<![CDATA[TRINITY UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST - Sermons]]>Mon, 09 Mar 2026 18:57:06 -0500Weebly<![CDATA[Call sunday sermon, rev. dale susan edmonds]]>Sun, 03 Feb 2019 06:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/call-sunday-sermon-rev-dale-susan-edmonds
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]]><![CDATA[Kent organ's farewell sermon]]>Sun, 13 Jan 2019 06:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/kent-organs-farewell-sermon
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]]><![CDATA[gift of freedom]]>Sun, 01 Jul 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/gift-of-freedomReverend Kent Organ speaks about what God is asking of us Americans at this critical time, and quotes Alexis de tocqueville from 1835, who said "America is great because America is good. But if America ceases to be good, America ceases to be great."
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]]><![CDATA[like a mustard seed]]>Sun, 10 Jun 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/like-a-mustard-seedText: Mark 4:26-34
Harry Golden once said  that if a religious census had been taken in 50 A.D. (C.E.), the results would have shown  that 64% of the population was for Zeus,  35% was for Mithra,  and only 1% was for Jesus.  That was the challenge  the early Christians faced.  It was the kind of situation  Jesus addressed  a generation earlier  when he spoke  parables  concerning the kingdom of God.

    The disciples were few.  There had been some converts, yes.  And there were many interested kindred spirits.  But, on the whole,  Jesus’ preaching, teaching and healing  had not  rallied  multitudes to commitment.  And so, he offered a parable  to give his twelve companions encouragement and hope.  “The kingdom of God is like  a mustard seed.”  It will expand.  It will explode  with astonishing growth.

    And it did.  In less than three centuries,  the faith of these few  had conquered the Roman Empire.

    But in the initial  lean years  of plodding along the dusty roads of Galilee,  the disciples could not have anticipated  what was to come.  So Jesus offered  a parable of promise.  “The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest  of all the seeds of the earth;  but when it grows up,  it becomes a tree,  putting forth large branches, so that birds can make their nests in its branches.”​

* * * *

    It is difficult for us  in the early 21st century  to realize  that 150 years ago  the Christian movement  was identified with only parts of the globe – with Europe, western Asia, and much of the western hemisphere, our hemisphere.  Africa, Australia, and the greater part of Asia and the Pacific  were hardly touched.

    But then,  in the mid-19th century,  the mustard seed of Christian faith  burst forth.  Dozens of missionary societies sprang up.  Heroic men and women  crossed oceans and deserts, jungles and mountains,  with the watchword  of William Carey  impelling them:

Expect great things from God;
Attempt great things  for God.

This was an era of prodigious evangelical expansion – the era when the Gospel was taken to distant peoples,  despite danger and persecution – to lands and nations  where the church continues  to grow dramatically:  Korea,  Africa,  China.  The Christian movement is now  universal.

    Think  how small  the seed  had been:  a baby  born into a harsh world;  a teacher on a hillside;  a condemned man executed;  an empty grave;  a handful of people who claimed  it wasn’t over.  The story of the Christ-event has spread,  and burst  all imaginable bounds:  hundreds of millions  drawn to faith, all over the planet.  Like a mustard seed,  just as Jesus promised.

    But more recently, things have changed.  Some of the older branches have shriveled.  Notably,  the old  missionary-sending  churches.  Europe’s cathedrals  have become museums.  The once “mainline” churches of America  have been declining for more than fifty years.  We are less  like a mustard seed, with promise and potential,  and more  like  an aged tree, grand and stately, but with some branches brittle, and without foliage.  

For American congregations,  things are increasingly difficult.  Pew Forum surveys say  that nearly one-third of American adults have left the faith in which they were raised.  For most younger adults – Gen. X, Gen. Y, Millennials – they were never part of church life.  Most of them have never even been inside  a church building.  The fast-growing category in relation to religion in this country  are the  unaffiliated, those known as “the Nones.” That’s  n-o-n-e.  Because  when pollsters  now ask Americans about  their religious preference,  the largest percentage  answer…  “None.”   No preference.  No religion.  For “Christian America” – and for many years,  many lived with the assumption, and illusion  that this  was  a “Christian nation” – for many American Christians,  this loss  has generated a cultural crisis.  And a politics of resentment.  But it’s been hard on us  too.

What happened – to the promise in today’s parable?  What happened  to  the “mustard seed… the smallest of seeds… [that] when it grows up,  becomes a tree?”

* * * *

When Jesus first uttered this parable  it can’t help but have been met  with skepticism.  The Jesus movement  was tiny.  Just a dozen disciples.  Curious crowds, yes.  But nothing much more.   And when they got to Jerusalem,  there was the overwhelming, repressive force  of the Empire.  

And when Mark was writing his Gospel,  the mustard seed promise must have been met  with deep pessimism.  Mark’s Gospel was written in Rome, around the year 70,  when the Emperor Nero  was scapegoating and persecuting Christians – by fire, sword,  and Colosseum spectacle.  When Mark was written,  the little Roman community of the faithful  was being decimated.

So, realize  that if we  respond  to this  mustard-seed-of-exponential-growth parable  with skepticism, and pessimism,  we are certainly  not the first  to do so.

    Your  Pastor Search Committee and Church Council have recently begun  an important conversation.  They are wondering  whether this congregation  would be wise  to seek  a full time pastor  or  a less-than-full-time pastor.  At present,  Trinity Church probably cannot afford  fulltime pastor compensation plus benefits – at least,  not for very long.  You’d manage  for a few years.  But then what?  So there’s this  basic question:  In this era,  in this location,  could  the right  fulltime pastor  lead  you  to sufficient membership growth?  Is this the time to go for it? to lay it all  on the line?  Or not.  Instead, would Trinity Church be better off  with a more sustainable  salary package,  perhaps at  three-quarters time?  I will say no more.  Because we all are invited to join this conversation  on June 17th after worship.  Mark your calendar.  Everyone’s input is being sought.

* * * *

    This morning, we’ve been talking about the prospects  for the Christian church: growth? decline?  potential for renewal?  But we need to ask ourselves, Was  the subject  in Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed – the church?  Listen again.  “Jesus said, ‘With what  can we compare  the kingdom of God?”  And, he continued, The kingdom of God “is like a mustard seed.”  

    Mark tells us  it was  this kingdom  that Jesus came to announce,  the good news  that God  is putting things right – in Jesus’ life and ministry,  God  restoring the world  to the way God intended  in its creation.  God’s reign, as a decisive assault  in Jesus  against everything that opposes life, that opposes  the way things  are supposed to be.

In June, 2011,  David Hollinger published an influential essay concerning  “ecumenical Protestantism” in America,  which is us.  Hollinger knew full well  that our  brand of “mainline” or “old line” Christianity has been hurtling downhill  for decades. But when he looked at our impact on American culture, he saw a much more hopeful picture.  “Ecumenical leaders may have lost American Protestantism,” he wrote,  “but  they have won  the United States.”  He pointed to our denominations’  commitments  to religious diversity,  to anti-racist legislation  and judicial rulings,  our skepticism of  aggressive, militant foreign policy,  our concern for civil liberties and civil rights.  And all this, he said,  is now embraced  by many Americans, and our government,  as normative,  David Hollinger wrote  that this is “in no small part  due  to” the efforts of the ecumenical churches.  That was  2011.  This  is  seven years later.  And much has changed.

The ecumenical, mainline view  of what it is  that God intends  in this society  and in the larger world,  is under great stress.  And threat.  If it’s true  that the kingdom of God (reign of God) trajectory  is toward  compassion and justice and peace, toward  the mending of the world and all its populations,  then there is certainly  lots more work to do.  And the mustard-seed promise of inexorable, decisive growth  hangs  in the balance.  

Now, there’s one last thing  I want us to notice  in relation to the mustard seed metaphor.  Which is, to remember  that just as seeds  produce trees,  so also  do   mature trees  produce seeds.  You know what it’s like  to walk through a forest  or woods,  the diversity of growth:  fully grown trees,  saplings,  seedlings,  shoots.  And here and there,  a fallen trunk,  decaying  but  becoming  a nurse log,  from which  emerges  new growth,  new sprouts,  the forest of the future.  

There  is work  for us to do.  Not just  our little congregation, of course.  There is work  for all  who seek to further God’s mission  in this, God’s world.  Last summer’s General Synod of the United Church of Christ  lifted up  God’s call  to seek a just world for all,  and  to practice  “The Three Great Loves.”  As we, last fall, were discussing  who we are, what we stand for, what it is God calls us to be,  we were drawn  to those great loves.  We placed them in our vision statement.  We saw ourselves, and see ourselves,  called  to love of neighbor,  love of children, and love of creation.  The Love of Creation mission group immediately tackled  a local issue,  advocated with the Village  to ban  toxic coal tar sealants,  and it happened.  Another task force  has been exploring the possibility of a ministry with LGBTQ youth.  

So, we got started.  Or… re-started.  Demonstrating  that mature trees – even little  mature trees –  can  recycle themselves,  can  produce seeds, produce seedlings.  We’ve gotten started – re-started – on this path.  But, friends, as you surely know,  it’s really  only a start.  


  • with thanks to Norman Bendroth and N.J. Demarath III
]]><![CDATA[May 27th, 2018]]>Sun, 27 May 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/may-27th-2018Reverend Kent Organ pays tribute to long-time Trinity parishioner, and retired Chief of the Deerfield Fire Department, Jack Gagne. While drawing parallels between Christ sacrifice for his friends and followers, and those men and women who have lost their lives in service to our Country.
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]]><![CDATA[is our way the only way?]]>Sun, 20 May 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/is-our-way-the-only-way
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]]><![CDATA[Nurturing god]]>Sun, 06 May 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/nurturing-god
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]]><![CDATA[April 22nd, 2018]]>Sun, 22 Apr 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/april-22nd-2018
Earth Day Sermon
]]><![CDATA[second childhood]]>Sun, 15 Apr 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/april-15th-2018
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]]><![CDATA[like the first morning]]>Sun, 01 Apr 2018 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.trinitydeerfield.org/sermons/like-the-first-morning
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