Sermons

Sermon October 14, 2018: Duty and Grace Reverend Mark Longhurst Luke 19:1-10 We’re suffering these days from a gratitude deficit. Many of us are worried and angry about the state of our country; we’re certainly not feeling grateful. If anything, we’re collectively boiling with rage. 2/3 of Americans are reporting more stress due to political Continue reading …

Sermon October 7, 2018: Ask the Animals Reverend Mark Longhurst Job 12:7-12; 39: 1-4, 26-27 It’s not right. Job did not have a serious drinking history. Job did not serious allegations hanging over him. Job, for all we know, treated women with respect. Job worshiped God, and he told the truth, so much so that Continue reading …

Sermon September 30, 2018: A House for All People Reverend Mark Longhurst Judges 56:1-8 I’d like to you a story today. It’s a story about an Empire. It’s a story of an oppressed people, and it’s a story about a culture in conflict due to ethnic, gender and sexuality, and religious identity concerns. It could Continue reading …

Sermon September 23, 2018: Hospitality and Social Crisis Reverend Mark Longhurst Judges 19:1-5, 10-21 The people of Israel, at this point in the narrative, are facing widespread social collapse. Tucked in the middle of this, even towards the peak of crisis, we stumble on this tale of hospitality, hospitality given by an immigrant to an Continue reading …

Sermon September 16, 2018: Three Visitors Reverend Mark Longhurst Genesis 18:1-8 To start off, I invite you to take a look at the picture on the bulletin’s cover. This is an icon painted by Russian Orthodox iconographer Andrei Rublev in the early 15th century. It is called, by some, the hospitality of Abraham. It’s also Continue reading …

Sermon September 9, 2018: Opening the Doors Reverend Mark Longhurst Luke 14:12-24 There I am, my freshman year at a Christian college, and I’m visiting downtown Boston for the first time. I meet a homeless man named Matthew. Matthew sleeps on the street after losing his job, and he is a person of faith and Continue reading …

Matthew 28:16-20 We know the story. Or, if we’ve been around town and church for a while, we at least know the highlights. We may know how, in 1806, five young Williams College students made their way to a Haystack to avoid a torrential downpour of rain. We know how they had a prayer meeting, Continue reading …

Romans 16:3-5 1 Corinthians 16:19 Acts 18: 1-4 Priscilla is one pioneering woman. But first, it’s important to get her name right. She’s also known, via apostle Paul’s end of letter name-dropping, as Prisca. But it’s easy to breeze through biblical thickets and simply assume that Prisca is one more man, another disciple leaving father’s Continue reading …

God is creativity. There’s something intrinsic to how God is conceived in the Bible that pulses with creativity. In the beginning God created… In the Hebrew imagination, the creative act of this God takes place first through speech. God, in Genesis 1, is a poet generating worlds. “God says, “Let there be light,” and there Continue reading …

Of the many churches founded by the Apostle Paul, none was more fractious than the gathering of troubled believers in the pagan city of Corinth. In the passage I am about to read, it’s clear that the Christians in Corinth are questioning Paul’s authority. You can almost hear the whisper campaign. “I wonder if he’s Continue reading …