This year’s Lenten sermon series, which runs from Ash Wednesday through Easter Sunday, arose out of Dr. Dale A. Meyer’s “Preaching in the Postmodern World” class at Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. Working with the seminarians in the course, he developed this series to address the key themes of postmodern culture and life. The series intertwines these themes with ideas from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s classic work “Life Together” to focus on what it means to live in community in postmodern times, drawing on selected texts from 1 Peter, as we walk together on the way to the cross and empty tomb.

Lent 1

This week’s sermon examines another postmodern attitude, namely, that the hearer can’t really know who he or she is. Is our identity a patchwork of various images and influences that are projected through our social worlds, or is our identity wrought by God, His baptized children? 

Lent 3

The theme we look at this week is the relationships between individuals within our congregation. Modern Christianity tends to think of the church either as a place where individuals come to find answers to their questions or as one more stop where individuals can try to satisfy their “consumer” desires. The biblical model of God’s church stands in stark contrast to this individualistic view.

Lent 5

What is it that we really need? Peter’s answer is a present hope for ultimate deliverance, because that present hope will change the way we live our lives in very practical ways from day to day.