Culturally, we’ve become obsessed with tidiness. But what deeper—darker—secrets lie below the tidy image we project? What messes are we trying to compensate for? Our summer sermon series deconstructs the tidy facades of our lives to expose the messes underneath. And then in the gospel of grace in Jesus, we find not just organization but resolution to our mess.
Anyone who approaches a relationship looking for tidiness is in for a surprise. Relationships don't work if the goal is for arguments to be won and sealed up, for everything to be balanced and symmetrical. Relationships work through beautiful messy honesty and forgiveness. Relationships work through unconditional not-keeping-track selflessness. Tidiness has no place in a relationship. This love that makes them work is foreign to our catalogs of relationship tools, but one that we know intimately, for it’s the love that Christ put in our hearts when he redeemed our hearts.
Pastor Pat Brown preached this sermon on August 11, 2019 at the Sunday morning worship service at Bethany Lutheran Church’s Parkway campus in Appleton, WI.
Learn more at www.bethanyappleton.org
A job. Your classes. Your family life. It’s easy to compartmentalize life. But for a Christian, everything we do is under one calling: to speak God’s message of reconciliation.
Pastor Zach Gebert preached this sermon on August 4, 2019 at the Sunday morning worship service at Bethany Lutheran Church’s Parkway campus in Appleton, WI.
Learn more at www.bethanyappleton.org
At some point in the last 50 years, we decided that a successful family was more important than a healthy family. That whatever relationships were (or weren’t) like within the family, whatever the mental and emotional health of moms and dads and children, if the kids had the grades or the points, parents would pat themselves on the back for doing a good job. So, we dress up in matching clothes to convince our extended family and friends every Christmas that we are indeed really that put-together. Or maybe it's to convince ourselves. To try to feel at least for a while that we’re a healthy family, when the reality is strained relationships, out of control schedules, people with big holes for affirmation, and a complete back seat to the most important contributor to both a family’s health and the wholeness of each family member: the gospel of unconditional acceptance and love.
Pastor Mark Henke preached this sermon on July 6, 2019 at the Saturday Family Worship Gathering of Bethany Lutheran Church’s Lynndale campus in Appleton, WI.
Learn more at www.bethanyappleton.org
What if the person we’re trying to convince of our “goodness” isn’t just others, but ourselves? What if we’re using our churchiness as affirmation of our relationship to God rather than looking to faith? Perhaps the accessories of church that we put on and take off are getting in the way of what Jesus asks of us. He asks us not to take on an hour a week, an activity or meeting a month, but to take up our cross and follow him. Faith is life and the cross is sacrifice.
Pastor Pat Brown preached this sermon on July 13, 2019 at the Saturday Family Worship Gathering of Bethany Lutheran Church’s Lynndale campus in Appleton, WI.
Learn more at www.bethanyappleton.org
As primp our tidy life, we keep church in an attractive bin somewhere in our lives. We pull it out for an hour on the weekend, and then tuck it back away on the way home. We dip into it for a monthly team meeting, and then just as quickly step out of it. But that isn't what church is. Church is a body. A body of those whom God has called out of darkness to gather together around Word and sacrament, to grow together, to serve the Kingdom together. The church gathers to celebrate and encourage each other in the salvation and identity God’s given us through Jesus. Doing this together require more of a commitment than attending church like it’s some sort of performance. It’s a community, even a family. And as such, we who are part of this family all share a common commitment to this family--and all the mess that may come with it.
Pastor Zach Gebert preached this sermon on June 29, 2019 at the Saturday Family Worship Gathering of Bethany Lutheran Church’s Lynndale campus in Appleton, WI.
Learn more at www.bethanyappleton.org
We live in a world where success is assessed not on how well you live your life but on how well you can Instagram your life. It’s a world where looking put together and happy can get you farther than actually being put together and happy. Though the media is new, the problem isn’t. Two thousand years ago, Jesus criticized the Pharisees for that very thing--looking pristine on the outside, but being garbage on the inside.
Why is it so hard to drop the tidy exterior? What’s the cost of showing ourselves to be less than perfect?
There’s a struggle involved with honestly admitting our weakness and feelings, but only when we admit our sin are we able to find restoration in Jesus’ forgiveness. And being whole is way more important than being tidy.
Pastor Mark Henke preached this sermon on June 22, 2019 at the Saturday Family Worship Gathering of Bethany Lutheran Church’s Lynndale campus in Appleton, WI.
Learn more at www.bethanyappleton.org
Human nature wants our relationship with God to be something we can negotiate, but it’s completely out of our control. It all hinges on a choice God makes—a choice of grace.
Pastor Mark Henke preached this sermon on August 17, 2019 at the Saturday Family Worship Gathering of Bethany Lutheran Church’s Lynndale campus in Appleton, WI.
Learn more at www.bethanyappleton.org