About Abundance: On Earth As It Is In Heaven

November 20, 2005Texts:  Ezekiel 34: 1-16, 25-31; Matthew 25: 31-46Rev. Stephen H. Phelps This past Thursday evening, the rulers in the House of Misrepresentatives passed a bill to cut student loans for working class families, medicaid for the poor who are sick,...

How Hunger Helped Us Here

(next in the series Lessons in the Beginning) Texts on Sunday, September 25, 2005Genesis 41:1–42:5; Luke 9: 13-17 “There is no way you can interpret your own dreams,” a psychotherapist once told me. “They are information in coded form, tales...

Every Round Goes Higher, Higher

(next in the series Lessons in the Beginning) Texts on Sunday, September 18, 2005Genesis 38: 1-30; Matthew 28: 16-20 There’s a phrase people throw about as if it were gospel: The end doesn’t justify the means. No? It had better! When people invoke that...

The God Behind God

(next in the series Lessons in the Beginning) Texts on Sunday, September 4, 2005Genesis 18: 17-33; Luke 13: 1-5 In the meeting room at Attica prison twice each week, fifteen to twenty inmates sit down with four or five volunteers from CEPHAS for a conversation. When I...

Forgiveness and the Face of God

(next in the series Lessons in the Beginning) Texts on Sunday, August 28, 2005Genesis 33: 1-20;   Matthew 5: 43-48 I met a bright, open boy yesterday named Jacob. I told him I am a minister and that for some weeks, my church and I have been reading and learning from...

Constantly Greater Beings

(next in the series Lessons in the Beginning) Texts on Sunday, August 21, 2005Readings: Genesis 32: 3-30;  Philippians 2: 5-11 “I want you to write down your three earliest memories,” the psychologist said. My seminary training was almost over and the...