A Plain Account

Our texts this week are here  Our prayer this week is here - "Palm Sunday" by Malcolm Guite  Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music. Earth Day Sunday - April 24th 2022 - Nazarenes for Creation Care is offering this free resource to help congregations engage creation in meaningful ways this April 24th. This downloadable resource will include a special liturgy, Scripture readings, song suggestions, prayers, a bulletin insert, action items for engaging in caring for God's good creation, and more! 

Our texts this week are here Sacrifice Zones: geographic areas that have been permanently impaired by environmental damage (especially from toxic pollution or economic disinvestment), or places where people are inevitably stuck in inhospitable places (for example, island nations suffering from sea-level rise). In Sacrifice Zones, Steve Lerner tells the stories of twelve communities, from Brooklyn to Pensacola, that rose up to fight the industries and military bases causing disproportionately high levels of chemical pollution. “We are called to prophetic work not nostalgic work” – Jo Saxton’s sermon at WHWC  Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music.

Our texts this week are here. Our prayer for this week is here: Blessed Be Our Table, by Neil Paynter (p 247) God, you have given us all kinds of plants, those that bear grain and those that bear fruit. O, taste and see that the Lord is good. You have given us, your word and law, sweeter than honey, sweeter than honey dripping from the comb O, taste and see that the Lord is good. You have given us manna in the wilderness of our wandering and daily bread to sustain O, taste and see that the Lord is good. For all you have given us, generous, loving God, we praise you. Amen. "Hoarding stinks." - Daniel Erlanger, Manna and Mercy: A Brief History of God's Unfolding Promise to Mend the Entire Universe Reflecting on eating locally: 100 Mile Diet: A Year of Eating Locally, by Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver. Ways to pray for Ukraine– consider baking a Ukrainian bread recipe Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music.

Our texts this week are here. Our prayer for this week is here: “Revise our taking” from Awed to Heaven, Rooted in Earth by Walter Brueggemann Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music. Check out the Lenten Devotional! N4CC: How to Eat Together as a Church Walter Brueggemann writes about the geography of imagination in Israel’s Praise and how imagination must come before implementation in The Prophetic Imagination. “Isaiah offers us hope that is grounded, but not limited.” -Rev. Aaron Moschitto 

Our texts this week are here. Our prayer for this week is here. It is adapted from Justice for Immigrants, “Prayer and Liturgy Suggestions,” originally posted on the Justice for Immigrants website.  Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music. Check out the Lenten Devotional, The Way Through, and Alicia’s Spotify playlist

Our texts this week are here  “Food means everything if you don’t have it and nothing if you do.” - Germaine Jenkins (see the whole conversation here) Our prayer for this week is from the book titled Blessed Be Our Table (p 63) Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music. Check out the Lenten Devotional "The Way Through"  Alicia’s Lenten playlist on Spotify 

Extra content for you! Enjoy this bonus episode where we talk about the season of Lent. https://onbeing.org/programs/wendell-berry-ellen-davis-the-art-of-being-creatures/ https://www.ted.com/talks/katharine_hayhoe_the_most_important_thing_you_can_do_to_fight_climate_change_talk_about_it?language=en

In this Episode we talk about the Transfiguration of Jesus as recorded in Luke 9:28-36. This seemingly bizarre event defies our understanding (at least as westerners), which might not a bad thing... 

Our texts for this week are here. Our prayer for this week is here.   We recommend this brief article with an overview and further links about trauma-informed preaching.  Consider Romans 12 as a parallel text, especially for talking about forgiveness. Alicia’s discussion of forgiveness is in part influenced by an article by Matt Potts: “Mourning for forgiveness.” Theology 122, no. 3 (May 2019), 180-187. His forthcoming book, Forgiveness: On Accountability and Atonement (from Yale University Press), is *very high* on her to-be-read list. Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music.

Our texts this week are here. We frequently discuss the practices of reading the Bible from the margins, and a “dislocated exegesis.” For further reading, see Reading the Bible from the Margins by  Miguel A de La Torre, The Word Before the Powers by Charles Campbell, and Preaching as Testimony, by Anna Carter Florence. A companion text from Paul’s epistle: “You can be sure that no immoral, impure, or greedy person will inherit the Kingdom of Christ and of God. For a greedy person is an idolater, worshiping the things of this world.” - Ephesians 5:5, NLT Megan quotes Stanley P. Saunders from Preaching the Gospel of Matthew: Proclaiming God’s Presence. You can read more from the Solentiname Island community in Lake Nicaragua in The Gospel in Solentiname by Ernesto Cardenal. Our prayer this week is adapted from the Beatitudes. Read the entire prayer here. Other resources on our website: commentaries, discipleship, liturgics, music.