A new year naturally allows for some looking back and looking ahead. What were the challenges of 2025? What were the blessings? Where did things go as you hoped and wanted; where did they not? And what are the plans and goals for 2026? Are you rolling any plans over that just didn’t happen (or weren’t completed) in 2025, or is this a year of new plans and fresh starts? Or, do you anticipate things mostly going as they have been?
"Wait for the Lord" (Sermon on Psalm 130) | December 7, 2025
Almost every parent of small children knows that this time of year can be taxing. Sure, there’s a lot to do, so many tasks to check off the list, but often for the children, there’s one thing and one thing only in view: those Christmas presents. I know that in my own childhood, I was continually looking for ways to convince my parents to make early Christmas presents a thing because it was tough to wait. That rarely went very far, despite the great reasons I had for implementing something!
"Listen Up! Our King Gives Rest!" (Sermon on Psalm 95) | November 23, 2025
Politicians on the campaign trail make a whole lot of promises. They assure voters that if they are elected (or reelected), things will be different—better—for those who vote for them. But those things don’t always happen the way they were promised. Perhaps there are political or logistical roadblocks to doing what they promised to do once in office. Maybe if you’re very cynical, you consider that they never intended to keep those campaign trail promises, and only said what they thought would get them votes.
"Seek a Lenten Mindset!" (Sermon on Psalm 85) | March 23, 2025
For some tasks, you just have to be in the right headspace, and if you’re not, perhaps you need to try to manufacture it. For instance, if you know you need to work out or do some cleaning around the house, but perhaps you just don’t feel like it, sometimes putting on the right music, podcast, or TV show can flip that switch and get you going. Perhaps you have a project due for school in the coming weeks, but it feels so far away that you find yourself lacking the drive to get any work done on it. But perhaps setting smaller, more immediate deadlines can help light that fire under you to get started.
"Do You Laugh with the Lord?" (Sermon on Psalm 2:1-7) | January 12, 2025
Have you ever been in a situation so bad, frustrating, or seemingly hopeless that all you could do was laugh? Why is that a gut reaction for us sometimes? I assume it’s a response to things we can’t control, things that are sometimes so out of reach that it almost begins to be funny.
That laughter or “humor” (if we can call it that) is a dark, hopeless laughter. I can’t do anything but laugh. But it’s not expressing the joy that laughter often communicates. It’s certainly not expressing something funny or entertaining. So, there are many reasons someone might laugh at the situation around them, some of them positive but sometimes very negative.
