Sun. May 25, 2014 (Gay Lynn Voth)

At our retreat, Gay Lynn Voth, in an impressive linking of the themes in the lectionary texts, spoke about the sources of spiritual renewal. Scripture confronts us with words we don’t hear often: sin, repent God, etc. “Novel” thinkers tend to see things in new and innovative ways. To see things rightly we need to train ourselves to resist the glamour of novelty; many things cannot and should not be made new. “There are experiences of evangelicals that are novel, rigid, idolatrous and deadly wrong,” she said. For instance, the claim that God hates certain people has not been filtered through the teachings of Jesus. We should not take one verse and build a whole theology around it; it needs to be tempered by Jesus teachings. Old Testament texts need to be looked at through Jesus teaching. Jesus said he would not leave us orphaned, he would send the Holy Spirit. Jesus gave us two commandments: love God and each other. “Try living only by the rule of love,” she said. [HN]

NOTE: No audio recording of the sermon is available.