Restore

And after a summer of sabbatical -- here's the sermon from my first Sunday back at St. Paul's UCC in Downers Grove, IL. Psalm 80:1-2, 8-19.  "Hey, wake up God!" (Also includes a lament written by some musicians from Liverpool ...)

Video sermon preview
"Restore" podcast

Home

Sermon podcast from yesterday at St. Paul's UCC in Downers Grove, IL.  Psalm 84

Video sermon preview
"Home" podcast

Practicing the Presence - aka Be the Church

Podcast from this morning at St. Paul's UCC in Downers Grove, IL.  A call to action instead of silence.   Also included, "Orlando Lament" a Psalm I read a the beginning of the worship service.
"Practicing the Presence" podcast
"Orlando Lament"

Connecticut Lament

Where were you, God?

Have you completely lost it?

The souls of children cry out

"Why didn't you save us?
Why didn't you protect us?
Why weren't you paying attention?"

How long
How long
How long will you let this go on?

Are you gone?
Are you listening at all?

Comfort your children
Change our hearts
Lead us to love

Please don't turn away.

Anger, pain, fear, frustration and disbelief

Please join with me in prayer for the students, families and friends of Northern Illinois University.

Here's are excerpts from a psalm of lament from Tod Gobledale. He wrote it less than a year ago after the school shootings in Virginia.

I weep, oh God. I wonder, “Where the hell are you?”
And God, what are you doing about this? This land that prides itself as a “Christian Country” How long will you let this go on?
O God, O God I know that you do not forsake us. As one is wounded, so you are wounded.
As my heart bleeds and I weep, so your heart bleeds and you weep.
Comfort your children’s sorrow, lamenting mothers, bitter fathers, a nation wounded.
Lead us to love and life in you where our guns are beaten into plough shares.

Excerpted from "Psalm: Virginia Lament" By Tod Gobledale - Serving Global Ministries as Chaplain at Churches of Christ Theological College in Mulgrave, Australia