Hi everyone,
Welcome to worship on this June 14, 2026, for the 3rd Sunday after Pentecost!
The bulletin can be found here. You can use it to follow along with the service or simply use the words that will appear on your screen. The sermon is included in both the bulletin as well as on this page below the video.
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 when the altar candles are extinguished 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 the appropriate time of the service. Further instructions will be given then.
May God’s welcoming love fill you with confidence and hope in God’s promises and blessing!
By your Spirit, O God, may we hear your voice, see your face, and feel you present with us, leading and guiding us, and lifting us up into your kingdom, through Jesus Christ. Amen.
So it was my buddy’s birthday earlier this week, and I sent him a very usual and typical “happy birthday” text message. I said, and I quote, “Happy Birthday, buddy. I hope you’re well.” Apparently, such a buddy is he that I even call him that. Then within minutes, he responds with a very usual and typical, “Thank you, I’m doing ok, how about you?” And then I answered with another very usual and typical message, “been alright. Insanely busy with stuff, and spending too much money lol.”
We carried on with a few pleasantries before he abruptly stopped messaging, which for some reason isn’t unlike him at all. Then for reasons unbeknownst to me, I wondered when this particular friend and I last messaged each other. I scrolled up a bit, past that day’s conversation, and found that we had some messages back and forth from roughly a year ago. You know, on his last birthday. That conversation started with, “Hey Happy Birthday bro! I hope you have a great day!” (apparently, he’s more than just a buddy, but he’s also a bro). He replies with, “Thank you, how have you been”…
And then in the not very surprising climax of this story, I answered with, and again I quote, “been alright. Life has been busy (and expensive lol)”
It’s the same exact conversation a full year apart!!
I guess I wasn’t kidding when I said it was very usual and typical. Some might even say it was boring. None of you, I’m sure, but just some… out there… somewhere.
Because really, there were no plot twists. There were no surprise cameos. There weren’t even any exciting explosions or anything like that, you know, like my normal conversations. But it was just the same old formula of being too busy to chat any more frequently than once a year on his birthday, and apparently being worried about finances.
And I guess that’s the point of me telling you all this. No doubt we’re busy. And everyone knows how expensive life can be especially in the Lower Mainland. So why did I feel the need to tell him what he probably already knows? Why did I almost auto-respond to the simple question of “how are you” to that effect? Why did I have to iterate and re-iterate this at least 2 years in a row and maybe even more (I dared not to scroll any further up as I didn’t want to cringe any harder than I was already cringing)?
Is this what life has become? Maybe it’s an “adulting” thing, but doesn’t it seem like being busy is sort of like a badge of honour now? Is this what society drills into us, that our value is tied to our productivity, our importance is correlated to how little rest we get, and our identity is defined by the length of our to-do lists?
It seems like it, doesn’t it? And judging by these two separate but same exact conversations I had with my friend, and probably if I’m honest, the countless other very similar and equally boring conversations I’ve had with others, it is pretty clear that I, and perhaps you, have fallen for it. It’s like we think, “I’m busy so I matter” or “I work hard because I’m trusted and responsible” or “I am productive because I’m not lazy, and because I’m not lazy, I am honourable, moral, and loved.” Ok maybe that last one is a bit extreme, but you get the gist of what I mean.
And honestly, passages like today’s gospel lesson doesn’t help much at all. Jesus calls his disciples by name and gives them this hefty work order of tasks and tells them to expect nothing in return. He empowers them to do the things he does. He fills them with the Spirit and tells them to go, do, and serve. No wonder we might moralize our busyness, it’s almost like we’re commanded in scripture to be busy.
In the book entitled “Laziness Does Not Exist,” author Devon Price describes how this stigma against laziness traces back to the Puritans of the 1500s-ish. Price says that the mentality of being busy = good came from a theology where God calls us to do, and to do a lot. With that in mind, it stands to reason that the more we do, the more we are answering that call. And the more we are answering that call, the more favour we gain. And the more favour we gain, the more saved we might be.
Now, I’m heavily paraphrasing here, but doesn’t that sort of our mentality now? Sure, we can cognitively say that we’re saved by grace and not by works, but don’t we have a problem with accepting gifts that we didn’t earn or have the urge to “pay back” favours or feel like we “owe” those who are gracious with us? It’s almost like faith has become this transaction where the payment is our blood, sweat, and tears. And honestly, it sometimes gets overwhelming.
Overwhelming to the point where we expend all our energy thinking that we’ll gain it back, where we give up our identities in hopes that we’ll find them, where we sacrifice ourselves believing that this is how we’ll be saved.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with hard work. There’s nothing wrong with getting things done. There’s nothing wrong with being productive. But I think the problem comes when we equate these things with how good we are, how loved we are, how Christian we are.
And I know, this sounds kind of weird when I am almost weekly asking for volunteers to help out with the different things that go on around here. It doesn’t seem to jive with the words we often use like “call,” “service,” and “mission.” It might not sit well with us in general as we are almost uncomfortable with ourselves if we aren’t complaining about how busy we are.
But the thing is, when we get to that point, we might miss the gifts that God gives. The gifts of community, relationship, and support. We might miss the blessings of compassion, empathy, and love. We might miss the grace that God had moved heaven and earth for us to have.
So then what can we make of Jesus’ call to his disciples? How can we justify us not working ourselves to death when that is literally what Jesus did? What is the Spirit telling us on this 3rd Sunday after Pentecost?
Well, going back to the “Laziness Does Not Exist” book, its author points out what having this negative stigma around perceived laziness does to us. If we blame people’s ailments on laziness, then we don’t have to worry about the supports for mental illness, trauma, or neuro-diversity. If we see those who don’t work as hard as us as lazy, then we give ourselves the right to label them, judge them, and even condemn them. If we equate non-busyness as lazy then we will do everything we can to unnecessarily fill up our time to the point of burn-out and pat ourselves on the back for it.
Again, I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be working hard and should just leave the heavy lifting to someone else. But what I am saying is that, hard work isn’t required of us, our productivity doesn’t define us, what we do will not, can not, and won’t ever be able to save us.
That’s by God’s grace alone, no matter what the world tells us.
Again, this isn’t a call to be lazy and ignore what needs to be done, but it’s a call to be liberated from the pressures that the world puts on us. This isn’t permission to procrastinate, but permission to take your time, take breaks, and take care of yourself. This isn’t telling you not to be productive and get things done, but that our productivity doesn’t equal our faith and getting things done doesn’t change our identity in God’s eyes as God’s own children.
Does Jesus call us into action? Yes, he does, but not at the cost of who we are and our well-being, but we are called to serve others out of compassion, we are called to heal through welcome, we are called to heal with love. And at the core of all that isn’t what we do as much as who we are. This isn’t centered around showing love as much as actually loving. This isn’t about how busy we can get ourselves to be but about the compassion we can have for others as well as ourselves.
See, our modern world tells us to do, accomplish, and sacrifice until it hurts. But God asks us to live in community, treat others with respect, and see the value and worth in all people, regardless of how busy, how much they can do, or the length of their to-do lists.
So in this season after Pentecost, may we be motivated by compassion, empowered by salvation, and strengthened by grace to not just do but be, not just work but love, not just be busy but live. Thanks be to God. Amen.
