Looking for a meaningful alternative to Cyber Monday stress? Check out the Nassau Alternative Gifts Market every Sunday of Advent in the Assembly Room. You can make a difference and delight a loved one by making a gift in their honor to one of our amazing community partners! Check off your gift list and spread the spirit of the season by supporting those who are working as the hands and feet of Christ in our world.
Holy God, as we look toward the manger at Christmas, prepare a way in our hearts to receive Christ into the world. May we love your world by showing forth the justice, love and peace only you provide. In Christ’s name, Amen.
This cherished offering strengthens two ministries equally: the Board of Pensions Assistance Program—providing emergency and long-term support for pastors, church workers, and their families—and Presbyterian-related schools and colleges equipping communities of color—forming future leaders with scholarships and leadership development.
Nassau Church will receive this Offering on Sunday, December 21. Can’t be here that day? You can give online anytime.
Christmas Joy Offering (link)
Acts 16:11-15
November 23
Lauren J. McFeaters
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Not too many women have ever prevailed upon Paul.
Not too many women carried the day when Paul was on the loose for the Lord.
Not too many women have ever faced Paul and upped the ante.
But somewhere between a riverside prayer meeting, a conversion, and a festival of baptisms, came the establishment of a church.
Lydia prevailed.
She prevailed upon Paul and the traveling Apostles to be her guests; and to find a port in the storm.
Before there was Iona or Rajpur; Taizé or Machu Picchu; before there was El Camino de Santiago or Changhua Ching Shan, followers of Jesus found their way to Lydia’s Home. [i] And it’s not just any home. It’s a thriving compound located in an epicenter of trade and fortune. Lydia has a hefty share of the city’s prosperity. She’s a commercial success: an importer of costly fabrics, a producer of rare textiles.
Eric Barreto describes Lydia as an entrepreneur with vision and initiative. She’s strikingly self-sufficient: bright, creative, industrious. And even though she depends on its adherents to be her customers, she doesn’t bow to the religion of the Empire.
Because in Philippi, it is Caesar who is “lord & god.” There are no synagogues.No places for Jews to worship. Any Jew had to go to the river’s edge, outside the city gates to pray. And it seems that’s where Lydia and her friends went to meet. [ii]
It’s a dangerous walk to the river’s edge when you want to worship God.
Paul, Silas, and Timothy have landed on the shores of Macedonia. It’s the Sabbath and there’s been talk in the streets about the goings-on in Jerusalem, anxious murmurings about a Redeemer who resurrected after being in a guarded tomb; and very quiet instructions about where to find a prayer meeting outside the city gates.
It’s just the thing God’s Chief Apostle wants to hear.Paul is on the loose; on the move, and ready to preach.
And when he does, Paul preaches through lips that only a short time ago had ordered the stoning of Stephen; the annihilation of any Christian; the eradication of any hint of a resurrected Messiah. But now – now Paul speaks and words flow. He speaks as one Converted by the Damascus Road; Altered, Persuaded, Re-Formed. He speaks and acts as one Converted by Christ Jesus. O Paul!
We don’t seem to talk about conversion very often. We don’t readily share about the experiences of God’s unwrapping our hearts and renovating our spirits.
For many of us it’s a private and intimate experience. For some, it happens over the long haul. For some it happens in the blink of an eye, a dramatic and fully realized moment when we know we will never be the same.
For two of my sisters-in-law, neither one raised in a family of faith, it came because someone invited them to church.
For me, it came when I was a 5-year-old during the Kindergarten Nativity play, like Wee Christmas. I was holding a baby-doll-Jesus in my arms and singing a lullaby and something changed. I have no idea what it was, but there was trust in God, and the trajectory of my life took flight. I was 5-years-old, and I look back and all I can think is, our God is so surprising. O Lauren!
Conversion can seem like a long-gone ancient practice; something that happens for a chosen few; a reward; an act reserved for those in the early church, or for those headed to ordination.
Anne Lamott says her conversion to Christ did not start with a leap but rather a series of staggers.“Everywhere I went,” she says, “I had the feeling that a little cat was following me, wanting me to open the door and let it in. But I knew what would happen: you let a cat in one time, give it a little milk, and then it stays forever. So I tried to keep one step ahead of it,slamming the doors of my life.”
“When I went back to church,” she says, “I was so hungover that I couldn’t stand up for the hymns, but it was as if the people were singing in between the notes, weeping and joyful at the same time, and I felt like their voices, or something was rocking me, holding me, and I opened up to that feeling – and it washed over me.”
And then Anne Lamott adds this:I hung my head and said . . . ‘I quit.’This was my beautiful moment of conversion.I took a long deep breath and said out loud, ‘All right. You can come in.’” [iii] O, Anne!
That’s what Lydia says, too. Here’s an influential woman who hopes for more, needs more, wonders if there’s more.
And before we picture Lydia as a neat, delicate, elegant, woman who glides through Phillipi offering you a look at tasteful, luxurious fabrics – She’s not.
Lydia has dirt on her face, blood on her knuckles, grit in her hair, and she’s just spit out a tooth as she rises for another go. [iv]
Lydia’s conversion does not take place in the C-Suite of her Corporate HQ. This is no tidy negotiation for textile distribution and sales.
No.
Lydia’s conversion takes place in the slime of a riverbank where it’s rough and rocky; swampy and water-logged. She’s got the smell of sulfur stinging her nostrils and sludge oozing between her toes.
And in the middle of the mud and muck, she and all who are dear to her are received into Christ’s church; are sealed by the Holy Spirit; and belong to Christ Jesus forever.
And how does Lydia respond? With tenacious hospitality. She prevails – upon Paul: Not with a sweet plea, not a polite appeal. Heavens no. But with a triumphant and unwavering summons.
Her home becomes God’s home – for traveling evangelists, refugees, new believers. God’s home for prayer, meals, rest, study.
And because she prevailed – her home becomes the First Church in Europe. O Lydia!
O Paul! O Lauren! O Anne! O Lydia!
O Nassau!
God has converted us. God has put wings on our Mission. We’re not a delicate, sweet, fragile group of converts, who gently beckon Princetonians to luxuriate in the fabric of our pews.
No.
We’ve got dirt on our face, grit in our hearts, and tenacity in our hospitality, because that’s what it takes to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly.
It takes placing people, who can never repay, at the head of the table; at the place of honor.
It takes the smell of sulfur stinging our nostrils to clear our sinuses for truth-telling in the public square, and bridge-building between divisions.
It takes a willingness to have mud oozing between our toes to dive into difficult but faithful conversations, so we may do God’s work for the community & world.
O Nassau!
You are Christ’s church; sealed by the Holy Spirit; belonging to Christ Jesus forever.
I thank you for loving me so deeply; for loving Michael and Josie.
And that for a time, together, we have, with God’s loving guidance: Mended the broken. Restored the lost. Comforted the grieving. Stitched up the hurt.
Such freedom. Such beauty. Such tenderness.
O Nassau!
[i] Religious communities: Iona, Scotland; Rajpur, West Bengal, India; Taizé, France; Machu Picchu, Peru; El Camino de Santiago, Spain; Changhua Ching Shan, Taiwan.
[ii] Eric Barreto. Acts 16:9-15 Commentary. www.workingpreacher.org, May 9, 2010.
[iii] Anne Lamott. Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith. New York: Random House Inc.; 1999.
[iv] Adaptation of a quote from Matthew @CrowsFault.
This week as we celebrate Thanksgiving in gratitude, we are mindful that many of our community members and neighbors are experiencing food insecurity. One way Nassau is meeting this need is through our Community Cabinet, located in front of the church on the Elm Dr. side. The Cabinet is available for all with a need.
Contributions are welcome and encouraged! Stop by anytime to add groceries to the cabinet – things like masa harina (corn flour), canned goods, and dry goods are always a good option. And if you are in need of some extra groceries this season, stop by and pick up some items, no questions asked. Jesus calls us to feed the hungry and to gather at table together, in lean times and seasons of plenty. Let’s keep the feast!
As we “Sing of a Savior” in worship this Advent, our Adult Education series turns to the words that prepare our hearts for Christ’s coming—poems, stories, and devotions that give voice to our waiting and wonder. Each week invites us to listen, speak, and create as we join the chorus of hope that proclaims: the Word is made flesh.
Audio recordings will be posted below each class description.
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Advent invites us to dwell in the tension between promise and fulfillment, waiting and arrival. In this session of Adult Education, we’ll read and discuss poems that echo the spiritual practice of waiting — from poets who find holiness in uncertainty, patience, and hope. Through shared reflection and conversation, together we will look at how poetry can shape our Advent imagination and open us to God’s quiet presence in the meantime.
Thais Carter is the Director for Strategic Initiatives at Princeton Theological Seminary and Associate Director of Iron Sharpening Iron, an executive leadership program serving women across the US and Canada. She serves on the Adult Education Committee for Nassau Presbyterian Church; is the current board president for the Westminster Foundation, the nonprofit that supports Princeton Presbyterians; and is a board member for LitWorld, a nonprofit focused on literacy and social-emotional learning initiatives for children and women. Her love of poetry emerged from her training with the Civic Reflection Initiative and the ways this form of expression enabled meaningful discourse across difference. She cultivates a good mix of high- and low-culture in her life, so you’re as likely to find her at a Marvel movie as you are at a poetry reading — and she would want to talk your ear off about the significance of both. She thrives in low-level chaos with her husband, Heath, and their four boys and two dogs.
Virginia Kerr is a Princeton attorney, a member of Nassau’s Adult Education Committee, and a member of the Steering Committee of Nassau’s Mass Incarceration Task Force. She has loved poetry from a very early age and still has fond memories of her sixth grade teacher’s reading of Millay’s The Ballad of the Harp Weaver. As a volunteer for Nassau’s ABC Prison Literacy, she taught poetry classes at New Jersey State Prison and the Mercer County Correctional Facility. In recent years, she has included poetry in story sessions she facilitated at FCI Fairton for the non-profit People & Stories, Gente y Cuentos. She has a B.A. from Bryn Mawr College, with a minor in English Literature, an M.A. in the Teaching of English from Teachers College, Columbia University, and a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania School of Law.
Meet an author of The Just Love Story Bible, a new children’s Bible inviting families to explore God’s justice and love throughout Scripture. Shannon Daley-Harris will share how this project took shape and how it can help households nurture faith, compassion, and imagination.
The audio for this class is not available at this time.
Shannon Daley-Harris is Associate Dean at Auburn Seminary and a nationally respected leader in children’s faith formation and faith-based advocacy. A child of Nassau Presbyterian Church, Shannon grew up in this congregation, where her parents continue to worship, and where she first developed the commitment to justice, storytelling, and compassionate faith that has characterized her career.
For thirty years, Shannon guided the Children’s Defense Fund’s partnership with congregations and faith communities across the country. In that role, she helped equip churches, clergy, and lay leaders to engage deeply with issues of justice, poverty, children’s rights, and moral public witness. Her work brought together spiritual practices, policy advocacy, and community engagement in ways that have shaped generations of ministry leaders and families.
Shannon is the author of several influential resources for parents, pastors, and congregations. Her books include Hope for the Future: Answering God’s Call to Justice for Our Children (Westminster John Knox Press), a practical and theological guide to nurturing a justice-centered faith in families, and The Just Love Story Bible, a new children’s Bible inviting households to encounter God’s justice and love woven throughout Scripture. She has also written widely in articles, curricula, and devotionals that support faith leaders and caregivers in raising children with compassion, courage, and imagination.
Shannon speaks and teaches nationally, encouraging churches to embrace their role in shaping a more just and hopeful world for all children. She brings to her writing and teaching a unique blend of pastoral sensitivity, deep theological reflection, and decades of hands-on experience walking alongside families and faith communities.
How do we live faithfully in an age of rising authoritarianism, spreading politics of cruelty, and the erosion of democratic culture? By reminding ourselves that we are not alone, grounding ourselves spiritually, diving into the resources of our faith tradition, and practicing communal discernment. Neither alarmist nor complacent, Hanna Reichel draws on scripture as well as historical precedents like the Confessing Church’s resistance to Nazi Germany to offer theological framing and practical wisdom for a Christian response to the present moment.
This class was postponed due to the snowstorm. We hope to reschedule with Dr. Reichel soon.
Hanna Reichel is the Charles Hodge Professor of Systematic Theology at Princeton Theological Seminary, where they teach and write at the intersection of Christian doctrine, ethics, and public life. An internationally respected scholar, Hanna’s work explores how theology responds to the urgent questions of our time—identity, justice, power, community, and the shape of faithful Christian existence in a complex and often fractured world.
A ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Hanna also serves on the Theology Working Group of the World Communion of Reformed Churches, helping connect global Reformed communities in shared theological reflection and public witness. Their teaching and writing consistently bridge rigorous academic scholarship with the lived realities of Christian communities across cultural, political, and social contexts.
Hanna’s published work spans a wide range of topics, including Christology, theological anthropology, eschatology, the doctrine of God, theological method, and critical epistemologies. Their first book, Theologie als Bekenntnis: Karl Barths kontextuelle Lektüre des Heidelberger Katechismus, reframed Karl Barth as a contextual theologian by examining his sustained engagement with the Heidelberg Catechism. The book received both the Lautenschläger Award for Theological Promise and the Ernst Wolf Award, recognizing its contribution to modern theology.
Their second major work, After Method: Queer Grace, Conceptual Design, and the Possibility of Theology, offered an innovative rethinking of theological method by bringing queer-liberationist thought and design theory into conversation with Reformed systematic theology. Widely noted for its creative and constructive approach, the book has shaped contemporary discussions about what theology can be and do in the public sphere.
Hanna’s newest book, For Such a Time as This: An Emergency Devotional, is their first written for a broader audience beyond the academy. Drawing on Scripture and historical precedents such as the Confessing Church’s resistance to Nazi Germany, the devotional offers spiritual grounding and practical wisdom for Christians seeking to live faithfully amid rising authoritarianism, eroding democratic culture, and the politics of cruelty.
In addition to their books, Hanna is actively involved in current theological dialogues on technology, surveillance, AI, and the ethical challenges of the digital age. Their current projects include Against Humanity, a critical examination of theological understandings of the human being, and Political Theologies of Omniscience, which places contemporary surveillance technologies and artificial intelligence in conversation with historical Christian debates about divine omniscience.
Hanna regularly speaks in academic, ecclesial, and public venues—nationally and internationally—and their work has been featured in outlets such as The Atlantic, Theology Matters, and the Presbyterian Foundation’s Leading Theologically series. Their preaching, teaching, and writing invite Christians to engage the world with courage, clarity, humility, and hope.
As we come to the final days before Christmas, Maria will share tales from the oral tradition that highlight the themes of humility, compassion, and joy found in Mary’s song/prayer in Luke’s gospel, the Magnificat. Come hear tales that reinforce our connections to people around the world and to each other, and offer possibilities for reflection on the deeper meaning of how we welcome the Divine in our lives.
Storyteller Maria LoBiondo delights in sharing the old tales — myths, folk and wonder tales — as well as literary tales with listeners of all ages. She believes these stories create a world of their own as they unfold in the telling, connecting us with previous generations and with each other today. Her engaging style and lively expressions have enchanted listeners for more than 30 years, including congregation members at Nassau Presbyterian, where she has told folk tales, interpretations of Tolstoy’s works, and Henry van Dyke’s classic, “The Other Wise Man.”
Maria’s approach is shaped by the belief that stories—whether ancient or contemporary, simple or profound—carry the power to form us, guide us, and bring us closer to one another and to God. Her Advent storytelling tradition, in particular, has become a beloved part of Nassau’s seasonal rhythm, offering the congregation a chance to enter the mystery and joy of Christ’s coming through the beauty of story.
Luke 11:5-13
November 16
David A. Davis
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It was only a few loaves of bread. That was all the friend was asking for. The one knocking on the door had a late-arriving visitor at the house. One can imagine that the expectations, the understanding, the norms, and the requirements of hospitality in the world at the time of Jesus were pretty well known and set with a high bar. A traveling friend arrives at your house? Yes, you are going to welcome them with more than open arms. A meal and a place to lay their head would likely be the least one would do, even if the visitor shows up unexpectedly and very late at night. Still, a warm welcome, a meal, and a place to stay.
The parable tells of three friends. The unexpected visitor. The one knocking. The one already in bed. Identified by Jesus as friends implies that the one knocking would surely return the favor if the shoe were on the other foot. If the friend, already asleep with the children, needed some assistance in showing hospitality, the neighbor now at the door would surely help. The traveling friend would no doubt receive and show hospitality and provide a meal, and a place to stay if the knocker was the traveler. It is, after all, a tale of three friends. The shameless persistence of the person at the door asking may be less about just being annoying and more about knowing that they would do the same in a heartbeat for the person inside the door. After all, it was only a few loaves of bread. It’s hardly that much to ask of a friend.
Except… it was midnight. “Suppose one of you has a friend, and you go to him at midnight…”. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s sermon entitled A Knock At Midnight appears in his book Strength to Love, first published in 1963. Dr. King begins the sermon like this: “Although this parable is concerned with the power of persistent prayer, it may also serve as a basis for our thought concerning many contemporary problems and the role of the church in grappling with them. It is midnight in the parable”, King preaches. “It is also midnight in our world, and the darkness is so deep that we can hardly see which way to turn.”
Martin Luther King builds on the metaphor of midnight throughout the sermon, and with an allegorical take on the parable, the friend already in bed is the church, the Christian. The persistence is the crying need for justice and righteousness in the land. And whether or not to answer at midnight is the question of the church, the Christian’s response of faith in public life. “At midnight,” King writes, “colors lose their distinctiveness and become a sullen shade of grey. Moral principles have lost their distinctiveness.” “Midnight is a confusing hour when it is difficult to be faithful.” King’s sermonic riff on “midnight” has a timelessness to it, almost a constant relevance. Last week, the biblical text from the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s gospel spoke of light shining and a city on a hill that can’t be hid. The metaphor of midnight must pretty much be the opposite. The kind of darkness all around that feels like you almost can’t see your hand in front of your face. A darkness that stirs discouragement, pessimism, worry, almost a paralysis when it comes to thinking you can make a difference, you can find a light to shine.
I have told you before about the weekend years ago when a few men from my first congregation were doing some work at our cabin in the Endless Mountains of Pennsylvania. The cabin was unfinished then, and as we settled in for sleep, we were in sleeping bags on the plywood floor. The darkness in a cabin in the woods is the sort of darkness that defines midnight. That night amid the darkness, someone said, “It’s darker with my eyes open than when my eyes are closed.” It’s darker with my eyes open. That’s the midnight Dr. King was describing for the church when the world is knocking with a shameless persistence.
It was only a few loaves of bread. Our Wednesday small group was discussing how it is easy to be discouraged and not be sure how to respond or what to do when the darkness seems so bright. I was reminded of the years when Cathy and I were part of the advisor team with our youth group at the summer gathering at the Presbyterian Conference Center in Montreat, NC. Absolutely every year, long about Wednesday, we would find ourselves in conversations on the porch with kids who thought they were doing enough to save the world. You understand how that happens. A great preacher or keynote speaker tells stories of a young person with a great idea that takes off and goes really well. Working for clean water. Fighting for the environment. Serving urban food deserts. Maybe a video was shown that morning as well, telling of a young person in a far-off place doing something transformational in their community. And what is supposed to be encouraging for a young person in their walk of faith actually does the opposite. Because young people of faith want to let their light shine.
In that conversation on Wednesday, one person said, “I don’t have the gifts that some of our church members do when it comes to making a difference, but I can make food. I know how to make food for lots of people.” I know they do, and I have seen them do it. Another person said, “I am just not sure what my gifts are that can make a difference.” I said, “Oh, I know what your gifts are. But I will wait to share it offline.” Yes, those gifts are already being shared. Another person called attention to how we can pray…constantly. And since we all had our Bibles open or on the screen in front of us, someone else turned to II Corinthians. “We have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed, always carrying in the body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be visible in our bodies.”
A knock at midnight and a few loaves of bread. Perhaps the church, the Christian’s response amid the darkness that surrounds us, begins with just a trickle from that stream of the everlasting waters of justice and righteousness. Or in the baby steps of letting love be genuine. Or in loving the smallest acts of kindness, looking to do justice in your little neck of the woods, and quietly striving to walk humbly with your God. For twenty-five years, one day a week, I think it’s Thursdays, as I pull out of the church driveway, I have watched members of the Quaker Meeting of Princeton stand across the street. Only two, maybe three. Different people each week. They stand and pray, holding a sign that says “Prayers for peace”. It was only a few loaves of bread.
Professor Heath Carter has done an incredible job this month leading our adult education series. Even as I can only listen on Mondays to the audio, I can tell he has the room in the palm of his hand. This week’s posted readings on our adult education web page include an article Heath wrote earlier this spring that he titled “A World That Might Yet Be”. He tells the story of Amelia Boynton Robinson. If you have not clicked on this posting yet, I really encourage you to do so. I have listened to Heath tell her story to me from the other side of the lunch table. I have witnessed him tell it in front of a room full of people. He can’t tell about Amelia Boynton Robinson without tears in his eyes. She was an unsung hero who worked in the African American community for voter education and voter rights for more than 30 years, beginning in the 1930s. She was beaten unconscious on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma. She walked across that bridge 50 years later, holding the hand of the first black president of the United States.
In writing about Amelia Boynton Robinson, Dr. Carter concludes with this: “It is important to remember that Boynton Robinson lived not only to see the passage of the Voting Rights Act and the election of the nation’s first Black president, but also the gutting of that same Voting Rights Act in 2013 and the beginnings of a new era of voter suppression. History is not a story of unbroken progress, but rather of fits and starts, forward and back.
In those moments when it seems clear that we’re lurching painfully backwards, I give thanks for the memory of Amelia Boynton Robinson, who inspires me to do the small faithful thing in front of me that day. One never knows what may come. But we can pray, as she did, not just with words, but with hands and feet, for a world in which God’s will is done on earth as it is in heaven. A world that might yet be.”
A small faithful thing in front of me that day. Or a few loaves of bread, maybe even at midnight. “Midnight is a confusing hour when it is difficult to be faithful”, Dr. King proclaimed. And King continued, “The most inspiring word that the church may speak is that no midnight long remains. The weary traveler by midnight who asks for bread is really seeking the dawn. Our eternal message of hope is that dawn will come…..The dawn will come. Disappointment, sorrow, and despair are born at midnight, but morning follows. ‘Weeping may endure for a night,’ says the psalmist, ‘but joy cometh in the morning’”. King concludes his sermon, A Knock at Midnight, like this: “This faith adjourns the assemblies of hopelessness and brings new light into the dark chambers of pessimism”.
Len Scales shared another sermon from Dr. King with her small group this week. He concludes with a similar word of hope: “I get weary every now and then. The future looks difficult and dim, but I’m not worried about it ultimately because I have faith in God. Centuries ago, Jeremiah raised a question, ‘Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there?’…Centuries later, our slave foreparents came along…They did an amazing thing,” King concludes. “They looked back across the centuries and they took Jeremiah’s question mark and straightened it into an exclamation point..’There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole. There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin-sick soul.”
By grace, the work of the Holy Spirit, and the righteousness of Jesus Christ, Nassau Presbyterian Church, straightening the exclamation when darkness seems to carry the day, begins with a few loaves of bread, even at midnight. The Gospel of John 1:5 — “The light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.” Did not. Shall not. Will Not. Shall never overcome it!
Summer camp may seem miles away right now, but mission doesn’t stop at Johnsonburg Camp & Retreat Center! All year long, “Camp JBurg” is providing experiential Christian education through retreats, trainings, a social justice cohort for high schoolers, and even a young adult internship in intentional community, of which Nassau is a sponsor. We are honored to be a part of the Johnsonburg community, and we are so proud of the work they do!
Learn more: https://www.campjburg.org/
Matthew 5:14-16
November 9
David A. Davis
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I would like to invite you to ponder with me this morning a phrase from the lips of Jesus. “A city on a hill”. But before reading the gospel lesson, a bit of background, an article published in the Humanities magazine in 2020 is entitled “How America Became a City on a Hill”. The author credits mid-20th-century Harvard historian Perry Miller with bringing a sermon from 1630 into focus. The sermon was delivered by layperson John Winthrop aboard the flagship Arabella sailing toward the New World. The title of the sermon was “A Model of Christian Charity.” Prior to Professor Miller’s study of the sermon’s importance to the Puritan presence in New England, apparently, the text was largely ignored. The sermon became infamous for this line: “We shall be as a city on a hill”.
I figure I am not alone in thinking Ronald Reagan was the one to initiate the political appropriation of the biblical metaphor in political rhetoric and platforms and the establishment of the vision of “American exceptionalism”. But according to the 2020 article, Reagan wasn’t the first or the last. The term was used in speeches by John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama. Winthrop’s sermon was not even mentioned in American History books until after Professor Perry’s death. In 2010, a high school history textbook was published with the title City Upon a Hill.
The author of the article, Abram van Engen, was on the faculty at Washington University in St. Louis at the time, and that year he also published his book City on a Hill: A History of American Exceptionalism. Van Engen points to the irony that Miller’s take on Winthrop’s sermon could not be more in contrast to its lasting political appropriation. His interpretation “differed radically” from any thought of American Exceptionalism. Van Engen writes that Miller understood that the sermon called Puritans to “model radical communal solidarity. It had nothing to do with the American Dream, nothing to do with bettering one’s life, nothing at all to do with making money or getting ahead.”
MATTHEW 5:14-16
“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.”
Our granddaughter Maddy turned two last weekend. Maddy and Franny love to listen to music and dance. Saturday afternoon, we were having a bit of a dance fest. During a break in the recorded music, the girls burst into a song they learned and sing all the time at the Broadway Presbyterian Church in NYC. Of course, both girls have a gifted ear and sing beautifully. Maddy’s blaring all the words along with big sister Franny, but most of them are not quite understandable. What was very obvious and easy to understand were the motions that go along with the song. [candle, blow it out, under a bushel, around the world]. It occurred to me as we all joined right in that the first move of the church, letting its light shine, is the generativity of faith in every generation.
The small groups this week took a journey through some of the light in the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. You don’t really need the help of a concordance or a device for it. “I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations” (Is. 42). Psalm 4: “Let the light of your face shine on us, O Lord.” “This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light and in God there is no darkness at all…. If we walk in the light as God is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, God’s son, cleanses us from all sin.” (I John) Revelation 22: “I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb. The Gospel of John. “Again, Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in the darkness but will have the light of life.” Jesus said, “I am the light of the world…and you are the light of the world.” So whose light is it, anyway? His light or your light. And, of course, the answer is “yes”.
The very light of Christ shining in the world by grace and the power of the Holy Spirit through the good works of those whom Christ has called. Here in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus could not be clearer. “Let your light shine before others, so they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.” Not just go tell it on the mountain. Not a religious fervor on the loose. Not showing a glimpse of piety. Letting your light shine is allowing Christ’s light to inspire you, lead you, and anoint you to good works. Jesus preaching and James applauding. James, who wrote “Show me your faith apart from your works and I by my works will show you my faith.” “You are the light of the world”, Jesus said. “People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.”
In his book The Continuing Conversion of the Church, long-time professor at Princeton Seminary and long-time member of the Nassau Church community, Darrel Guder, makes a compelling, even provocative argument for a congregation sending folks into the world to let their light shine. He tells the story of a woman who was a pillar of the church. As one of her pastors, he was growing frustrated that she never said “yes” to a request to serve on a committee or board of the church. Finally, he asked her about it. Her response stopped him in his tracks and influenced his academic/theological life for years to come. She told him her calling was to be a children’s librarian, and it takes a good deal of work and study for her to be good at what she does. “I want to represent Christ there, and that has to be my priority.” Professor Guder follows that example in his book by stating that if a congregation took seriously the call to empower its people to carry the mission of God out in the world, to let their light shine so to speak, the congregation should expect to see people less at activities within the building. In other words, letting your light shine not just in here, but out there!
This week, in our letter to the congregation, Elder Wendy Wakefield Davis and I invited all of you to join us in a month of expressing gratitude for one another, for our ministry together, for the abundant blessings God continues to pour out on, in, and through Nassau Church. I want to share with you that recently I have found my heart strangely warmed and my spirits strangely lifted. I say “strangely” not in homage to Charles Wesley and his account of his conversion. “Strangely,” rather, because these are not really days for warm hearts and lifted spirits, are they? But the privilege of seeing your light shine in these days is a remarkable gift to me as your pastor. I see it all the time, in more ways than I can count, in more ways than I could ever tell. I saw it a few weeks ago when I went to visit a church member struggling with health, and they told me of a visit from a deacon and their young child that very morning. I saw it when going to the 100th birthday party for a church member last summer, and seeing a church couple and their two kids at the party, and the one celebrating the birthday told me how much their visits have meant to them.
I see it in how your light, the light of Christ, shines all around your continuing efforts to support and care for our current refugee family. I think it is the 14th family to be sponsored by you in almost 60 years. I see how the light of Christ beams from the steady stream of volunteers who come in and out of ArmInArm in the lower level of this building during the week. Some are serving downstairs. Others are loading their car for food deliveries. Your light and the light of other members of the Princeton community. I see your light, the light of Christ, in the generosity that allows us in real time to cut a check to a landlord for an immigrant family about to be evicted. I see your light, the light of Christ, warming the hard work of racial reconciliation in the now years-long conversations between members of the Witherspoon Street congregation and Nassau Church in the “Bending the Moral Arc” small groups.
And this week, I have seen your light, the light of Christ, brightly shining in our congregation’s response to nationally elected officials and appointed judges intentionally letting the most vulnerable among us go hungry. This week, Len Scales received a request from the Trenton Area Soup Kitchen for a $50,000 grant for a third food truck. TASK uses traditional food trucks to serve hot meals out in the community. They often partner with ArmInArm in the city. Going out together to designated spots with ArmInArm distributing groceries and fresh vegetables from their refrigerated truck and TASK serving hot meals. TASK reported serving 600 people in one day. Thanks to your generosity and the leadership of the Mission and Outreach Committee, $50,000 went out the doors of this building by the end of the week. In addition, almost $40,000 was granted to ArmInArm for a commitment to give every client they see at one of their pantries this month an extra gift card to a grocery store for $25. An absolutely breathtaking example of your light, the light of Christ shining for all the world to see, giving glory to the God we know in and through, and serve through Jesus Christ. The One whom we serve. Jesus, who said, “I was hungry and you gave me something to eat.”
There is an unexpected plus with our current LinkedIn series that brings together our preaching life, adult education, and small groups. Professor Heath Carter has provided links each week to some secondary readings, videos, and blogs. Heath provides snippets of some of the most important historical materials while also pointing to unexpected examples in the media or on video. You can find these links under adult education, current series, and the week-to-week listing on our website. It is well worth the click even if you are not in a small group.
One of those clicks this week is a blog post from Rachel Held Evans. It is a brief, one-page post about what she does and does not believe evangelicalism to be. It is her response to being excoriated by far-right evangelicals for daring to identify as an evangelical and hold views that others thought to be heretical and evil. Like Rachel Held Evans, it may not surprise you that some among us here at Nassau Church have been on the receiving end of an abusive, “Christian” nastiness you would not believe. Here is how Held Evens described what “evangelical” means to her. “It means, traditionally,” she wrote, “an impassioned personal response to the gospel and a commitment to the scriptures that point to it. And so, as an evangelical, I am deeply invested in my faith, at both a personal and communal level, and I believe that all scripture is inspired by God and useful for teaching, challenging, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that people of faith are equipped to love God and their neighbors.” Or one might say, to allow their light to shine. Not all lights in this big old Christian tent of ours are the same. When it comes to being faithful to the gospel taught from the lips of Jesus, the loudest light, the most dominating light, the most arrogant light, may not be the light that is shining the brightest.
“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.”
A city built on a hill. You and I know Jesus was not referring to America. A city built on a hill. Jesus wasn’t referring to America. Jesus was referring to you.
At Capital Harmony Works, children of all ages come together to make music, build meaningful connections, share the cultural richness of their community, and express themselves in new ways. Nassau is proud to partner with Capital Harmony Works as they welcome children and empower them as creatives and artists. On Monday, November 24, 7:00 – 8:00 p.m. you can hear the Trenton Children’s Chorus perform at the Community Thanksgiving Service in the Princeton University chapel.
Learn more: https://www.capitalharmony.works/events
Romans 12
November 2
David A. Davis
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It occurs to me that we would likely be hard-pressed to find a few verses of scripture that have more variation in translations and paraphrases than Romans 12:1-2. That was evident Wednesday morning as our small group read from the different versions of the bible being used in the virtual room. The variations seem to reflect an attempt to understand what Paul means by “present your bodies as a living sacrifice” and “your reasonable act of worship,” and being transformed rather than conformed. I don’t have time to offer much for your hearing, but I invite you to do a search this week on your device of choice.
I appeal to you, therefore, brothers and sisters, based on God’s mercy, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable act of worship. Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect (NRSV)
An English translation commissioned by the Church of Scotland in 1964:
Therefore, my brothers, I implore you by God’s mercy to offer your very selves to God: a living sacrifice, dedicated and fit for God’s acceptance, the worship offered by mind and heart. Adapt yourselves no longer to the pattern of this present world, but let your minds be remade and your whole nature thus transformed. Then you will be able to discern the will of God, and to know what is good, acceptable, and perfect.
And maybe the most recent published translation to be found is in New Testament scholar Dr. Beverly Gaventa’s hot-off-the-press commentary on Romans:
So I urge you by God’s mercies, brothers and sisters, to present your bodies as a sacrifice that is living, holy, and pleasing to God. That is your reasonable service. And do not be shaped by this age, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind that you discern God’s will for you, the good and pleasing and fully mature
Do not be shaped by this age. Adapt yourselves no longer to the patterns of this world. Do not be conformed. The gift of the 12th chapter of Romans. The gift and the wisdom of the Apostle Paul is that he continues in the chapter to describe for the reader what it looks like. A life transformed. A life of reasonable service. A life of sacrifice that is living, holy, and pleasing to God. While translators and scholars attempt to help you and me wrap our heads and hearts around some of Paul’s vocabulary in the first two verses, Paul launches into practicalities, paints a picture. Paul tells the church at Rome, and the church ever since, “here’s what it looks like”. Or as Dr. Gaventa puts it, “Following the summons, with its depiction of life as radical sacrifice, [Paul goes on] to promote an understanding of that life in terms of shared generosity made possible by divine gift and characterized by love”.
“For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly that you ought to think…so we, who are many, are one body in Christ…ministering… teaching… encouragement …. Sincerity …diligence …cheerfulness … Let love be genuine, hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good,; love one another….rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep…. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” Interestingly, after the first two verses, there is a remarkable consistency across translations and paraphrases for the rest of the chapter. Paul to the church at Rome and the church ever since: “This is what it looks like!”
When I was in college, an itinerant campus preacher came to visit our Christian fellowship group one Friday night. The next day, Saturday morning, a few of us went with him to the University of New Hampshire. When I describe him as an itinerant campus preacher, I mean he would show up on a campus somewhere, find an outdoor central spot with student traffic, and start preaching. His goal was to get people to engage with him, talk back to him, and even argue with him. It was a form of open forum political debates that seemed to be popular on college campuses today. Even though I was in a different place in my theological journey way back then and felt a call to ministry and preaching way back then, I found it a shockingly strange way to try to share the gospel of Jesus. By means of picking an argument with people. Picking a fight instead of showing someone with your life what being a disciple looks like.
Of course, if we are honest about the tradition, about the history, about the church, in absolutely every generation, in every season, the followers of Jesus, the church, denominations of every persuasion, congregations of every kind, could learn, should learn, a whole lot from Paul and Romans 12. “Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal; be ardent in spirit; serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in affliction, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints, pursue hospitality to strangers…live in harmony with one another, do not be arrogant, but associate with the lowly….do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good.” A life of shared generosity made possible by a divine gift and characterized by love.
Our theme for this week in the Linked-In Adult Education/Small Group fall series is “Social Gospels and Smaller Tents”. In looking to the evangelical movement in the first half of the 20th century, Dr. Heath Carter points to the conflict between the ecumenical effort working to serve the common good and improve equality for all people and those looking to draw boundaries and claim the right kind of Christianity. Professor Carter’s use of the metaphor of “smaller tents” is a reference to the beginning of an ongoing obsession for so many about who is in and who is out. Who is right and who is wrong? Who is a proper believer and who is not? The history tells that the arguments and the language and the vitriol were as heated and unchristian in the early and mid-twentieth century as they are today.
It seems to me that the lasting focus in the Christian tradition on who is in the tent and who is out of the tent could not be in greater conflict with the last 19 verses of Romans 12. At the end of the day, isn’t the persistent longing for smaller tents and more and thicker boundary lines inconsistent with lives of shared generosity made possible by divine gift and characterized by love? Or to say it another way, how often does the intramural nastiness in the Christian world distract from and diminish the call of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Understood in Paul’s language: “Let love be genuine; hate what is evil; hold fast to what is good…Contribute to the needs of the saints; pursue hospitality to strangers…. Do not be arrogant but associate with the lowly…. Do not repay anyone evil for evil but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all…if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink….do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
As the infuriating inaction/incompetence/feckless behavior of elected officials in Washington has led to lost jobs, lost pay, and now lost SNAP benefits for upwards of 42 million of our fellow citizens including what must be a terrifying number of children, I found myself drawn to the very last paragraph of Princeton University Professor and Nassau Church family member Matt Desmond’s book Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City. His captivating sociological study of eviction rates and predatory landlord practices is chilling. But this week, his last paragraph is a prophetic, relevant lament about a whole lot more.
“Whatever are way out of this mess, one thing is certain. This degree of inequality, this withdrawal of opportunity, this cold denial of basic needs, this endorsement of pointless suffering—by no American value is this situation justified. No moral code or ethical principle, no piece of scripture or holy teaching, can be summoned to defend what we have allowed our country to become.”
I wonder how the Church of Jesus Christ has any time to be picking fights when there’s so much gospel work to do. Picking fights instead of showing the world what the life of discipleship looks like. The body of Christ is not conformed to this world but transformed to live a life of shared generosity made possible by divine gift and characterized by love.
In Romans 12, the Apostle Paul paints a picture with words describing for his readers, for the church, for you and me, a life transformed. A life of reasonable service. A life of sacrifice that is living, holy, and pleasing to God. “Here’s what it looks like.” Jesus, our Savior, shows us with his teaching, his life, his death, and his resurrection. Way beyond words.
Jesus said, “This is my body broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”
“This is the cup of the new covenant sealed in my blood for the forgiveness of sin. Every time you drink it, do it in remembrance of me.”
Come, people of God. This is what it looks like.
