Ordinary Time

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The Surprising Vision of God

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“Our first reading today comes from the Book of Ezekiel. You probably know Ezekiel best from the story of the dry bones, that great vision that Ezekiel had of the valley full of bones, when the bones came back together bone to its bone, and muscle and sinew and flesh came upon them and the spirit of God gave them life. It was a vision of new life, a vision of resurrection, a beautiful vision of restored life for a people living in what felt like death.”

Click “Read More” to read or listen to Bingham’s entire sermon for the 3rd Sunday of Pentecost

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The Family of God

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Just as Jesus is gaining friends and followers, he is also gaining enemies, people who are not concerned about the danger of the crowd, but rather concerned about Jesus and the danger that he and his teaching pose. So they are going around saying things like, "We are not so sure about this Jesus guy and all the stuff that he is doing and saying. We are not really sure the spirit behind him is of God. Maybe it is a different kind of spirit--you know what I mean--an evil spirit." They are trying to sow the seeds of doubt in the people and to rile up the crowds against Jesus.

Click “Read More” to read or listen to Bingham’s entire sermon for the Second Sunday after Pentecost

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Welcomed to the Table: Made in the Image of a Triune God

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“You know me. I love the Church Year. The Church Year has a shape to it, and when we allow that shape of the Church Year to shape our lives, it can draw us closer to God. It can draw us into holiness. There are so many beautiful things about the Church Year. Each season has a richness and meaning that can help form us. But the year is also beautiful in its larger overarching shape as we have been talking about the last few weeks.”

Click “Read More” to read or listen to Bingham’s entire sermon for Trinity Sunday.

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The Holy Spirit still comes

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Happy Pentecost! Today is the Feast of Pentecost, one of the three most important days of the Church Year. You have Christmas, you have Easter, and you have Pentecost, the Holy Trinity of Feast days. Pentecost is as important as the first two, although it doesn't quite get the celebration that they do, but for the Church it is just as important. Today is the day we often call "the birthday of the Church."


What do we mean by that?

Click “Read More” to read or listen to Bingham’s entire sermon for the Day of Pentecost.

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Where is Christ Found

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I want to start my sermon today with a story. It is a story about a priest named Marc Nikkel. Marc was one of my dad’s priests in the Diocese of Southwestern Virginia, although he was not serving in the geographic boundaries of the Diocese because he was a missionary in Sudan. Marc spent the better part of the last twenty years of his life in Sudan, going there initially in 1981 to teach at the Bishop Gwynne College, an Anglican Episcopal school. Along the way he felt a call to the priesthood and so returned stateside for some coursework and to get ordained. Then he returned to Sudan as a priest.

Click “Read More” to read or listen to Bingham’s entire sermon

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Read, Mark, Learn, and Inwardly Digest

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"Our worship life is full of Scripture. Beyond our worship life, how is it that we discern things in the Episcopal way? That is also deeply rooted in Scripture. We have the concept of the three-legged stool. The idea that in order to understand anything about faith, anything about God or what God wants us to do in this world, we need to look at that dialogue of Scripture, Tradition, and Reason, that dialogue of our minds, the voices of our ancestors, and Scripture. There are debates among Episcopalians as to whether all three of those are equal, or does Scripture have a bigger role. But however you look at it, Scripture is critically important."

Click “Read more” to read or listen to Bingham's entire sermon for the 24th Sunday after Pentecost.

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Agents of Hope

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We live in highly anxious times. That might be something of an understatement for 2020. There is so much to be understandably anxious about right now in this year. One of the side affects or outcomes of anxiety can be hopelessness. It is easy to allow anxiety to sap us of our hope. “Hope, that thing with feathers that perches in the soul,” as Emily Dickinson so beautifully put it. Hope is important to us. We need hope to keep moving forward, especially when times are so difficult. We need hope, and anxiety is the enemy of that hope.

Read or Listen to Bingham's entire sermon by clicking “Read More.” If it's meaningful to you, share it with a friend.

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