Rev. Eric Anderson Sermons

Sermon: Not Any of These

March 15, 2026

1 Samuel 16:1-13
Ephesians 5:8-14

I learned something new this week. I learned about “Dark dining.” This is a restaurant where you eat with all the lights off. The idea is to focus your attention on the tastes and scents of the food. Thinking about one of these restaurants, Biblical scholar Roger Nam writes at Working Preacher, “Without the crutch of vision, textures, flavors, temperatures, and nodes of taste are enlightened. It is amazing how the deliberate restriction of sight may enhance a dining experience!”

And that, says Dr. Nam, is the way Samuel found himself approaching the task of identifying God’s chosen successor to Saul, the first King of Israel. He continues: “I wonder how much our own sight blinds us to God’s wishes, and prevents us from truly experiencing God’s intent. Perhaps the occasional experience of blindness can remind us how the gift of sight may prevent us from seeing the heart of God… 1 Samuel 16 implores us that sometimes we only need to deliberately close our eyes to see what God wants us to see.”

“[Samuel] looked on Eliab and thought, ‘Surely his anointed is now before the LORD.’ But the LORD said to Samuel, ‘Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him, for the LORD does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.’”

As you can probably tell from the beginning of the text, things were complicated in Israel. Samuel had anointed Saul as the first King of Israel possibly as little as two years before. God and Samuel hadn’t been enthusiastic about replacing the system of judges with a monarch, but the Israelites had been hard pressed by raids and military incursions from their neighbors, and the people demanded a reliable, consistent leadership. Samuel, at God’s direction, had chosen Saul. It wasn’t long, however, before Saul began to do things he wasn’t empowered to do, such as offer sacrifices, and he failed to do things he was supposed to do. Samuel confronted Saul about it and informed him that God had rejected him.

It seems from the Samuel’s concerns about his safety at the beginning of this passage, and the trembling question of the leaders of Bethlehem – “Do you come peaceably?” – that everybody knew that the King and the prophet were at odds.

What he was doing, of course, was setting up the nation for a lengthy civil war. That’s the best name for it. As you might remember, Saul and David worked as a team for several years. David even married one of Saul’s daughters. A day came, however, when the relationship fractured into open conflict. As Patricia Tull writes at Working Preacher, “Samuel secretly anoints him [David] as God’s chosen future king while Saul is still reigning, and for the next fifteen chapters, that is, most of the story, the conflict between the two kings Samuel has anointed, a conflict neither of them created, balloons from rivalry and jealousy to deadly hostility: the recognized king of Israel, who still had a following, periodically determined to destroy his hidden heir, who time after time eludes his grasp.”

King Saul: Not this one.

God guided Samuel to the sons of Jesse, a respectable resident of Bethlehem. Samuel asked to meet the young men one at a time, or at least the authors presented it as something of a parade, with each one “passing by” in turn. The first was the eldest, Eliab, and Samuel thought he looked like a likely candidate for king: tall and good looking. God chimed in, however, to say, “I have rejected him, for the LORD does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.”

If God told Samuel what was in the heart that disqualified Eliab, the story doesn’t say. We only know that Eliab got angry at David later on for asking an embarrassing question – which is, I’m afraid, the usual fate of younger siblings who ask questions that embarrass their older siblings. Was that it?

My guess is, probably not.

Eliab: Not this one.

Then son number two: Abinadab. And: Not this one.

Son number three: Shammah. Not this one.

After that the storytellers ran out of names, because four more young men were run by the prophet, and four more young men were rejected.

Not any of these.

But now Samuel was out of candidates.

It turns out there was one more, one whose utility as a shepherd outweighed the prophet’s request to meet all Jesse’s sons. That was David, of course. You’ve heard the story read, and you’ve heard it before. God told Samuel, “This is the one.”

Not any of these.

This one.

Why?

That’s the crucial question, isn’t it? We don’t know what God saw in the heart of Eliab or the other six brothers that disqualified them. We also don’t know what God saw in the heart of David to qualify him. What made him a good potential king? What made the others less good – we don’t actually know they’d have been bad – what made them less suitable candidates than the youngest of Jesse’s sons?

The closest we can come is to look at what David did after his anointing. What qualities did he show? What did his behavior say about what was in his heart?

The first virtue, I have to say, was compassion. The very next story, wrapping up this chapter, tells how David became a member of King Saul’s entourage. Saul suffered from some kind of mental health ailment, described as “an evil spirit.” Music soothed him, and the musician was David.

The story told in the next chapter of First Samuel is David and Goliath. There are a lot of things you can learn about David in that, but the first and foremost is that he was brave. There are a lot of ways to show courage. David displayed many of them.

Another virtue David displayed repeatedly was loyalty. His friendship with Saul’s son Jonathan is iconic. The two maintained a relationship even when King Saul sought David’s life. Further, David, even as a rebel, remained oddly loyal to Saul himself. There are two stories of David having the opportunity to kill King Saul, and refusing to “raise his hand against the LORD’s anointed.”

Finally, David showed a quality that Saul so lacked that it was what provoked God and Samuel to anoint him in the first place. David displayed a trust in God and a humility before God that clearly separated him from his predecessor. Saul assumed that his status as king gave him priestly powers. David routinely asked God about the things he should do. His relationship with God governed his decisions far more than Saul. David’s relationship with God was further recorded in the psalms he wrote. They reveal a trust and faith that even the storytellers of First Samuel could not fully describe.

What David did not possess, the virtue of the heart that God did not discern, was perfection. It would be nice if he had, because the stories of his reign would be different. But it’s also a relief, isn’t it? God isn’t looking for people who make no mistakes. God is looking for people who are brave, but not always. God is looking for people who care, but not for people who always know exactly what to do. God is looking for people who trust in God, but not people whose faith never falters.

God knows that people are people. God knows that people will fail from time to time.

What God wants is people who try, and try again, and try again.

What God also wants is for people not to be in positions where they cannot or will not fulfill their responsibilities. God wants the inclinations of the heart to be consistent with the roles they’re called to play. Those inclinations may change – that seems to have happened with Saul – but if they’re preventing someone from fulfilling their kuleana, it’s time to move on.

You and I might envy God that ability to see into the heart, but I’ll remind you that we are not so ignorant. In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, the poet Maya Angelou said, “My dear, when people show you who they are, why don’t you believe them? Why must you be shown 29 times before you can see who they really are? Why can’t you get it the first time?”

May we be visible as people of good hearts the first time and the twenty-nine times after that. When God looks into us, may we not hear: “Not any of these.”

Amen.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Sermon

Pastor Eric makes changes from his prepared text while he preaches. The sermon you just read is not precisely as he delivered it.

The image is David Anointed King by Samuel, Dura Europos synagogue painting (3rd cent.), reworked by Marsyas. Yale Gilman collection, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5107843.

Rev. Eric Anderson Sermons

Sermon: Refreshment

March 8, 2026

Exodus 17:1-7
John 4:5-42

The best drink of water I’ve ever had in my life came from Thoreau Spring, a little pool of fresh water about 4600 feet up the slopes of Mount Katahdin, the highest mountain in Maine. I was fifteen, taking part in a week long hiking trip in Baxter State Park with our church youth group. We’d had a rough day. We’d taken the wrong trail early in the day, and although we would end up where we intended to go, we were taking the long way across one of the shoulders of the mountain, which we hadn’t meant to do. We’d also misplaced one of our adult advisors, who we caught up with at our destination.

So there I was with a few other young people at the front of the pack as the afternoon was waning. We spotted the sign for the spring and turned off to it, even though we all had plenty of water in our water bottles. We fetched out our cups, dipped them into the water, and sipped.

It was heavenly.

We couldn’t stay long, because our other adult advisor called to us to keep going so we wouldn’t be hiking in the dark. It was a near thing. The sun had just set when the last of us arrived at camp. I’ve never regretted that stop or that sip, though. I’ve been thirstier. I’ve been hungrier. I can’t remember ever being more refreshed.

Jesus asked for a drink of water.

He asked it of a Samaritan woman, who was quite surprised to be asked. That might have been in part because of her gender, but it was in great part because he was Jewish and she was Samaritan. Samaritans and Jews shared a common heritage. Jews were descended from the citizens of the nation of Judah, with its capital at Jerusalem, ruled over by the descendants of King David until the Babylonian invasion about 580 years before Jesus’ birth. Samaritans were descended from the citizens of the nation of Israel, with its capital at Samaria, north of Jerusalem. Israel broke away from Judah after the death of Solomon and endured until the Assyrian invasion about 740 years before Jesus’ birth. Though the nation vanished, the people remained. Jews and Samaritans shared a belief in God; reliance on the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy; and even a belief in a coming Messiah.

As Sherri Brown writes at Working Preacher, “Although sharing the same founding history, they currently shared nothing else, including food, drink, or utensils..” I’d add one thing. They shared a deep resentment of the other.

Jesus asked for a drink. He asked to be refreshed by a person who, by usual expectation, couldn’t be expected to refresh him.

Jesus and this woman – John didn’t record her name, but she’s listed as a saint by the Eastern Orthodox church with the name “Photini,” which means “Enlightened One” – then had the longest conversation recorded between Jesus and any person in the four Gospels. It’s longer than the one Jesus had with Nicodemus in the previous chapter, one which, you might recall, leaves you wondering whether Nicodemus managed to catch up with Jesus or not. Personally, I think he did, but I think John left it vague on purpose.

In this conversation, however, Jesus got as clear as he ever got. This chapter includes the first of Jesus’ “I am” statements in John. You probably remember the others: “I am the bread of life.” “I am the light of the world.” “I am the good shepherd.” “I am the resurrection and the life.”

The “I am” statement here came in reply to Photini’s statement, “I know that Messiah is coming.” Jesus said, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.”

In the rest of the Gospel of John people argued about whether Jesus was the Messiah. Here in chapter four, Jesus told a Samaritan woman that he was. It’s a stunning moment, and so easy to miss.

Debie Thomas writes at JourneyWithJesus.net, “As theologian Barbara Brown Taylor points out, Jesus’s dialogue with the woman at the well is his longest recorded conversation in the New Testament.  He talks to the Samaritan woman longer than he talks to his twelve disciples, or to his accusers, or even to his own family members.  Moreover, she is the first person (and the first ethnic/religious outsider) to whom Jesus reveals his identity in John’s Gospel.  And — this might be the most compelling fact of all  — she is the first believer in any of the Gospels to straightaway become an evangelist, and bring her entire city to a saving knowledge of Jesus.”

Jesus asked for refreshment of the body.

The woman – I’ll keep calling her Photini, why not? – asked for something else pretty early in their conversation. She immediately brought up the religious significance of the well, which was attributed to Jacob, grandson of Abraham. When Jesus’ knowledge of her background revealed his power as a prophet, she immediately began to question him about theology. Yes, theology. She was less concerned with literal flowing water to ease her daily burden than she was about the appropriate worship of God.

Photini asked for refreshment of the spirit.

Oddly enough, it’s not clear whether Jesus got his requested refreshment of the body. It’s abundantly clear that Photini got her refreshment of the spirit.

“God is spirit,” Jesus told her, “and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

She left her water jar and went to fetch her neighbors.

As several commentators have noted, Jesus made no judgements about her. He simply spoke with her. He answered her questions, rapidly steering the conversation from day-to-day matters to spiritual topics. She followed him there, and I’d have to say she did it eagerly. The Orthodox have it right. She earned the name Photini, Enlightened One.

Jesus refreshed her spirit.

At the same time, Photini refreshed Jesus’ spirit. That eagerness, that engagement, that enlightenment nourished Jesus even more than the water. He told his disciples so when they urged him to eat something: “I have food to eat that you do not know about.”

She refreshed Jesus’ spirit.

That drink of water from Thoreau Spring high on a mountain decades ago refreshed me body and soul. That’s why I’ve never forgotten it. Photini refreshed Jesus in body and soul as well – I think I’ve got to assume she gave him a drink of water. That’s why we’ve never forgotten her. She went on to refresh her friends and family and neighbors. She invited them to seek even more refreshment in Jesus – and they found it.

As they did, they refreshed Jesus as well.

Refreshment sounds… trivial, doesn’t it? What do we get at refreshment stands? Ice cream. Candy. Snacks. The nourishment that some would tell us we don’t need.

The word “refreshment” is bigger than that, however, and the reality of refreshment is more necessary than that. Our bodies and our souls cry out for refreshment when they need something. Our stomachs rumble with hunger. Our mouths gasp for air with exertion. Our tongues dry up with thirst. Our spirits falter when there’s confusion, or deception, or abuse. When we meet our needs, we feel refreshed.

I think that makes refreshment a basic activity of the Christian life. It starts by making sure that I am refreshed in my body and in my soul. It starts by satisfying my actual needs for food and drink and shelter. It continues by meeting my actual spiritual needs through prayer and study and reflection and companionship in the journey. The first task of any Christian is to seek refreshment themselves.

Further, though, and it’s not much further because it’s the next thing, Christians refresh others. We refresh those who are near and dear, and we refresh those who are far and feared. A Samaritan woman refreshed Jesus, and he refreshed her and lots of other Samaritans. “Love your enemies,” Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount. What is love for another but the willingness and the commitment to keep them refreshed?

The notion that Jesus, of all people, would ever summon his followers to holy war has always been the vilest of heresies. It’s false. It slanders Christ. Those who proclaim it may believe it, but they lie.

Refreshment is the way of Jesus. Refreshment for those around, and refreshment for those who seem like the other or the enemy. Refreshment for a world thirsting for compassion and renewal. Refreshment for our bodies and souls, for yours and for mine.

Refreshment with Jesus himself.

Amen.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Sermon

Pastor Eric makes changes as he preaches, so the prepared text does not precisely match the sermon as delivered.

The image is Jesus and the Samaritan Woman, from JESUS MAFA, Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=48282 [retrieved March 8, 2026]. Original source: http://www.librairie-emmanuel.fr (contact page: https://www.librairie-emmanuel.fr/contact).

Rev. Eric Anderson Pastor's Corner, What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: Dream

Joseph had a dream, and it changed what he did, and what he did changed things for Mary and Jesus, and what they all did changed the world. What is your dream?

Here’s a transcript:

The service for the Fourth Sunday of advent the Church of the Holy Cross will feature the Christmas pageant performed by our young people. I’m not thinking about this week’s Scripture with the idea that it will become a sermon, but I am still thinking about the first chapter of Matthew (Matthew 1:18-25).

Luke described the circumstances of Jesus birth; Matthew didn’t. Matthew, however, talked about one of the real difficult moments in that series of events: because when Joseph discovered that Mary was pregnant, he determined to set her aside: quietly, so that she wouldn’t be shamed any more than she already was.

Then he had a dream, and in that dream an angel assured him that she was with child by the Holy Spirit, that this child would be the Messiah, and that he would be the one who would be called Immanuel, God with us.

You’ve got to have a dream.

That’s an old song from a musical, but it’s also true. Dreams change things when we set out to put those dreams into reality.

Joseph might have shrugged it off — I’m not sure how you shrug off the words of an angel whether in waking life or in dream life — but he could have. Mary could have had her child, the Messiah, all alone, cut off from family and friends. But Joseph had a dream, and Joseph’s dream meant that he had a role to play, and that was a supportive partner to those who were taking the lead roles: to Mary the mother who would carry and then comfort the newborn child, to Jesus himself, Jesus who would eventually carry everything including the cross, that Jesus had done so because Joseph had a dream and set out to live that dream.

What is your dream? Is it a dream of love and care and support? Is it a dream that overcomes your prejudices? Is it a dream that leads towards life becoming better, not just for you, not just for your family, but for all those around you and those perhaps on the far side of the world?

Dreams change life. Have a dream and live it.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.

Rev. Eric Anderson Pastor's Corner, What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: Good News

When John asked Jesus if he were the they’d been waiting for, Jesus took the opportunity to define what a Messiah was, and to invite everyone into thee Realm of God.

Here’s a transcript:

For this third Sunday of Advent, I’m thinking about the eleventh chapter of Matthew’s Gospel (Matthew 11:2-11). If this seems a little far along in the book to be describing things that happened before Jesus’ birth, well, it is.

John the Baptist, who had baptized Jesus, had been arrested and was being held in prison by King Herod. He sent messengers to Jesus to ask him if he was the one who had been promised, or should they wait for another? Jesus said to the messengers, go and tell John what you see and hear: the people are being healed, the dead are being raised, the poor hear good news.

The messengers left, and hopefully that message brought John some comfort and reassurance.

Jesus then turned to the crowd and asked them why they had gone out to see John the Baptist in the first place? Did they go to hear a reed that was being blown by the wind? Did they go to see somebody in great clothing?

No. They went to hear a prophet. And yet, said Jesus, the least in the realm of God is greater than John the Baptist.

Well, that’s a lot, isn’t it?

In this message, Jesus defined for us what he meant an Anointed One, a Messiah, to be: a healer, a teacher, someone who restored people to life, someone who restored people to the full care of their communities. But Jesus also defined what it is to be a prophet. A prophet is one who tells the truth despite discomfort, despite oppression.

But Jesus also said it is God’s grace, the grace that brings us into the realm of God, that surpasses everything. God’s grace made John a prophet. God’s grace makes each and every one of us a citizen of God’s realm.

As we approach this season of Christmas, as we prepare to rejoice once more in the gift of Jesus Christ, let us rejoice as well that we have been included in that same realm of God as John the Baptist, that we share it with that great prophet and with so many other saints over time.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.

Rev. Eric Anderson Pastor's Corner, What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: Peaceable Kingdom

Isaiah’s vision of an utterly peaceful world began with wisdom, compassion, righteousness, and peace. May we move toward it this Advent season.

Here’s a transcript:

I’m thinking about the eleventh chapter of the prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 11:1-10). This coming Sunday is the second Sunday of Advent. The theme is peace, so it is entirely appropriate that the Isaiah reading is one of his accounts of the Peaceable Kingdom.

The wolf and the lamb lying down together. The lion eating straw like the ox. “And a little child shall lead them.”

Not surprisingly, Isaiah started with a description of what leadership would look like: that a shoot would emerge from the stump of Jesse, and that this new monarch would rule in a new and different way, with wisdom, with righteousness, with the fear of the Lord – that kind of reverent respect that, well, is frankly very uncommon amongst leaders of nations, now isn’t it?

The foundation of peace for the natural world, Isaiah said, was peace within the human world.

I can’t say that that is obviously true. If human beings ceased to make war upon one another, if human beings ceased to commit crimes against one another, if human beings abandoned violence forever, I’m afraid there would still be hunting in the forests and in the seas – at least until God changes the world. Nevertheless, Isaiah was absolutely right to seek out that first part of the vision rooted in peace amongst human beings. Because even if we can’t directly affect the peace of the rest of Creation, we can make peace amongst ourselves. We can choose wisdom over folly. We can choose compassion over violence. We can choose peace.

All too frequently, we choose folly. We choose violence. we choose war. All too rarely, we choose wisdom. We choose compassion. We choose peace.

In this Advent season, may we take a step, even a fraction of a step, towards Isaiah’s vision. Let us choose wisdom, righteousness, compassion, and peace.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below; I’d love to hear from you.

Rev. Eric Anderson Pastor's Corner, Sermons

Sermon: Righteous Shepherd

November 23, 2025

Jeremiah 23:1-6
Luke 23:33-43

Ancient Israel had a somewhat romantic view of shepherds. They pictured themselves as herding people rather than farming people, people of the hillsides rather than the plains. They ignored lots of the gritty details of shepherding, including the long hours, low pay, and lengthy list of discomforts. Rather they praised the virtues of the shepherd, including attentiveness, diligence, bravery, and self-sacrifice.

Over and over again in the writings of the Old Testament, the Hebrew writers compared their monarchs to shepherds. In that best remembered psalm, the one-time shepherd who became a monarch compared a shepherd to God.

Both the psalmists and the prophets urged the nations’ leaders to emulate the virtues of the shepherd, to keep the people together, to attend to their needs, and to protect them from outside dangers. The Scriptural record says that on some occasions they were successful. A few of the kings of Israel and Judah received the praise of the prophets themselves and, later, the ones who wrote the histories of the Bible. But most of the time, both prophets and historians sounded more like Jeremiah here, who most likely had the last king of Judah, Zedekiah, in mind when he wrote, “Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the LORD. Therefore thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock and drive them away, and you have not attended to them.”

I’m afraid it’s not unusual in human societies that people call upon their leaders to emulate the virtues of the shepherd and, instead, find themselves afflicted with the gritty realities of sheep herding: long hours, low pay, and a lengthy list of discomforts. In the meantime, the leaders live large.

It’s an old, old story.

Jeremiah lived that old, old story even as he told it so frankly and so boldly. The “righteous branch” from David’s line translates the Hebrew “Tzemach Tzedek,” an ironic reflection on the king’s name, “Tzedekiya,” or “the LORD is my righteousness.” Essentially, Jeremiah said that God was not the king’s righteousness, and another branch from David’s family tree would do much better, thank you very much.

Around six hundred years later, Jesus excited a lot of interest, a lot of speculation, and a lot of comment as he moved through Galilee and Judea. Jews had come to long for, even expect Jeremiah’s “righteous branch,” an “anointed one,” or “mesiach,” which we tend to pronounce “Messiah.” This would be someone to free them from the foreign rule of Rome and to clear the greatly disliked descendants of Herod the Great from their thrones. This would be a new monarch who would fulfill the yearnings of the centuries for a ruler who would display the virtues of the shepherd: attentiveness, diligence, bravery, and self-sacrifice.

But maybe not as much self-sacrifice as Luke described in chapter 23. As Debra J. Mumford writes at Working Preacher, “If Jesus was true royalty, he would not have been crucified on a cross. Secondly, even if Jesus somehow ended up on a cross, as a person with authority in those days, He would have had the power and influence to secure his own deliverance. So, they likely mocked Jesus because it was obvious to them that Jesus could not have been the person some claimed him to be.”

I really can’t overstate this. Kings didn’t get crucified. Saviors didn’t submit to a cross. Messiahs didn’t get executed by the ones they were supposed to overthrow.

The center of the Christian Gospel is that this time, that’s exactly what happened. The center of the Christian Gospel is that a crucified Messiah is exactly what we need. The center of the Christian Gospel is that even death cannot overthrow the righteous shepherd.

The prophets and the psalmists called for a monarch who would demonstrate the virtues of a shepherd for centuries. Even they, I’m sure, would have stood agog, even aghast, to see Jesus take that call to a cross.

What we have in Christianity is a monarch who sets aside the privileges of a king for the virtues of a shepherd.

We’ve spent the last two millennia trying to come to terms with that.

As Alyce McKenzie writes in her blog:

How can a crucified king bring us life? How can a forgiving king right the wrongs done to us and that we have done to others?

How can a peaceful king end the wars that rage within us and around us?

How can a compassionate king find the strength to lead us?

The result, I’m afraid, has been history in which Christian leaders imitated the rulers Jeremiah criticized so harshly more than they emulated Jesus. Contemporary American Christian Nationalism would look comfortably familiar to those who ordered the destruction of the Cathars in the 14th century, or authorized the Doctrine of Discovery in the 15th century, or launched the wars between Protestants and Catholics that afflicted the people of Europe for hundreds of years.

Jesus’ crucifixion forces us to ask who he is, as Emerson Powery writes at Working Preacher. “What kind of king will he be? Posing the question in this way is really another way of asking a more personal question: what kind of church should we be?”

Will we imitate Jesus, or imitate those who crucified him?

This congregation is not, I believe, filled with people in positions of power. We are not the movers and the shakers of the time. We are, however, moving and shaking within our own circles.

First, who are we moving and shaking for?

We need to move and shake for ourselves to some degree. Eating is a good thing. Housing is a good thing. And despite the mythology about people who do nothing and live large that is so widespread in the United States, the only people who live in comfort without working live in mansions. Most people do the job of a living wage, but they’ve also got to advocate for a living wage or they may not get one. As I keep saying, this nation believes in the value of hard work right up until it’s time to pay for it.

I’d argue, however, that if we’re only moving and shaking for ourselves, we’re subject to the same criticisms Jeremiah made of those ancient monarchs.

Even if we’re moving and shaking for our families, that’s still not enough, is it? Those ancient monarchs did what they could to see that their children inherited the power and the privilege that they did – sometimes they did it well, and sometimes they didn’t. But while they focused their attention on the welfare of their own family, what happened to the country? What happened to the people they were supposed to care for?

“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture,” says the LORD.

Is it enough to include our friends in our care and concern? Or at least those among our neighbors who think right, act right, do right? A “coalition of the willing,” if you like. Well. Perhaps. It’s pretty good. You can build a community that way. But is it enough?

No. Not according to Jesus.

Cheryl Lindsay writes at UCC.org, “From the Incarnation at his birth to this moment of humiliation on the cross, Jesus has demonstrated that the kindom of God does not reflect the dominance-driven kingdoms of this world. Strength does not come from exerting one’s power against the powerless or stripping power and authority from enemies. The power of the Spirit enables us to love our enemies and to share power and other resources for the good of all.”

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

Jesus did his moving and shaking for the entire realm of God.

He also showed us how. Not, as Rev. Lindsay wrote, by exerting brute power over enemies. That’s the way of the monarchs, not the shepherds. Instead, it’s with forgiveness. Mercy. Sharing. Love.

That’s what a righteous shepherd looks like.

Debie Thomas writes at JourneyWithJesus.net, “If there is any moment in the Christian calendar that must smack all smugness out of us — all arrogance, all self-righteousness, all contempt — this one has to be it. Our king was a dead man walking. His chosen path to glory was the cross. If paradise was anywhere, it was with him, only and exactly where his oppressors left him to die: Today. With Me. Paradise.”

That is Christ’s gift to us: Today. With me. Paradise. It is also Christ’s challenge to us that we imitate the righteous shepherd, not the unrighteous monarch, and extend to others that same gift:

Today. With me. Paradise.

Amen.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Sermon

Pastor Eric makes changes to his prepared text while preaching, sometimes accidentally, and sometimes deliberately. What you read and what you heard will not precisely match.

The image is Christ and the Robber (1893) by Nikolai Ge, 1831-1894, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=59662 [retrieved November 23, 2025]. Original source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ge_ChristandRobber.jpg.
Rev. Eric Anderson Sermons

Sermon: An Example to Imitate

November 16, 2025

Isaiah 65:17-25
2 Thessalonians 3:6-13

In some circles, 2 Thessalonians 3:10 is a very popular verse. “For even when we were with you, we gave you this command: anyone unwilling to work should not eat.” I think it’s safe to say that it supports a worldview in which activity, effort, and industry are valued. It contributes to the idea of the Protestant work ethic, which says that labor itself is a Good Thing.

In some other circles, 2 Thessalonians 3:10 is a very problematic verse. Folks in these circles ask about those who, for one reason or another, can’t work. They speak of factors like health or available employment. They may also raise the virtues of generosity and sharing. Jesus, they observe, didn’t ask any of the five thousand to do some work before he fed them on a Galilean hillside.

So which is it? Eat only through work? Or should everyone eat?

Frank L. Crouch writes at Working Preacher, “In scripture, the question of how we justly distribute food and other resources within our communities lies on a continuum, with this statement from Paul on one end: ‘Anyone unwilling to work should not eat,’ and a statement from Jesus on the other end, ‘Give to everyone who begs from you [Greek “aitéo”: asks, requests, pleads for, demands], and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you’ (Matthew 5:40-42). Or, from the Old Testament, in Deuteronomy, ‘Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land” (Deuteronomy 15:11).’”

So… it’s both.

I could end the sermon right here, but I’m not sure any of us would be impressed with the amount of work that took.

It’s probably not what Paul had in mind, either.

The Greek word Paul used that the NRSV translated as “idle” has other meanings as well. As Jennifer S. Wyant notes at Working Preacher, “Outside of the New Testament, this word means ‘disorderly or irresponsibly’ and is often found within the context of battle imagery, of men not being ready at their post or ready for the fight ahead because of their disorder.” That fits with the description of “busybodies” in verse 11. The people Paul criticized weren’t just relying on other people to support them. They were disrupting the church community at the same time.

So who were they?

As I thought about it, I came right up against the fact that very few people in the first century could eat without work. According to a 2017 article by J. W. Hanson and S. G. Ortman (1), between three-quarters and four-fifths of the population of the Roman Empire lived in the rural country. In other words, they worked farms, or possibly in quarries or mines. There was very little question of working or not working on a farm. As anyone with a garden knows, let alone a farm, getting the plants you want to grow without having the plants you don’t want to grow growing with them requires continuous labor.

Thessalonica, of course, was a city. It had a port that provided trade connections for a significant area of Macedonia. That meant a higher proportion of skilled workers, of financial supports, and of simply more wealthy people. Still, it’s worth remembering that most of the residents of the city would have been quite poor by our standards. According to Sarah E. Bond, a good number of them, based on the archaeology of Pompeii, were probably slaves, perhaps up to a fifth.

So who, I wondered, could be eating without work? It wouldn’t have been the slaves. It wouldn’t have been the poor laborers. It wouldn’t have been the bakers or blacksmiths or builders. Who could it be?

The clue was in what Paul wrote just before this verse about working and eating. “…We were not irresponsible when we were with you, and we did not eat anyone’s bread without paying for it, but with toil and labor we worked night and day so that we might not burden any of you. This was not because we do not have that right but in order to give you an example to imitate.”

Who gets fed by a religious community? Who might have the right to be fed by a religious community? Religious leaders. Yep. Folks like… me.

Well. That’s awkward, isn’t it? Especially just a couple weeks after you passed a budget that will feed me for the next year. Especially in a year when I took three months off to be an idle busybody. Yeah. That’s awkward.

Paul was the apostle of the new Christian communities of Greece. And he had a fundamental notion of what was important in these new Christian communities. It was, first and foremost, trust in salvation through Jesus. A close second was the welfare of these new Christian communities. “Let all things be done for building up,” he told the Corinthians (1 Cor. 14:26). “Each of us must please our neighbor for the good purpose of building up the neighbor,” he wrote the church in Rome (Rom. 15:2). “Let no evil talk come out of your mouths but only what is good for building up,” he said to the Ephesians (Eph. 4:29). And he wrote, “Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed you are doing,” in a previous letter to the Thessalonians (1 Thess. 5:11).

He did his level best, he said, to give them an example of building up. Bring the gospel as a gift, and don’t make the recipients “pay” for it. It might be appropriate to be supported in that way – Paul says it would have been, but he didn’t take advantage of it. He chose not to take advantage.

In contrast, others seemed willing to take advantage of their positions of leadership. “It is not that they are simply lazy, or heaven forbid, unable to work,” writes Mariam Karnell at Working Preacher. “These people are able to work, but use that ability to create chaos in the community. As such, they directly contradict the example of the apostles who by status would not have had to work but did anyway. This passage has nothing to do with whether a social welfare should be in place to catch the helpless in society; this is entirely concerned with those who should and can work but refuse and instead direct their energies to causing chaos in the community. This day and age when it is entirely possible, and disturbingly common, to work full time — or more than full time — and still not earn a living wage, Christians need to be profoundly careful with our rhetoric about those who depend on welfare for survival. We should be fighting for justice and help for those in that position, rather than carelessly branding people with this passage.”

As I said right at the start, plenty of people have chosen to brand people with this passage. So let’s take a quick look at who gets support through the Federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, in Hawai’i. Well, it’s a large number. According to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, in 2024, 161,600 Hawai’i residents received SNAP benefits, 1 in 9. That’s a lot. It’s actually lower than the figure in the United States as a whole, where it’s 1 in 8. Over half of SNAP participants are in families with children. 35% are in working families. 37% are in households which include kupuna or disabled adults.

While I’m sure they’re in there somewhere, that doesn’t sound like an overwhelming number of lazy busybodies.

The average monthly benefit per person in 2024 was $378. That will buy just short of 19 large pizzas. Cheese pizzas, no other toppings. Not including delivery. I guess that would feed me; a pizza every other day for 30 days. It’s not extravagant, though, is it?

And why are a third of Hawai’i’s SNAP recipients in families where somebody is employed? Because they’re not being paid enough to cover housing and their other bills and buy food. Our food aid programs aren’t subsidizing lazy people. They’re enabling large companies to pay their employees less than it costs to live.

What builds up our community, both within the church and in the wider society? What makes us stronger? What makes us wiser? What makes us more gracious?

I don’t think Paul or Jesus would say that hungry neighbors contribute to a healthy community. I don’t think they’d say that rigid lack of empathy or outright cruelty make us a more blessed island. I don’t think they’d say that those who are already struggling to survive should starve if they can’t persuade someone to pay them a living wage.

I do think they’d call upon those in positions like mine, or in some place that you might occupy, to demonstrate the work of Christ: compassion, support, encouragement, and yes: food.

That, I’d say, is an example to follow.

Amen.

by Eric Anderson

(1) Hanson, J. W.; Ortman, S. G. (2017). “A Systematic Method for Estimating the Populations of Greek and Roman Settlements”. Journal of Roman Archaeology. 30: 301–324

Watch the Recorded Sermon

Pastor Eric makes changes while preaching, so the recording does not precisely match the prepared sermon text.

The image is Saint Paul Writing His Epistles by Valentin de Boulogne (ca. 1618-1620) – Blaffer Foundation Collection, Houston, TX, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=596565.

Rev. Eric Anderson Pastor's Corner, Sermons

Sermon: Shaken and Reshaken

November 9, 2025

Haggai 2:1-9
2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17

In the first century in which the Apostle Paul lived, Christianity was very new. It wasn’t always clear how it was supposed to work. Its best-known leaders didn’t always agree.

Then there were the basic problems of living in the first century. Most people were poor, very few people were middle class, and far fewer people were rich. “Give us this day our daily bread” was a heartfelt prayer for most people. Injury and illness could be much more dangerous than they are for us. Without antibiotics any infection could overwhelm a body’s ability to survive and recover.

And then, there were the problems of becoming a Christian. It was a new faith, unfamiliar to most people. As an offshoot of Judaism, it would appeal to some Jews, but concern others who worried that their faith was being corrupted. Paul himself had been on both sides of that argument. Far more people, however, would have followed the religious traditions of Greece, Rome, or Egypt, and found Christianity unfamiliar, unsettling, and even threatening.

In Thessalonica, it seems that the Christian community had suffered a lot of pressure from those around them. That’s why Paul wrote. In First Thessalonians, Paul wrote, “For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea, for you suffered the same things from your own compatriots as they did…” (1 Thess. 2:14). We don’t know what the source of the persecution was. It might have been the pressures of prejudice from those around them. They might have been overcharged or refused service in shops. They might have faced taunts in the street. They might even have suffered assault and injury.

Or there might have been official suppression of the Christian community. They might have been “moved aside,” or arrested, tried, and punished for not following the customs of Rome. And, of course, there might have been both. Taunts in the streets leading to provocations and assaults, which were followed up by arrest, appearance before the magistrates, and further punishment.

That happens to marginalized people. In a lot of places. In a lot of time periods.

Whatever was happening, it concerned Paul, who had been instrumental in founding the church in Thessalonica. He feared that the suffering would drive people away from the church, and away from the faith itself. “I was afraid that somehow the tempter had tempted you and that our labor had been in vain,” he wrote in First Thessalonians. “But Timothy has just now come to us from you and has brought us the good news of your faith and love” (1 Thess. 3:5-6).

They had held on. They had not been shaken.

Shaking is a frequent part of the life of faith. Or rather, getting shaken. It was the situation of Jesus’ friends and followers. Jesus kept shaking their expectations. It was the situation hundreds of years before when the exiles who returned from Babylon to Jerusalem found that they had more work before them to rebuild God’s Temple than they’d anticipated. They’d been shaken. Haggai reminded them that God shakes the world.

The Thessalonians had been shaken by their persecution. They had been shaken, but they had not fallen.

Paul feared, however, that they might fall to something else, something that you and I don’t fear quite so much. “…We beg you, brothers and sisters, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as though from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord is already here.”

Why would he fear that? Because the Thessalonians wanted it to be there.

I don’t blame them.

There has been more than one occasion in my life where I have thrown my hands into the air and said something like, “Come, Lord Jesus!” What I meant was: I was ready for the Second Coming. I’d seen or felt too much pain. I’d seen or felt too much oppression. I’d seen or felt too much, and it was time for it to come to an end. Let history close. Let the new sunrise dawn. I was ready for not just a change, but The Change.

So far, to be clear, that hasn’t happened.

The Thessalonians, I suspect, were drawn to predictions of the end, of Jesus’ imminent return, because they had suffered. They’d suffered more than they wanted. They’d suffered more than what was just. They’d suffered more than they thought they could bear. “Come, Lord Jesus!” was a cry to end the suffering. It was a cry to have mercy.

Mariam Kamell writes at Working Preacher, “For some churches and preachers, it becomes a fascination bordering on an obsession, but the teaching of ‘escape’ through the rapture leaves people paralyzed about how they ought to live in the world now while they wait. In a sense, life can become a mere holding cell, a waiting pattern till they can escape and go to heaven. But Paul’s focus is to remind them instead of all the things that need to happen first, so they ought to trust God and continue on doing good rather than obsessing about the end.”

My guess is that you are not likely to be obsessing about the end of time, or the end of history, or the end of the world as we know it. I would further guess, however, that something has happened in your life, perhaps recently, perhaps some time ago, where you’ve asked, “When is this going to end? I’m tired of being shaken. I’m weary of being reshaken.”

When is this going to end?

I remember feeling like that about the Puna eruption in 2018. I remember feeling like that about Hurricane Lane that same year, which settled off the southwestern coast and dumped heavy rain on us for three solid days. I remember feeling like that during uncertain times of my career as a minister, during health crises in the family, during the breakup of my marriage.

When is this going to end?

The Thessalonians wanted to know. They wanted to read things in their time as signs of the end. They wanted the suffering to be over.

Paul, however, couldn’t reassure them that way. One of the characteristics of first century apocalyptic literature – a format in which contemporary events were criticized by declaring how they’d be judged at the end of time – is that the meaningful signs are things people could have seen. And in fact, during our Bible Study on Wednesday, one of the group read, “He opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, declaring himself to be God,” and gave that person a name. I would guess you could give such a person a name. I would also guess that we wouldn’t all give that person the same name.

Right?

Paul couldn’t tell them that Jesus was about to return and that their suffering would end. What he could do was commend them for their faithfulness and urge them to hold on. “Stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by our letter.”

“Paul’s point,” writes Nijay Gupta at Working Preacher, “is not to sketch out a full timeline of eschatological events. His point is that some big things are yet to happen, and there is really nothing we can do to stop them (unlike issues of political strife and economic turmoil, matters that we certainly can and must address).”

Paul’s point was to say, I hear you. I ache for you. I am proud of you. I pray for you. My heart is with you.

“My thoughts and prayers are with them,” has, all too often, substituted for real help in our day. Properly, thoughts and prayers should be coupled with concrete action. We have our limits, however. We can’t do all we want to do, like the ‘apapane who can’t find another flower for a hungry i’iwi, or when a loved one’s illness brings pain I can’t relieve, when the world around has problems I can’t address.

This week Mary Luti quoted the late Pope Francis in a UCC Daily Devotional. He said, “The world needs to weep. The marginalized weep, the scorned weep, the sick and dying weep, but we who have what we need, we who are privileged, we don’t know how. We must learn. There are realities in this life you can see only with eyes clarified by tears. If you don’t learn to weep, you can’t be a good Christian.”

Paul wrote, my heart is with you. My prayers are with you. My tears are with you.

Let’s be with one another. Let’s be aware that God is with us.

Amen.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Sermon

Pastor Eric writes his sermons ahead of time, but he also makes changes while he preaches. The sermon you watch will not be the same as the sermon you read.

The image is Saint Paul Writing His Epistles by Valentin de Boulogne (between 1618 and 1620) – https://www.mfah.org/art/detail/20223, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=74425088.

Rev. Eric Anderson Pastor's Corner, What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: When Will It End?

The Christians suffering persecution in Thessalonica wanted to know when it would end. Paul couldn’t tell them, just urge them to hold to their faith and compassion.

Here’s a transcript:

I’m thinking about the second chapter of Paul’s Second Letter to the Thessalonians (2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17).

In this chapter Paul commented on the return of Christ, the Second Coming, if you will (though he didn’t call it that). The reason, I suspect, is that the Christians in Thessalonica had been having a very bad time. Paul commented on it in his First Letter to the Thessalonians, that they had been enduring some pretty harsh persecution. He compared it to the persecution that he himself had suffered in Jerusalem.

By the time he wrote the Second Letter it appears that that had not ended. They were still going through some very harsh times.

In times like that, the basic question on anyone’s mind would be: “When will it end? And indeed, when will it end in some kind of reversal, in some kind of justice, in some kind of event so that those who persecuted us suffer and we ourselves triumph?

And Paul’s comments here: to me, well, they’re a little obscure, because he talks about some mysterious figure that will sit in the temple (or possibly already was sitting in the temple) and clearly Paul had discussed this with the folks in Thessalonica and so he left the details out. The point is —— and it was a point that he made in First Thessalonians — that we still have to endure, and we still have to live out the lives to which we were called by Jesus as we do so. We still need to do good works for one another. We still need to pray for one another. We still need to bring our compassion to one another even when it is hard.

These are also harsh times. We’ve just come through a global pandemic: harsh times. There are wars in the world in which people suffer terribly: harsh times. And we are looking at the withdrawal of supports from the poorest of the poor here in the United States and elsewhere around the world: harsh times.

We are asked to hold to our faith, to trust in the grace and compassion of God. And in the midst of it all, to exercise our capacity for love and care and tenderly bring to those who suffer the most the resources, the aid, and the compassion that we can, the compassion which has been given to us by Jesus Christ.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.

Rev. Eric Anderson Pastor's Corner, Sermons

Sermon: Remembered

October 26, 2025

Ephesians 1:11-23
Luke 6:20-31

When I was little, I wanted to be an astronaut. I also wanted to be a firefighter. I seem to remember that I wanted to be a soldier for a while. I don’t recall ever wanting to be a politician, but I did think it would be cool to be President – even at that age I recognized that there is a difference between running for office and doing the work of the office.

Now. As an astronaut, I didn’t want to be the command module pilot, left orbiting the moon while my two colleagues landed and explored. I wanted to be the mission  commander. And I wanted to be a fire captain or a fire chief. When I wanted to be a soldier, I imagined myself as a general.

You get the idea? I had some ambition. I was going to be President, after all. I was going to be the one you remembered.

What if I’d had the ambition of Jesus?

In chapter 6 of Luke, Jesus had just appointed twelve of his followers as “apostles,” or messengers. I’d say that shows some ambition and initiative. He’d then come to what Luke described as a “level place” and found a great crowd seeking healing. He gave them healing. That shows power and capacity. Then he got them settled down somehow, which shows capability, and told them:

Blessed are the poor. Blessed are the hungry. Blessed are the weepers. Blessed are those who are hated.

I did a Google search for “inspirational quotes,” and its AI overview gave me the following:

“Inspirational quotes include ‘Believe you can and you’re halfway there’ (Theodore Roosevelt), ‘The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams’ (Eleanor Roosevelt), and ‘The only way to do great work is to love what you do’ (Steve Jobs). Other popular themes focus on resilience, such as ‘It’s not whether you get knocked down; it’s whether you get up’ (Vince Lombardi), and personal agency, like ‘Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me’ (Carol Burnett).”

So. Nothing about how blessed the poor are. Actually, nothing from Jesus.

Hm.

Jesus had a few words to say for those who were in different circumstances of life. Woe to the rich, woe to the full, woe to those who laugh, woe to those who are held in honor.

Funny. Those weren’t among the inspirational messages, either.

Matt Skinner writes at Working Preacher, “It seems to me that Jesus’ woe statements are revealing something—that the things we assume are advantages are actually illusory. What if money, food, comfort, self-won security, respectability, and the like are things that kill our souls—not just in some far-off afterlife but right here, right now? What a tragedy to mistake them for benefits given by God, then.”

What a tragedy indeed. And still not in tune with the inspirational messages of the twenty-first century.

Fortunately, Jesus went on to tell us to love our enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you, and submit to assault and robbery.

Do I have to mention that this isn’t very inspirational, either?

It can also be dangerous. This passage has all too often been used to encourage victims of abuse, particularly in domestic situations, to continue to suffer abuse. I can’t believe that’s what Jesus wanted. Jesus pronounced woe on the wealthy, the well fed, and the merry. Do you really think he’d say, “Blessed are the violent?” No. And when Jesus declared a wake-up call for the comfortable, I’m sure he declared it for the violent as well.

How do I know that?

Because he asked those who’d been victimized not to respond to violence with violence. Violence has to end, not be escalated.

That’s not very inspirational, either.

But maybe something else is. Or rather, someone else is. Someone, or rather, several someones.

Why are we here today? To worship God, yes. But today we also make the time to honor those who have touched our lives with love. They blessed us.

They blessed us whether they were relatively rich or relatively poor. They blessed us when they were hungry and when they’d had a full meal. They blessed us when they were merry and they blessed us through their tears. They blessed us when people commended them and they blessed us when people thought they were out of their minds to do so.

They blessed us and so we honor them.

Don’t answer this question. Think about it. Are there people who died in the past year that you didn’t choose to name, and to remember, and to honor? I’m not talking about the people you’ve heard of but didn’t know. I’m talking about the people you did know, but you didn’t have that good a relationship with them because, well, there were problems. You argued. There was bullying. Disagreement over money – doesn’t that happen often. Whatever it was, it was such that you just didn’t want to be friends. When you heard that they’d died, you may have said a brief prayer for those who love them, but… you didn’t feel the need to pray for yourself.

Like an i’iwi that bullies, that’s a sad way to be remembered. And, when it comes to a service like this, to be forgotten.

None of the people we’re honoring today were perfect. I’ll light a candle for my stepmother, the Rev. Shirley Anderson, today. As is the case with a lot of people later in life, she spent the last ten years trying to downsize. Inevitably, that meant distributing stuff to her children, her stepchildren, and all the grandchildren. Including the one who lived in Hawai’i and had to ship everything 5,000 miles. I brought something away from her apartment from every visit I made to her except the last one.

No, Shirley wasn’t perfect.

She was so loving, though. So caring. So attentive to people. So concerned about their needs. She put her time and energy into learning and responding and helping people grow. She did that as a member of the family. She did it as a pastor.

That’s how – and that’s why – she is remembered. I would guess that that’s how you’re remembering those for whom you’ll light a candle today.

Susan Henrich writes at Working Preacher, “The blessed are those who have caught at least a glimpse of God’s future and trust that it is for them. The blessed may be poor or needy, even weeping in life by the standards we humans have in our very bones, but they are blessed in both trust in God and in God’s future, in their hope of justice. The woeful are those who have forgotten that the ‘fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.’ The woeful are those who say ‘yes’ to the title question of an old song, ‘Is that all there is?’”

We honor those who saw a glimpse of God’s future and knew that it was for them, and for you, and for us. That’s how we remember them. That’s why we honor them.

As I wrote six years ago,

You entertain the wealthy,
set aside the sick,
refuse the refugee,
and call it greatness.

While I have known a woman
in whose presence every soul
received a lift. Every soul
was lightened by her gift.

Jesus can and does inspire us, even as he’s in conflict with most of our more customary inspirational literature. But let’s face it: he’s hard to follow. He’s demanding. His yoke isn’t all that easy. His burden isn’t all that light.

But these saints? They showed us that there are ways to follow, ways that can be accomplished by human beings, imperfect as we are. They showed us that it’s not about success and power, or about comfort and riches, or about respectability and position. It’s about care and compassion, faithfulness and commitment, energy and love.

And love. Love always. Always love.

May we be remembered as these saints, for our love.

Amen.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Sermon

Pastor Eric does make changes while preaching. Sometimes he intends to make them. Sometimes the changes happen.

The image is The Sermon on the Mount by Fra Angelico (1437) – Copied from an art book, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9048898.