St Timothy Presbyterian Church in Toronto: Sermons

Exodus 1:8-2:10

Our interns have prepared an E-book version of this sermon. Enjoy!

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Genesis 45:1-15

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The post God Behind Our Stories appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.

Matthew 14:22-33

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Click to Read This Week’s Congregational Prayer!

This week, we celebrated the graduation of the students moving from Kids’ Church into Hi-C and from Hi-C into College. We also celebrated the graduation of students at St. Andrews Humber Heights. The Hi-C graduates created a video of their reflections on how they feel moving on into their next stage in life and what the St. Tim’s community has meant to them.  Several other students in Hi-C put together a farewell video for the graduates.

The post The Hand That Saves appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.

Genesis 32:22-31

Our interns have prepared an E-book version of this sermon. Enjoy!

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The post Finding Our Blessing appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.

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Last Friday was our last session of this study on Anti-Racism and Galatians. This week, we read Galatians 5-6. In these chapters, St. Paul talks about new creation, and we reflected on how new communities would reflect the unconditioned gift of God in Christ.

Reflecting on our own lives, we found that our society is very similar to the Galatians. Honour is not given freely and unconditionally to those who are marginalized. Instead, they have to earn honour while those who have privilege are simply given honour. In this context there is a stratification between those whose honour is not under great threat or competition, and those who face daily and recurring threats to their honour. In a context like that, it is so difficult to build community.

The communities that we should strive to create should be built on love. When we become free from the previous standards of honour, we can then give honour to one another rooted in love. These communities would be formed without regard to one's worth, and without heed to pre-existent norms of acceptability. This kind of community would be evidence of faith and a life in Christ.

A challenging question that came up was this: Can we build this kind of community with those who are very different from us? The ESM members at the Bible study shared and reflected on our own community of St. Tim’s. We wondered how we could open up our community to others. Many shared their thoughts on how we could reach out to those beyond the Korean community as well as their reflections on the biases and barriers that have discouraged others from truly joining our church. We hope that we can use the strong foundation that we already have but also reach out to others who are of other ethnicities. Creating personal relationships with those who are different than us will lead us to become more like the Beloved Community MLK envisioned.

Thank you to everyone who participated in this study! It was a very fruitful and insightful four weeks due to your commitment and openness to sharing.

Session 4 E-book

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Matthew 13:44-46

Our interns have prepared an E-book version of this sermon. Enjoy!

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Click Here to Read this Week’s Congregational Prayer!

The post Finding Hidden Treasure appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.

Last Friday was the third session of the Becoming Together: Toward the Beloved Community study led by Rev. Simon Park. This week, we read and reflected on Galatians 3:1-5:1. In this passage, we saw how normativities in our lives affect what we view as desirable. For the Galatians, the issue was this: they had found freedom from the norms of Roman normativity, and all the negative connotations and mental and spiritual enslavement that entailed. Now, however, they had reverted to a new enslavement, this time under Jewish norms. Like the Galatians, we are enslaved to norms. Our norms have been shaped by white normativity overtime, and have led to an unconscious bias against what is black.

Through this study, we learned that Christ is the new normativity that decentralizes everything else. We are all equal in God's eyes. Your worth is affirmed in the love of God shown through Christ. We reflected on how having Christ in our lives can change the way we think and discussed how we can stand with Black people who are suffering with Christ at the centre of our thoughts and hearts.

In discussion groups, our ESM congregation members shared their experiences, insights, and newfound understanding of their own views on anti-black racism, privilege and the normativities we live with. Many shared their own experiences of coming to Canada as an immigrant and discussed the privileges they didn’t realize they had due to the fact that Korean immigrants followed the norms already present in Canadian culture. We found that it was hard to articulate the normativity we live with, which lead to questions like “Are we just victims to this normativity or can we break out of it?’ and ‘What is centred in our lives? What should be de-centred?”.

As these normativities have shaped the way our society functions as a whole, there are many layers of issues at both micro and macro levels. While minorities find themselves stuck in these cyclical lifestyles where there seems to be no chance at change, how can we empower the underprivileged and break through? How can we change our different upbringings and situations for the better, so that we can all share equal privileges, education and experiences? We must work together as a community to bring to light the needs and struggles that black people face daily, and work with them to find ways to change.

We thank you all for participating in a very fruitful session and hope that you can make it to the last one on Friday, July 31st! Let us continue to reflect together.

Session 3 E-book

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Matthew 13:24-30

Our interns have prepared an E-book version of this sermon. Enjoy!

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Click Here to Read This Sunday’s Congregational Prayer!

The post Let Them Be appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.

This past Friday marked the second of four sessions in our Becoming Together: Toward the Beloved Community study led by Rev. Simon Park. As part of our mission to seek truth through the gift of Scripture, we reflected on the important issue of racism in our society and our role as a church and community in the fight against anti-black racism. Last week we learned about the history of the Galatians, the concept of model minorities, and the white normativity that we see in today’s society. Many of our ESM congregation members shared their stories and honest reflections on issues relating to racism, freedom and identity.

This week we covered Galatians 1 and 2, exploring the source of the gospel as Paul understood it. As we began to delve into the message and thoughts of St. Paul, we learned about how this revelation of the Gospel changed Paul's entire belief system, helping him find a new calling in life. We continued to look at the real-life implications of Paul's understanding of the gospel and how he built communities based on new norms. We began to understand that the essence of a new community is based on the norm of a life where all receive God's grace without regard to their worth.

From the insights of these chapters, we were able to relate to our current real-world context. In particular, we reflected on the residential patterns of Toronto, and realized how we've structured ourselves as a society. Toronto is much more segregated and racialized than we thought, even though we hold this reputation of being one of the most diverse cities in the world. What do these facts tell us about the norms we follow and the choices we make? Whom have we deemed worthy to be with? Is this due to the subconscious choices we make as citizens? Or is this a systemic issue that stems from the top and those in power? Questions like this provoked discussion and deep reflection on our actions as a faith community.

As we were able to listen in to the discussion groups and hear the thoughts of our congregation members, many insights and new perspectives were introduced to us. Topics such as cumulative advantage, white privilege and ignorance branched many discussions on our history and our role as a faith community. Some members realized that normality and what seems right can be subjective; things that may be wrong can seem normal to us if we are used to it. Others discussed ignorance and how we are hesitant to help those who are different from us. Overall, it was truly a beautiful sight to see many of the members of our community, from all different types of backgrounds and experiences, come together and honestly discuss such prominent issues in our current context. We encourage you to continue to participate in these active discussions and Bible studies as we explore our role as a church and faith community.

See you next Friday!

Session 2 E-book

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Romans 8:1-11

Our interns have prepared an E-book version of this sermon. Enjoy!

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The post A Spiritual Person appeared first on St Timothy Presbyterian Church.