Sermons by Bob Rhodes (Page 2)
Value the Vulnerable
As we near the end of our post-Easter series Reckless Love, we arrive at a question that has been building for weeks: what do we do with the people we’d rather avoid? This week, we are called to go further, toward the people our communities have written off. What happens when Jesus goes to the person everyone else has given up on raises questions about who we consider worth our time, our attention, and our love. Discover what it means…
Openhearted Love
As we continue our post-Easter series Reckless Love, we turn to John 4, where Jesus walks his disciples straight through Samaria and sits down at a well with a woman no one expected him to speak to. This week explores what it means to go where your assumptions tell you not to go, and to stay long enough to be changed. Discover what openhearted love looks like when reconciliation moves from theology to practice. Scripture: 2 Corinthians 5:18-21; John 4:4-30,…
Lavish Love
As we continue our post-Easter series Reckless Love, we turn to what Psalm 103 and Jesus have to say about generosity. The psalmist remembers a God who forgives, heals, redeems, and crowns with steadfast love. Jesus tells his disciples to love their enemies, give without expecting anything back, and be merciful as God is merciful. This goes well past the point where most of us would stop. Bishop Tom Berlin calls it “lavish love,” and this week we ask what…
Expand the Circle
As we continue our post-Easter series Reckless Love, we turn to a question Jesus keeps raising: who exactly is our neighbor? We follow Jesus from the shores of Gennesaret to the home of a tax collector, and the pattern of who he chooses to spend time with raises an uncomfortable question. What does it look like to follow Jesus into relationship with people we would not have chosen? What does it require, and what does it make possible? Scripture: Luke…
Begin With Love
As we begin our post-Easter series Reckless Love, we open with a question at the heart of the Judeo-Christian faith: of all the commandments, which one comes first? This week explores what it means to take Jesus’ answer seriously — loving God and loving your neighbor as inseparable practices. Reading from Mark 12 and Galatians 5, we consider what changes when we choose to begin every day, every conversation, and every decision with love. Scripture: Mark 12:28-34, Galatians 5:16-26 (NRSVUE)
The Host Who Becomes the Meal
In the final week of our Lenten series The Last Supper: Conversations That Led to the Cross, we arrive at the table it’s all been heading toward. On Palm Sunday, Jesus takes his place in an upper room, breaks bread, and gives it to his disciples. He calls the cup a new covenant. This week we explore what it means that the host becomes the meal, and that what looked like the last supper turned out to be the first…
Crumbs from the Table
As we continue our Lenten series The Last Supper: Conversations That Led to the Cross, Jesus tells the story of a rich man who feasts lavishly every day while a poor man named Lazarus sits outside his gate, covered in sores and hoping for scraps. This week explores the unsettling question of what happens when comfort narrows our vision, and when proximity to suffering generates no response at all. Discover what this parable reveals about who God sees, what we…
Feasting with the Found
As we continue our Lenten series The Last Supper: Conversations That Led to the Cross, we turn to one of the most familiar parables in the Gospels—and possibly the most misread. This week explores Luke 15 and the story of a father who sees his son coming from a long way off and runs to meet him before he can finish his apology. Along the way, we encounter an older brother with a legitimate grievance, a feast that feels unfair,…
Open Invitation
This week we continue our Lenten series The Last Supper: Conversations That Led to the Cross, following Jesus as he tells stories about who belongs at God’s table. A host has prepared a feast and invited many people — and when the guests send their regrets, one by one, he doesn’t cancel the party. He sends his servant back out with one instruction: fill the house. This week explores what it means when the invitation keeps expanding past every expectation…
Sowing, Seeking, Finding
As we begin our Lenten series The Last Supper: Conversations That Led to the Cross, we follow Jesus on his final journey toward Jerusalem, listening to the parables he tells along the way. This week opens in a field, where a farmer scatters seed recklessly—on roads, rocks, and thorns, not just on good soil. It’s not an efficient strategy, and that’s the point. Join us as we explore what this parable reveals about God’s character, and what it means to…
Glory Revealed
Transfiguration Sunday marks a pivotal moment when Jesus takes Peter, James, and John up the mountain and they see him transfigured in glory. This Sunday also marks a transition from the season after Epiphany toward our Lenten journey to Jerusalem. Discover what it means to stand on the mountaintop with Jesus, knowing the road ahead leads to the cross. Scripture: Exodus 24:12-18 (NRSVue); Matthew 17:1-9 (NRSVue)
Why do the Innocent Suffer?
This week we wrestle with the question that shakes faith more than any other: why do innocent people suffer? We explore what Genesis teaches about human freedom and responsibility, how our choices shape the world around us, and where God is when tragedy strikes those who have done nothing wrong. We examine the systems that produce suffering and our call to be God’s presence for others in the midst of pain. This is a hard conversation, and we trust that…