by Guy Sayles | Oct 9, 2009 |
Mark Twain once said that the difference between the right word and the almost-right word is the difference between lighting and a lighting bug. The church is committed to the right words, lighting-flash words which illumine the mind, captivate the imagination, touch...
by Guy Sayles | Oct 6, 2009 |
Tonight, at our Deacons’ meeting, I offered a brief description of my understanding of “evangelism.” I’m posting part of what I said here.Evangelism is the process of saying and showing the good news of Jesus in such a way that people (1)...
by Guy Sayles | Oct 1, 2009 |
Lily, the central character in Sue Monk Kidd’s novel The Secret Life of Bees, was haunted by the story of her young childhood, a story that included violence, abuse, and a tragic accident with a gun, an accident that killed her mother. By a strange but providential...
by Guy Sayles | Sep 30, 2009 |
One of the most astonishing things Jesus ever said is found in John 15: “I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have...
by Guy Sayles | Sep 14, 2009 |
From yesterday’s sermon:William Ury, bestselling author and cofounder of the Harvard Program on Negotiation, wrote about a relative of his who struggled with alcoholism. He had tried over and over again to quit drinking, but even a serious car accident that...
by Guy Sayles | Sep 2, 2009 |
I read about a teacher in Harlem who wanted his students to get out of the city and spend a little time in open-country. He arranged to take his class for a week of camp in the great outdoors. Once there, one of the first things he did was to organize a baseball game,...
by Guy Sayles | Aug 20, 2009 |
This past Sunday, I tried to describe how our relationships with the people closest to us–our families, colleagues, neighbors, and fellow church-members–are crucially important; because, on the one hand, our love for them matters in itself. Our compassion...
by Guy Sayles | Aug 13, 2009 |
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus offered two metaphors for the church on mission—two ways the church can manifest his presence: as “the salt of the earth” and as “a city set on a hill.” As “salt of the earth,” the church is on mission by way of involvement. Salt only...
by Guy Sayles | Aug 4, 2009 |
Ernest Campbell, once the preaching minister at NYC’s Riverside Church, preached a wise sermon entitled “Every Battle is Not Armageddon.” It wasn’t a sermon about end-time prophecy or an apocalyptic war in the Middle East. Instead it was a...
by Guy Sayles | Jul 31, 2009 |
Not long ago, my friend and teacher Buddy Shurden jogged my memory about something author Kurt Vonnegut once said about his “rules” for writing a short story. One of those rules was: “Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not...
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