St George's Sermon Blog

  Luke 10:25-37 So now we are getting into the meaty part of this green season of the church year where we learn to follow Jesus and discover how to be his disciples.   All summer, we have been hearing stories about Jesus crossing over and breaking boundaries and reaching out to the least expected people imaginable.   He has taught and healed and cast out demons and then he even called out and sent his followers to join in his boundary breaking ministry. And now this week, we reach the capstone of this series of readings with our gospel story for today.   The Story of the Good Samaritan.   Which has to easily be one of the most popular stories in the whole Bible.   We love this story.   And we tell it so often that it’s easy to scarcely give it a second thought.   It’s just a simple object lesson about how we should be kind to strangers and help people in need right?   To us today it couldn’t really be more straightforward.   Clearly...

  Peace [RCL] 2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30; Galatians 6:(1-6)7-16; Luke 10:1-11, 16-20  by  The Rev. Joslyn Ogden Schaefer   What do you think of when you hear the word “peace”? Many people first associate the word with internal positive emotional states like calmness, contentment, and acceptance. Others jump straight to external realities like harmony among groups of people, or the absence of it among nations. It’s a big and slippery concept – something most humans desire but few seem to experience consistently. Our faith tradition has a lot to say about peace. Shalom is the word in Hebrew, and it connotes well-being in every dimension of our lives. In the New Testament, the Greek word is eiréné . In today’s readings, both Jesus and Paul talk about peace. Instead of giving us suggestions for how to cultivate inner peace or tips for self-improvement, we hear that peace isn’t generated through our own efforts. Instead, God provides this spiritual gift to us. It is ...