Hi everyone,

Welcome to worship for this 22nd Sunday after Pentecost, which lands on November 9, 2025!

The bulletin for this service can be found here. In it, you will find the order and words of worship and the full sermon manuscript. You can use the bulletin to follow along in the service, or just use the words that will appear on your screen.

To enhance your online worship experience, you are invited to have a candle in your space, lit for the majority of the service and extinguished near the end after the sending hymn. You are also welcome to participate in communion if you are comfortable, by having something small to eat and drink prepared for consumption. Further instruction will be given at the appropriate time.

May God’s undying and everlasting love and grace fill you with hope and joy, this day and always!

Redeeming God, through the power of your Spirit, may we be connected to you and each other in your Word, that we might know your eternal presence throughout our lives and community, in the name of Christ. Amen.

Don’t you just miss the good ol’ days?

You know, back in the day when things were how they were back in the day.  During those times when we still did things how we’ve always done them.  So long ago when long ago wasn’t that long ago.  I’m talking about those good ol’ days that were so good before change came and changed it all.

I know, it sounds like I’m having a breakdown of some kind.  A stroke, perhaps.  But I’m being intentionally vague and confusing because really, the thing about “the good ol’ days” is that they’re different for pretty much anyone you ask.  Each one of us will hold onto different memories, different experiences, different ideas of when and what was best.  And we might find that what was best for some could have been the worst for others.  Really, the only thing we have in common about those good ol’ days is that in our own heads and minds, they were good.

So you might be wondering where I’m going with all this, and how I’m just repeating myself almost as though I was trying to fulfill a self-imposed sermon word count.  Seriously though, I’ve been having a lot of these kinds of things in my mind as I reflect on where we are as a community, as a church, and how we express our faith.

As some of you know, I’m part of a somewhat recently formed national steering committee for the ELCIC, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, the wider church that we are a part of.  The committee is called “Facing Today: Dreaming for the Future”.  I know, it’s a mouthful that sort of sounds like the title to a movie or something, but it really does help the aforementioned sermon word count.  Anyway, the point of this committee is to look at where we are as a church, to get to the grassroots to see what dreams, hopes, and visions we might have for the national church, and to figure out ways of implementing some of those ideas.  The goal really is to help the church discern how we can be more faithful to our collective call as a church, and finding what steps we need to and should take to get there.

So far, the group has just done a lot of information collecting from the National Convention that happened earlier this year, and by visiting our Synod Council meetings and various other groups within the whole church.  And while we’re still very much in the initial stages of that work, what I’ve seen in the data so far is that we as a church really seems to miss… you guessed it… the good ol’ days.

The days when the church was busting at the seams.  The days when attendance was aplenty, Sunday Schools were packed, and we needed more than one worship service just to fit everyone in the building.  The days when God’s presence and blessing was so apparent and clear to us.

I mean compare those days to now.  Now it seems like churches in our denomination and otherwise are struggling just to keep the lights on.  Now it’s like the church’s place in society has been pushed to the back of the line and out of sight.  Now it’s like those good ol’ days are gone and are never coming back. 

So, why bother with this committee?  It’s pretty clear that our church is dying.  It’s clear that we’ll never reach the levels of attendance that we had in our glory days.  It’s clear that this church is beyond fixing, beyond saving, beyond… resurrection.  At least, beyond resurrection into what was.

And this is the problem that I see with the Sadducees in today’s gospel reading.  We don’t know much about these guys, I mean they don’t get same number of lines or as much screen on time as the Pharisees get.  In fact, this will be the only mention of the Sadducees we’ll get in this whole lectionary year, and that’s because this is the only mention of them in all of Luke’s gospel.  So we don’t know much about them because there isn’t much written about them.  But what we do know is that the Sadducees don’t believe in resurrection.  Or I should say, they don’t believe in the resurrection that they don’t believe in.

Like, look at this really poorly laid out trap they set up for Jesus.  They ask him this almost outlandish question about a woman who was married into some serious misfortune and is widowed like 7 times over by these brothers that just keep dying on her.  They ask, in the resurrection that is to come, whose wife of these 7 brothers will she be? 

As in, when the resurrection happens, when we get the sequel to this thing we call life, when everything as we know it is resuscitated back to everything as we know it, how will we be able to navigate all the changes?  How will we be able to organise ourselves?  How will we be able to live life as the good ol’ days?  It was clearly a ridiculous question meant to make the resurrection sound ridiculous.

But Jesus doesn’t fall for it.  He doesn’t jump up to defend this misplaced definition.  He doesn’t put them in their place by playing their same games.

Instead, Jesus reframes it for them.  He shifts their paradigms.  He hits them with truth.  See, the promise of the Christian faith isn’t that everything will always be awesome and stay the same.  The mission of the Messiah wasn’t to vanquish our foes and make our lives great again.  The good news of our salvation isn’t something that is realised only after we die.  But Jesus says that God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.

So really, the Sadducees just got the question wrong.  They were wondering how the resurrection could be when logically speaking it would just not make any practical sense.  Jesus was telling them that yeah, a resurrection that happens in the way they describe would be a logistical nightmare, but that’s not the resurrection that Jesus talks about.  That’s just not what resurrection is.

See resurrection isn’t resuscitation per se, but resurrection is bringing life where there wasn’t life before.  Resurrection is seeing and living in the fact that death doesn’t mean the end of our community and relationships.  Resurrection is finding joy in the promise that God’s love for us and all people is eternal and unchanging and will find us wherever we might be, even in pain, brokenness, and change.

Essentially, resurrection isn’t an event that we wait for in the future, but it is something in the here and now, in the present time.  It is the light that pierces through the darkness of loss.  It’s the reconciliation that replaces resentment.  It is the community that is formed out of isolation.  And it is the church that continues to proclaim good news in a world that seems so lost.

Again, there is nothing wrong with reminiscing what was or cherishing how it used to be.  There’s nothing wrong seeing the differences between then and now.  There’s nothing wrong with recognising or even missing the good ol’ days. 

But let’s not let that reminiscing blind us from what God is doing now.  Let’s not allow the uncomfortable and perhaps unwanted change block our view of God’s presence and blessing among us in the midst of it.  Let’s not let the discrepancy between what we want the world to be and what it actually is distract us from the truth of God’s promise, the strength of God’s love, and the very real work of resurrection in, through, and in spite of us and our community.

I mean, imagine what the world could be like if we truly lived resurrection lives.  Imagine what our churches, not just the ELCIC but all that claim the name of Christ, could do if we were no longer afraid of losing what was in the good ol’ days.  Imagine the life that could be lived by us, those around us, and all of God’s people if we could just reframe the question and open our hearts and minds to what God is already doing in grace, mercy, and love. 

My friends, this is resurrection.  This is where we can find hope and peace.  This is where we can face today and dream for the future, knowing that even though things might not be the same as they were in the good ol’ days, even though we won’t get everything we want, even though we will go through hardships, pain, and even death, that life and love continues on.  Together, with God, as the body of Christ.  This is resurrection. 

So in this season after Pentecost, may we continue to believe, have faith in, and trust in the resurrection that heals us, lifts us up, and leads us into life.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.