Prepare the Way     Rev. Thomas Cary Kinder
The Congregational Church of the United Church of Christ,
Bradford, Vermont
November 6, 2016   Twenty-fifth Sunday after Pentecost,
Advent Preparation Sunday
Matthew 25:1-13 and other Advent passages
Something is coming. A birth, something new, something good, a change, a transformation, an in-breaking of God’s realm of mercy, justice and peace on earth, a higher power of love and life and light that will fill us and fill our church and shine like a lighted window changing everyone and everything around us.

Something is coming, and yet it is already here, and it has been here since the beginning of time and will be here until the end of time. It is flowing into our hearts right now, every one of us, full of power and possibility. It is a mystery, beyond our understanding or control. It has its own way that is not our way, its own thoughts that are not our thoughts, its own wisdom and power far beyond ours, and yet it can all be ours if we give ourselves entirely over to it.

We can have that new birth, we can transform our home and church and community to be more like God’s realm, we can move through this world as an instrument of peace and lovingkindness, we can be full of the power of the Spirit, we can shine like a lighted window no matter how dark and foggy life around us becomes.

Advent opens the way to us, Advent unlocks the mysterious door and lets that glorious light burst into the humble, manure stained stable of our world.
Continue reading Sermon, November 6, 2016 →

A Reforming and Reconciling Force   
Rev. Thomas Cary Kinder
The Congregational Church of the United Church of Christ,
Bradford, Vermont
October 30, 2016   Twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost,
Reformation and Reconciliation Sunday, All Saints Day Sunday
Psalm 32; Isaiah 1:10-18; Luke 19:1-10

Bob Dylan recorded the song “The Times They Are A-Changin’” in the few months between Martin Luther King Jr.s’ “I Have a Dream” speech and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The times certainly were a-changin’ in the 1960s. But then again, they certainly were changing in the 1970s, too, with Watergate and the end of the Vietnam War, and they were changing in the 1980s with the rise of the “Me Generation” and the fall of the iron curtain. The times were changing when Bob Dylan first sang the song over fifty years ago, and they still are changing today.

Things were about to change when the prophet Isaiah warned the people that God was running out of patience with their heartless neglect and violent injustice toward the poor and vulnerable among them. In fact, Dylan’s song sums up the message that all prophets receive from God. Go tell the people, God says, that the times, they are a-changin’.

Nobody could have known it when it was happening, but the biggest change in all of human history began eight centuries after the Prophet Isaiah. Continue reading Sermon, October 30, 2016 →

The Power of the Humble Truth    
Rev. Thomas Cary Kinder
The Congregational Church of the United Church of Christ,
Bradford, Vermont
October 23, 2016   Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost
Psalm 84; I Corinthians 1:17-31; Luke 18:9-14

Psalm 84 says,

How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts!
My soul longs, indeed it faints for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh sing for joy to the living God.
Even the sparrow finds a home,
and the swallow a nest for herself,
where she may lay her young, at your altars.

Those words are so beautiful and comforting when we think of them meaning the church. We love it when a church feels that good to us. It gives us joy to help create a beloved community that can be a home and warm nest to us all.

The words have an even deeper and more powerful meaning than that, though. Our hearts are the dwelling place of God, too. We each have in us a place where we can go where we find our home and nest, where we sing for joy. That place is the core of our deepest, truest self.

That heart’s core place is where we find the Holy Spirit rising like a spring of living water. It is where Paul would say we find God’s foolishness that is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness that is stronger than human strength. We find intuition there, and we find love—unconditional, universal, all forgiving love. In other words, we find Christ living within God’s dwelling place in our heart.

Jesus told today’s parable as a map for us to follow to find God’s dwelling place. Continue reading Sermon, October 23, 2016 →

Not to Lose Heart
Rev. Thomas Cary Kinder
The Congregational Church of the United Church of Christ,
Bradford, Vermont
October 16, 2016  
Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost, Neighbors in Need
Genesis 32:22-31; Psalm 121; Luke 18:1-8
 

Jacob was faithfully following God’s way and obeying God’s word. He had no intention other than to love and serve God. Everything was going well. He had escaped a bad situation and had gained wives and children and great wealth and was coming home to the Promised Land. Then God came and wrestled with him and wounded him. Jacob fought with God all night, and when Jacob finally had endured and prevailed, God blessed him and gave him a new name.

It is a strange story, and yet it has rung true for three thousand years for faithful people who try to follow God’s way. It is a mystery why wrestling with God and emerging changed is part of the spiritual journey, but it always has been and probably always will be. Continue reading Sermon, October 16, 2016 →

Praising God with a Loud Voice
Rev. Thomas Cary Kinder
The Congregational Church of the United Church of Christ,
Bradford, Vermont
October 9, 2016   Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost
Psalm 111; 2 Kings 5:1-15c; Luke 17:11-19

Nine out of ten lepers in today’s gospel passage did not express gratitude to Jesus. Only one “when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice.”

What do you think it would it take to make the other nine turn back? What does it take to make you turn to Christ and praise God with a loud voice? Do you turn as often as you could, praising as loudly as you could? If not, what would it take for you to do so?

Continue reading Sermon, October 9, 2016 →