Taylor Mertins

One of the things we struggle to remember, here in our comfortable Christianity, is that Jesus was a revolutionary. He was not killed for loving too much. He was killed for calling into question who was really in charge, for confronting the elite about not taking care of the poor and the marginalized, and for telling the truth.

Jesus was a revolutionary and calls us to join the revolution.

Our lives have changed forever. We can’t just retreat to the ways of the past because grace abounds. God in Christ has made in us a new creation! The gift of God in Christ on the cross was, and is, such that we are forever freed from the tyranny of sin and death. Should we continue to sin in order that grace may abound? HELL NO!

Truly I tell you, we cannot know who we are to be, if we do not know our story. This inexhaustible, unexplainable, indescribable moment from the beginning (Genesis) is who we are. It is the story of how the life of order fell into disorder. But, thanks be to God, it is not the end of the story.

We don’t like admitting our shortcomings, our faults, and our helplessness. We reject that gospel and substitute our own. We’d rather believe the American gospel: God helps those who help themselves. Actually, Paul tells us quite the opposite: When we could not help ourselves, when we were stuck in the shadow of sin, Christ died for us.

We can have the perfect advertising campaign, with our slogan in big capital letters, but that does not redeem our sinful actions and behaviors. We might think we are righteous and that we are “color-blind” or “LGBTQ affirming” or “economically transparent” but we are nevertheless sinners in need of God’s grace and forgiveness. We can even leave the church doors unlocked all week long, but we will still be broken and in need of God’s redeeming love.

By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

In an attempt to live into my fear, I stepped up to the pulpit without a pre-written sermon and offered this about the Transfiguration.

When we pray like the psalmist, when we utter words with true faith and humility, when we ask for God's will to be done and mean it, our prayers will always mean more than what we hear from the pulpit.

Is the Church supposed to make the world a better place? - Sermon on 1 Corinthians 3.1-9

Does Jesus really want us to love the sinner and hate the sin? Why is this such a popular thing for Christians to say?