St. Luke’s Archives!

The Rev. Mark Moline
Sunday July 26th, 2009  
Title:  “The Time of Your Life”

In my sermon just a few weeks back, I quoted Christ from the 5th chapter of John’s Gospel, “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise.”  I am confident that even as a young boy, Jesus saw God miraculously turning water into wine, so he  – in turn – launched his earthly ministry by doing the same at that wedding in Cana of Galilee.  As a teenager, even I saw God performing that very same miracle – with my own eyes.  And before you begin to think I’m losing my mind, let me explain that at that time I was living in Linden, California and from our house – on a clear day – I could see the snow on the high peaks of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and then during the spring/summer thaw I saw that water gushing down off those mountains and pushing back the banks of the diverting canals that criss-crossed the central valley.  I saw the growers around Lodi irrigating their vineyards with that water.  Then I saw, and even worked in the harvest as we cut ripe grapes bursting with juice; water on its way to becoming wine.  Then later as I would pass the wineries, I could smell the water-turned-grape-juice turning into wine.  Ventnor’s don’t manufacture wine.  Like the servants at the wedding they assist God.  Mary told the wedding servants “Do whatever he tells you.”  She knew more than others that God provides the creation, the power and the time; God does all the work. Read the rest of this entry »

Sermon / The Rev. Mark Moline
Memorial Day 2009
St. Luke’s / Prescott

On this Memorial Day I’m going to use another preacher’s sermon; almost verbatim although I have paraphrased some in the interest of time.  Still it is the same sermon and this is Memorial Day week-end and the sermon seems to fit. 

 This sermon was written by the Rev. Leonard E. Welshons, Pastor of the Open Bible Church in Ottumwa and was presented only once, 65 years ago.  It was preached at the memorial service of Judy’s older brother Paul. 

 I know you didn’t know Paul, neither did I and neither did Judy beyond that cold granite stone that bore his name there at the cemetery in Ottumwa; the one her parents frequently took her to visit on Sunday afternoons when she was a little girl.

 You don’t know Paul, but on this Memorial Day Week-end you do know of and remember other Paul’s, or perhaps it was a James, or a Mike or a Donald, other brothers, other uncles or even dads or a spouse; and maybe even a Susan or a Mary for there were 460 American Military women killed in WW2 alone.  It is my hope that, as I preach Pastor Welshons’ sermon you will remember all of those who paid the ultimate price in defense of our nation, our way of life, our freedom. Read the rest of this entry »

St. Luke’s Episcopal / Prescott
The Rev. Mark Moline
Memorial Day Sunday / May 25^th, 2008

Title:  “Truth Marches On”

 “In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea, with a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me: as he died to make men Holy – let us die to make men free…. His truth is marching on.”  This weekend we celebrate Memorial Day, and so we pause briefly to reflect that God’s truth is still marching on. 

 Back in 1942 God’s truth marched across the southern deserts of Arizona as fellow Episcopalian George Patton and his army of very young Americans prepared and trained to march across North Africa and Europe.  And so they did, and subsequently lost many of their own – many of our own along that treacherous path.  I know that today it’s not trendy, it’s not popular theology, it is not even pleasant to consider – but still I believe God’s truth rolled with them in their M4-Sherman tanks, marching across war-torn Africa and Europe in 1944 and then on April 11^th, 1945 God’s truth rolled through the very gates of hell – at a place called Buchenwald.

 Many will disagree, but I believe there are some things worse than the horrors of war.  In raw terms of human suffering and death, our own nation’s history of institutionalized slavery produced far greater pain, suffering, deprivation and loss than did the war that ended all that evil.   I think such was the same with the European Holocaust of the mid 1900s.  I know it’s not popular with all Episcopalians, but “To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: there is a time for war, and a time for peace.”

 War is indeed a terrible thing.  Memorial Day was never intended as a celebration of War – it is not my intent today to glorify the awful realities of war, but one must at least consider what a Nazi dominated world would be like today with its hi-tech Buchenwalds scattered around the globe. The young martyrs of Patton’s 3^rd Army still stand between us and that unimaginable hell. Read the rest of this entry »