Appalachian Spring

In Revelation chapter 6, the seals on the scrolls start to be opened, unleashing the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse on the earth, and an earthquake happens, and the stars fall from the sky. The world is coming undone. This week, in chapter 7, we’ll consider what it takes to put the world back together after it comes undo

In today's passage, Jesus is getting caught up on his correspondence, writing letters to the churches in Asia Minor, giving them both praise and correction. What do we think Jesus would say to Christians in the United States today, if he wrote us a letter?

As we continue reading the Book of Revelation as a book of resistance, we encounter a story of a woman who gives birth in space, while a dragon waits to eat the baby. Hopefully, none of our own birth stories are that dramatic. But there are days, and sometimes years, when life comes at you in ways other than you predi

"Why dost thou doom scrolleth even now?"(Victor 3:16) On this Queer Pride Sunday, we worship the One who shows us how to live with integrity and profound joy. That which is against God shall not stand! As the world unravels, celebration reveals our power to resist.

The book of Revelation includes scary beasts with horns and special marks with numbers revealing who they are. But rather than foretelling future events, what if they were unveiling current rulers and empires who preyed on their people? Let us slay the beasts of oppression and injustice as we resist the empire and embr

This week we will begin a sermon series on the Book of Revelation. It is often used by Christians to predict future events, but it wasn't written for that purpose. The Book of Revelation was written to call people to resist the Roman Empire. It carries on the tradition of 'apocalypse' which is Greek for 'revelation'. In apocalyptic literature, God reveals, or makes clear, how to respond to the world in which we find ourselves. But it is written in a way that obscures the message from the people who it critiques.

The story of Pentecost is a story of adoption. God takes strangers and makes them family. And while adoption is good news for those of us who experience it, that good news doesn't make it easy. God brings strangers together and makes them family, but God doesn't make us all the same. We are adopted into God's family with all of our differences and our disagreements. How can we celebrate the differences between us, rather than using them as wedges to divide us?

This week's story from the Book of Acts speaks of the importance of hospitality when life is difficult and dangerous. Where does God call the church to be when people are facing exile, persecution, and danger?

Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow's sermon for May 25, 2025