May 2026
First Sunday After Pentecost
This sermon explores the mystery of the Holy Trinity and its practical implications for Christian life. Through the lens of God's image in all humanity, the preacher emphasizes that love and relationality are central to understanding God's nature and our calling to serve others with compassion and mercy.
Pentecost
This Pentecost sermon explores the Holy Spirit's transformative power to break through division and foster genuine human connection. Drawing on personal experiences of cross-cultural encounter, the preacher celebrates how God's passionate Spirit moves us beyond fear and isolation toward authentic communication and heart-to-heart bonds across all barriers.
Seventh Sunday of Easter
The Ascension is not Jesus's departure but His presence in a new way through His followers. Rev. Owren teaches that Christians are called to embody Christ on earth, becoming witnesses to God's love and Kingdom through humble service, compassion, and faithful action in daily life.
Sixth Sunday Easter
The preacher explores the role of the Holy Spirit as an active guide and counselor in daily Christian life. Drawing on John's Gospel, she emphasizes that developing a relationship with the Spirit requires intentional practice through scripture study, silence, and attentiveness to inner nudges. She illustrates how believers can discern the Spirit's presence in nature, intuition, and everyday moments, always testing experiences against God's character of love and peace.
Fifth Sunday of Easter
The preacher reflects on Jesus's command not to let hearts be troubled, exploring how disciples struggled with Jesus's impending departure despite witnessing miracles. Drawing on personal experience with medical uncertainty, the sermon encourages believers to trust God's presence in the current moment rather than anxiously fixating on future concerns or troubling world events.
April 2026
Fourth Sunday of Easter
Rev. Dr. David T. Gortner explores holy community as the body of Christ, drawing parallels between a shepherd's flock moving in harmony and the early Church's joyful togetherness. He emphasizes how God guides believers through relationships of trust, care, and mutual commitment, knitting us together as one body to carry Christ's grace into the world.
Third Sunday of Easter
This sermon explores the risen Christ's presence in believers' daily lives and encounters. Drawing on the disciples' recognition of Jesus during resurrection appearances, the preacher emphasizes how Christ continues to open new ways of seeing and understanding through faith. The message encourages openness to encountering the risen Jesus in Scripture, community, and surprising moments of spiritual awakening.
Second Sunday Of Easter
Drawing on the resurrection and Peter's message of living hope, this sermon explores how faith enables Christians to face life's trials with optimism and purpose. Through the story of Lena Bargo's organ donation and references to Bonhoeffer's faithful resistance, the preacher illustrates how believers are called to give their lives for others, standing on the solid ground of Christ's resurrection.
Easter and Easter Vigil
This sermon explores the profound spiritual meaning of Easter and the Easter Vigil, emphasizing themes of resurrection, new life, and God's redemptive love. Through biblical readings and reflection, the preacher calls the faithful to experience personal transformation through Christ's victory over death and to embrace renewed commitment to following Jesus in daily life.
March 2026
Fifth Sunday in Lent
This sermon explores the daily choice between spiritual death and life through the stories of Ezekiel's vision of dry bones and Jesus raising Lazarus. The preacher emphasizes that prophetic speech—declaring God's promises with courage and conviction—awakens hope and possibility even amid profound loss, grief, and uncertainty, calling the faithful to choose life daily.
Fourth Sunday in Lent
This sermon explores spiritual vision through the Gospel account of Jesus healing a man born blind. Preacher Ernest Warner examines how affliction reveals God's work rather than punishment, challenges rigid beliefs that obscure truth, and calls the congregation to serve those in need with compassion and mercy.
Third Sunday In Lent
The Reverend Dr. David T. Gortner explores friendship with God and peacemaking through the lens of water imagery in Scripture. Drawing on the Israelites' wilderness struggle and Jesus's encounter with the Samaritan woman, he encourages persistent engagement with God and others—whether through praise, wrestling, or honest disagreement—as essential to spiritual life and lasting peace.
February 2026
Last Sunday After the Epiphany
The Transfiguration reveals Jesus' divine glory and offers believers a glimpse of resurrection life to come. The sermon explores how Christians are called to be transformed through faith, living intentionally into God's kingdom by embodying mercy, peacemaking, and love as reflections of Christ's light in the world.
Fifth Sunday After Epiphany
The Reverend Dr. David Gortner calls the parish to embrace their identity as salt and light in the world. Drawing on the Beatitudes and examples of costly discipleship—from Bonhoeffer to King—he challenges St. Luke's to active witness and courageous service in their community, rejecting complacency in times of crisis and injustice.
January 2026
First Sunday After Epiphany
This sermon explores Jesus's baptism as an epiphany—a moment of divine recognition and transformation. Rev. Gortner invites listeners to recall their own life-changing encounters with God's presence, examining how such moments name us as beloved and call us to purpose. He emphasizes remembering baptism throughout life as a marker of spiritual turning points.
December 2025
Fourth Sunday of Advent
This Advent sermon reflects on God's promise of renewal and restoration through Christ's birth. Drawing on the nativity account and the spiritual journey of Mary and Joseph, the preacher emphasizes trust, faith, and obedience during uncertain times. The message urges listeners to embrace hope, accept divine purpose, and recognize that God transforms chaos into new creation, offering reassurance that active participation in faith changes the world.
Second Sunday of Advent
Reverend Owren explores the Advent theme of God's presence and comfort during life's struggles. Through the metaphor of being trapped in a hole, he emphasizes that Jesus—Immanuel, "God with us"—knows the way out. He calls Christians to repentance as transformation of mind and renewal, inviting believers to make room for Christ's redemptive love.
November 2025
Twenty third Sunday after Pentecost
Reverend Gortner reflects on Jesus's warning against obsessing over the end times, urging the congregation instead to remain steadfast in faith and trust God's promises. He emphasizes that the church's true mission transcends its physical buildings—to embody Christ's love and participate in God's ongoing creation of peace and renewal in the world.
Twenty second sunday after pentecost
This sermon explores resurrection hope through Jesus's encounters with the Sadducees and teachings on the afterlife. It emphasizes that resurrection requires new imagination beyond earthly understanding, inviting believers to live freed from death's fear. The preacher connects this hope to the diocesan theme of singing a new song, calling the community to praise, justice, and transformed witness.
All Saints Sunday
On All Saints Sunday, Rev. Dr. David Gortner explores the countercultural nature of God's kingdom through Christ's Beatitudes, celebrating the saints—both historical figures and those in our own lives—who embody Christ's radical call to love enemies, serve the poor, and sacrifice self for others.
October 2025
Twentieth Sunday After Pentecost
This sermon examines the parable of the Pharisee and tax collector, exploring how Jesus reverses social expectations by showing that genuine humility and repentance matter more than outward righteousness. The preacher challenges listeners to recognize their own self-righteousness and emphasizes that judgment belongs to God alone, not to followers of Christ.
Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost
On the Feast of St. Luke, Rev. Dr. David T. Gortner reflects on Jesus' declaration of purpose—bringing good news to the poor, release to captives, and sight to the blind. Through the healing of ten lepers, the sermon explores how true worship emerges from grateful response to God's grace and calls the congregation to follow Christ's liberating mission in their community today.
Seventeenth Sunday After Pentecost
Reflecting on St. Francis and St. Clare, this sermon explores how faith becomes active through courageous witness and service. Drawing on scripture and the saints' examples, Rev. Gortner challenges believers to stand forward in their callings, leaving behind attachments that hinder discipleship, and to extend Christ's love to all creation.
September 2025
Sixteenth Sunday After Pentecost
The sermon explores Jesus's teaching on wealth and generosity through the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. Rev. Gortner urges Christians to "buy low, share and give high"—investing faithfully even in difficult times while generously sharing abundance. He warns that wealth distorts perception and compassion, calling listeners to practice giving as a spiritual discipline that reorients the heart toward God's kingdom rather than material accumulation.
Fourteenth Sunday After Pentecost
In response to recent violence and despair in America, this sermon proclaims God's relentless mission of reconciliation through Christ. Drawing on parables of the lost sheep, coin, and prodigal son, the preacher urges listeners to embody Christ's love by seeking the lost, loving enemies, and participating in God's redemptive work across all creation.
Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost
The Reverend Dr. David T. Gortner reflects on Jeremiah's vision at the potter's house, exploring how God molds individuals, communities, and nations. He emphasizes the spiritual importance of remaining pliable and open to transformation rather than hardening one's heart, illustrating this through pottery's creative process and personal stories of faith yielding to God's will.
August 2025
Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost
This sermon celebrates the dignity of all workers and urges Christians to cultivate holy imagination—mentally entering others' experiences with empathy. Drawing on Labor Day reflections and Scripture, the preacher calls parishioners to move beyond detachment toward compassionate action, mirroring Christ's radical welcome and reshaping community through sacrificial care for the marginalized.
Eleventh Sunday After Pentecost
Reverend Gortner explores God's call to each person across all barriers and boundaries, drawing from the healing of the bent woman in Luke's Gospel. He emphasizes that all Christians are part of God's kingdom and invited to rise into their fullest purpose, freed from self-doubt and shame to become bearers of divine light and love.
Tenth Sunday After Pentecost
The preacher explores true repentance and divine judgment through Isaiah's vineyard allegory, examining how God's people have turned from righteousness. Drawing on scripture's "cloud of witnesses," the sermon challenges hearers to move beyond mere apology toward genuine transformation of heart, while confronting hypocrisy and pursuing justice.
Ninth Sunday After Pentecost
The preacher explores faith as a living practice rather than mere intellectual assent, calling believers to actively serve others and pursue justice. Drawing on Isaiah's condemnation of hollow worship, the sermon emphasizes that genuine faith manifests through compassionate action and welcoming the marginalized into God's kingdom.
Eighth Sunday After Pentecost
This sermon explores God's enduring love despite human unfaithfulness, drawing on Hosea's prophecies and the Exodus narrative. The preacher emphasizes that God's commands call us to love and self-giving rather than acquisition, and that God's anger toward Israel stems from parental anguish, not vindictiveness. Ultimately, God's compassionate embrace remains eternally open to those who return.
July 2025
Seventh Sunday after Pentecost
The preacher explores the Lord's Prayer as Jesus taught it, examining its transformative power through themes of surrender, service, gratitude, and forgiveness. Drawing on congregational reflections, the sermon emphasizes that prayer changes us, aligning our lives with God's purpose and helping create heaven on earth.
Fourth Sunday After Pentecost
This sermon explores the story of Naaman's healing, emphasizing how God works through humble servants and unexpected means. Drawing on Pope Francis's call to "stay human," the preacher examines themes of faith, compassion, and the transformative power of recognizing God's work in others, particularly the overlooked young slave girl whose intercession initiates Naaman's journey toward healing and spiritual renewal.
Sixth Sunday After Pentecost
The preacher explores how busyness and distraction distance us from God, drawing parallels between the ancient Israelites condemned by Amos and Martha's anxious service. He urges listeners to prioritize their baptismal promises and find rest in God's presence, reassuring that restoration and mercy ultimately await the faithful.
June 2025
Second Sunday after Pentecost
Finding God in silence rather than chaos, this sermon explores Elijah's encounter at Mount Horeb and calls listeners to step back from worldly turmoil. Drawing on Scripture's themes of unity in Christ and Jesus's command to love all neighbors, the preacher encourages contemplative prayer and inner listening as paths to discerning God's will amid contemporary discord.
June 2024
2024 Listening to God and Our Neighbors
This resource invites individuals and congregations to deepen their spiritual practice through nineteen Scripture passages centered on listening to God's voice, hearing one another, and responding with courage and love. Organized in five thematic sets, the texts guide participants toward holy curiosity, vulnerability, and faithful action as they seek Christ together.
2025 Called and Compelled by Love SCRIPTURE
This sermon explores how Christians are called and compelled by Christ's love to serve others. Drawing on Scripture passages about Jesus's ministry and encounters, the preacher examines what it means to be summoned by God's love and how believers should respond through prayer, devotion, and compassionate action toward those in need.
2024 Who Is This Jesus Texts
This meditation guide invites individuals and faith communities to encounter Jesus through sixteen biblical texts organized into four thematic sets. Participants are encouraged to read, pray, and reflect deeply on Jesus's identity, purposes, and calls to discipleship over nine months, exploring his heart for the poor, his nonviolent kingdom, his self-emptying love, and his transformative presence in human lives.
