"Conceal, Don’t Feel!" This is the advice the King of Arendelle gives to his daughter, Princess Elsa. The young princess has incredible power living within her, but like most power, it could do great harm as well as great good. So she follows her father’s advice and isolates herself out of fear of harming her sister Anna or anyone else.

When have you sought to conceal a part of who you are? When have you tried just not to feel anymore? What gift do you have that you aren’t letting go free? This week in our Disney Sermon Series, Magic Kingdom? Amazing Kin-dom, we will explore how fear impacts our lives, what gifts we hide, and what does the "freedom" to "let it go" and use them really look like. After all, Christ, our Savior and Guide, never runs from the power of his desire to love and save us. How can we follow his lead?

In order to explore these questions, we will look at a queen in scripture, Queen Esther, her power, and her fear and ultimately her role in liberating and saving her people. Take some time and read the Scriptures for this sermon and consider where God unfreezes and frees our hearts.

Close your eyes and let your imagination picture "God’s world." What does it look like? The Setting? The "Props?" The People? What are they doing? How do they treat each other?

This week in our Magic Kingdom? Amazing Kin-dom Disney Sermon Series, we will look at The Little Mermaid, a story of a mermaid who longs to become human and part of their world. There’s much to this beautiful story and to the way the recent remake has made news headlines, but we will focus on this longing to be a part of a world different than our own.

As people trying to follow Christ, we are called to long for more - for the different, unknown and essential world of God. We are called to thirst for God’s world like a "deer pants for the water." So read the Scriptures for this sermon and come to it ready to imagine not only God’s world, but ways we can be a part of it today.

If you could make three wishes right at this moment, what would they be?

Now, imagine with me for a moment that Christ suddenly “poofed” and appeared right before your eyes like a real-life Genie and Jesus could offer his opinion on the three things you most need? What might they be?

As we continue our Disney Sermon Series, we consider Aladdin and his journey into his heart’s desire. Watch the movie if you desire (the new one is in theatres now), and read the Scriptures. How does the 1 Corinthians passage relate to Aladdin who is called a “street rat.” Does he exemplify how “God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong” as our Bible lesson claims? What does that verse even mean for our God of grace to “shame” someone, and is there good news in that? How does Jesus’ recommendation in the passage in John to “lay down my life in order to take it up again” relate to the choices / wishes Aladdin eventually chooses. What does God wish for you to lay down and / or pick up in the weeks to come?

Stars Wars isn't Disney, you say?

Correct, not originally, but in 2012, Disney purchased Lucasfilm and the rights to the Jedi empire. This deal matters not to the Gospel, but it worked out nicely for CHUMC, because we are in the middle of a Disney sermon series AND our Vacation Bible School entitled To Mars and Beyond starts Sunday, July 14. So we are sliding a Star Wars sermon into the Disney Sermon Series.

We are especially blessed to have Carolyn Browender, CHUMC's own who is usually away at Union Seminary, here to preach. So, read the Scriptures for this sermon, and come to it ready to consider all the ways we can access "the Force" of God's grace and be transformed.

Who’s got your back? And why?

And whose back do you have? And why?

This week in our Disney Sermon Series, Magic Kingdom? Amazing Kin-dom!, we will let Disney’s version of Victor Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre Dame guide our study and worship. Both the book and movie begin as a tale about “a man and a monster.”

In the story, Esmeralda, a Roma (gypsy) woman is persecuted by a legalistic, church authoritarian, Frolo, who epitomizes bad, harmful, religion. Esmeralda seeks sanctuary from Frolo and his soldiers in the Cathedral of Notre Dame and discovers Quasimodo inside, a young man born at birth with physical deformities. Watch the movie if you can before listening, and even if you can’t here are a few other ways to prepare for hearing it.

Ask yourself, "What does Jesus look like to you?" Then read the Isaiah passage, which helps give us insight into the meaning of Jesus, our Messiah, and try to imagine Jesus with this description. Can you perceive Christ as Quasimodo?

Now ask yourself, "When do I act like Frolo, finding comfort and safety in letter of the law rather than questioning any law that isolates, separates or minimizes one of God’s children?"

Finally, read the gospel lesson and ask whose prayers (the pharisee or the tax collector) do your prayers most resemble? Then pray the words of Esmeralda’s song “God Help the Outcast” and ponder how and for whom God may be calling you to pray.

Disney, really?!?!?!

This has been the most common reaction when I’ve shared that we will spend six weeks this summer on Disney with a sermon series entitled Magic Kingdom? - Amazing Kin-dom! I will note, that although the same phrase, I have heard it with two distinct tones. Some of you have asked, “Disney, really?!” with such glee that you could hardly contain yourselves; a few others of you have bemoaned, “Disney, really?” with such disdain that you could hardly hide it.

I understand both reactions. For many, Disney is the soundtrack of our childhood. No matter if we remember the tragedy of Bambi, the thrill of a band under the sea, or a kind ice princess, each generation has Disney films that have influenced it. To some of you that’s beautiful and to others, that’s big corporations taking over our lives.

But here’s the hook for the preacher. Disney films, at their heart, are about the human condition. That’s why they are so popular. We’ve all longed to be different like Ariel. We’ve all hoped we could be transformed like the Beast. We’ve all struggled to embrace our gifts like Elsa. And the Gospel is written as a response to our human condition. It’s God’s way of working with our own frailties. So though Disney is not a true religion (albeit some of you may jokingly disagree), we can use their beautifully animated stories about the human condition to look afresh at God’s love story with us mere humans. And don’t worry, we promise to name some of the issues with Disney along the way.

In this sermon, we begin the series with Beauty and the Beast in order to explore holy hospitality. After all, though it seems so easy to say “Be Our Guest” when the “flatware’s entertaining,” true God-led hospitality is something we all struggle with as individuals, communities, and even countries. So take some time before listening to read the Scriptures and maybe even watch the new or the old Beauty and the Beast and contemplate our age-old struggle with opening our hearts, lives, and homes to all.

Once again, Jesus finds himself in a predicament. In our gospel lesson, the Pharisees have laws, passed down over time - Sabbath laws intended to bring peace, rest, and restoration to the people. But they are holding so tight to these laws, that they are destroying community and allowing injuries to continue rather than healing. So one Sabbath, Jesus looks down at a wounded man with a withered hand and challenges the good religious leaders asking, "Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save life or to kill?"

Beloveds, 14 years ago, you took Jesus’ question seriously. You spent a year listening to Scripture, prayer, and to each other. You sought out God’s heart. Then, honestly recognizing the emotional, spiritual, and sometimes even physical killing happening to our LGBTQ siblings, you faithfully, boldly, and loudly proclaimed we are here to save life, to do good, and to fight against the harm being done in our denomination. You became a Reconciling Congregation and have lived out this love for all in countless ways since then. I share just a few of them in this sermon as

a part of our Reconciling Sunday Celebration.

But, of course, human brokenness does not end, and especially now, our reconciling work continues in our denomination and our world. So, we find ourselves at a cross road. In addition to the gospel text, read the passage from Acts 15. Consider how/why the church leadership opens their hearts to the work of the Spirit among the Gentiles and releases their old certainties. Contrast the oppressive silence of the Pharisees in Mark and the expansive silence of the leaders in the Acts passage. Then consider how you are listening to God in this time of great change and come ready to hear from the One who loves us most, our God and Savior. Come ready to listen, celebrate, and be reconciled afresh as God speaks and heals on the Sabbath just as Jesus did to the man with the withered hand 2000 years ago.

Well, it’s Fathers’ Day weekend!

If we are honest, this day probably strikes us all a little differently. For some of us this will be very meaningful; for others of us, we’re ambivalent about it; for some of us it is a painful day.

No matter how we feel about the day, what does fatherhood mean to us? What are our thoughts about our father figures? What authority do we give them, and how do we grant them that power? What does childhood mean, and what does it look like?

Even with these questions, I’m sure our answers will be quite diverse. So, listen to this sermon to spend some time thinking of fatherhood and childhood in relation to what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 4:11-17 and what Jesus says in Matthew 18:1-5.

Pentecost, the Christian holiday we celebrate with this sermon, is perhaps my favorite celebration. Christmas means Christ came for you and me. Easter means he rose giving you and me new life. But Pentecost is the holiday reminding us that life and faith are not about “you and me” as individuals. On Pentecost (Acts 2:1-21), the Spirit poured out over all gathered in Jerusalem and, against all odds, connected people from various walks of life, speaking different tongues and, undoubtedly, possessing different understandings of God and helped them communicate with one another for the benefit of our world.

Some consider Pentecost the reversal of Babel. For Pentecost is about power, but not the power of individuals or an elite group focused on accomplishing something for themselves. Rather it is the power of adoption, the wind that brings people from all walks of like and ways of faith into one working family. So in this sermon, we study the confusing story of the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9) and its warning to avoid the deceptive unity created when we come together for the purpose of “making a name for ourselves” (Gen 11:4) or elevating “you and me.” Then we explore God’s way of uniting us through the “spirit of adoption” (Romans 8:14-17) and what it means to take on the identity and work of an individual adopted into or irrevocably united with the family of God born on that first day of Pentecost. So, in preparation, read the Scriptures above and ask yourself, "Have I accepted 'the spirit of adoption,’ and when / how do I let it guide my movements in the world?

ANGER- it energizes us, exhausts us, empowers us, and can demolish us. Doctors and psychologists study it. Advertisers and politicians exploit it. We struggle with it daily. What is its role in our life? And what would God like it to be?

We know that Scripture repeatedly warns us about the destructive consequences of anger unchecked. We also see anger and indignation alive and at work in Jesus at least three times in Mark alone. I’m most intrigued by Paul’s command, “Be angry, but do not sin.” He directly tells us to be angry but restricts the possible outcomes or ways of releasing of our anger.

Personally, over the past few months, I have felt and seen other’s intense justified anger at our denomination and the hurt being done. This week at Annual Conference, the valve was temporarily released by acts of justice and courage and an outpouring of love.

So come to this sermon to wrestle with what it looks like to “Be Angry as a Christian,” as we celebrate the historic commissioning and ordination this week by our Bishop of 18 individuals including TC Morrow and Joey Heath, two LGBTQia servants of God.