Rev. Zach

“Give thanks to the God of heaven. His love endures forever.”  Psalm 136:26 Just the other day my daughter called me outside to ask me to help her with some sidewalk chalk. She wanted to write the phrase “Let LOVE Overtake You!” in big letters, and thought it might take her too long unassisted. How could I resist? Not only that, how could I agree with the value of her impassioned plea without joining in? Suddenly, I am reminded of the Vision Statement for the church. First Presbyterian is “A Place to Experience, Express, and Explore the Love of God.” In Psalm 136, each of the 26 verses end with, “His love endures forever.” Love is of God. The Psalmist speaks of the way the love of God has been experienced by the Israelites over and over again in the good creation we all enjoy, in God’s sustaining presence in the wilderness, and through victory over those who would enslave them. In all of these things, God’s love is the active force. And so it is for us as a community of...

Sermon Delivered July 21, 2012  2 Samuel 7:1-14 Ephesians 2:11-22 Mark 6:30-34 Earlier this Summer, my daughter and I participated in what has become somewhat of a tradition – the annual building of a drip castle. If you have never built one of these it is the careful result of filling your hands with wet sand and letting it slide through – little by little – to create larger structures. Usually there is some kind of hard packed base, and usually there are portions that break off due to their height and weight becoming out of balance. But, with enough patience or persistence – which ever characteristic suites you best – you can eventually come up with something quite unique! The most unique thing about it is that it never comes out the way you have in mind, and it always ends up as the result of participating with forces beyond your control. That seems to me to be a lot like who we are and what we do in the church. In fact, this tension between building something unique ...

Sermon Delivered July 15, 2012 2 Samuel 6:1-5 Ephesians 1:3-14 Mark 6:1-13 Our readings today have a lot of expectations in them, both implied and obvious. The idea of expectations reminds me of a joke about opinions. Opinions (or expectations) are like arm pits – we all have them, and some of them stink! It’s true. Hard to believe – I know – but not everything that I want or expect to happen is going to happen. Not everything that I expect to happen, even the things that should happen – good things, great things – are the right thing or even the likely thing to happen. That is not a bad thing. It is not necessarily a good thing, either. It’s just the way things work. Even the Rolling Stones knew it. Mick Jagger sang [ though I will not as I do not have the moves like Jagger] , “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes you’ll find you get what you need!” That’s true, but I’m not sure that it’s the best theology. At least, it’s not a complete witness. It’...

Sermon Delivered July 8, 2012 – Pentecost (6B)  2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10 Acts 5:27-42 Luke 2:1-15 There are some things in this life that you just can’t stop. We like to think that we can control and channel the elements of nature - and to some extent we always have. Crops have used the power of the sun and rain to feed our families. Winds have been harnessed to blow ships through the sea and air for centuries. We have even used the gravitational pull of the earth to balance out the thrust and and extension of our hand into the depths of space. We can do all of these things. We have done all of these things, and we will do more. But we still can’t stop the tide. We can use inertia, but we cannot change the fact that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Likewise, we can not always predict the reaction we are going to illicit! When it works the way we want it to we call that a job well done. When the reaction exceeds our expectations we might even call it provid...

Sermon Delivered on July 1, 2012 – Season After Pentecost (5B)  2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27 Acts 5:12-24 Mark 5:21-43 [ Dramatic Interpretation ] Restoration is such a positive word! It offers the hope of holding on to what is good while improving the bad and dysfunctional. As a boy I can recall my grandparents restoring an old farmhouse in North Georgia. I had no idea at the time what they must have gone through to raise the sagging wrap-around porch and replace the ancient newspaper they found in the wall with actual insulation. Restoring that house took them a few years, and I would bet a few more dollars than they expected. I never heard them complain, as it was not their way to do so. All I know is that they enjoyed themselves, and they used the opportunity to create a home of hospitality for others. Restoring old homes is not uncommon these days – even as our culture becomes more interested in disposable and temporary solutions. People refer to it as flipping homes, and they do ...