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The Immediate Word

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TIW Contributors

George Reed
Mary Austin
Dean Feldmeyer
Chris Keating
Tom Willadsen
Bethany Peerbolte
Katy Stenta
Quantisha Mason-Doll
Epiphany 3 | Ordinary Time 3 - C
Dean Feldmeyer
Thomas Willadsen
Katy Stenta
Mary Austin
Christopher Keating
George Reed

For January 23, 2022:



What is The Immediate Word?

The Immediate Word gives a theological perspective on today's headlines and popular culture for your sermon, children’s sermon, and worship service. The Immediate Word gives a theological perspective on today's headlines and popular culture.

Cutting Edge: THE IMMEDIATE WORD gives you the tools to be cutting edge ... to put you in touch with today's most critical issues and to aid you in crafting messages and presentations that will truly help your congregants understand the Gospel in the context of what is current and most important to them.

Collaborative: THE IMMEDIATE WORD is a unique collaboration of some of the sharpest, most contemporary clergy of our day in an Internet-based service that gives you weekly information, inspiration, and presentation materials for your sermon, children’s sermon, and worship service.

Enabling: THE IMMEDIATE WORD will enable you to create high-impact sermons, children’s sermons, sermon outlines, worship services and compose pastoral prayers that help people pray with you, write compelling pastoral columns for your newsletter, arm your Sunday school teachers with meaningful, up-to-the-minute discussion sermon material, speak more constructively during the "Concerns of the Church" portion of your sermon, children's sermon and worship service about matters that worry your parishioners, advertise timely discussion topics to draw people into your church, and more.

Interactive: THE IMMEDIATE WORD is a dynamic, interactive process. First, among the team of clergy that creates it every week. Secondly, with you: you can personally participate in the creation process by providing your input and reactions to the input of others on new sermons, children’s sermons, sermon outlines and worship resources.

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Satisfaction Guaranteed: THE IMMEDIATE WORD is not only guaranteed to satisfy you, we believe it will actually energize your ministry. We are so confident that you will find THE IMMEDIATE WORD to be such a great value that if you are not completely satisfied with the service we will refund the balance of your subscription payment, no questions asked.
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Recent TIW Installments

Epiphany 3 | Ordinary Time 3 - C
Coach Comes Calling
Epiphany 2 | Ordinary Time 2 - C
When The Wine Runs Out
The Baptism of our Lord | Epiphany 1 | Ordinary Time 1 - C
Brood of Vipers
Epiphany of the Lord - C
Who Do You Say Is The King Of Kings?
The Nativity of our Lord - C, First Sunday after Christmas Day - C
Happy Xmas -- Is War Over? / Merry Anxious Christmas

New & Featured This Week

CSSPlus

John Jamison
He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (vv. 16-21)

The Immediate Word

Dean Feldmeyer
Thomas Willadsen
Katy Stenta
Mary Austin
Christopher Keating
George Reed
For January 23, 2022:
  • Coach Comes Calling by Dean Feldmeyer — In today’s Epistle lesson, when Paul speaks of gifts that are given to us by God, nowhere does he mention the word “privilege.”
  • Second Thoughts: A Healthy Body by Tom Willadsen — Imagine the whole church being able to act in coordination, as a healthy body, because everyone recognizes the collective, communal health depends on the responsible choices individuals make.

Emphasis Preaching Journal

David Kalas
I’ve attended a lot of NFL games over the years. I lived in Cleveland, Ohio during the 1980s, when the Browns were often fielding an exciting and competitive team. And now, for the past decade, I have been living in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where the Packers have enjoyed a lot of winning seasons. And so, I’ve been fortunate to watch a lot of good football in person.
Mark Ellingsen
Bill Thomas
Frank Ramirez
Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10
In a comment which explains a lot of what is happening in contemporary America, the Greek philosopher Aristotle observed, “Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.” Mahatma Gandhi is said to have observed that “Poverty is the worst form of violence.”

Singer-songwriter Bono observed in a comment in accord with a Christian reading of this lesson (esp.vv.9-10): “To me a faith in Jesus Christ that is not aligned with the poor... it’s nothing.” The initiator of black theology James Cone made a similar comment: 

StoryShare

Peter Andrew Smith
“No problem.” Carl held up his hands. “If you tell me as the senior minister that I need to wait to hold the session until later in the week, then that is what we’ll do.”

Pastor Luke frowned. “Jack told me you were adamant that you had to start on Tuesday night --otherwise nothing would work properly.”

“Well.” Carl rubbed his neck. “It would make things easier if we didn’t have to delay. I mean, we have the promotional material all done up for the rally and we are talking to speakers.”

“Yet it is not impossible for you to move to a different date?”

The Village Shepherd

Janice B. Scott
When Jesus chose that particular passage from Isaiah, he went to the heart of his gospel - an option for the poor. But the existence of large numbers of poor keep comfortable people comfortable, so he was immediately marked out as a dangerous person with dangerous ideas. And he was eventually executed for his beliefs.

Today's story is about Oscar Romero, who suffered a similar fate when he too chose an option for the poor.

The Christian gospel is a dangerous gospel when it's truth is really heard.

SermonStudio

Stephen P. McCutchan
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.
-- Psalm 19:14

Richard A. Jensen
It was to be "Spiritual Gift" Sunday in Corinth of old. After all it was no lesser an authority than Paul himself who had said of these people that they were, "... not lacking in any spiritual gift" (1 Corinthians 1:7). Not lacking indeed! They were abounding in spiritual gifts and once every year they gathered in their worship service to honor the greatest among them.
Mary S. Lautensleger
One of the more colorful eras of our country's past is the old Wild West. We can visualize cowboys chasing stagecoaches over rough, barren terrain, and sheriffs swaggering down dusty main streets. Towns sprang up virtually overnight around regions rich in natural resources such as lumber, borax, silver, and especially gold, the glitter that inflamed a continent.
Carlyle Fielding Stewart, III
Sweat swarmed and beaded the palms of his hands as his heart thumped and pulse escalated. Bulging eyes blinked rapidly as his face twitched. His brown, swollen hands rumbled nervously through the inside pocket of his urine-stained tweed overcoat. "I got to find a match," he said to himself. "I got to find a match." Again he jerked through every pocket of his pants, jacket, and shirt. Still no match.

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