The Shape of Shalom: Pulling God’s Future into the Now 6/6

Chronic anxiety vs. an economy of abundance. Capitalism depends on our anxiety. Our fear of not having enough is fuel for Pharaoh’s economy. The narratives we ingest reinforce our perceived deprivation. How can we replace the story of “if I only had a little bit more…” with a trustworthy story of God’s sufficient gifts?

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

Deep Water: Contemplating Baptism 5/7

Blessings and Woes, Love and Hate. There’s an economic punch in the Sermon on the Plain – “blessed are the poor/hungry; woe to the rich/well-fed.” But there’s also this reputational component – do people speak well of you (woe!), or defame your character (bless!)? The relationship between those two is worth exploring, as we (still) tend to villainize the poor and assume good things about the wealthy. I don’t mean the super-wealthy – just the normally wealthy, as if they followed the rules and worked hard and blah blah blah. This is the lie of capitalism – that good people can prove their goodness by working the system to their advantage. Jesus calls bullshit.

The Cries of Our Hearts 8/8

We cry out for our stories to be believed. Apprentice Evangelist Remi Shores finishes our series with a text from John. The man born blind shows us how to listen to the wisdom in our bodies, even when others won’t. Others may cast you out, but Jesus will find you.

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.

What the World Needs Now 5/5

What the world needs now is to think critically about our social media citizenship. The most sophisticated technology of our time has one purpose: to make us want to stay on a website. The social media “platforms” are, according to Hank Green, less like services we use and more like places where we live. They have their own governing bodies, their own currencies, and they call us not “customers” but “users.” And we “use” that technology to do a lot of really good things: to create art; to foster relationships; to critique the very platform that hosts our criticism. But what does it mean that so few people—the CEOs of a handful of corporations—have so much power over us? What if this is not a new thing—consolidated power in a central “location” where almost everyone “lives”—but an ancient thing happening in a new, well, “platform”? How can the wisdom of our ancestors in faith help us navigate our citizenship in these strange new lands?

To tell us your thoughts on this sermon, click through to the web posting and leave us a comment. Or, find us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or, email us the old-fashioned way: info@galileochurch.org. To contribute financially to the ongoing ministry of Galileo Church, find us on Venmo, Patreon, or PayPal, or just send a check to 6563 Teague Rd., Fort Worth, TX 76140.