Eliot Church of Newton, UCC
Connect with us!
  • Home
  • Who We Are
    • Staff and Hours
    • Commissions and Committees
    • Open and Affirming Statement
    • Safe Church Policy
    • Accessibility
    • History of the Eliot Church of Newton
  • Worship
    • Explore our Sermons
  • Music
    • Joyful Noise Music Cafe
  • Mission and Social Justice
    • Eliot Stands Up for Racial Justice
    • Connecting With Our Muslim Neighbors
    • Eliot & Climate Change
    • Supporting Our Neighbors
    • Charles River Clean-up
  • Adult Faith Enrichment
  • Children & Families Faith Enrichment
  • Life at Eliot Church
    • Leadership Council Notes
  • Weddings at Eliot
  • Renting Space at Eliot
  • Directions
  • Donate
  • Weather Cancellation Policy
  • Calendar
  • United Church of Christ

Love Grows, One By One - April 12, 2015

4/15/2015

0 Comments

 
Jack Farrell
Pledge Sunday Sermon
April 12, 2015
"Love Grows, One By One”

         I’m going to start with a little story from my life.

            My Dad is a singer and he was always a singer in my childhood. We’d grow up with him traveling to schools and performance venues singing his repertoire of songs for children and families. His repertoire changed as we changed, but there was one piece in it that you could count on him keeping, and that was his last song of the show, a song called “Love Grows” which I’m going to sing a part of to you now, God willing!

Love grows, one by one,
Two by two and four by four.
Love grows ‘round like a circle
And comes back knocking on your front door.

Today is Pledge Sunday and usually we talk to you about money and why you should invest in Eliot Church, but Patrick O’Reilly and “Rev. John Eliot” have already done some of that in the Children’s Message, so thank you to you two! The reading today came from Jesus’ ministry, the parable of the sower. It speaks to the uncertainty of sowing seeds and the care with which we take in sowing our seeds. In one patch of soil, the seeds fall haphazardly on the gravel and they are unable to take root; on another, there are weeds that choke out the life of the plants; some seeds fall on the road and become bird-food, and some fall in really healthy soil and flourish. Jesus challenges us to read this metaphoric parable and to listen. Are we listening? I look around at Eliot Church and I see exactly what kind of patch we are: we’re some real good soil.

On our bulletins are written the following words: Building Community, Growing Faith, Living Love. I want to add to each of these seeds that we’re planting in this patch. We are a church that is building community, but we’re also a church that is Celebrating Community. That’s evident in the support for our youth, the children in the congregation, the ministers – those who preach, those who teach and those who make music – and we celebrate this community in a way that simply makes us stronger. That’s some real good soil!

We’re s church the does grow faith, but we also Explore Faith. That’s easy to see in the spiritual forums we hold, the Men’s and Women’s Spirituality groups we run, where women can go reflect on their connections with God and with each other in meetings and retreats, and where men can go talk about issues that are today’s spiritual issues and can go into the broader community to explore and experience faith in other religious contexts, so that looking at their own faith becomes a richer experience. And I cannot deny the faith power of our Sunday worship services and the talent and ability of our preachers. All that, that’s real good soil!

We are definitely a church that is living love, but we’re also a church that is Sharing Love. We share love with each other when we pass the peace, and we share and show love to others with our mission trips and community service projects, to nature and all God’s creatures with blessing the animals, and to the memory and wisdom of this church that is represented by its elders – to whom a massive Thank You is owed for preserving this church through your gifts of memory and history-keeping. That’s real good soil!

How can these seeds not flourish in this soil? In order to see the harvest of our sewing, we have to remember that these harvests are not overnight events. They take time and cultivation. We have to be mindful of the soil and turn it every now and then, water the plants we’ve planted to keep them growing, give them space and air and sunlight to give them the best chance of surviving, and we can only do that through constantly giving of ourselves to this place, this building, this community and the mission it represents in the world. Do we have certainty that the seeds we’re planting are going to grow in the soil and yield a magnificent harvest? Nope. And that’s where faith comes in. We can only do as much as we are able to give our seeds the chance to become something great, and when they do become great, we become great with them.

That’s stewardship. That’s what our pledges are trying to achieve: to keep this soil as good as it gets, we donate ourselves and our resources so that we can continue to be a healthy patch of God’s garden.

Picture
To read a previously posted sermon, please click on the <<PREVIOUS>> link at the bottom of the page
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    photograph above by 
    ​Belinda Fewings



    Eliot Church of Newton, UCC

    The Eliot Church of Newton is an Open and Affirming congregation in the United Church of Christ (UCC). We affirm that all people are children of God. We honor and welcome everyone, and we are committed to being a uniting church that embraces the rich diversity of God's creation.

    Archives

    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

The Eliot Church of Newton, UCC
617-244-3639 | office@eliotchurch.org  |  https://www.eliotchurch.org
474 Centre Street
Newton, MA 02458