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Plain Talk
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - June 02, 2024
For thousands of years knowledge about the Lord, the afterlife, angels and devils, faith and charity has been clouded with a certain degree of mystery and confusion. One of the promises of the New Church faith is that what was once a mystery can now be understood plainly. The Lord says, “I have spoken to you in figurative language; but the time is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figurative language… I will tell you plainly…” (John 16:25). Plain talk seems like something we’d welcome anytime but is that always the case? | By Rev. Derek P. Elphick | Bryn Athyn CathedralSeeking Clarity
Worship Service: Sermon only - June 02, 2024
We all crave clarity – no one goes in search of confusion. We’ve been wired to seek knowledge, truth, so that we may understand and understand ever more clearly. The Lord’s revelations (Old, New Testament, Writings) are a time-lapsed, sequential, unfolding of truth, moving from “figurative” language to “plain” language. This process has taken thousands of years to unfold but why so long? The Lord wishes to tell us “plainly” about Himself (John 16:25) and guide us “into all truth” (John 16:13). Is this something we can handle? Clarity can be freeing and threatening. | By Rev. Derek P. Elphick | Bryn Athyn CathedralKnow Your Spiritual Enemies: The Assyrians
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - May 26, 2024
The Assyrians were a large and powerful nation—not just another neighboring nation to squabble with, but an international super-power. The Assyrians represent something very powerful within us: our rational mind—our ability to figure things out and think things through. Our rational mind can be a powerful enemy to our religious life that takes us into spiritual captivity or it can be a powerful ally. Let’s learn from the Lord how to have the right kind of relationship with the Assyrians. | By Rev. Malcolm G. Smith | Bryn Athyn CathedralKnow Your Spiritual Enemies: The Assyrians
Worship Service: Sermon only - May 26, 2024
| By Rev. Malcolm G. Smith | Bryn Athyn CathedralMemorial Service for Greta E. Bochneak
Memorial Service - May 26, 2024
| By Rt. Rev. Peter M. Buss, Jr. | Bryn Athyn CathedralBecoming One Flesh
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - May 19, 2024
In the story of creation, it says that the Lord created male and female and then there is a beautiful phrase near the end the story where the Lord says that the man and his wife shall become one flesh. We will be looking at what it really means to become one flesh in the eyes of the Lord, and how by making males and females wonderfully unique and different, actually allows for the Lord to create a more perfect whole when they are joined together in marriage. | By Rt. Rev. Bradley D. Heinrichs | Bryn Athyn CathedralMemorial Service for Audrey Merrell Smith
Memorial Service - May 19, 2024
| By Rev. Eric H. Carswell | Bryn Athyn CathedralBecoming One Flesh
Worship Service: Sermon only - May 19, 2024
“Becoming One Flesh” In the story of creation, it says that the Lord created male and female and then there is a beautiful phrase near the end of the story where the Lord says that the man and his wife shall become one flesh. We will be looking at what it really means to become one flesh in the eyes of the Lord, and how by making males and females wonderfully unique and different, actually allows for the Lord to create a more perfect whole when they are joined together in marriage. However, some people worry that if a husband and wife seek to become one, then they will inevitably lose their sense of individual identity. We will explore if this is really the case, and whether it is something to worry about! | By Rt. Rev. Bradley D. Heinrichs | Bryn Athyn CathedralMemorial Service for Christa K. Bedford
Memorial Service - May 18, 2024
| By Rev. Jeffrey Smith | Bryn Athyn CathedralThe Widow's Oil
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - May 12, 2024
(2 Kings 4:1-7) A poor widow saved her two sons when her small jar of oil kept pouring and pouring into borrowed vessels. As the Lord prepares us for life in heaven, there’s a lot we can learn from other people. But in the end, the Lord wants us to use the goodness and truth He provides as if it actually belonged to us. | By Rev. Kurt Hyland Asplundh | Bryn Athyn CathedralBorrow Vessels, Shut the Door
Worship Service: Sermon only - May 12, 2024
2 Kings 4: 1-7. To make possible the miraculous regeneration of her small jar of oil, Elisha instructed the indebted widow to “borrow vessels” and “shut the door.” The imagery here suggests that our spiritual lives develop as a result of some combination of both “borrowed states” and the private decisions of our conscience. | By Rev. Kurt Hyland Asplundh | Bryn Athyn CathedralReaching Out
Worship Service: Childrens Talk & Adult Sermon - May 05, 2024
At this Community Service will be talking about having the courage to reach out—reaching out to offer help and reaching out to ask for help. Let’s talk about what stops us from reaching out and how the Lord can help us to reach out anyway. | By Rev. Malcolm G. Smith | Bryn Athyn CathedralMemorial Service for Lauretta Klein
Memorial Service - May 04, 2024
| By Rev. Jeremy F. Simons | Bryn Athyn CathedralWhy Does the Lord Need Guards to Protect Him?
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - April 28, 2024
In several stories in the Word the Lord is surrounded by guards. Why is this? What do they do? | By Rev. Jeremy F. Simons | Bryn Athyn CathedralThe Guardians of Holiness
Worship Service: Sermon only - April 28, 2024
One of the most brilliant devices that the Lord has built into creation is His way of protecting us from His overwhelming power, leaving us in freedom to think and do what we want. The heavenly watchdogs that appear in both the Old and the New Testaments show how He does this. | By Rev. Jeremy F. Simons | Bryn Athyn CathedralMemorial Service for June Marie Smith
Memorial Service - April 26, 2024
| By Rev. Jeremy F. Simons | Bryn Athyn Cathedral“Spiritual Buying and Selling”
Worship Service: Sermon only - April 21, 2024
“Spiritual Buying and Selling” (Matthew 13:45) The Word sometimes compares the spiritual process of regeneration to the process of buying and selling. Often the “selling” part seems difficult, as when the Lord tells the rich young man to sell all that he has. But the selling does not always have to be sorrowful. How can we sell gladly? | By Rev. Stephen D. Cole | Bryn Athyn CathedralThe Pearl of Great Price
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - April 21, 2024
One of the ways that the Lord describes the kingdom of heaven is as a man buying and selling pearls. What is it about pearls that makes them a picture of what heaven is like? And how can we be like the man who buys and sells them? | By Rev. Stephen D. Cole | Bryn Athyn Cathedral"Build houses, plant gardens..."
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - April 14, 2024
(Jeremiah 29:3) Gardens feature prominently in the Scriptures, beginning with the Garden of Eden in Genesis and ending in Revelation with the garden appearing again, this time in the midst of the Holy City New Jerusalem. It’s significant too that the Lord chose to rise from the tomb in the midst of a garden. All of the physical delights of a garden - the sights, sounds, textures, smells, tastes – represent what happens when we invite the order and symmetry of the truths of the Lord’s Word into our lives. In this service we will explore the profound spiritual principle that our choices determine our spiritual environment. | By Rev. Derek P. Elphick | Bryn Athyn Cathedral"The Word is like a garden"
Worship Service: Sermon only - April 14, 2024
“The Word is like a garden…” (TC 259). “Build houses, plant gardens.” (Jeremiah 29:5)) Gardens feature prominently in the Scriptures, beginning with the Garden of Eden in Genesis and ending in Revelation with the garden appearing again, this time in the midst of the Holy City New Jerusalem. It’s significant too that the Lord chose to rise from the tomb in the midst of a garden. All of the physical delights of a garden - the sights, sounds, textures, smells, tastes – represent what happens when we invite the order and symmetry of the truths of the Lord’s Word into our lives. In this service we will explore the profound spiritual principle that our choices determine our spiritual environment. | By Rev. Derek P. Elphick | Bryn Athyn CathedralThe Lord's Orders
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - April 07, 2024
"Children, have you any food." (John 21.5) After the Lord's resurrection, He sent the eleven disciples out to preach the gospel to all nations. Soon after He again appeared to them as they were fishing and asked "Children, have you any food?" and they replied no, for they had not caught any fish. Why were the disciples fishing when the Lord clearly gave them a command to go and preach the gospel? The disciples learned one more valuable lesson after the Lord’s resurrection. | By Rev. Pearse M. Frazier | Bryn Athyn CathedralReceiving Food from the Lord
Worship Service: Sermon only - April 07, 2024
"Truths cannot be implanted except by means of affections which well forth as from charity and love." (AC 4018.3) When the Lord sent His disciples out to preach the gospel, they already had practically all the knowledge needed for this important work. The Lord wanted His good news to spread to every nation, but He also hoped for the salvation of these very disciples. This Sunday we will see through the story of the Lord appearing to the disciples after His resurrection how it is only in doing the work of love that faith can save. | By Rev. Pearse M. Frazier | Bryn Athyn Cathedral"He Will Raise Us Up"
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - March 31, 2024
| By Rev. Derek P. Elphick | Bryn Athyn CathedralWhat Kind of Savior Do You Need?
Worship Service: Family (may include music) - March 24, 2024
When Jesus came riding into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday the people cheered and cried out for Him to save them. They were hoping that a king of the natural world was riding into town to throw off their Roman oppressors. That wasn’t what the Lord was there to do but He was there to save them. If a powerful person could ride into your life and change things drastically, what would you want them to do? Maybe the Lord won’t do that, but what sort of spiritual salvation could He give you? This year we will have two identical services, both in the nave (there will be no Young Children’s or Informal Family Service in the Undercroft). There will be one talk for the whole family. At the end of the service, people will be invited to pick up palm branches on their way out of the building to then form a crowd outside and an actor playing the Lord will come past with a live donkey, while people sing and cheer. | By Rev. Malcolm G. Smith | Bryn Athyn Cathedral