Janet Cox, Ph.D.: 10 Tips For Coping with the COVID-19 Pandemic
Dr. Janet Cox, of Synapse, LLC summarizes the best ways to protect ourselves mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. We hope they benefit you and your loved ones.
Frederick Buechner Sermon Illustration on Easter (Matthew 28:1-10)
Next Sunday we will celebrate Easter Sunday. Here is an excerpt from Frederick Buechner on this week’s reading from Matthew 28:1-10...
Eric Barreto: First, We Wait: Why did Jesus call the disciples to wait? (Acts 1:4a) - COVID-19
In this season of COVID-19 life, Dr. Eric Barreto asks, Why did Jesus call the disciples to wait? And now asks us to do the same (Acts 1:4a).
COVID-19 Pandemic: What's Up at Day1, and How We Can Help
Day1 host and producer Peter Wallace brings you up to date with what's happening at Day1, and offers ways we can help you cope through the pandemic.
Walter Brueggemann: God's New Thing: Is God with us in the COVID-19 crisis? (Isaiah 43:18-19)
Walter Brueggemann says it is possible to trust that the God of the Gospel is in, with, and under the crisis of the virus without imagining that God is the cause of it.
David Crumm: Need to smile again? Get a free Bob Alper book and you’ll say: ‘Thanks. I Needed That.’
In a global crisis, we all need hope—so, we’re giving It to you. In fact, that’s why rabbi and stand-up comedian Bob Alper—famous as a master of clean comedy—has written a book. You can get it for free.
Frederick Buechner Sermon Illustration for Palm Sunday: Judas
In our blog post every Monday we select a reading from the Revised Common Lectionary for the upcoming Sunday, and pair it with a Frederick Buechner reading on the same topic. Next Sunday we will celebrate Palm Sunday. Here is this week’s reading from Matthew 26:14-16...
Frederick Buechner Sermon Illustration: Lazarus
In our blog post every Monday we select a reading from the Revised Common Lectionary for the upcoming Sunday, and pair it with a Frederick Buechner reading on the same topic. Next Sunday we will celebrate the Fifth Sunday in Lent. Here is this week’s reading from John 11:1-45...
Russell Levenson Jr: "Peace, Be Still": What to Do When the Coronavirus Comes Knocking
In a special message in these times of fear over the Coronavirus, the Rev. Dr. Russell Levenson, Jr., offers hope and calls us to prayer-filled faith.
Susan Sparks: Coronavirus and Kindness are Contagious
The Bible says to love your neighbor. Alternatively, some people on this earth apparently believe that the Bible says love your neighbor unless you are in a pandemic and shopping for groceries.
Duncan Newcomer: What Would Abraham Lincoln Do … about facing the fears of epidemic?
Two horrific health crises ravaged Abraham Lincoln’s early life. A disorder known in his day as Milk Sick quickly took Lincoln’s mother and two other adults in his seven-person cabin, then the typhoid epidemic took the life of Ann Rutledge, who many scholars now credit as being Lincoln’s first true love. Wide-spread suffering and intense personal suffering are the polarities of Lincoln’s life as president. His frontier early life taught him so.
Benjamin Pratt: Faith in a Pandemic: ‘Now thank we all our God …’
"Now thank we all our God with heart and hands and voices, who wondrous things hath done, In whom this world rejoices; who from our mothers’ arms, hath blessed us on our way with countless gifts of love, and still is ours today." Those words of this well-known hymn are particularly meaningful in our world right now, when the coronavirus has become a pandemic. Ironically, they were penned in 1636-1637, during an outbreak of yet another terrible plague.
Frederick Buechner Sermon Illustration: Darkness
In our blog post every Monday we select a reading from the Revised Common Lectionary for the upcoming Sunday, and pair it with a Frederick Buechner reading on the same topic. Next Sunday we will celebrate the Fourth Sunday in Lent. Here is this week’s reading from the book of Ephesians 5:8-10.
Margaret Marcuson: Do You Have Leaders Who Are Burned Out?
Most clergy are overfunctioners, with a tendency to take responsibility in relationships and in leadership. Of course, they are not alone. Many church leaders are as well, and they can get to the edge of burnout. What do you do when you’ve got a volunteer who is exhausted or resentful?
Paul Raushenbush: What happens when a virus forces faith communities to go virtual
When two or three are gathered on Facebook, is Christ there? When 10 Jews meet on a Zoom call, is it a minyan? Over the past few days, as states have asked houses of worship to suspend services, synagogues have held muted Purim celebrations and other religious meetings and services have been canceled, people have already begun mourning the loss of community.
Presiding Bishop Michael Curry on the Coronavirus Crisis
In this time when we are all affected by the coronavirus, whether directly or indirectly, whether physically, biologically, psychologically, spiritually, and for many economically, it may be helpful to remember that we're in this together.
Frederick Buechner Sermon Illustration - Hope That Brings Us Here (Lent 3)
In our blog post every Monday we select a reading from the Revised Common Lectionary for the upcoming Sunday, and pair it with a Frederick Buechner reading on the same topic. Next Sunday we will celebrate the 3rd Sunday in Lent. Here is this week’s reading from Romans 5:1-5...
Duncan Newcomer: Abraham Lincoln - "Boys, Now I've Got You!" - Book Excerpt
“Boys, now I’ve got you” doesn’t sound too spiritual, does it? Yet Lincoln gleefully surprised his young friends in southern Indiana one day with these very words—words not found etched on the walls of the Lincoln Memorial. But who were these boys Lincoln had gotten? Enjoy this excerpt from Duncan Newcomer's book of meditations...
Susan Sparks: Sarah's Purse
I always knew it would be a great day when Sarah Goodson walked through the door of our church carrying her big purse. Raised during the Depression on a share-cropper’s farm in the South Carolina low country, Sarah loved two things in this life more than anything: her family and taking care of others. She shaped her life around making those two things a priority, including what she carried in her purse.
Frederick Buechner Sermon Illustration: Second Sunday in Lent: Eternal Life
In our blog post every Monday we select a reading from the Revised Common Lectionary for the upcoming Sunday, and pair it with a Frederick Buechner reading on the same topic. Next Sunday we will celebrate the Second Sunday in Lent. Here is this week’s reading from John 3:13-17...