Sermon: Advent Hope, 1 Thess. 3:9-13
Adam J. Copeland
First Presbyterian Hallock, Minn.
Nov 29, 2009
Advent Hope
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Talk about a full day marking many things. This Sunday we celebrate the first Sunday of the church year which is also the first Sunday of the season we call Advent. Advent means “coming,” and today we begin our preparation for Christ’s coming at Christmas.
Today also marks the Sunday closest to Thanksgiving, when we gathered as a nation to loosen our belts and watch football…and also remember the many people and things in our lives for which to be thankful.
Today is also the first Sunday in the official holiday shopping season. Added to that, later we have a Commissioning service and Family Advent Night. As if that’s not enough, the Vikings plays the Bears at 3:15 and there’s an all new Desperate Housewives on ABC tonight.
But believe it or not, we gather today less to anticipate Desperate Housewives, than to look through the lens of scripture on all that today brings and listen for God’s word to us.
In their letter the Thessalonians, Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy emphasize two main ideas. The four verses before us today are a sort of a summary of those two points: (1) you’re doing really well, and we thank God for that, (2) let’s make it even better. The writers sort of sound like my high school chorus teacher who always said, “Good better best, never rest until your good is your better and your better is your best.”
Sound like a message for today? Well if we’re thinking about today as the first Sunday of the new church year — the first sunday of Advent — then Paul and his buddies’ hit the nail on the head. After all, at New Year’s we look back at the previous year, and we look forward to the next. So on this first sunday of the new year, let’s give that a try. … Continue Reading
Sermon: Christ the King, John 18:33-37
Adam J. Copeland
FPC Hallock
Nov 22, 2009
Christ the King
John 18:33-37
Today I begin with a confession: I love the HBO television series The Wire. It is extremely violent, offensive, glorifies drug culture; it has more than its fair share of drunken shenanigans, dead bodies, and police brutality. I missed the show while it was on television, so I’ve been slowly watching it over several months on Netflix and iTunes. I’m not quite addicted, but I’m pretty close.
The Wire is a show about many things, but its main plot centers upon the inner city drug culture in Baltimore, Maryland, and those who police it. Two drug lords in close partnership, Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell, rule a hefty portion of Baltimore drug corners. They carry a powerful reputation and even more powerful guns and strongmen to support them. What makes The Wire stand out among shows of its kind, is the complexity it affords such characters supposedly as lowly as drug lords and hit men. The viewer gets glimpses of ethical struggles — not quite the kind the we have in Hallock — but about how to give back to the community while you’re supplying its drug fiends with cocaine. In this culture, honesty, efficiency, allegiance, and honor are all upheld in peculiar but convincing ways.
I’m nearing the end of the third season now, and at this point the main drug dealers, Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell, have their reputation on the line. A young up-and-coming dealer has challenged their territory and imputed their honor. In inner city Baltimore, Avon and Stringer are king. Nobody disputes their power. If you do, you find yourself or your family killed. But this young upstart refuses to respect their muscle. I don’t know what will happen, but something must give in the next few episodes. Avon and Stringer above all must keep their rule in tact. With their guns and their money someone — many, probably — will be killed. And some dealer will remain on top; on The Wire in inner city Baltimore, the drug dealer is king.
Today we celebrate Christ the King Sunday, a day on which we declare that Christ is King and no other, that Christ rules every corner, that the reign of Christ is supreme. The problem with Christ the King Sunday, though, is we Americans aren’t used to the metaphor. Since we don’t have a royal family in this country we might think this Sunday doesn’t apply to us. But Christ the King Sunday is about much more than literal kings, it’s about who or what, ultimately, rules our lives. … Continue Reading
Sermon: Hannah, 1 Samuel 1:4-20
Adam J. Copeland
FPC Hallock
Nov 15, 2009
Hannah
1 Samuel 1:4-20
I have a book entitled “Men and Women of the Word” in which the author, Jaroslav Vajda, has written reflections on famous or not so famous biblical characters. So when I come across a text like today’s 1 Samuel passage about Hannah, I always pull it out for inspiration.
But call me unlucky, or call Mr. Vajda too picky, but I’ve had this book for seven years and never, not once, have I found a passage on the character I was looking for. This week is no different. Hannah didn’t make the cut.
Though I admit, when I was stymied one more time, a part of me relaxed because there’s a danger in what Vajda does in the book. You know it all too well since it happens every day on our TVs and in our celebrity magazines. Call it our celebrity syndrome — making people larger than life and above condemnation.
So a part of me is always relieved when Vajda’s book, “Men and Women of the Word” turns up nothing one more time. It’s all too easy to take a Biblical passage about God and make it solely about an individual. It’s just too easy to say something overly simplistic like: preach the gospel like Paul, or be wise like Solomon. So we must be careful to keep perspective and remember that even biblical characters are sinful humans.
But even still, Hannah is a pretty safe bet to emulate; she’s real, she’s tough, she’s emotional, she’s faithful, and God hears her prayer. … Continue Reading
Sermon: The Widow's Mite or Jesus' Sight?
Adam J. Copeland
FPC Hallock
Nov. 8, 2009
The Widow’s Mite or Jesus’ Sight?
Mark 12:38-44
For some of you, today’s gospel passage might have sounded a bit funny. It’s one of those classic passages in the King James Version: “And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, which make a farthing.” The passage, still today, is often called “The Widow’s Mite” even though many of us wouldn’t know a mite if we saw one.
What’s a “mite”? Well, I had to check, but found that a mite is something small — often a coin, or a child, or an animal. According to the KJV, the widow gave “two mites,” which together make one farthing. A farthing was an old British coin taken out of circulation forty years ago. So, though iconic, the “widow’s mite” translation doesn’t even make sense in Britain any more!
The NRSV reads: “A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny.” But no matter what translation we use, the point is clear: the widow was poor, dirt poor, and she gave all she had — two tiny coins — to the treasury of the Temple.
I’m told we haven’t conducted a Stewardship Campaign here for several years. Instead, the session models the next year’s budget on the previous year and trusts the congregation will come through. But many churches, around this time of year, are eagerly awaiting the results of stewardship drives. And many a preacher out there, I’m sure, read the story of the Widow’s Mite with a certain glee this week.
Fantastic, a story that’s clearly about sacrificial giving to the church. The widow only had two coins, and she gave them both. What a fantastic message for stewardship season! Just ask: what would the widow do and sign those pledge cards. Man, some sermons just preach themselves.
If we were in the midst of a stewardship campaign, I admit, I’d be sorely tempted to preach a similar sermon. But we’re not, and I’m not going to.
Such a simplistic sermon (and reading of the text) does not do justice to the word. As usually happens, God is up to something here a bit more tricky, more compelling, and more extreme than we might first imagine. The story of the widow’s mite calls all authority into question until the reader is left with nothing but God and God’s promises.
Sermon: Unbound, John 11:32-44
Nov 1, 2009
FPC Hallock
All Saints’ Day
Unbound
John 11:32-44
Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.” Unbind Lazarus, dead for four days, but now by another of Jesus’ signs, alive. “Unbind him, and let him go,” he had no more need for his funeral wrappings. “Unbind him, and let him go” live life once more.
Jesus was not bound by the laws of physics and reason in which we pride ourselves today. Jesus was not bound by our expectations and our understandings. Jesus was not bound by even our greatest enemy — death itself.
“In the raising of Lazarus, God steadfastly refuses to allow death the final word.” [Feasting on the Word, Year B v. 4, p. 236] “Unbind him, and let him go.” In the raising of Lazarus God shows us Jesus’ ultimate power: in Jesus Christ, death can never have the last word. In Jesus Christ, death itself is conquered; death is dead forever.
But in this time after Jesus’ resurrection and before his coming again, we easily forget this good news because we are bound to so much ourselves. We are wrapped in shrouds of doubt and entombed in narrowed visions of what God can do with us today. So Christ, unbind us too, and let us go.
Sermon: God the Farmer, Psalm 65
FPC Hallock
October 25, 2009
Harvest Festival
God the Farmer
Psalm 65
Psalm 65, A Thanksgiving for the Harvest, rouses us this morning. Verse 11 can be translated a number of ways:
“You crown the year with your bounty, and your carts overflow with abundance” -NIV
“…and thy paths drop fatness.” -KJV
“…even the hard pathways overflow with abundance.” -NLT
“…your wagon tracks overflow with abundance.” -ESV
Literally the verse reads, “The tracks of your chariot overflow with fat.”
Now the “RHT” translation, the Revised Hallock Translation of Psalm 65:11 would read something like:
“You crown the year with your bounty, even 175, 75, County Road 1, and I-29, overflow with sugar beets abundant.”
Round about the 1870s, the town of Hallock began to take form. Charles Hallock, for whom the town is named, came to our area in 1880 all the way from New York City. Charles Hallock did not come to farm — his fortune was already made — but instead to enjoy the great outdoors, the hunting and fishing abundant in the area.
And so, throughout the 1870s, 80s, 90s and past the turn of the century, word must have spread about a new bustling community with rich farmland and good hearty people.
We can imagine the difficult conversations so many families must have had — to sell what few possessions they owned and uproot themselves from another place, then load up a wagon with what they had left, and come to farm in Hallock.
In the early days, wagon tracks came from the North, bringing English and Scottish immigrants who would soon found this church, the first congregation in the new town. But wagons came, too, from the south and east, as over the ruts and dusty roads settlers came to make Hallock their home. Later they could even travel by Ford’s amazing automobiles or the new train that came straight through town.
Farming in those days, I don’t need to tell you, was bone-tiring work. If the frost cooperated, and the rust stayed away, and the grasshoppers didn’t bother you too bad, and the price of grain held up, and your creditors cooperated, you could maybe squeeze by. But it wasn’t easy. And so the new farms sheltered hopes and dreams, as well as tears and disappointment.
Though Charles Hallock first came looking for an outdoorsman’s paradise, it was the farming that made Hallock tick. The Centennial History Book puts it this way:
Without mutual support of the town of Hallock and Hallock’s farmers, one wonders if Hallock would be celebrating a Centennial. The community of Hallock, which extends far beyond the city limits, has always recognized the vital role of agriculture in its history and in its future. -p. 231
Agriculture and Hallock are almost synonymous. So, on this Harvest Festival, it only makes sense to celebrate with a Psalm of Thanksgiving for the Harvest. Surely we’ve got that covered, don’t we?
Looking at the psalm… … Continue Reading
"It's All Sermon Prep to Me"
When I was in high school and chatting with a teacher about our churches, he said “I don’t think I could ever respect a pastor who didn’t know Greek and Hebrew.” That statement stuck with me. Heck, it probably kept me going through some rather challenging times in both my Greek and Hebrew courses.
For a few years now, however, I’ve been wondering how much credence my teacher’s comment really has. I preached about forty sermons in Scotland two years ago without my Greek or Hebrew resources over there (I opted to take golf clubs, not books 
). I didn’t get too many complaints from church members about my lack of declining Greek nouns or parsing Hebrew verbs.
Now, though, I have my Greek and Hebrew books on my new pastor’s study bookshelf, but I haven’t been inclined to pull them out. Sure, I could check out a perplexing phrase in a text if I really wanted to, but I just rarely ever want to. So I wonder, what’s the rub: am I a sermon writing slacker or reality claiming time-manager?
The point, I suppose, is not that one uses Greek and Hebrew in one’s exegesis necessarily, but that sermons are well planned and delivered, deeply grounded in the word and call others to do the same. I’d never want to intimidate someone with knowledge of Biblical languages (what little knowledge I have), or put someone off with a flippant Greek or Hebrew remark in a sermon. On the other hand, I wonder what was the point of all those sweat and tears in Greek, Hebrew, and exegesis courses? Maybe they were supposed to teach me how to think, and did that. But how, also, might my sermon direction change if I took the time to read the original language each week?
When I have a conundrum, I often try to solve it with technology. The problem is, technology isn’t always the answer. (I don’t want to become like another Adam and blame my Weight Watchers struggles on the lack of iPhone app.) I do wonder, though, if investing in a good Bible translation program might provide me the added boost to work more with the original language? If you think so, what program for my Mac would you recommend?
And, in any sermon prep discussion I always wonder: and how might I involve our congregation more in the exegesis?
image by Renaudeh
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