George Hermanson

Finding the Lost

Year C
Season of Pentecost
Sunday Between September 11 and September 17 Inclusive
September 12, 2010, Sixteenth Sunday After Pentecost

Read the Bible passage: Luke 15:1-10, The Message;   or   Luke 15:1-10, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Luke 15:1-10.

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

Note: This sermon was first preached on September 16, 2007 at Edwards (Knox) United.

We all love stories. We go to movies, watch TV, read books, and tell family stories. All are literary forms. We seek to find ourselves in those stories - seek the meaning of literature. Literature is an artistic presentation in words of some aspect of human experience. The purpose of literature is to provide enjoyment and vicarious experiences that can deepen and enrich our lives. Yet all literature cries out for understanding.

This is because not all stories are self evident. Some are dangerous to how we think. Others scare us.

Some are a puzzle. Parables are a particular form of story. There are transformational - they question the common sense views of the world. They reverse expectations. They puzzle us. They also puzzled writers like Luke. In telling them Jesus hoped that it would create an open space in one's consciousness, so much so that in the hearing one could actually feel the sense of God within the world and self.

Note: This sermon was first preached on September 16, 2007 at Edwards (Knox) United.

We all love stories. We go to movies, watch TV, read books, and tell family stories. All are literary forms. We seek to find ourselves in those stories - seek the meaning of literature. Literature is an artistic presentation in words of some aspect of human experience. The purpose of literature is to provide enjoyment and vicarious experiences that can deepen and enrich our lives. Yet all literature cries out for understanding.

This is because not all stories are self evident. Some are dangerous to how we think. Others scare us.

Some are a puzzle. Parables are a particular form of story. There are transformational - they question the common sense views of the world. They reverse expectations. They puzzle us. They also puzzled writers like Luke. In telling them Jesus hoped that it would create an open space in one's consciousness, so much so that in the hearing one could actually feel the sense of God within the world and self.

Passion

Year C
Season of Pentecost
Sunday Between September 4 and September 10 Inclusive
September 5, 2010, Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost

Read the Bible passage: Luke 14:25-33, The Message;   or   Luke 14:25-33, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Luke 14:25-33.

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

Note: The following sermon was preached on September 9, 2007 at Edwards (Knox) United Church.

Astonishing words of Jesus. Hate your family. Hate your mother. Hate your father. Hate your children. Not friendly words in a family centered culture. What is going on? Jesus goes on to say “If you don’t say good-bye to everything that belongs to you, you’re no disciple of mine.”

These are not the words you would have as the main article in a parenting magazine. What to make of them? They were also tough words for Luke. The early community struggled with them, so Luke turns them into advice about planning. Now that does resonate with us for we know planning for the future is crucial - wait till next January and February and all those ads for RRSPs. It works with us because urban planning, rural planning, church planning and personal planning are the currency of our day.

Still those words hang there despite all of our rationalizations - even the good ones. Pretty radical stuff.

Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?

Year C
Season of Pentecost
Sunday Between August 28 and September 3 Inclusive
August 29, 2010, Fourteenth Sunday After Pentecost

Read the Bible passage: Jeremiah 2:4-13, The Message;   or   Jeremiah 2:4-13, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Read the Bible passage: Luke 14:1, 7-14, The Message;   or   Luke 14:1, 7-14, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Luke 14:1, 7-14.

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

One of rock songs chez plays continuously is “Rules, Rules, Everywhere Rules.” I checked Goggle to get the words for rules and found Goggle has over 3 million sites referring to rules, everywhere rules. So life has more than its share of rules We just can't seem to get away from them.  Some of the rules protect and some are used to repress.

A Surprising Answer

Year C
Season of Pentecost
Sunday Between July 10 to July 16 Inclusive
July 11, 2010, Seventh Sunday After Pentecost

Read the Bible passage: Amos 7:7-17, The Message;   or   Amos 7:7-17, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Read the Bible passage: Luke 10:25-37, The Message;   or   Luke 10:25-37, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Luke 10:25-37.

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

In our times of terrorists and wars, where we read about those who seek our ill-will we have this challenging parable of Jesus. On first reading it seems to tell us that we are to love one another as we love ourselves. It seems to be a variation on the golden rule. It goes beyond what is demanded and sets a standard that asks much of us.

It starts out innocently. Luke has Jesus engaged in a advance seminar about the law. A good question is asked about what is the most crucial thing we can do with our life - what is the most basic attitude we must have to have a fulfilled life? Jesus responds with the summary of the what was considered to be the law - Love God. Love self. Love the neighbor.

Into A Far Country

Year C
Season of Pentecost
Sunday Between July 3 to July 9 Inclusive
July 4, 2010, Sixth Sunday After Pentecost

Read the Bible passage: 2 Kings 5:1-14, The Message;   or   2 Kings 5:1-14, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Read the Bible passage: Luke 10:1-11, 16-20, The Message;   or   Luke 10:1-11, 16-20, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Luke 10:1-11, 16-20.  

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

After church we are leaving for a brief trip to visit friends. Suzanne has done her usual due diligence of preparation. Got the Google maps. We figure out what we will need by checking the weather forecasts. Lay out our things. Wonder if we are taking too much or not enough. Worry. Seek for just right information as we go into a far country.

Planning is big on our agenda -for we want to make the best use of our time and we want to arrive without too many distractions. There is an irony to all of this because we live a time a great prosperity, yet with great dissatisfaction. We have genuine shortage of time, and deep shortage of deep spirituality. There is a deficit in meaning and both rich and poor are afflicted by this deficit. To fill the emptiness many turn to consumption which in turn commodifies us. Rather than growing free time for compassion, we are even more closed in - worried, scared. Prosperity has exacted a terrible price from its favourites.

Forgiveness

Year C
Season of Pentecost
Sunday Between June 12 to June 18 Inclusive
June 13, 2010, Third Sunday After Pentecost

Read the Bible passage: Luke 7:36-8:3, The Message;   or   Luke 7:36-8:3, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Luke 7:36-8:3.  

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

Let us use our imagination for a moment. You have seen this scene in such TV programs like Rome, or some movie about ancient Rome. Picture the room when the dinner is being held. A group of men is at a table and they are eating in the Roman style. See them on a couch. That means two people on a couch, this is so intimate conversations can happen. Those who get invited are the elite of the village - those who are learned in the Law. High level of conversation. Behind them are the outsiders, who can only approach in supplication.

The first thing to ask is why this Roman style of eating? It tells us much about the context of Luke’s story. This means those there had become captive to the culture of the oppressor.

What's On Your Resume

Year C
Season of Pentecost
Sunday Between June 5 to June 11 Inclusive
June 6, 2010, Second Sunday After Pentecost

Read the Bible passage: Galatians 1:11-24, The Message;   or   Galatians 1:11-24, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Read the Bible passage: Luke 7:11-17, The Message;   or   Luke 7:11-17, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Luke 7:11-17.  

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

In our reading of Galatians there is a travel log. Often when someone tells us of a trip our eyes glaze over. Did your eyes glaze over when you were listening to the letter of Paul to the Galatians? All those towns and places he visited. He talks about his former vocation and now his new mission. Think of it as a resume. He is telling us about what is important to him and what motivates his passion. His resume begins with what is important to how he lives.

As you now know this Sunday is a celebration of the 85th anniversary of the United Church of Canada. The question for our future is what is our business? What is so important we will give our lives to it. In part, we answer that by what is on the resume of the church and how that has informed our personal Christian resume.

All We Need Is Love

Year C
Season of Easter
Pentecost Sunday

Acts 2:1-21
Read the Bible passage: Acts 2:1-21, The Message;   or   Acts 2:1-21, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Faith-provoking, historical insights into the lesson by David Ewart, Acts 2:1-21, Holy Textures.  

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

In our Acts passage we get the marching orders for the church. We may puzzle over the meaning of the coming of the Spirit. They did then. The watchers ask if the disciples were drunk.

It is called ecstatic speech. We have all some experience of this when we are so excited we cannot get out our words or they tumble over one another. Then there are times the moment of awe is so great we say nothing. There is nothing magical about this experience, and the writer of Acts uses colourful and metaphorical language to tell of a moment when the world changed.

We all have a moment or event in which our world changed. We heard or saw things in new ways, heard or saw things that we had never had before. Our world was changed, we were changed.

Discernment

"Ascension living calls us to being 'clothed in power from on high.' This is the development of spiritual eyes and insight where we see God is in all things."

Year C
Season of Easter
Ascension Day

Acts 1:1-11
Read the Bible passage: Acts 1:1-11, The Message;   or   Acts 1:1-11, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Luke 24:44-53
Read the Bible passage: Luke 24:44-53, The Message;   or   Luke 24:44-53, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this sermon.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

When I was in seminary we would issue a joke course outline, and one course was on the ascension - "It will meet in the elevator." Ascension Sunday is one that is often ignored in the UCC. Yet it is an important moment in the gospels. For Luke it is a literary device to get Jesus off stage so the church could get on with its work.

It is the time after Jesus’ resurrection where followers become leaders, and must speak with their voice, testify and witnessing to their world. Like a good spiritual leader, Jesus must depart physically so we can mature as spiritual leaders. The early church claimed the Spirit that informed Jesus, that comes from God, to witness and testify in their time and space. We, too, are called to live out of the Spirit of God, to find our own witness and testimony for our age.

What Is Our Business?

"God is seeking to bring the kingdom of heaven to earth. ... we live not for rewards after death, but because our living will make the common good better. Faith is the ground for compassionate action in our world that needs healing."

Year C
Season of Easter
Fifth Sunday

Acts 11:1-18
Read the Bible passage: Acts 11:1-18, The Message;   or   Acts 11:1-18, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

Click here: George Hermanson's sermon, for an easy to print or email Adobe PDF version of this post.

The Rev. Dr. George Hermanson

Peter Drucker, who developed one of the first executive MBA programs at Claremont Graduate University, said the first question any organization needs to ask is: “What is your business?”

This is the question the church is at the moment asking, both in the context of what it means to be The United Church of Canada, and how to be the church in a community.

Now it would seem self evident that we know what we are about. However, it isn’t. We have as many theories about being church as there are people. For some it is a question of survival; we must grow. For others, it is to be the same as it was years ago. For others, it is to speak to power words of justice and compassion. For others, it is to support what they think are the values of traditional society. For others, it is to have correct unchanging doctrine - this is what you must believe. For others, it is to enhance their sense of God and have a spirituality that sustains them in their daily living.