Sermons

We invite you to enjoy these sermons of our rector, The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz and others.  Browse her latest sermons below, or look for a specific sermon by title in reverse chronological order and listed by year in the right-hand column.  Above the years is a word cloud of clickable tags for these sermons.  Also listen to her dynamic preaching about 20 minutes into our live-streamed services on our YouTube Channel.

Dazzling White

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Last Sunday after the Epiphany, B, February 15, 2015, The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

2 Kings 2:1-12 Please let me inherit a double share of your spirit.
2 Corinthians 4:3-6 We do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord.
Mark 9:2-10 Dazzling white.

O God of blessing, grant us the wisdom, the strength and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

Reflecting on white more dazzling than any bleach could achieve struck me as I pondered our Gospel passage for this morning as the threat of yet another blizzard developed. However you feel about the snow, invigorated or exhausted, it sure is dazzling white.
Continue reading →

Sharing the Blessings of the Gospel

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Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany, B, February 8, 2015; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Isaiah 40:21-31 Lift up your eyes on high and see: Who created these.
1 Corinthians 9:16-23 I do it all for the sake of the Gospel, so that I might share its blessings.
Mark 1:29-39 Everyone is searching for you.

O God of Blessing, grant us the wisdom, the strength and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

When I look at the three scripture readings we have before us today I am reminded that, one of the things I love about the Bible is that it gives us more questions than answers. And I love the questions. I hear a question being called out in each of our readings. Our first reading, from the 40th chapter of Isaiah follows the famous plea from God for comfort and consolation for a people who have been devastated and who are despairing. “Comfort, comfort ye my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and call to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is more than fully paid…‘in the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in a desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all people shall see it together. God is going to gather up the lambs and carry them and gently lead the mother sheep.’” What we hear today in Isaiah is the last part of a tender overture to an opus of consolation – a continuation of a love song written to bring relief to people who had been far from home, in exile in Babylon for more than half a century. Continue reading →

Asserting Exousia

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Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, B, February 1, 2015; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Deuteronomy 18:15-20 If I hear the voice of the Lord my God any more…I will die. 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Mark 1:21-28 What is this?

O God of love, grant us the wisdom, the strength and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will. In our reading from Deuteronomy this morning, the last book of the Torah, we hear a portion of the section of Moses’ teaching about developing and maintaining the welfare of the community. A couple of chapters earlier, Deuteronomy has taught, “If there is among you anyone in need within the land that you inhabit, do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor. You should rather open your hand…give liberally and be ungrudging when you do so…open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor.” Compassion is one of the hallmark values of Deuteronomy. [1] Compassion is an ordering principle for Torah and Gospel. Continue reading →

How Love Works

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The Second Sunday after the Epiphany, Year B, January 18, 2015; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

1 Samuel 3:1-20 Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.
1 Corinthians 6:12-20 Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God and that you are not your own?
John 1:43-51 I saw you.

O God of our wildest dreams, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

This morning we heard the stirring reading of the call of Samuel with the fantastic introduction that back then (“then” being about 1100 BCE), in the olden days, the word of the Lord was rare, and the ability to see clearly was not widespread! Eli the priest and his sons were responsible for guarding the Ark of the Covenant and its holy oracle, which, in those days, was more like a war trophy than a piece of liturgical furniture. Eli’s sons did not behave well at all and Eli wasn’t able to get them to change their violent ways. This is a story of the transfer of authority from Eli to Samuel that highlights Eli’s wisdom and integrity, and Samuel’s responsiveness and bravery. For me, this story has always been a powerful lesson about how the Word of the Holy One can come through the voices of humans, in this case, a beloved teacher. Have you ever heard your name called by a beloved teacher and known that you were being invited to grow in leadership and authority? That’s how God works sometimes. Continue reading →

New Beginnings

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The First Sunday after the Epiphany, Year B, January 11, 2015; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Genesis 1:1-5 Beginning…
Acts 19:1-7 We have not even heard that there is a holy spirit.
Mark 1:4-11 He will baptize you with the[sic] holy spirit.

O God of beginning again, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

Today is a special day in the Church – a Feast Day called, “The Baptism of our Lord.” It’s a perfect day to celebrate Patrick Cheng’s ordination to priesthood in the Episcopal Church. (However, I will tell you that, any day would be a perfect day to celebrate Patrick Cheng’s ordination to priesthood in the Episcopal Church, which took place yesterday. Congratulations Patrick!) As most of you know, Patrick lives in New York City now and is working for the Church Pension Fund. He’s been commuting to Boston to serve Emmanuel for the last four months. It’s a long way to come to volunteer to help out at a church! On behalf of all of us, thank you for that, Patrick, and thank you for choosing Emmanuel, Boston as the place for your first Eucharist as Episcopal priest! This is nearly, but not quite goodbye, because Patrick will be back in two weeks to preach and preside while I am away at the end of the month. Patrick, we hope you’ll be back with us whenever your schedule permits. Continue reading →

Give me Jesus!

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Second Sunday After Christmas B, January 4, 2015; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Jeremiah 31:7-14 Their life shall become like a watered garden.
Ephesians 1:3-6, 15-19a I do not cease to give thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers.
Luke 2:41-52 I must be in that belonging to my Father.

O God with us, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

The Gospel of Luke contains the only story of the boyhood of Jesus in the Bible – and I’ll tell you, it baffles Biblical scholars. We know that ancient biographies commonly told stories of heroes in their youth to demonstrate that there were signs of greatness early on. There are some fantastic stories about Jesus’ magical powers as a youth that didn’t make the cut when the scriptural canon was being set. But none of the other three Gospels that did make it into the Bible have any stories from Jesus’ youth, and Luke’s intention is not clear. Is Luke demonstrating that Jesus was like other heroes, fulfilling a divine promise clear in his youth? Or was Luke demonstrating that Jesus was NOT like the others because he didn’t start out knowing everything? Was he a child prodigy, teaching the teachers in the temple? Or was the young Jesus an ordinary adolescent, not telling his parents where he was, doing something quite dangerous getting separated from his family, worrying them sick for the better part of a week? The answer to all these questions seems to be yes. Continue reading →

Grapes

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First Sunday after Christmas B, December 28, 2014; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Isaiah 61:10-62:3 For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake, I will not rest.
Galatians 4:4-7 So that we might receive adoption as children.
Luke 2:22:40 The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.

O God with us, Emmanuel, grant us the strength, the wisdom and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

This Gospel portion that I just read is only told in the Gospel of Luke. It follows immediately after the verse which says, “After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child, and he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. If it had been a little less chaotic at Emmanuel Church in the weeks leading up to Christmas, I might have remembered to expand our Gospel reading in your bulletins to include this verse, because of the reference to Jesus’ naming ceremony. Only Luke tells anything about Jesus before he reached later adulthood. So I wonder, what is it that Luke wanted to demonstrate with these stories of Jesus’ infancy and boyhood?

I think the first is that Jesus was a real human, according to Luke. He was born to human parents, with a genealogy that went back to Adam — earthling (who Luke calls the Son of God). The Good News of Jesus Christ in Luke is that God anointed a human being to fully embody God’s intention of freedom and right-relationship for God’s people. Jesus increased in wisdom as he increased in years. According to Luke, Jesus didn’t land on earth knowing it all. Jesus learned as he went. According to Luke, Jesus was fully, really human. Continue reading →

The Mystery of Love

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Fourth Sunday of Advent, 4B, December 21, 2014; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16 I have not lived in a house…but I have been moving about in a tent and a tabernacle. Romans 16:25-27 According to the revelation of the mystery. Luke 1:26-38 But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. – or Here am I.

O God of impossible possibilities, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

Many of you know that I grew up in a household where wrestling with Holy Scripture was one of the things we did as a family for exercise. I didn’t know that some families went on ski vacations until I was well into college! I will confess that that discovery made me feel a little jealous, but over the years my gratitude for my dad’s insistence on Biblical engagement has grown and grown. Our Gospel story this morning has been calling people to wrestle – with paint, with poetry and prose, with music, with drama since the beginning. In fact, so many have wrestled with this text before us that we might not think we have to – we might think that we must either accept or dismiss the truth of the annunciation or accept or dismiss the truth of the virgin birth. Did this happen or not? (I think the answer is yes — sometimes.)

The town of Nazareth, in the Galilee is built on a hillside in the southern Lebanon Mountains. It’s a bustling Palestinian city now with a population of about 65,000. In the mid-nineteenth century, a French order of nuns built a convent in Nazareth. The Sisters of Nazareth have exercised their ministry there ever since. When I visited in 2007, they told a story of calling a plumber to repair a leak, who, in the course of his work, fell through the floor of the convent into a well-preserved first century courtyard house where there is evidence of 1st century Jewish occupants; there is also an animal feeding trough (a manger made of stone, not wood); and a burial chamber with a huge stone disk that can be rolled to cover the opening. Continue reading →

Reasons to Rejoice

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The Third Sunday of Advent, 3B, December 14, 2014; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Isaiah 66:1-4, 8-11. To give them a garland instead of ashes.
1 Thessalonians 5:16-24. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing.
John 1:6-8, 19-28. This took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing.

O God of hope, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

One of the benefits of sharing sanctuary and programs, families and friendships, with a synagogue is that we are regularly called out of theological complacency when it comes to our Christian scripture and Church tradition’s references to Jews – or Levites, priests from Jerusalem, high priests, Sadducees, scribes, or Pharisees. I changed the word Jews in our Gospel lesson to Judeans by way of putting a speed bump in our path, not because Judeans is necessarily the best translation of Judaios here, but because I want us all to slow down a little bit when we listen to this reading. John the Evangelist (that is, John, the Gospel writer) begins his version of the story of Jesus with tension between “the Jews” and Jesus in a way that the other three Gospel writers do not. For John the Evangelist, the tension started before Jesus even appeared on the scene. It’s not exactly clear to scholars who John means when he writes Judaios. He’s certainly not talking about all Jews or all Judeans even at the time, since Jesus and his followers were all Jewish. He may be contrasting Judeans and Galileans, but most likely he’s writing about some of Jerusalem’s religious authorities.[1] He clearly has an ax to grind that the other Gospel writers do not have. The Gospel of John uses the term Judaios some sixty-four times compared with six in the Gospel of Mark, five in Matthew, and three in Luke.[2] It seems that John, who was writing in the late first century, is caught up in a late-first-century conflict, which he is applying retroactively to the first part of the first century. I wonder if John is using the word the way some of us refer to “the police,”  “the military,” or “the government,” when we are angry or despairing in the midst of struggle. I don’t know John’s intent, but I do know that we cannot let it slide. Continue reading →

See, love, and behave accordingly!

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The Second Sunday of Advent, 2B, December 7, 2014; The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

Isaiah 40:1-11 Cry out!
2 Peter 3:8-15a Do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.
Mark 1:1-8 He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.

O God of the prophets, may we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth – come when it may and cost what it will.

Every year at this time, the church gives us a new advent – a new beginning — a new season of longing to hear and respond to lessons of prophetic wisdom and calls for repentance writ large. These calls are not for personal repentance, but for national repentance, for corporate repentance, and for ecclesiastical – that is Church — repentance. And the good news is that this year is no exception! The most magnificent sign of this kind of prophetic action can be seen in the large numbers of people rising up in Boston and all around the country to protest the status quo of racism and injustice. It’s good news. People are watching and waking up and demonstrating anger and calling for change. Continue reading →