One Helluva Week 1/6

Sundays are for palms and protest. The ride into Jerusalem is a satire of militaristic commanders-in-chief returning from battle to receive the accolades of their citizenry. Jesus declares a new empire, a new citizenry for any who will receive him and his way of being – more like a colt than a steed, more like a children’s pageant with makeshift props than a well-orchestrated, red carpet affair. He’s mocking their (our) collusion with domination by violence; he’s challenging our sense of what “good society” looks like.

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Once Upon a Time: Meet the Ancestors 6/6

God remains and God restores (and still we wait). The restoration of Jerusalem and its temple after exile is something short of the city’s former glory. A remnant returns from exile and what they are able to effect shows their diminished status on the world stage. This “second temple” in Jerusalem under Roman occupation is the “Israel” Jesus knew; the people were hungrier than ever for a messiah to usher in God’s reign and overturn centuries of suffering.

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Once Upon a Time: Meet the Ancestors 5/6

God opened God’s hand to relinquish (or smack?). The Bible has an argument with itself here: as one empire after another takes bites out of Israel’s land and people, are we to understand that God has engineered their destruction? or that this is the grain of the universe, and those who go against the grain bear the consequences? In other words, does God punish the Israelites, or simply release them to their fate? The biblical prophets report variously on the primary cause of Israel’s exile. But they are agreed that God “waits to show mercy…”

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Once Upon a Time: Meet the Ancestors 4/6

God fulfilled the promise of land (and the people built an empire). It’s problematic to us that Israel’s armies have to obliterate other people to settle in their “promised land.” But more problematic, biblically speaking, is their wannabe empire status. The more settled they become, the more they want to play the militaristic, consumeristic, power-tripping game their neighbors play. King David’s family is an allegory for the whole nation – his house is in disorder, even as he’s “winning” the day.

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Once Upon a Time: Meet the Ancestors 3/6

God heard, remembered, looked, took notice – and liberated Israel. The groaning Israelites catch God’s ear, and God launches Operation Deca-Plague with Moses, Aaron, and Miriam as God’s agitators. The family-specific covenant now expands to the new nation they are becoming – if only they had somewhere to settle.

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Once Upon a Time: Meet the Ancestors 2/6

God wrestled Jacob, and gave him strong (enslaved) descendants. Jacob is scrappy, devious, and chosen by God to carry on the covenant with Abraham. The bloodline finally expands with his 12 sons (and unnumbered daughters); but by now God has competition for sovereignty, and Egypt’s Pharaoh claims God’s people (now “Israel”) as his own. Where does God go? Why does God wait?

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Once Upon a Time: Meet the Ancestors 1/6

God chose Abraham, and promised him the world. God’s relationship with Abraham (and Sarah and Hagar) begins a new era for God with God’s world – the narrowing of focus from “all creation” to just one family and its descendants. Maybe God and this family will find a way to be in harmony, a.k.a. covenant? Thereafter, Abraham becomes a meme of faithfulness beyond (before) religiosity. What God looks for in a person is trust, even when God’s promise-keeping is slow and subtle. 

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Prayer Service after Insurrection, All Things Covid, and the failure to indict Jacob Blake’s killer

After a week of trauma, injustice, and violence, and following a known Covid exposure to the skeleton crew in the Big Red Barn, we had to adjust our worship service, both in content and manner of production. This week’s podcast includes all of the spoken portions of Sunday’s service.

God-With-Us: Call the Midwife 7//7

Global Jesus vs. local powers (a.k.a. Herod). The astrologers “from the East” who pay homage to toddler Jesus are ethnically, geopolitically, and religiously wrong for this story. But they signal to Herod, and to us, that something much bigger is happening in this child. God is staking a claim against Empire, and it feels like a threat. “Don’t you know, we’re talkin’ about a revolution, and it sounds like a whisper” (Tracy Chapman).

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

God-With-Us: Call the Midwife 6/7

Religion makes God possible. What if Simeon and Anna are the apologists we need for religious infrastructure, for a community of tradition and ritual and accountability? What if we could understand that the religion (the church) is not the thing, but it is the vehicle by which the thing can come to us? (It can come other ways, for sure, but early recognition of Jesus included these who were ensconced in traditional religious structure and community.) 

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

God-With-Us: Call the Midwife 5/7

Christmas Eve is for dreamers. If we do the genealogy from Matthew on the First Sunday of Advent, we have Joseph and his dreaming available for a short meditation on Christmas Eve – an invitation for us to dream, our sanctified imaginations pulling us into new and beautiful possibilities in the days to come. There’s a lot of hope here… 

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

God-With-Us: Call the Midwife 4/7

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. For John, Jesus arrives from cosmic pre-existence. And the only birth referenced by John is our birth – “But to all who received him…he gave power to become children of God, who were born…of God.” How about if Christmas is when we get born, our true identities made plain by the light of Christ?

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

God-With-Us: Call the Midwife 3/7

Lowly mother, lowly shepherds, lowly messiah. Luke has a strong economic theme running through his gospel, beginning at the beginning. From Luke we get the barn, the manger, the swaddling clothes, the impoverished holy family and their impoverished guests. When the angels show up to sing the shepherds toward that baby, what’s happening to our own sense of economic privilege and poverty?

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

God-With-Us: Call the Midwife 2/7

Baptism is the only birth that matters. For Mark, there’s no birth narrative – just a baptism. John is the midwife of Jesus’s new life; God the Father looks on in amazed pleasure (“Wow!”); Jesus comes of age in the desert; then he begins to speak in his own voice, and his first words? “The reign of God, y’all!”

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

God-With-Us: Call the Midwife 1/7

The #nastywomen who begat the messiah. Say their names: Tamar. Rahab. Ruth. Bathsheba. Mary. A reprise of a sermon Katie has preached twice before, in 2016 and 2019.

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Wait for It: The Early Church and Us 8/8

Sheep and goats, “You did it unto me.” The “Son of Humanity” so identifies with the small, oppressed, marginalized people of the world that our lives can be assessed by how we have aligned ourselves with respect to them. Think of the gladiator games, where the emperor gave a thumbs up or thumbs down for the life of the competitors. Here, the emperor is replaced by “the least of these my brethren,” collectively informing Jesus the King as to the worthiness of each ovine in the judgment queue. A note: this is a parable, making extensive use of metaphor. It’s not a literal description of a “judgment day,” but it’s an imaginative exercise about an imagined future meant to provoke real action, here and now. 

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Wait For It: The Early Church and Us 7/8

Buried talents. Using a capitalist analogy, Jesus seems to advocate for risk-taking in the life of his disciples. We don’t wait for God to act by hunkering down, passive and careful, hands closed tightly around what we’ve got. Rather, we release and relinquish, finding courage in our understanding of who God is – not the “harsh man” of v. 24, making us too afraid to act. What is it about God’s nature that empowers us to take risks for God’s sake?

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Wait for It: The Early Church and Us 6/8

Ten bridesmaids. The Christian liturgical year closes out with three parables from Matthew 25. The one about the bridesmaids seems to indicate Jesus’s awareness that what we’re waiting for may take a long time, longer than we want, longer than we’re ready for. What are we likely to run out of, if we haven’t filled our tanks? (And is it really his advice that those with plenty should not share with those in need? Can we push back on that? But he’s right in guessing that it’s our impulse to hoard, and to take some pleasure in other people’s “foolish” unpreparedness.) 

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Wait for It: The Early Church and Us 5/8

“Children of light, children of the day.” In vv. 1-11, Paul describes our waiting as an active readiness – staying woke, keeping awareness that all is not well until we are at home in God’s heart. What does the uniform of faith, hope, and love (v. 8) prepare us for while we wait? And the closing instructions in vv. 12-28 – it’s a laundry list of virtues for life in community and life with God. 

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Wait for It: The Early Church and Us 4/8

“So that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.” While we wait, people die. Paul’s own mythology of angels and trumpets in the clouds is not exactly resonant to our ears, but the hope of “being with the Lord forever” is still how we “encourage one another.” We say, “Death does not get the last word – as it did not with Jesus, so it will not with us” (v. 14, paraphrased).

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.