Emmanuel Episcopal Church

Service Bulletin for the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost

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Service Bulletin for the Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Download the Service Bulletin for the Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Diocesan Service of Repentance, Reconciliation & Healing for the sin of racism

Homily for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost - Proclaiming the gospel of peace

Isaiah 5:1-7
Psalm 80:1-2, 8-18
Hebrews 11:29-12:2
Luke 12:49-56

Homily by Fr R Christopher Heying

Almighty God, you have given your only Son to be for us a sacrifice for sin, and also an example of godly life: Give us grace to receive thankfully the fruits of his redeeming work, and to follow daily in the blessed steps of his most holy life; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Let there be no doubt that the Gospel of peace is a costly gospel. Scripture is clear that even just to be a Christian is to engage in battles, not just with flesh-and-blood opponents but with rulers, authorities, cosmic powers of darkness and spiritual forces of evil that dwell even in heavenly places.

First Peter tells us that we must be vigilant for the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour (1 Peter 5.8) and Ephesians urges us that even as we stand firm against the wiles of the devil to put on our feet shoes that make us ready “to proclaim the gospel of peace” (Ephesians 6.14). 

For as we engage in hand-to-hand conflict with the very personal forces of evil, we must proclaim in word and deed that God was and that God is in Christ reconciling the world to himself and giving us the message of reconciliation, the gospel of peace (2 Corinthians 5.19ff).

But where there be no justice there can be no peace. 

True peace is not ultimately about the absence of anything: tension, vexation, anxiety, stress.  True peace is about the presence of justice—palpable, real, accessible, actionable, and not just for us but for every person, for each person is made in the image of the living God.

So it is with that critical need for justice in mind that we meet today a not-so-meek and not-so-mild Jesus this morning. 

Service Bulletin for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost - Revised

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Homily for the Twelfth Sunday after Penetecost - Be not afraid

Genesis 15:1-6
Psalm 33:12-22
Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16
Luke 12:32-40

Homily by Fr R Christopher Heying

For everything there is two creations, first the blueprint, then the building.  First we imagine; then we create. With imagination apprehending the finished product we can build it correctly. 

Stephen Covey proposes this as one of the habits of highly successful people: they begin with the end in mind. They envision where they want to go, so they can actually get there.

But if our vision is off, if the compass is pointing to the wrong wall, then every step taken will just move us to the wrong place faster!¹

So each of our scriptures today plead with us to orient our spiritual compass toward the right wall, the one that is as solid and sure as God’s promise, though we may see not and feel not.  But holding in our hearts and imagination obedience to God, we can move forward with confidence.

From the end of Chapter 11 to the beginning of Chapter 15 of Genesis, from which our first reading comes, we find a spiritual compass being reset, being redirected toward the right wall.

The story begins with Terah setting out from Ur of Chaldeans, heading toward the land of Canaan togethre with son Abram, daughter-in-law Sarai, and grandson Lot, Abram’s nephew. 

Service Bulletin for the Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

Download the Service Bulletin for the Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

June Parish Picnic Attracts Large Crowd

Despite a brief spring shower (or was that just the bright sun?), Emmanuel parishioners and friends enjoyed a festive outdoor Eucharist and great fellowhip at this year's Parish Picnic on June 16th, graciously hosted by Janis and Billy Simpson at their Chatham home.

See more photos in the Photo Gallery.

Homily for the Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost - Death and dying well

Hosea 11:1-11
Psalm 107:1-9, 43
Colossians 3:1-11
Luke 12:13-21

Homily by Fr R Christopher Heying

From dying suddenly and unprepared,
Good Lord, deliver us!

In Name of the Living God and the God of the Living:  

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.

We slowly drove, he knew no haste, 
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.

We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.

We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.

Since then 'tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.

Such of course is the poem by Emily Dickinson that reminds us that Death will come for each of us.

Ars moriendi,¹ in English, “the art of dying,” refers to a genre of literature that grew from two Latin books in the 1400s which dealt with death and dying, the shorter of which being a “block book,” complete with wooden images upon which one could meditate and learn to “die well.”