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LET’S MAKE THE CHURCH TOGETHER

To Listen to this Sermon, click here -> http://sermon.net/ststphnfw/sermonid/1200056383

2 Kings 2: 1-2, 6-14  *  Psalm 77

Galatians 5:1, 13-26  *  Luke 9: 51-62 

June 30, 2013

Rev. Dr. Warner M. Bailey

Over the last few weeks billions of cicada grubs have awakened from 17 years of subterranean slumber to emerge into the bright sunshine of America’s Mid-Atlantic states.[i]  Their strange cycle brought vast swarms of males swirling above the trees who created a tremendous racket in the hope of mating, frantically, then to die, unlamented, leaving behind eggs that will hatch in another 17 years.Read More »LET’S MAKE THE CHURCH TOGETHER

“Found Difficult and Not Tried”

By The Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch
St. Stephen Presbyterian Church
Fort Worth, TX
September 2, 2012

Mark 7: 1-8, 14-15, 21-23
James 1: 17-27

I would like you to hear and consider this re-writing of our Gospel lesson for today. It doesn’t apply, of course, to St. Stephen:

“Now when the leaders of the church and those who did all the real work around here had gathered around Jesus, they noticed that the new members and the youth and the homeless were eating with defiled purpose, that is, that they hadn’t done anything to earn their meal. (For the Presbyterians, and all Christians in those days, believed you were not taking Christianity seriously if you didn’t serve on at least five committees, thus observing the conventions of their society; and they did not eat anything from the market unless it was free-range and safe from causing environmental hazard, and there were many other traditions they observed: that church members had their own pews, on which no one else, even visitors, could sit; the correct washing and placement of Tupperware containers in the church kitchen; the correct order of worship; that all should bring a dish to the pot-luck or else not come; and that those who were most like them were the ones most truly welcome and that everyone else was ‘the least of these,’ who were to be helped, but otherwise avoided.)”Read More »“Found Difficult and Not Tried”

A Personal Journey, 8: God’s Kingdom of Forgiveness

A Canterbury Tale

By the end of my sophomore year at Hampden-Sydney College, Inter-Varsity, our official campus fellowship group, was becoming more exclusionary and judgmental. There were standards that brooked no room for questions or disagreement. I was increasingly frustrated for my friends in IV who had questions, or were troubled in their souls, or who didn’t toe the fundamentalist line, or who weren’t quite pretty enough, cool enough, or secure enough in their faith to fit the IV model. Don’t get me wrong, there were many good, faithful people in IV–but the tenor of the group had become increasingly “Us against Them”–us against the “liberal religion professors,” us against the fratty boys, us against the Creeping Religion of Secular Humanism. Us against the world.Read More »A Personal Journey, 8: God’s Kingdom of Forgiveness

Broken Pieces–Mark 6: 35-44, Part 1

 

By Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch, St. Stephen Presbyterian Church

Fort Worth, TX

The Lord’s Supper

July 15, 2012

 

Jesus’ disciples want to send the crowds home to get something to eat. Instead, Jesus tells his disciples “You give them something to eat.” He has them organize the thousands present in groups of hundreds and fifties, as were Roman army units, and they pass out the bread.

And somehow, everybody has enough.

We call this the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes, but the Bible doesn’t say it’s a miracle. Scholars will argue forever about whether the food somehow multiplied like bunnies or if in fact people there really had brought food with them, and decided that rather than hoard it, they would share it with the members of their group. We aren’t going to solve that mystery today, and that’s not what I want to focus on.

What’s interesting is that Jesus tells the disciples to give the crowd something to eat, but the disciples don’t really do anything special. They organize the people and they hand out the food. That’s it.

And then, they gather the broken pieces.Read More »Broken Pieces–Mark 6: 35-44, Part 1

“The Lord is Trying to Do Something Grand Through Us…Therefore We, God’s Servants, Arise and Build”

Our unofficial church historian, Cathy Corder, has unearthed some fascinating documents from the early days of St. Stephen. Most interesting are those that detail the process our predecessor church, Broadway Presbyterian, went through in deciding to move from its location across from present Broadway Baptist to this site.Read More »“The Lord is Trying to Do Something Grand Through Us…Therefore We, God’s Servants, Arise and Build”

Rain Didn’t Spoil Christmas On The Hill!

For the fourth year in a row, St. Stephen celebrated Christmas on the Hill, this year with a Mexican theme. As always, there were food, crafts, people in First Century Palestinian costumes–and more. But what made it unusual was that for the first time, we were forced indoors, into the Parish Hall, because of the rain  and cold.

But that didn’t spoil the fun. In  fact, it made it more  celebratory. There had to have  been 300 people in that two  hour span.

Who came? We had a lot who  came for our first ever Las  Posadas, a traditional Spanish  and Mexican journey to  celebrate Christmas. Read More »Rain Didn’t Spoil Christmas On The Hill!