Rev. Zach

“You’re on Fire!” The Rev. Zachary S. Sasser Chester Presbyterian Church Day of Pentecost, Year B Confirmation Sunday June 4, 2006 Scripture: Ezekiel 37:1-14 Acts 2:1-21 Sermon Text: Coming up with a sermon title is always an interesting task for me, especially since I usually have to submit a title before I actually write the sermon.  I do, of course do a preliminary study of the text, but there are some weird societal expectations that often come to bear.  I tend to feel like a sermon title should be some combination of a sticking point to take home with you and mull over and an advertising slogan that makes a person want to figure out what you are talking about.  My hope is that you will not soon forget today’s title or the gospel it proclaims, as it has special significance to me. “You’re on fire!” came from a restaurant I used to work in.  Every server (which is what I did there, I was a waiter) had a station of three or four tables that he o...

“Bearing the Word” The Rev. Zachary S. Sasser Chester Presbyterian Church Memorial Day: May 28, 2006 Seventh Sunday of Easter, Year A Scripture Texts: Acts 1:15-26 John 17:6-19 Theological Thrust: To be a Christian means to bear the very presence of God and to connect with God through others. This is not something we do on our own but something God does through us. We still make choices to make, but those choices are in response to God’s action. At the end of the day God’s will works through all things, even those choices that are not in keeping with God’s will as we understand it. Sermon Text: Being a Christian I tend to think of most things in light of faith. I don’t mean to say that I so pure and pious that I do nothing but contemplate the mystery of God. Rather it’s just a natural thing to think about how a movie, an event, or a commercial reminds me of my faith and of God’s activity in my life. So far one of my favorite commercials for this type of activity are the commercia...

“Sinless” The Rev. Zachary S. Sasser Chester Presbyterian Church April 30, 2006 Easter 3B Texts: 1 John 1:8-10 1 John 3:1-7 Today’s texts are two of the truest statements in the Bible.  Taken individually they could almost be seen as a summary of the Gospel.  All of us are in need of God’s forgiveness and if we remain in our sin we can not know and experience God’s love.  Sounds simple enough, but they also seem to represent a double standard.  You have to be without sin to know and experience God, but all of us sin so we can not know God.  The simple answer to this problem is, of course, that faith in Christ cleanses us from our sins when we confess them.  But what about the sins we will commit today, tomorrow, and the next day?  Can any of us really say that we will not sin?   Can we who are human, and imperfect, and wired for self preservation really say that we are going to put the interests of other peo...

I'm up way too late again. I wonder how many blog posts start that way? I'm at a house in Nag's Head in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Funny how God takes things that stand for pain and suffering, like the cross, and turns them into banners for victory. You see I came here for my honeymoon for my first marriage. Neither of us knew what we were doing. We had no business getting maried...both trying to fix ourselves through someone else's affection. I've been divorced from her for 11 years now. Really its almost a dream of a memory at this point. I'm now married to a partner God has called me to be with. I have two beautiful children, and I am sitting here listening to thunder roll past this incredible beach house I am sharing with friends from seminary for a week. Nag's Head has become a sanctuary of sorts for me. I don't know that all this has much to do with finding Christ in the unfortunate, except for the fact that we in this group expre...

So, the gang from the POJ who went to New Orleans are back safe and sound. Praise be to God! So, now I'm off to find the next example of proclamation in action! Happy Easter, one and all! -Zach

Gulf Coast Mission Trip Update – Wednesday, April 12, 2006 Our third day of work started without event. Breakfast was bagels and fruit, and we got an early start. Having finished work on Mike’s Mom’s house, one group got started working on Katherine’s house – again untouched since August 29. It was an emotional start, as the homeowner, her teenage daughter and her mother were present to see everything they owned scattered around the house in ruins. The youth showed a great deal of compassion and helped to get started on the clean up effort. This family had a lot of belongings, and the group had to literally shovel things off the floor to get into a room. By the end of the day, the floors were cleared and progress was being made on deconstruction. LuAnne’s house is almost finished. A small contingency stayed to work on removing the ceiling and the floors. To look at the before and after pictures is fascinating – they have removed everything down to the studs. LuAnne will be abl...

Gulf Coast Mission Trip Update – Day 3 (Tuesday) Another early morning saw us moving and ready for a day of hard work. The breakfast crew treated us to strawberry and/or chocolate chip pancakes, so we were well fed and ready to go. By 9:00 each group was on their work sites. The group at LuAnne’s house had finished removing personal belongings and began removing walls and floors. The smell was much better, until the floor in the basement came up. Those N-95 masks have been a definite necessity! All that remains in this house is to finish removing floors, remove the ceiling and empty out the garage. We expect to finish this house up on Wednesday. The group at Mike’s Mom’s house finished their work today. The walls have been removed down to the studs. The ceilings and floors have been taken out, and all the deconstruction debris removed. We even trimmed back some trees. This work group is looking forward to the opportunity to start from scratch with an “untouched” house. They w...