not he is the Messiah, he responds with an invitation out of the narrow confines of mere belief and into the rich mystery of a holy relationship with God. | 4/29/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
209 |
CleanOur Unrecognized Creation | (The Third Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) In a worship service remembering the Earth, coinciding with Earth Day celebrations, Este Cantor reflects on the profound spirituality that connects us to God through the beauty of Creation and nature. As we move forward as a Christian community, we are called to remember the holy work of building sustainable lives in relationship with the natural world, learning to overcome our blindness to the Risen Christ in Creation before us. | 4/22/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
210 |
CleanWhat Kind of Faith will we Have? | (The Second Sunday of Easter - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In our post-Christian, scientific age, talking about Resurrection can seem indeed very strange. In this sermon, Richard Helmer explores one of the stories of the Risen Christ's appearances to his first followers, suggesting that empirical evidence may not, in fact, be at all the truth we are needing to seek, but rather another kind of truth rooted in the boundless mysteries of relationship. | 4/15/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
211 |
CleanGod Out of the Box | (Easter Sunday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Resurrection is all about a God who defies our everyday expectations, grabs our attention, and turns everything -- even death -- on its head. As an Easter People, we Christians can prepare only to be surprised, and to surprise the world with the Good News we know in the Risen Christ. | 4/8/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
212 |
CleanFrom Easter Vigil | (Easter Vigil - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The Easter Vigil is a growing tradition at Church of Our Saviour where we gather to keep vigil in the hours of Holy Week when tradition holds that the powers of death were broken by God in Christ. This podcast shares some of the reflections and readings from this year's Vigil, as offered by the people of Church of Our Saviour. In addition to scripture readings by our members, The Rev. Este Cantor offers a reflection on the creation stories of Genesis, The Rev. Betsy Rosen responds to the reading of the story of the valley of dry bones in Ezekiel, and The Rev. Richard Helmer reads the Easter Sermon of John Chrysostom. | 4/7/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
213 |
CleanWhy the Cross? | (Good Friday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The cross stands at the center of ongoing debate in Christianity. Is its work merely in our theorizing, or does it work more deeply than that in the real parts of our lives? | 4/6/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 214 | CleanWhen Grace Dons a Towel | (Maundy Thursday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Reflection textThis reflection was originally offered as a homily on Maundy Thursday, 2006 at Christ Episcopal Church -- Sei Ko Kai, San Francisco. | 4/5/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
215 |
CleanA Reflection for Palm Sunday | (Palm Sunday - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Reflection textThis reflection was offered to the congregation in writing and is posted in audio as a meditation for the beginning of Holy Week. | 4/1/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 216 | CleanThe Outrageous Anointing | (The Fifth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) The anointing woman is an image that runs not only through the four canonical gospels of Christian tradition, but other religious traditions as well. From it, we have much to learn about a generosity that is willing break taboos and the social order that can hold us back from the lavish grace of God. | 4/1/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
217 |
CleanPreparing for Contemplation | (The Fifth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) A strange and unsettling scene in Mary and Martha's home in Bethany opens us to prepare for the mysteries of Holy Week and invites us into lives that, contrary to the expectations the world presses upon us, seek contemplation and devotion rather than self-absorbed measurements of performance and productivity. | 3/25/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
218 |
CleanThe Prodigal Son | (The Fourth Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Betsy Payne Rosen) The parable of the Prodigal Son is among the most popular and beloved of Jesus' teachings, even outside of the Christian Church. With three remarkable characters, Jesus embraces the breadth of human experience and teaches his followers how God expects us to live with each other. | 3/18/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
219 |
CleanOur Constant Gardener | (The Third Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When confronted with very human questions about why bad things happen, and how is sin involved, Jesus appeals again to a parable to illustrate the patience with which God in Christ deals with all of us, seeking in us the fruits of grace. | 3/11/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
220 |
CleanInheriting the Blessing | ( The Second Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) Every first Sunday of the month, Church of Our Saviour holds a Community Sunday worship service for our children and families, including a children's homily. On this Sunday, The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor spoke about the wonder of God's promises to us, even when we are unsure they will be fulfilled. | 3/4/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
221 |
CleanThreats and Trust | (The Second Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The Anglican Communion is moving through a difficult period of conflict and threats both from within and without. When Jesus is confronted with a threat to his life and witness in a troubled world, how he responds hearkens back to the ancient faith of Abraham, and calls us to trust in a God who does not deal in threats, but rather in abiding covenant. | 3/4/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
222 |
CleanJesus in the Wilderness | (The First Sunday in Lent - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) Jesus' sojourn in the wilderness resonates with our wilderness experiences, each unique, each transformative, and each revealing our own weakness, temptations, and God's grace in response. Like Jesus, we discover in the wilderness that we ultimately rely on God's Word to sustain our lives. | 2/25/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
223 |
CleanArchbishops and Transfiguration | (The Last Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) Recent actions by some Primates of the Anglican Communion in refusing to join Eucharist with others, prompts questions about what it means to be gathered at God's Table together as a community and how we as Christians share the message of the Transfigured Christ with each other and a broken world. | 2/18/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
224 |
CleanThe Call of Tomorrow | (The Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When Jesus appears at the lakeshore seeking disciples, Peter, James, and John encounter God at work in the middle of lives they thought they already knew. When God in Christ breaks into our routine with a new call, be prepared for surprises! | 2/4/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
225 |
CleanAnglican Transformation | (The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) When Jesus is at home in Nazareth, he is confronted with the expectations of his own people. How they respond and how we respond when God in Christ does and says the unexpected says a great deal about what it means to be a people of faith, and a community yearning for transformation. | 1/28/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 226 | CleanGlobalization in the Arctic | (The Third Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Belle Mickelson) Belle Mickelson offers a sermon concerning the indigenous peoples living in a fragile, beautiful landscape above the Arctic Circle and how our hunger for resources puts them in peril.The Rev. Belle Mickelson is a newly ordained transitional deacon in the Diocese of Alaska. She has been living in Alaska for 30 years playing fiddle music, making friends, writing curriculum as a marine education professor, teaching at an alternative high school, raising her family at a bird-watching lodge, and helping out at her church. | 1/21/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
227 |
CleanWater into Wine | (The Second Sunday after the Epiphany - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In John's Gospel, Jesus performs his first miracle at the wedding in Cana. At first glance, this story of changing water into wine seems strange, if not even a bit funny. But with John, there is always deep meaning in the text, and here Christ calling us by example to change a world in need. This sermon also includes reflection on Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. | 1/14/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
228 |
CleanOver the Edge | (The Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In the annual commemoration of Jesus' baptism by John at the River Jordan, we celebrate the gift of our baptism. The Rev. Richard Helmer invites reflection about the place of water in our lives, and what it represents as a powerful spiritual symbol of life, death, and transformation. | 1/7/07 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
229 |
CleanBeginnings | (The First Sunday after Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In the prologue of the Gospel of John, we are confronted with both glorious mystery and wondrous newness through powerful images of Christ with us.The Rev. Este Cantor reflects on the astonishing life found in beginnings, the spirituality of new birth, and Jesus' presence in both. | 12/31/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
230 |
CleanWhat Child is This? | (Christmas - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) As Mary ponders this strange child born to her and Joseph, the arrival of the shepherds to worship him and all that has foretold his birth, we ponder anew the beginning that Jesus' birth brings -- the beginning of a movement that will transform the world. | 12/24/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
231 |
CleanAll Things Made New | (The Fourth Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) In looking ahead to Christmas, The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor reflects on the wonder of the incarnation -- its incredible implications for the vast universe and our particular lives -- as particular as Elizabeth's and Mary's as they rejoice with each other in God's promise that all shall be made new. | 12/24/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
232 |
CleanReady Yet? | (The Fourth Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) How do we approach Christmas when we aren't ready? The Rev. Richard E. Helmer reflects on the miracle of grace we are given, even if our preparations to receive it have fallen far short. | 12/24/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
| 233 | CleanA Prophet or Two | (The Third Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) How is that prophets always seem to get us where it hurts? In this sermon, The Rev. Richard E. Helmer explores the fiery introduction John the Baptist brings to the Gospel. | 12/17/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
234 |
CleanMetanoia and the Other | (The Second Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) We live in a fractious age, where division and isolating ourselves from those who disagree with us is both a great temptation and a spiritual danger to community. The Rev. Richard E. Helmer reflects in this sermon on John the Baptist's witness as he invites people to enter into metanoia through an encounter with radical otherness." | 12/10/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
235 |
CleanThe King of Kings | (Proper 29 - Christ the King - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) Understanding what we mean by calling Jesus "King" invites taking a close look at the witness of Jesus' life, both in the Gospel, and in the sacramental way we experience his love for us and in our actions that help set the captive free. The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor discusses John 18:33-37 in this last sermon of the church year on "Christ the King" Sunday. | 11/26/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
236 |
CleanThe Desolating Sacrilege | (Proper 28 - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) In exploring the terrifying words of Mark 13:14-23, The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor brings Jesus' teaching about forgiveness, freedom, and welcoming the stranger elsewhere into contrast with the fearful apocalypse and the notion of the "elect" that weave themes and counterthemes in the New Testament and later Christian traditions. | 11/19/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
237 |
CleanTwo Widows and our Pledge | (Proper 27 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In Mark 12:38-44, Jesus poses a challenging contrast between those who give out of their abundance and the widow who gives away everything, even the little she has. This raises questions about how we as Christians share our gifts with the Body of Christ and a world in need. The Rev. Richard E. Helmer also reflects on the story of Elijah and the widow in 1 Kings 17, inviting prayerful consideration of how we decide how much to give away to others. A written copy of this sermon may be downloaded here. | 11/12/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
238 |
CleanPlaying with Probabilities | (All Saints' Day - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) With a sermon for All Saints', The Rev. Richard E. Helmer tells a story about showing up for jury duty and finding there cause to reflect about the nature of the faith of saints. A written copy of this sermon may be downloaded here. | 11/5/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
239 |
CleanThe Healing of Bartimaeus | (Proper 25 - The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor) With Mark 10:46-52 as a backdrop, The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor reflects on the spiritual blindness that accompanies wartime, our contentious relationship as a Church with the idea of just war, and the present situation in Iraq.You may download the text of this sermon here. | 10/29/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
240 |
CleanOn Pecking Orders and Servants | (Proper 24 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) In exploring the request of James and John in Mark 10 and the imagery of the suffering servant in Isaiah 53, The Rev. Richard E. Helmer preaches about a family of owls, Japanese keigo, and our call as a Christian community of servants for a world in need.Click here to download and read the text of this sermon. | 10/22/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
|
241 |
CleanIt's all about. . . | (Proper 23 - The Rev. Richard E. Helmer) The Rev. Richard E. Helmer explores the story of Jesus and the rich man (Mark 10:17-31), our relationship with wealth, and our spiritual need to be generous.A written copy of this sermon may be downloaded here. | 10/15/06 | Free | View In iTunes |
| Total: 241 Episodes |
Listeners also subscribed to
- Episcopal Services from St. Chad's Tampa
- StChadsTampa.org
- View In iTunes
- St. John's Episcopal Church Podcast
- St. John's Episcopal Church-Columbia, SC
- View In iTunes
- St. James's Episcopal Church
- St. James's Clergy
- View In iTunes
- The Episcopal Church of the Ascension Podcast
- The Episcopal Church of the Ascension
- View In iTunes
- Free
- Category: Christianity
- Language: English
- Copyright ©2012 Church of Our Saviour, Mill Valley. All rights reserved.
