St. Paul Podcast

In week three of the series, the impact of both Enlightenment ideas and the dynamics of the 19th century leads some in society and the church to conceive of the American dream as "a land of opportunity."

Katy Warren preaches on faith. Faith is not being sure where you’re going but going anyway. It is a journey without maps. If true faith is being sure of what we hope for, then we need to regularly evaluate what consumes our hopes and our dreams, placing God at the center of our lives, and letting Christ guide our steps in many ways. Faith has less to do with gathering together a certain quantity and more to do with this ability to put one foot in front of the other, pouring our lives into something greater than ourselves. 

The second session in this series takes up the American dream of "a more perfect union," enshrined in the opening lines of the US Constitution (1787). Its relationship to the God-language of the Declaration of Independence and to the "city on a hill" of the Puritans offers a window into the vision and project of the country's founders to respect both the foundational place of religion in human life and the pragmatic plurality of religious views and convictions in public policy debates.

Peter W. Marty preaches on the gift of forgiveness. Receiving the gift of forgiveness should prompt us to develop the kind of mindset of forgiveness. It should inspire in us a posture of generous pardon, to recognize how readily God reaches out beyond our deeds and how God looks beyond consequences to give us a second chance and from which we are to become new people. If we take seriously the Lord’s mercy upon us - this Lord who abundantly pardons - we have to ask ‘what are we going to do or be because of that?’ 

Drawing heavily on research presented by Abram Van Engen in his 2020 volume, City on a Hill: A History of American Exceptionalism, the introductory session of the 4-part series explores the origins and use of "a city on a hill" as one expression of the American dream. Biblical sources and presidential usages of the phrase contribute to the complexity that the phrase carries today. (Correction: the speaker incorrectly identified UN membership as comprising 167 nation-states; in fact, there are 193.)

Pastor Sara Olson-Smith preaches on the plurality of the Lord’s Prayer. This prayer is always a communal thing, even when we pray alone. These words are powerful in how we share them. When we pray, we are pulled into connection with each other; even when we can’t hear each other prayers, we can feel them. 

Pastor Megan Eide preaches on Isaiah. Big or small, Jesus listens with love. Take time to sit in the presence of Christ, building a relationship together. Jesus was not just a character in Bible stories, maybe Jesus is someone we could get to know personally and someone who wants to know us. You are worried and distracted by many things, but there is need of only one thing.  Our worries and duties can often pull us away from what is most important, our families and our God. 

Pastor Katy Warren preaches on the parable of the Good Samaritan. In no Bible will you find the heading named the parable of the robbers. Jesus gives the robbers little attention, focusing on the good Samaritan who showed mercy, was kind and thoughtful, and a good neighbor. The way Jesus decides to tell this parable demonstrates that we have a choice about what we focus our lives on. Are we focusing on the things that inspire love and kindness, moving us toward richer lives of faith?

Pastor Peter W. Marty preaches on Isaiah. We’ve been shaped through a multitude of words and images to view God as a paternal figure. The prophet Isaiah uses explicitly maternal images to describe God, images that appropriately enlarge our imaginations of the divine. Our conceptualization of God influences the ways in which we relate to each other. Everything we can do to enlarge our understanding of God will expand our faith and understanding. 

Sara Olson-Smith preaches on the fruit of the spirit. The fruit of the spirit is…not the fruits of the spirit are… It’s as though Paul couldn’t quite come up with just one word that could contain the fullness of what a spirit-led life looked like. The fruit of the spirit is not just a list of things we can check off or measure ourselves by but a whole way of life that moves toward love for ourselves and other people. The fruit of the spirit are those things that restore life and create joy, goodness, and community.