Church of the Open Door Sermon Archives

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This is our annual Novembering service where we take time to be with one another as we mark the passing of family and friends of those in our body. We also desire to acknowledge together the many other losses people have experienced in this past year, loss of health, jobs, community, independence, and many other forms of losses. We hold these special services to honor and remember those we love, invite God’s healing presence into those tender places of grief and loss, and be reminded of the solid assurance and hope of Heaven.

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Back in Jerusalem, the apostle James is arrested and killed by Herod. Peter is also arrested by Herod, but an angel releases him. James and Peter both lived with open hands to the work of God. One is not “rescued;” one is“rescued.” Meanwhile, Herod and the Jewish people, grasp for power and control, holding on tight to what they know, but all that comes is death. When we live a surrendered life, God can use our living and our dying to advance the God’s work.

Dave Brickey brings the message, of the Holy Spirit’s whispers that led Dave, Stefanie, and their children to this point, to this place, at this time.

Barnabas dared to follow God across cultural and religious lines, bringing his gifts of faith and encouragement to nurture and strengthen what God’s grace had brought to life. It’s an apt topic this week as we bless our students, parents and educators and seek to partner with God out in the actual world. His grace is at work all around us!

Do you have any idea what Shark Week has to do with the Peter/Cornelius story of Acts 10-11? Kati Beasley sees the connection and will share that with us this Sunday! Scientists assisting the birth of shark babies offer a potent parallel to Peter’s holding space for what God wanted to do, even when Peter didn’t know at the outset what that would turn out to be. Peter’s obedience, openness, and willingness to be awake and let God do the work is a great invitation for us, a reminder that God is at work in so many places, and we’re called to pay attention.

In keeping with the summer study in Acts, Maureen Pranghofer shares some of her life journey. She opens up about growing up with major physical challenges; and how the twists and turns of life brought her to a place of forgiveness and healing.

Luke puts dramatic demonstrations of power (a divine healing and a miracle) in context. Powerful displays like these are included in the “everything” in Matthew 28:20; and are to be part of the “normal” Christian experience. However they also can take attention away from the really big deal, a person coming to faith in Jesus Christ.

Is anyone beyond the reach of Jesus? Should we ever give up hope on anyone? Today in our study of Acts we come to one of the most dramatic conversion stories in all the Bible. It reminds us to hold out hope for everyone and how to pray for and walk with those we might think are beyond the reach of Jesus.

Today we hear the story of how God used a waiter named Phillip to bring the good news of Jesus to the ends of the earth. Phillip did so by using a simple principle Jesus taught – look for and lean into people of peace. Maybe if we practice this principle, God can use us to bring the good news of Jesus to the ends of our worlds too.

From the large-scale stories of earlier chapters, with thousands of people coming to faith, the focus narrows in chapter 8 to a single individual, Simon the sorcerer, and his heart’s deep needs for attention, affection, and approval. Peter’s rebuke sounds harsh, but it actually offers hope – to Simon and to all of us who are still have those captive and bound places within us.

After the stoning of Stephen, a great change occurred in the early Church as they were sent out and shared the Good News wherever they went (Acts 8:1-4). What does it mean to be sent out and scattered? How can we see ourselves as sent while serving, in conflict, in running errands, having family time, at work, in traffic and in these chaotic times in history? The good news: We are sent into the ordinary by the extraordinary Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit...and God's work is not done!

What is our mindset about the sacred? Where do we believe God is at work and to be worshipped? At the church building? Everywhere? If we say, “everywhere,” then why do we gather for collective worship?

Seeing needs and inequities when they occur, then responding in ways that remedy those difficulties, is a significant characteristic of God’s people. The young church in Acts 6 offers us a model for meeting practical needs with care and sensitivity as they addressed the discrimination and neglect of a vulnerable population within their congregation.

As we are forced to be the church without walls during Covid-19, how do we sustain a focus on bearing witness with our words and deeds? Today we learn about the accountable relationships that lead the earliest church to bear witness… boldly.

A potential silver lining in the Covid-19 pandemic is that the church in North America has been forced to be the church without walls: in homes, in neighborhoods, in back yards, on the streets, with our hands. But what happens when churches go back into their buildings again? Will the silver lining end? Or, will the silver lining become the playbook?

In our country’s time of reckoning for failing to face up to and fix racial injustice, how should Christ followers bear witness to the good news of Jesus? Today we continue in our study of the book of Acts and watch two of Jesus’ disciples bear witness in such a way that its’ result is actual good news.

That first church in Jerusalem, seeded by the Winds of Pentecost, was marked by courage and a commitment to radical community. Miracles, prayer, study, worship, and open-hearted hospitality characterized their fellowship even as persecution loomed, and their extraordinary generosity, “holding all things in common,” meant that no one among them was in need. They are models for us, in this time, of the generosities the Spirit can grow in us to meet the needs around us.

Tom points us to the purpose of Pentecost, which is to empower us to be witnesses of Jesus and carry on His mission in the world.

As individuals we find ourselves between the Covid 19 shut down and the opening back up. Church of the Open Door finds itself between a former pastor and a new pastor. What should we do when we are waiting for what is next? Today we look for an answer from Acts 1 and what the earliest Christians did between Jesus’ return to heaven and the coming of the Holy Spirit.

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Ever feel like everything has changed? Ever feel like everything that has changed, is changing again? That first Easter morning everything changed. But grasping that change didn’t come all at once for John, whose Easter story you will hear in this message. So, John helps us see what Jesus is inviting us to do when everything changes, and changes again.

Tonight, as friends of Jesus, we gather together to keep watch and wait with him.

On that first Palm Sunday, Jesus intentionally orchestrates a victory parade (V-Day). He rides into Jerusalem as a victorious king and the crowds hail him as their military messiah. But, by sundown on Friday, their military messiah has been arrested, convicted, and crucified. Why would Jesus hold a V-Day before a D-Day which leads to his death?

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We’re in Epiphany, the season of “unveiling” and revelation about Jesus and the ways of His Kingdom. Becca Erickson shares her family’s journey with God over the past several years: “You can spend all your time in analysis, or you can come to love what God reveals to you in these hard places.” Becca, a member of Open Door with her husband Ryan and three children, is the co-founder and executive director of Emerge Mothers Academy, a Twin Cities non-profit whose goal is to equip single mothers to emerge as confident women and caring moms. Emerge Mothers Academy is one of our supported partners through Missional Life.

Continuing from Kati’s beatitudes of the upside-down gospel last week, Ronn Johnson takes us to Paul in Corinth as he walks out the countercultural and Spirit-dependent ways of the Kingdom: I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in human wisdom but in the power of God. (1 Cor 2:1-5) In Ronn's words, “Paul was repeating, maybe not in word but in action and in thought, the same gospel Jesus brought, that ‘with loud cries and tears, Jesus met the Father.’ Wherever you are – low, defeated, sad – know that Jesus comes to you and says, “Blessed are you; you’re not on Plan B.’” In our weakness, loss, discouragement, God is strong and God is for us.

We come to Communion in the midst of our real lives, with their unexpected turns and uncertainties. Though we resist not being in control, that is the normal state of things, and that’s where God shows up in powerful ways – when life is hard and intense. In our worship together, in Kati Beasley’s message, and in coming to the Table, we will bring all the challenges facing us and lean TOGETHER into the One who is steady, who says “Blessed” and pronounces His favor on us.

In Matthew 4:12-23 (this Sunday’s Lectionary passage) Jesus inserts an interesting teaser as He calls people to follow Him: “I will send you out to fish for people.” Kathy Collier, our NextYouth Associate, proposes that, in the language of this metaphor, Jesus might be calling us to use a different lure as our culture changes. It might be scary, she admits; and it also might be that God is working in a way we’ve not seen before. Kathy, along with three of her young friends – Jonny, Gabby, and Nadine – will challenge us to look at things differently, to see what God might be up to.

Rose is the Associate Pastor of Formation for our sister congregation, Sanctuary Covenant Church in North Minneapolis. Rose’s talk – “Three Unlikely Virtues for Kingdom-Building Disciples” – springs from Exodus 1:15-22, the Hebrew midwives’ disobedience to Pharaoh, our faith’s ancient foundation of standing against oppression.

These next seven Sundays encompass the season of Epiphany, Jesus' increasingly being made known to the world, revealing what kind of Gift God has sent to us so that we might understand what God is like and receive His life and love. This first Sunday of Epiphany, Tom Johnson takes us to the Jordan River as Jesus approaches John the Baptizer and asks to be baptized.

Ronn Johnson brings us to the Lord’s Table, that expansive and inclusive place of Jesus’ love and unity.

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On this final Sunday of Advent, anticipating God’s putting on human flesh to dwell among us, we’ll experience first-hand some of the fruits of that incarnation. Filled with the Presence of this indwelling God, members of our congregation will offer us gifts that have sprung from their own Spirit-saturated creativity. In addition to Mark Collier’s message about shepherds and joy, inviting us to “make space for wonder and awe and running across muddy fields to meet our Savior,” Spencer Grimes has composed a song for us, Paul McLellan brings a faith story, Bob Stromberg will do the reading, and the entire McLellan family will light the final Advent candle. Our entire service this Sunday is a demonstration of Revelation’s promise that “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among humankind, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them,” filling and equipping His people for His mission of joy into the world.