Sermons & Such
In this teaching on another famous Jesus story, Leah looks at Matthew’s account of Jesus walking on water toward his disciples. In doing so, she invites us to consider how God might be present to us in challenging seasons, and how we might respond.
Read Leah’s notes here and listen to or view the teaching below.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from Washington D.C, United States, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
This teaching by Pastor Leah Martens is the next in our "Stories That Sustain Us" series, looking at the life of Jesus through gospel stores. In this teaching, Leah starts by considering the recent performance of Inaugural Poet Amanda Gorman (pictured above), and then turns to the story of Jesus preaching at his home synagogue in Nazareth. Her teaching considers how that moment can inform our own understanding of Jesus, as well as what it means to "emerge".
Read Leah’s notes here and listen to or watch the teaching below.
In this second teaching in the "Stories That Sustain Us" story, Leah takes a look at a famous story - Jesus' first miraculous sign in the gospel of John.
Review Leah’s notes here and listen to or watch the teaching below.
In this teaching, Leah kicks off our 2021 series with a personal story and an invitation to consider together “Stories that Sustain Us” from the life of Jesus, as related though the gospels.
Read Leah’s notes here and listen to or watch the teaching below.
Emil Nolde - Crucifixion (1909) Hope found here
On Palm Sunday 2020, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, Leah shares the final teaching in this series on the work of Girard. In this teaching she takes a look at how the scapegoating mechanism plays out in the final days of Jesus life, as well as shares insights from a personal scapegoating experience.
You can review Leah’s notes here or listen to the teaching or watch the video below.
When trying to sort through what we might actually be hearing from God, a classic quandary is the question “Is that God or is that me?”. As Leah points out in this second teaching on discernment, a first step in answering that question has to do with understanding ourselves better, so we are more aware of what our own voice actually sounds like. This teaching includes a look at Jesus’ journey growing in self-awareness. It also considers what tidying (via Maria Kondo) and the Enneagram typology (via Richard Rohr and Christopher Heuertz) might teach us about ourselves.
To learn more about the Enneagram, check out the following resources:
Books -
The Road Back To You by Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stable
The Sacred Enneagram by Christopher Heuertz
The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective by Richard Rohr and Andreas Ebert
Podcasts -
The Liturgists “Enneagram” Episode (Episode 37)
The Road Back to you Podcast
Listen to the teaching below or review Leah’s notes here.
In this “Reconstructing Faith” teaching, Leah tackles the topic of musical worship, considering what role it might play in a community like Haven that sees to be safe, diverse, and Jesus-centered. Alisa Winkie also shares her story of deconstructing and reconstructing musical worship and worship leading in her journey of faith (beginning around minute 6:30).
Review Leah’s notes here or listen to the teaching below.
This image depicts one way we might consider the practice of faith, described in this teaching.
In this first teaching in the "Back to Basics" series, Leah considers a question pretty fundamental to Christianity: why Jesus? What's the big deal? She examines some of the traditional answers Christians have offered and their weaknesses, and opens up a conversation about another possible approach, including a review of the Blue Ocean model of Centered Set.
Read the notes here or listen to the recording below.
The view of the Trinity most Christians consider to be Orthodox.
In this teaching, Leah explores the 1st of the 3 Haven Core Values Identified in the recent teaching on Envisioning Haven Together: Faith that's Jesus-Centered. As Leah explains here, part of what has traditionally set Jesus-Centered faith apart from other understandings of cosmic reality is the relationship the person of Jesus has to God, a relationship Christians have long described through a group of relationships called the Trinity. How is the Trinity best understood, and how is it not?
Read Leah's notes, or listen to the teaching below, as she explores these questions and their implications for Haven.
"All of us are wired for relationship. We’re wired to be with other people. We come from tribal ancestors who found safety, security, identity, and developed a plethora of amazing cultures that span the globe by associating in groups.
"We often feel the need to define and defend our group against other groups... But for those of us who are trying to live lives of Jesus-centered faith, hunkering down and only taking care of our own doesn’t really seem to be an option..."
For Easter, we started a new series on all of the relationships in our lives, whether as group members, partners, parents, friends, or colleagues. What wisdom does Jesus (as well as thinkers of today) have for us about living well in the midst of all these relationships? Listen below or check out the notes here, and tune in next week for more!
Many of us are feeling the stress of this season not only in our own life, but in our country. Through sustained seasons of stress, how do we take care of ourselves so we can stay engaged in life for the long term? Is self-care even a valid concern, or simply an expression of privilege.
Audre Lord was a leading activist in the 20th Century. She was a poet, a writer, a feminist, a womanist, a lesbian, and a civil-rights leader. She said the following on self-care, "Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare."
In this new series, which we will come back to periodically, we will explore "Soul Care for Seasons of Stress". With a unique format, Leah will lead us through some Biblical frameworks for caring for our selves and our souls, and then other Haven-ites will take the time to share some of their own unique soul care practices, and help us discern if they might be something that could work for others of us, or inspire us along the way to finding our own rhythms and practices.
In this Sunday's teaching, David Lai shares about his practice of meditation and Connie Barker shares about her practice of Bible Reading.
See Leah's notes for this week here. Listen to the entire teaching below. David's portion begins just before 23 minutes, Connie's at minute 36.
Photo by Jonathan Weitz. Creative Commons License, 2010.
The stories we tell matter. Stories communicate how we see the world, what we value, what we look to, where our hope is. But sometimes, as people of faith, we have a hard time telling our story, particularly when it comes to the crucifixion of Jesus. What does Jesus' death say about the character God? Why would God require the death of his own son to save communicate His love?
A number of us in the Blue Ocean network have found the work of Rene Girard particularly helpful for the lens it gives us in understanding the story of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection. In this teaching, Leah explores how Girard helps Jesus followers better understand and tell the Jesus story.
Listen to the teaching below and/or check out Leah's notes here.
