Tag: bible

Queer Leaven

On By Oby BallingerIn SermonsLeave a comment

Preached at Creekside United Church of Christ (Minneapolis, Minnesota). Text: Matthew 13:33.

Imagine with me that you’re in an aisle of a grocery store, holding one of those rectangular baskets with handles that flip up. Put your hand out like you’re carrying it. (I’ll look less dumb if you join me.) Standing in the baking goods aisle, you reach for a five-pound bag of flour, and place it into the empty basket. Feel the weight as the powdery paper sack drops into it. Now, imagine that’s one terrible news headline, one calamitous thing, landing heavy as a bag of flour in your basket. How many other headlines and stories are you carrying after these last few weeks? Bombs dropping in Iran and missiles in Israel. Disinvestment in medical research, veteran services, disaster relief, suicide prevention. Five pounds, five pounds, five pounds. The supermarket basket is too full for more, but there’s additional pounds to come. Open your arms wide to a great bushel basket now—it can carry more. Add to it the pounds from Supreme Court decisions, ICE abductions, wildfire smoke, and political assassination. Palestinians murdered waiting for their sacks of flour. Do you feel the weight? You’re holding this awkward bushel basket, needing both hands, moving gingerly, so heavy in your arms, and unable to do anything else. How much are you carrying, the piled-up woes of the world this week? Fifty, sixty, seventy pounds—what to do with all that weight? There’s so much potential in the flour—enough to make more than a hundred loaves! But by itself the flour is just inert, dead weight.

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Open and Affirming: Past and Future

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Preached at First Congregational United Church of Christ (Moorhead, Minnesota). Texts: Genesis 9:8-16 and Mark 12:28-31

In September 2001, I completed a move from Great Falls, Montana to Moorhead here, and started schooling down the street at Concordia College. The first couple days of classes were the usual overwhelm you can imagine—a new school, new place, new friends, and new studies. But then on September 11th, the rest of the world and I sat in bewilderment as we tried to make sense of terrorist attacks that would change world history. The next Sunday, I went looking for a church that would help me make sense of what was going on. That cool September morning, walking north from Concordia, I was heading to St. John the Divine Episcopal Church north of here. But as usual I was running behind, and would be late for that service. Walking past on the sidewalk, I noticed that worship here was also at 10am. I’d be on time here, and I could always go to that other church the following Sunday. So I looked up the stone steps, heard chatting and a friendly invitation, then entered through the open front door. In all the years since, I have never made it to St. John the Divine.

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A closeup picture of a quilted stole, showing rectangles of fabric in blues, purples, and other colors.

Known, Called, Commissioned

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Sermon preached at Newport United Methodist Church and Community United Church of Christ in Newport, Minnesota.
Text: Jeremiah 1:4-10.

I have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to clergy stoles—so many beautiful and lovely fabrics to wear as symbols of God’s call to ministry! When I left parish ministry to begin full-time faith community organizing,
I hung them up in my closet and wondered when I would wear them again. So when Pastor Anne reached out to ask me to preach and share communion this morning, I’m just vain enough to start asking, “What should I wear??” In most Protestant churches, the Epiphany season of growth and wisdom is marked by the color green. So I went to the green and gold stole that a mentor gave me at my ordination, with the reminder that green is worn most often throughout the year. But I was also drawn to this other green one made by a pastor friend in Duluth, which includes the rainbow colors, fabric showing love, the spiral way of faith, and the Black Lives Matter salute that communicates resilient determination. Then again, anticipating seeing here some of the dear Community UCC members, who ordained me fifteen years ago last month in a sanctuary just down the road, made me reach for another stole that the church’s moderator there once gave me: “Blah, blah, blah”! (I think it was a joke?) Finally, Pastor Anne told me that the color for the day was every color—the rainbow! So I have opted for this stole of rainbow colors, made by a gay man in the congregation where I taught Sunday school while in seminary. You may not be able to see it from farther away, but this stole is made of hundreds of small colorful fabric squares, all stitched together by painstaking work into a colorful and diverse tapestry.

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After Trump’s Reelection

On By Oby BallingerIn Blog1 Comment

I woke up at 2:30am and rolled over, sensing that the space beside me was empty, and then saw that Javen’s bedstand light still on. Turning the other way, I reached for my phone and read the headline: Trump won Pennsylvania. I got out of bed and went downstairs to find Javen where I left him hours earlier—lying on the couch, checking election returns. I heard his rundown of the painful results and took some relief in the Minnesota outcomes, but kept going back in shock to the national trends. Republicans gaining ground almost everywhere, and Trump on track to victory even after everyone knows what he plans. I slumped to the floor, leaned on Javen, and said, “It feels really hard to love my neighbor.”

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