Sermons For The Autumn Season

On the anniversary of the dedication of the monastery church at Clairvaux, Saint Bernard spoke to the community to explain the meaning of the feast: “What sanctity can these stones have that we should celebrate their festival? They do indeed have sanctity, but it is because of your bodies. . . . Your bodies are holy because of your souls, and this house is holy because of your bodies.”The thirty-eight sermons in this volume carry forth this theme, revealing the holiness of the monastic life as monks alternate through the rhythm of the day and the year between the opus Dei and manual labor, journeying faithfully through life to death and the transitus to glory. The twelfth-century Ecclesiastica Officia of the Cistercian Order required abbots to speak formally to their communities in chapter on seventeen fixed days, mostly liturgical feasts. This volume witnesses to Bernard’s fulfillment of this requirement and includes sermons for the Assumption and Nativity of the Virgin and the Feast of All Saints, sermons devoted to the feasts of particular saints celebrated during the autumn months, sermons for the time of harvest, and funeral sermons that look forward to the eternal joy in the communion of saints.

For Michael Wuchter, the gospel is in the details. From the story of the pilgrims who over-invited to that first Thanksgiving Day to the sugar content in grapes at the harvest, Wuchter probes the parables and sayings of Jesus to find every possible piece of good news in them. A wordsmith for the Word made Flesh, Michael has left us a treasure of thoughtful and insightful sermons that read as well as they preach.John D. MorrisPastor, Prince of Peace Lutheran ChurchDublin, OhioUplifting Christ Through Autumn gathers together 12 imaginative sermons from a remarkably gifted parish pastor and campus minister, covering a variety of important occasions, such as: * World Communion Day* Stewardship Sunday* Homecoming/Fall Festival* Reformation Sunday* All Saints Day* Holy Cross Day* ThanksgivingHowever, the ecumenically oriented expressions of Christian faith, hope, and love in these messages make them relevant for any time of the year. Plus, Wuchter's keen eye for the telling detail, exemplified by his observation that "the refrigerator is the household religious shrine that reveals the ethical heartbeat and spiritual faith of a family," means they're readable and appealing for everyone.Michael Wuchter's painting with words, his weaving of poetry into the art of the sermon, is what makes these words worth reading. These sermons seem to sing from resurrection life beyond death, and focus our eyes, ears, and hearts on the living, breathing, poetic, and art-filled Gospel. Read. See. Hear. Imagine. These sermons will allow you to touch the holy.Canon Howard AndersonPresident and WardenCathedral College of Washington National CathedralMichael Wuchter's sermons are a mending together of Word and world, allowing divine love to flow into the unpredictability of real life. I highly recommend this book for pastors, parishioners, and students alike.Edwin EhlersFormer PresidentNew Jersey Synod, Evangelical Lutheran Church in AmericaAccenting themes such as sainthood, death, angels, reformation, thanksgiving, and unity, These sermons are marked by sound biblical-historical scholarship and are linked to the challenges of our present-day life. The Word is powerfully proclaimed in every sermon.Daniel F. MartensenEcumenical Research Fellow, Washington (D.C.) Theological ConsortiumFormer Director, Dept. of Ecumenical Affairs, ELCAMichael D. Wuchter was the senior pastor of First Lutheran Church in Duluth, Minnesota, when he suddenly passed away in 2000 while traveling to Namibia. In addition to parish ministry, Wuchter also served for 18 years as university pastor at Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio.

What to do when they say they’re Christian but don’t know Jesus Whether it’s the Christmas and Easter Christians or the faithful church attenders whose hearts are cold toward the Lord, we’ve all encountered cultural Christians. They’d check the Christian box on a survey, they’re fine with church, but the truth is, they’re far from God. So how do we bring Jesus to this overlooked mission field? The Unsaved Christian equips you to confront cultural Christianity with honesty, compassion, and grace, whether you’re doing it from the pulpit or the pews. This practical guide will: show you how to recognize cultural Christianity teach you how to overcome the barriers that get in the way give you easy-to-understand advice about VBS, holiday services, reaching “good people,” and more! If you’ve ever felt stuck or unsure how to minister to someone who identifies as Christian but still needs Jesus, this book is for you.

This last small group of Bernard's sermons to be published in translation by Cistercian Publications rightly goes by the title De varii in the critical edition. While most of them treat feasts on the church calendar, they do so in a somewhat hit-or-miss fashion. Three sermons also deal with God's will, God's mercies, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Two sermons for the feast of Saint Victor are a response to a request to Bernard from the monks of Montiéramey; the Bollandist Life of Saint Victor appears here as a complement to those sermons. Besides the nine sermons normally assigned to the De varii, this volume also includes a sermon on the feast of Saint Benedict that was recently added to the collection in Sources Chrétiennes. The survival of this loose assemblage of sermons outside of the organized collections of Bernard's sermons provides a reminder of Bernard as preacher and writer, able despite all his other activities to turn his hand to preaching when called upon. While they treat of disparate themes, they allow us to encounter the quintessential Bernard-speaking of the life of desire, the true meaning of holiness, and the awakening of the spiritual senses in the search for God.