Prepare Ye

  This is my sermon from St. Mark Lutheran Church on Sunday, August 19, 2018. The main lesson was the Gospel lesson, John 6:51-58. Because of the focus on Jesus using the verb for eat that is better translated as gnaw , my Bullodogge, Ananias wrote this message.  An audio version is available here . The Preaching Preview is available here . The 60 Second Sermon Summary is available here .  Written by Ananias Bulldogge Campbell, Assistant (to the) Pastor, Covenant Lutheran Churches of Oklahoma City Grace & Good News to you from our Creator & Lord .   AMEN. My Big Guy has started having a text study with other pastors at his office at St. Mark on Tuesday mornings. They listen to a podcast from Minnesota where some professors talk about Sunday’s lessons. Usually, I’m just trying to get something to eat from them, but the people from Minnesota said that when Jesus was talking about eating the Living Bre...

This is my sermon from St. Mark Lutheran Church on Sunday, July 28, 2018. The main lesson was Ephesians 3:14-21, with reference to the Gospel lesson, John 6:1-21, and a quote from Psalm 145:10-18. An audio version is available here . The Preaching Preview is available here . The 60 Second Sermon Summary is/will be available here . I open with words of prayer from our Psalm: All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and all your faithful shall bless you. They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom, and tell of your power, to make known to all people your mighty deeds, and the glorious splendor of your kingdom. AMEN. Grace to you & peace from God our Creator & the Lord Jesus Christ .   AMEN. We use examples all of the time. We use examples to describe what if situations. We use examples to describe results of various behaviors. As an example, if you eat a slice of pizza right after it comes out of the oven, you may burn the roof of your m...

This is the text of my sermon for March 11, 2018, the Fourth Sunday of Lent and the 1st Sunday of Daylight Saving Time. The text is John 18:28-40. Much of my thoughts on this text were influenced by David Lose's Lenten Devotions from his website  ... In the Meantime , especially the devotions here and here . The lesson we hear today is at the heart of the telling of the Passion, or Suffering, of Jesus Christ. It is a key scene in any depiction of the last day of Jesus. I think of the various movies about the life of Jesus, and all of them feature this scene. In one of my favorite depictions, the musical Jesus Christ Superstar , the song Trial Before Pilate is one of the turning points in the play. It takes the lessons we hear today and next week, showing how Jesus is abandoned by the very people he came to. It calls back to the opening prologue in John’s Gospel, “ He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. ” Pilate who is used to fighting a...

Ten years ago this morning, I started a new adventure. Just before 8:30 am, I walked from my new apartment into a new building, sat in the front row and began to learn Greek from a brilliant, hilarious, rabbit hating, lamination loving, table hopping New Testament scholar. I also met some of my dearest friends and most faithful leaders of the church. Many of them scared me. Some said they had wanted to be a pastor since before they were teenagers. I thought some of them still were teenagers. I hadn't even thought of being a pastor until a little old lady suggested in just over a year earlier. This group of people who gathered in Valentine 310 that morning (and several others along the way) have helped me in immeasurable ways. They have inspired, challenged, comforted, cajoled, kicked me in the ass, prayed for, hugged, motivated, questioned, tutored, accepted and just been there for me for each day since. They have done everything from inviting me to study sessions, teaching me how ...

It's been a while. I mean, a really long while. For those who regularly still have checked this, wow. Since you're probably friends, gee, get a life. If this shows up on a feed reader, you probably forgot about this blog. I did. The last real post from me goes back to March of 2011, and was about waiting for ELCA Regional Assignments. I think I stopped blogging because I was "concerned" about the wonderful Synod staffs & congregations sniffing this out and hitting the big DENIED button.  Well, too late. Since that last post , I got assigned to Region 5 (Illinois, Indiana, the UP of Michigan and Wisconsin). Then I was called to the North West Synod of Wisconsin. I flew out to meet the Bishop & the Synod staff on my birthday. Got profiles of the churches which eventually called me.  Just before graduation, on the day I was putting on my play, "Four Voices, One Passion" (I'll get back to that in a future post), my mother was hospitalized....

This is the text of my sermon for Sunday, December 23, and was based on the Magnificat. I don’t think many of us in the Lutheran tradition, or in any of the Protestant traditions, really think about Mary. The Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ, seems to be the, I don’t want to say possession, but she belongs to the Roman Catholic tradition. There, she is venerated. She is prayed to. She is considered to be the co-redeemer of humanity, along with her son, who is also the Son of God. She is asked to intercede on our behalf. We don’t feel we need to ask anyone to intercede on our behalf when we can pray directly to God. We can ask Christ directly for forgiveness. We don’t have to ask Mary or any of the other saints to intercede for us. So we tend not to think of Mary very much. Sure, she’ll be the focus of some hymns and carols during Christmas. We will thank her for telling Jesus to turn water into wine at the wedding in Cana. We feel for her when we hear the lesso...

I had been posting sermon texts at my other blog, A Sower Went Out to Sow, which I created for a class back at The LTS. I had been planning on letting this blog, just fade away. But Sow & Sow has been uncooperative, so I have come back here. I'm going to repost what had been at Sow & Sow, and that may be the one to just fade away.   This is my sermon for February 3. We celebrated the Presentation of Our Lord (even tho that was 2/2) because it allowed us to hear almost all of the Nativity from Luke. So the focus of my message was from Luke 2:22-40 . While we were down in New Orleans for the National Youth Gathering, we got to hear a LOT of great music. Every night in the Superdome, where I understand there is a football game being played later today , a band of musicians set the tone for the evening. They rocked. They played of mix of contemporary Christian music, ranging from slower tempo worship songs to blasting our up tempo rocking praise anthems. We heard eve...

This is my sermon text from the 1st Sunday of Lent, February 17, focusing on Luke's telling of the Testing of Jesus (Luke 4.1-13). The man is sitting alone at his local bar. He doesn’t come in there too much; enough so that the wait staff recognizes him, but they don’t know his name or what “the usual” is. But this day, they’re finding out. Because he’s ordering a lot of it. He’s not making conversation. He’s not watching TV. He’s just sitting there. While they don’t know the details, they know what is going on. He’s just got bad news. They don’t know the specifics: is it his family? His job? Investments? Right now, he feels totally alone. His world has been turned upside down. He doesn’t know what to do. He doesn’t know who to call. He doesn’t know where to go. So he finds a place to be, just for a while, just long enough to figure out, “Now what?” That’s when he’s vulnerable. That’s when the next voice in his ear can swing the whole thin...