In today’s parable, Death came to the youngest son, in that far-off land, and asked its question. “I see you’ve become destitute,” said Death. “Here you are very far from home, with no money and no friends. Now that even the pigs eat better tha...

Jesus desires our ingathering, and we so often are not willing. Jesus goes belly up, like a fierce yet vulnerable mother hen in the presence of a fox, ready to take us under the shelter of her wings. Are we willing? And what might we learn from...

One familiar story which contains a familiar parable flows into another familiar story. Is there anything at all new to say about the Samaritan that’s called “good” or the Mary and Martha sisterly tiff? Unclear. But given our deep dive into Luk...

Visiting guest preacher Rachael Weasley shares about what her queer church plant is up to these days, and explores today's passage in a queer way.Sermon begins at minute marker 3:43.Scripture: ​​​​

Fetus John the Baptist knew exactly who Jesus was, according to Luke. Adult John the Baptist sends emissaries to ask Jesus who he is. Jesus does not answer John’s question, but rather instructs the question-askers to simply report what they ...

Jesus sees a woman and is moved with compassion to respond. But what about all the other women, humans, creatures, who also needed his compassionate response??? And what about the root causes of her suffering - Shouldn’t he have fixed the sy...

Sabbath was to be the fountain around which the garden of all public life and policy grew in ancient Israel. On six days the people were to work, tending that garden, ensuring its health and growth and accessibility to all people, and on the se...

Three major commemorations converged last week: the birth of the Anabaptist movement, the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. (and the broader movement of which he was part, including our Anabaptist ancestors, Rosemarie and Vincent Harding), and th...

There’s lots going on in this story from Luke, and also in this sermon from Pastor Megan, and also in the story of our Anabaptist roots, and also in the congregational life of Seattle Mennonite Church. It’s all a bit of a mess, to be quite f...

When the writer of Luke’s gospel litters his stories with the names of politicians and references to their political maneuverings, we are meant to pay attention. When the tale of a 12-year-old Jesus choosing to remain in the temple occurs DU...

Since at least the 4th century, Simeon’s prayer has been among the last words spoken by Christians each night before the candles of evening prayer are extinguished. His words are the incense the church has sought to breathe while falling asl...

As we wait for God’s “Big L” Liberating Love to be fully realized, we are called to BE God’s love of ourselves, for one another, and for all creation. We enter the story of Mary, and then Mary with Elizabeth, to see how this love begets more...

Advent is a home for our longing that is at once ancient and new every day. We join our longing for the full inbreaking of God’s justice, peace, and liberating love to the longing of our forebears in the faith. Like them, we continue to wait...

Jesus equips the disciples with power and authority, and then sends them to their ministries with no bread, no staff, no money, not even an extra shirt - nothing. Why? As we prepare to release Tyler to his ministry as our Pastor of Faith Format...

What does it mean to sing “Holy holy holy is God” NOT to God, but to one another? Might Isaiah’s magnificent and poetic imagery of the seraphim singing their praise of God’s holiness TO one another be received as an invitation to do the same?

Jonah sought to protect his own people when God’s compassion and mercy were to extend to the repentant beyond Israel’s borders. Fairness, justice and truth are to be balanced with compassion and mercy by God’s definition and ways rather than...

What happens when a raven and a prophet form a little community of care? How about a Hebrew man and Phoenician widow - across religious and political divides? According to our storyteller, the needs of all are met, and the storyteller calls thi...

Solomon sets out to build a house for God, as people across time and place have done over and over again. But even in the dedication prayer, Solomon acknowledges that God cannot be contained by a building, regardless of size or grandness or eve...

Whether in tents or temples, God is present and abiding with the Israelites and their descendants. God's living promise is a loving extensive, generational commitment/covenant among, between and with us just as we are: the only tabernacle God n...

Hannah’s Song, often referred to as The Magnificat of the First Testament, is a collection of Hannah’s utopian dreams. She sings of a world where the bows of the warriors are broken and where God lifts the poor from the ash heap and sits them w...

The Hebrew people grow weary of their supposed leader leaving them behind, and - in Moses’ absence - they ask for a symbol to represent God? Replace God? Hold them together as a community in a very destabilized time? Unclear, but even as we see...

A sermon about a 25 chapter novella, in three parts: 1) Joseph actually had an amazing technicolor princess dress, and isn’t that both telling and fabulous?! 2) Love unevenly distributed produces division, resentment, and - in this sto...

Abram longs for a child that he believes God has denied him. God meets Abram in that specific need, but then leads him to a more expansive - even cosmic - view. This is a story that might be easier for aunties like me to understand: I absolu...

We start a new Narrative Lectionary year at a very good place to start: In the beginning… We begin with the genesis of all things, and it doesn’t take long for everything to devolve into deception, messing up, shame, hiding from God, and sca...

Join Keyan, Eden and Rita as they share stories of discernment in the last of our series. This summer we asked congregation members if they would be willing to share stories from their lives about moments of discernment. Sermon b...