Palms Presbyterian Sermons Palms Presbyterian Church

New Life (Part 2)
Colossian 3:1-17
Sunday, April 21, 2024
We're asking the question of what it means to have new life in Christ, and it may seem a bit simplistic to say that it means we have been called to a new way of life. But there's nothing simple about changing the way we live. There's nothing easy or straightforward about changing course and following a new path. But this is the transformation that is intended for us: nothing less than a new way of living.
Bryant Anderson preaching.
Referenced in this sermon:
Wendell Berry, The Mad Farmer Poems (2008)Wendell Berry, "The Mad Farmer, Flying the Flag of Rough Branch, Secedes from the Union"

New Life (Part 1)
Jeremiah 29:1, 4-14 & Hebrews 6:10-20
Sunday, April 14, 2024
The hope that we have in Christ is not merely wish casting or positive thinking. This Easter hope grows out of the knowledge that God has a plan for us and for this world, and it transforms our experience of even the most difficult challenges.
Beverly Dempsey preaching.
Referenced in this sermon:
Karen Armstrong, The Spiral Staircase: My Climb Out of Darkness (2005)

Easter Sunday
Matthew 28:1-10
Sunday, March 31, 2024
Easter is a story of expectations radically altered. Women went to the tomb with clear expectations of what they would find there, founded upon the bedrock certainty that dead people stay dead. They went expecting to find death and found life instead. We often go through our days expecting to find death, but Easter reminds us that life is always ready to turn our expectations upside down.
Bryant Anderson preaching.
Referenced in this sermon:
N.T. Wright, "The Bible's Most Misunderstood Verse," Time (October 20, 2023).

The Greatest Commandments (Part 5)
Matthew 5:43-48
Sunday, March 24, 2024
Jesus commands a very special kind of love: love for those who can't (or won't) return the favor. His reason? This is how God loves. But this is an unbelievably difficult sort of love for us to live out in practice. People can be so hard to understand—and even harder to love—especially when they see the world differently than we do. The world needs a whole lot more of this sort of love.
Bryant Anderson preaching.
Referenced in this sermon:
David Brooks, How to Know a Person (2023)

The Greatest Commandments (Part 4)
Romans 12:1-2
Sunday, March 17, 2024
God created us with physical bodies to inhabit a physical world. It cannot possibly be the case that our love of God resides solely in the invisible spaces within and does not extend to how we make use of our physicality. We are commanded to love God with—among other things—all of our strength. How does love find its embodied expression in us and through us?
Bryant Anderson preaching.
Referenced in this sermon:
John Maynard Keynes, "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren" (1930)Andy Crouch, The Life We're Looking For (2022)

Guest preacher Dr. Andrew Root
Sunday, March 10, 2024
Andrew Root (Ph.D., Princeton Theological Seminary) is the Carrie Olson Baalson professor of youth and family ministry at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota, and joins Palms Presbyterian as our visiting theologian for the weekend.
Dr. Root writes and researches in areas of theology, ministry, culture and younger generations.  His most recent books are Churches and the Crisis of Decline (Baker, 2022), The Congregation in a Secular Age (Baker, 2021), The End of Youth Ministry? (Baker, 2020), The Pastor in a Secular Age: Ministry to People Who No Longer Need God (Baker, 2019), Faith Formation in a Secular Age (Baker, 2017), and Exploding Stars, Dead Dinosaurs, and Zombies: Youth Ministry in the Age of Science (Fortress Press, 2018).
To learn more, visit andrewroot.org.