Sun. Mar. 3, 2013 (Laura Eriksson)

On the Third Sunday of Lent, Laura Eriksson spoke on "Unexpected Warnings and Welcomes". "Warnings are good for us, even if we do not like them and ignore them." At that point, the fire alarm went off and the entire assembly laughed as the vast majority of us proceeded to ignore it (I counted 15 teachers/former teachers/principals present!) Even so, warnings do make us aware of possible dangers. Lent reminds us to 'come', 'return', 'repent' (it is time for a spiritual tuneup), 'return to the God whose ways are higher than our ways'. We are surrounded with warnings daily (email, food, poisons, environment, scams) but the most difficult to accept is the warning to repent. The story in Luke 13, telling of people trying to interpret the latest news and why others were killed by a falling building or Roman soldiers. They were surprised when Jesus told them they should repent from judging others and instead, repent so that they are ready, should an unexpected calamity fall on them. The next story in Luke told of the gardener giving the fig tree one more in year which to produce fruit, and how he was going to invest time and nutrients so that the tree could benefit for this one last chance to be fruitful. Laura concluded with a thought I hope to ponder this coming week: "True repentance is not so much about looking at the past and saying 'sorry', but it is about looking to the future and saying 'Wow!'" [JEK]

Listen to the sermon audio MP3 recording from Sunday, March 3rd, 2013 using your browser's preferred media player.