Before the offering:
This is the time where we make our love visible
through the giving of our tithes and offerings.
Let’s give with cheerful hearts.
After the offering:
Generous God;
Over and over your grace sustains us,
over and over your love provides for us,
over and over your arm steadies us.
We give you these gifts,
with gratitude and joy,
thankful that you are God over all.
Amen.
God, the action of this offering
is a public sign of our allegiance to you:
we proclaim you ruler of our lives,
of our families,
of our finances.
of our future.
We give you thanks for all you have given us,
and all we have the privilege to give.
Use these gifts for the work of your church,
we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.
A sermon where I actually cooked a pot of soup while I talked about how the church is changing–a new recipe for church.
Three stories of peace in the midst of violence: Jehoshabeath, J.S. Woodsworth, and John Witmer. Every action for peace makes a difference.
An interactive sermon where I invite people to take on different characters in the story: “Jonah means dove, a book that brings an olive branch of good news to all people, especially in dark times. This morning we sat in Nineveh’s chair. We sat in Jonah and Israel’s chair. We are invited to sit in God’s mercy seat, to feel God’s compassion. As followers of Jesus, we are called to carry that olive branch of peace, that message of hope and good news, no matter what the cost.”
Wholesale change is sometimes what we need. If you have seen wholesale change, if you have seen God hapak someone’s life, then you know how dramatic this can be. I was with someone when God hapaked their heart. It wasn’t anything I said, I was just there to witness it. It was just a sudden shift in thinking, a sudden realization, a moment of clarity, and they were…overthrown! This person had spent years putting up defenses, so they wouldn’t have to face the destructiveness of their own actions. And suddenly in an hour, all the defenses just fell away, and the person crumbled. Their past was laid open to them, and they saw with new clear eyes the trail of destruction behind them…
A sermon that uses slides of artwork to illustrate the story of Jonah: Jonah descends to the depths in this story, but he arrives, by the end of chapter two, at the surface alive again, by the grace of God. Going to the depths and coming up again…that’s something all human beings can relate to, even today. The translatability of this story to today’s world, combined with the vivid imagery may explain why this story has had such lasting power in our culture.
I hope we can approach the story with curiosity and an open mind. In our reading of this book in the coming weeks, I hope that we don’t try to reduce Jonah to a pithy little nugget that we can put in our pocket. It’s polyvalent…it has many meanings; it’s a story that can journey with us, because it’s a story about a journey. A journey that involves storms and amazing creatures and amazing conversions in foreign lands. It’s a big picture story that points to God and the nature of creation. I hope you are as excited as I am to be taking flight with Jonah. What does a man named Dove have to tell us?
Schools, businesses and professional organizations of all kinds have safe place policies. Now I know that we have high hopes for the church. As followers of Jesus, shouldn’t we have a lower percentage of bad behavior? We strive not just for civility and not killing each other, we strive for love in the church. Shouldn’t the church be a safer place than other places? Yes, there is love and caring in the church but unfortunately, people bring every part of their humanness to the church, and that includes the humanness that leads to hurting each other.
I am a Mennonite pastor currently teaching theology at Conrad Grebel University College in Waterloo, Ontario. I’ve served congregations in Ontario and most recently, Alberta.
I love to write and to lead worship! If you are finding my writing helpful, I would love to hear from you! Feel free to use or adapt the material here, it is all written by me. If printing material, please credit “Copyright Carol Penner www.leadinginworship.com” (and say whether you modified it). If publishing, please contact me for permission. Contact me at carol@leadinginworship.com
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