Sermons & Worship by Rev. Laurie DeMott (Page 16)

I Corinthians 9:19-23 The story of Pentecost that we heard read this morning in a babble of different languages is found in the book of Acts, written by Luke as a sequel to his gospel. The full title of the Book of Acts in our Bible is “The book of the Acts of the Apostles” but many scholars have noted that the title is a bit misleading. A more accurate title would be something like: “The Book of the Acts…

Philippians 1: 1-11 Paul began every letter with a reminder of grace and he spoke about grace a lot in the body of those letters. “For all of you share in God’s grace with me,” he tells the Philippians, “whether in prison and as we work on behalf of the gospel.” I think Paul talked so much about grace because he knew that we fight grace.  We have problems believing it, practicing it towards others, and accepting it on our…

I Corinthians 6:9-20;   The Message translation (attached at end) One of my first years in ministry, I was asked to give the sermon at the high school Baccalaureate.  Back in those days, all of the churches still gathered every June to honor the graduating seniors in a joint worship service but even then, the Baccalaureate tradition was struggling to stay alive:  high schoolers were increasingly diverse in their faith backgrounds and decreasingly interested in observing the traditions of their parents.  Preaching the Baccalaureate sermon to…

Romans 13:1-7 In the 70’s there was Watergate; in the 80s, Irangate; in the 90s, Nannygate, in the aughts, Leakgate, in 2015, Deflategate; and now before the decade is finished, we have Chaplain-gate — the controversy that has surrounded the resignation of Father Patrick Conroy as the chaplain to the House of Representatives.  Father Conroy, a Jesuit priest, has served as the House Chaplain for seven years providing pastoral care to the members of the House and opening sessions with prayer.  It…

Ecclesiastes 1:1-10; II Corinthians 5:12-21 When I was a teenager, my family always had an Easter egg hunt on Easter afternoon, but this was no tame suburban type Easter egg hunt.  We lived on a six acre piece of land near Geneseo and my father would hide our colored eggs all over the property — some on the lawn but some in the barn, some along the edge of the pond, a few in the garden, and some scattered randomly along…

John 21:1-17 Yankees catcher Yogi Berra famously said, “It’s deja vu, all over again.”  Well, here in the final chapter of the gospel of John, it’s deja vu all over again.  Peter and the other disciples are fishing, casting their nets continuously into the water only to pull them up empty time and time again throughout the night.  As the dawn breaks, a figure appears on the far shore and calls to them, “Throw your nets down on the other side,” and when…

John 20:19-31 If you are looking for games that provoke a lot of discussion, laughter, and occasionally disgust, you might want to try a game called “Would you rather?” I’ve been playing this game for years with my youth group but for those who would like to try it at home, it’s now available as an app on your phone. The game is simple: it consists of questions like, “Would you rather eat slugs or worms? Would you rather lose…

Romans 5:1-5 Hope is a frustrating thing.  Just when you need it most, it is often the hardest to find. I’ve been thinking a lot about hope lately — actually I’ve been thinking about it for the last six weeks because our Lenten theme has been the art of hope.  And so every week since Ash Wednesday, I have scoured the internet for quotes about hope to put in the bulletin.  Every week, I have done Bible searches for scriptures…

During the weeks of Lent, we have been looking at ways in which the arts express our faith and inspire us with hope.  We’ve heard poems and stories, sung hymns, eaten bread, and moved our bodies in an expression of reverence, and finally in this last week of Lent, we turn to the most classic of arts — painting and sculpture — and since today is the beginning of Holy Week, I’ve decided to focus specifically on how the crucifixion…

Luke 13:10-17 You’ve probably seen a woman like the one in our gospel reading, a woman whose back is so distorted that she is permanently bent in half.  What would it be like, we wondered, to have your eyes always glued to the ground; to see and yet not see, to have functioning eyes that did so little good restricted as they were to the periphery of a permanently downcast sight? Some of us may be coping with a similar…