• Content

  • Pages

  • Upcoming Events

    • Sunday service - Holy Communion December 28, 2025 at 9:30 am – 11:00 am Grace Church 215 Pleasant Street, Sheldon, VT Website: www.gracechurchsheldon.comTime:  09:30 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)        Every week on Sun.Join Zoom Meetinghttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/83929911344?pwd=alZQTWZMN0ZkWFFPS1hmNjNkZkU2UT09Meeting ID: 839 2991 1344Password: Call for detailsOne tap mobile+13126266799,,83929911344#,,1#,816603# US (Chicago)+19294362866,,83929911344#,,1#,816603# US (New York)Dial by your location        +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)        +1 929 436 2866 US (New York)Meeting ID:…
    • Sunday service - Morning Prayer January 4, 2026 at 9:30 am – 11:00 am Grace Church 215 Pleasant Street, Sheldon, VT Website: www.gracechurchsheldon.comTime:  09:30 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)        Every week on Sun.Join Zoom Meetinghttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/83929911344?pwd=alZQTWZMN0ZkWFFPS1hmNjNkZkU2UT09Meeting ID: 839 2991 1344Password: Call for detailsOne tap mobile+13126266799,,83929911344#,,1#,816603# US (Chicago)+19294362866,,83929911344#,,1#,816603# US (New York)Dial by your location        +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)        +1 929 436 2866 US (New York)Meeting ID:…
    • Sunday service - Holy Communion January 11, 2026 at 9:30 am – 11:00 am Grace Church 215 Pleasant Street, Sheldon, VT As of January 16, 2022 our service online only (via Zoom). Website: www.gracechurchsheldon.orgTime:  09:30 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)        Every week on Sun.Join Zoom Meetinghttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/83929911344?pwd=alZQTWZMN0ZkWFFPS1hmNjNkZkU2UT09Meeting ID: 839 2991 1344Password: Call for detailsOne tap mobile+13126266799,,83929911344#,,1#,816603# US (Chicago)+19294362866,,83929911344#,,1#,816603# US (New York)Dial by your location        +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago) …

Advent 1 Year C November 28, 2021

Posted on November 28, 2021 by Beth Crane

Jeremiah 33:14-16
Psalm 25:1-9
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Luke 21:25-36

Today is the First Sunday in Advent. This is the New Year’s season of the Church. We change from lectionary year B to year C. Our vestments go from green to the purple which symbolizes both a season of penitence and a time to prepare for the coming of our King.

Our first reading is from the prophet Jeremiah. Scholars tell us that Jeremiah is in prison. The Babylonians have conquered Jerusalem. Jeremiah has actually seen bodies of his fellow citizens piled up in the streets. This is a terrible situation. Jeremiah has been imprisoned because he has told the king the truth. The king does not want to hear the truth.

In the midst of a national and personal tragedy, Jeremiah shares the most profound good news. God is going to raise up a king from the family of David, and this king is going to rule with justice based on a right relationship with God. Judah will be saved. Safety will prevail. Peace will come. In the midst of this disaster, God is sending a message of hope and healing.

In our epistle for today, Paul is writing to his beloved Thessalonians. This is one of the earliest letters in the New Testament. He had started this congregation just a few months ago and he has moved on to Corinth. He writes, “How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy that we feel for you before our God because of you?” Paul loves these people deeply. He is hoping to visit them and to help them strengthen their faith. They are suffering persecution. Paul prays that God and Jesus will lead him back to these beloved people. He prays,”May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we abound in love for you.” These strong bonds of love enabled the followers of Jesus to stay close to each other when all they had were letters carried by messengers such as Timothy. We can be sure that when the people of the Church in Thessalonica heard this letter read. their “hearts were strengthened in holiness.”

In our gospel for today Our Lord tells us that there will be all kinds of tensions among nations and severe weather events, and we have certainly seen many of these kinds of upsets and turmoil. But Jesus tells us not to spend a great deal of time trying to figure out when he will come to us. Rather he tells us to be ready, to be alert.

All of our readings today tell us about how God comes to us in challenging times and gives us the good news about God’s kingdom of peace and harmony. 

Advent is a time when we look backward to the birth of our king in a cave used as a stable in Bethlehem. He came among us, just as we came into the world, as a baby. He is a king who knows what it is to be human. He grew up in a carpenter shop, helping his earthly father, Joseph, and learning his trade. Our King is fully human and fully divine. He knows us and understands us. We can look at his life and see how a human life is to be lived. A kingdom life. A life of shalom.

In Advent, we also look toward his coming again to complete his work of creation. It is going to require a great deal of effort to take this world. which is full of strife, just as Jeremiah’s world was, and filled with persecution just as the world of the Thessalonians was, and transform it into a world of peace and harmony. But that is what our King is trying to do. When he comes again, he will complete that work.

Meanwhile, he is asking us to help him with that work now. He is calling us to be people of hope as Jeremiah was in the midst of war and suffering, He is calling us to be people of love as the Thessalonians were in the midst of persecution. He is calling us to be people of faith.

Think about the power of the love that connected Paul with the community of faith in Thessalonica. As we read the passage, we can feel how much they cared about each other. And Paul prays that they will have that love for each other and for all people.

In this Advent time, this time that is between Jesus’ birth and his coming again, we have a great gift that can guide us as we try to walk the Way of Love. We can look at the life of our Lord here on earth as we read the gospels and we can see a living, breathing example of how to live as shalom people, kingdom people. We can follow his example. We have the model of a human life to follow; we have the living example of Jesus’ life. 

If we’re going to prepare the way of the Lord, we need to follow his example, and the wonderful thing is that we have his gift of grace. We have his help. Some of us are reading Bishop Curry’s book, Love Is the Way,  and it is full of people who “cast away the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.”

One of the most important ways that we can be ready when he comes again is to move closer and closer to him by asking his grace to walk the Way of Love. In every choice, every decision we make, we can choose the path that will lead us closer to love. Love for each other, love for all.

Loving God, help us to be alert to opportunities to walk the Way of Love. Strengthen our hearts in holiness and faith and hope. Give us grace to be partners with you in building your shalom of peace and harmony and wholeness. Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Advent 1C RCL December 2, 2018

Posted on December 2, 2018 by Beth Crane

Jeremiah 33:14-16
Psalm 25:1-9
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Luke 21:25-36

Advent is a time when we look back to the first coming of our Lord as a baby and look ahead to his coming again to complete his work of creation. Advent is also the new year’s season of the Church. We move from lectionary year B to year C, and our liturgical color changes from the green of the post-Pentecost season to the purple which befits both penitence and the welcoming of our King.

As we look around our world, we have been seeing all kinds of destructive weather events—forest fires consuming people’s homes and destroying their lives, severe storms, continuing mass shootings, war, famine, refugees seeking asylum, and on and on the list of tragedies goes.

Our very brief reading from the prophet Jeremiah comes from a tragic time as well. Jeremiah is writing from prison. He is under house arrest because he has displeased King Hezekiah. He has been telling the king truths that the king does not want to hear. The Babylonians have leveled Jerusalem. Earlier in the chapter, Jeremiah describes corpses being piled up in houses. It is a terrible time, a time in which it would be easy to lose all hope.

And yet, Jeremiah reminds his people and us of God’s great promise to all of us. A righteous branch will spring up. From an old stump, a new shoot will appear. The kingship of David will be restored. People will live in peace; they will raise crops; business will be carried out with honesty and integrity; people will marry and have children.  The Lord will “execute justice and righteousness in the land.”

As Christians, we see that shoot from the stump of Jesse as our Lord Jesus Christ. In times of darkness and turmoil, we look for his return and the establishment of his shalom of justice, love, and peace.

Our epistle today is from Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians. Scholars tell us that this is probably the earliest writing in the New Testament. Paul had founded this community of faith and then had been called to a new mission. But he had always wanted to go back to visit these people, whom he loved very much. He sent Timothy to see how they were doing, and Timothy returned to Paul with a glowing account of this loving community which continued to show forth the compassion of Christ even under persecution.

Paul writes, “How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy that we feel before our God because of you?” Paul prays again that God may make it possible for him to visit this beloved community. And then he prays, “May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we abound in love for you. And may he strengthen your hearts in holiness….” That is St. Paul’s prayer for us as well. Love is at the heart of our faith. Paul is praying that we may continue in love for each other and for all people and that God may strengthen our hearts in holiness that we may remain steadfast in our faith. And a key part of our faith is that our Lord will return to set all things right.

Our gospel for today is full of apocalyptic images, “signs among the sun, the moon, and the stars,” “distress among the nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves,” “fear and foreboding.” Every age has its turmoil, and our Lord counsels us not to run to the hills, but to be ready for his coming.

He says, “Stand up, and raise your heads. because your redemption is drawing near.” He tells us to be careful that we are not “weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life.”

Jesus calls us to “be alert at all times.”

Herbert O’Driscoll writes, “The great significance of this passage for us lies in the attitude that our Lord calls for. Our Lord is saying something like this—If we truly believe that God is at the heart of human events, then we can experience life with confidence, knowing that all events have ultimate meaning and purpose within the mind and will of God.” (O’Driscoll, The Word Among Us, Year C vol. 1, p. 15.

Confidence comes from the roots con, meaning “with,” and fides, meaning “faith.” The true meaning of confidence is to live with faith, to have our lives rooted and grounded in faith.

What are these readings saying to us, here in the year 2018?

First, in the midst of one of the most devastating tragedies in history, the Babylonian Captivity, Jeremiah, one of God’s greatest and most courageous prophets, reaches into the heart of God’s life with God’s people and reminds us that God’s promise is always to bring wholeness out of brokenness, life out of death, meaning and purpose out of chaos and confusion. As God’s people, we are called to focus on the light of that hope and to move forward in faith.

Secondly, we learn from St. Paul and the Thessalonians that love is at the center of everything. Grace is a small congregation, but, like the church at Thessalonica, Grace is a congregation where folks love each other and share God’s love with all people. It is easy to take that for granted or to diminish the value of that, but the power of love is beyond our imagining or understanding. Love is a gift from God. a gift to be cherished.

Finally, our Lord is talking to us about the time when he will come to make the creation whole. He calls us to be ready. He also tells us not to try to figure out when that moment will come, but simply to be ready all the time.

When he does come to bring in his shalom, we do not need to be afraid. Yes, he is our King. The King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Yes, he is mighty. And he is also the One who has said that his kingdom is within us. He is also our Good Shepherd, who knows each of us, weaknesses and strengths, gifts and flaws, and he calls us each by name, and we follow him. Into his kingdom.  Amen.

Filed under: Reverend Janet Brown, Sermons | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »