Pastor Serena Rice

A sermon on Matthew 5:1-12. [for an audio recording of this sermon, click here . Photo by Elsa Gonzalez on Unsplash.com ] It’s been a few years, so I am wondering if anyone here today remembers when we did a one-sitting reading of the whole Gospel of Matthew here at Abiding Peace? (Don’t worry, I’m not going to quiz you about themes, or narrative structure or anything. I just wanted to jog your memory about why it might be important to sometimes take a couple of hours to read a gospel...

A sermon on Matthew 4:12-23 and 1 Corinthians 1:10-18. [ Photo by Sven Pieren on Unsplash ] In our denomination (the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America), the process for becoming a pastor is called Candidacy. It involves a variety of requirements, including both formal schooling and practical training, psychological testing, a number of writing submissions, and three separate meetings in which the candidate sits in a room full of more experienced pastors and synod leaders who ask you...

A sermon on John 1:29-42, in conversation with Dr. MLK's Letter from Birmingham City Jail. [an audio recording of this sermon is available here. Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash.] I would be willing to bet that if asked to name the signature phrase of John’s gospel, at least 9 out of 10 seminary graduates would say “come and see.” It is a phrase repeated a number of times, in different voices, throughout the narrative, but that’s not why biblical studies departments teach us about the...