Covenant Presbyterian Church Augusta

6/8/2025 A Mighty Wind

Recently, Pastor Andy Cooke said he watched A Complete Unknown, the movie about Bob Dylan that was released last year. Near the end of the movie, he is performing at the Newport Folk Festival and playing his new songs with an electric guitar rather than his old folk songs on an acoustic guitar. The audience revolts and starts throwing trash on the stage! They want the songs that they know and love, not the new ones.Pastor Andy says he's often lamented the fact that this is reversed for preachers. People want something new rather than a sermon that they appreciated from long ago. During the month of June, we're experimenting with a reversal of this mindset. This Sunday is the second week of our "Greatest Hits" sermon series during which Katelyn and I will (re)preach some favorite sermons that we've preached during our time at Covenant. This Sunday will be an adaptation of the Pentecost sermon that I preached on June 9, 2019.

6/1/2025 With All Our Heart

This Sunday is the first week of our "Greatest Hits" sermon series during which Andy and I will (re)preach some favorite sermons that we've preached during our time at Covenant. To kick off the series, Pastor Katelyn Gordon Cooke is  preaching a sermon from early November 2022. We had just started our "Heart and Home" stewardship campaign, which included our annual stewardship campaign for 2023 as well as a three-year Home Improvement Plan.In the Friday email on November 4, 2022, I wrote, "There's a well-known quote from Teresa of Avila that goes, 'Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassion upon the world.' It's also true that we are an extension, an expression of God's heart in the world, and that's what we're exploring together in worship this Sunday as part of our conversations about stewardship of time, talent, and treasure." This is still true for us today,

5/25/2025 The Peace of Christ

This week's reading from the Gospel of John includes some of my favorite verses of Scripture. Jesus says to his disciples, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid." I don't know about you, but I need to hear those words from Jesus on a daily - and sometimes hourly - basis. as Pastor Katelyn Gordon Cooke tells us, there's a lot about our world and in our personal lives that is troubling and that makes me afraid. I need that encouragement and invitation from Jesus to receive his peace.

5/18/2025 What Will Be

I've been looking forward to this Sunday for some time. During our worship service, we will recognize and celebrate our confirmands. They have attended confirmation classes, completed their confirmation journals, created faith statements, and met with mentors and elders. This Sunday is the last step on their confirmation journey, and I hope that you will join us and show your support for them.The sermon text will be Acts 11, where God shows Peter a new way to follow Christ that he could never have previously imagined. We often view faith as static, but as Pastor Andy Cooke tells us, it is interesting to watch God change the rules for this old disciple. As we watch these confirmands assume their new roles in the church, I have to wonder what changes God might bring through their involvement that we could never have previously imagined.

5/11/2025 The Great Multitude

Revelation is not usually a favorite book of the Bible for most Christians, but it is a wonderful place to go during the season of Easter. There are many visions of redemption or resurrection throughout. As Pastor Andy Cooke explains, "I will grant to you that most of it sounds odd to our ears and is often not especially well suited to Sunday morning worship. But there are certain parts that paint a glorious picture of God's Kingdom for us. The seventh chapter of Revelation is one of those places, and I'm looking forward to sharing it with you this Sunday. I promise that I won't make Mother's Day a drag for you."

5-4-2025 The Lure of the Familiar

On Andy's and my first date, I ordered one of the "safer" items on the menu: a flatbread pizza. Andy, on the other hand, looked at our waiter and said, "I'll just have whatever you think is good." I was both flabbergasted and impressed - who was this man who would leave his dinner order up to a complete stranger??Our choices for dinner that evening many years ago said something true about each of us: Andy likes novelty and adventure, and I prefer what is known and familiar.My preference for the familiar means that I resonate with Peter in this Sunday's gospel reading from John. It's a few days after Jesus' resurrection - a life-changing, world-changing event! - and what does Peter do? He goes back to what's familiar to him; he goes fishing. As pastor Katelyn Gordan Cooke tells us, it might not be what we expect from the disciple who was so zealous in his faith, but it's what he did and it's where Jesus found him.

4/27/2025 On a Tree

This Sunday, we will look at the resurrection through the lens of Creation. God's Creation reflects the resurrection everywhere, which is why you see so many hymns that make that connection. As Pastor Andy Cooke explains, simply put, resurrection is God's way and there are opportunities all around for us to see that.

4/20/2025 Stories Without Endings

The story of Jesus' resurrection is our annual, insistent reminder that God is not done with the world, with us, or with God's own story yet, and, as Pastor Katelyn Gordon Cook explains, it is a reminder that is joyful, perplexing, surprising, and overwhelming all at the same time.

4/13/2025 Stories of Hope

Pastor Andy Cook tells us this week that this Sunday marks the beginning of Holy Week with our Palm Sunday service. Holy Week is a time to remember the words and actions of Jesus and his disciples during that last week in Jerusalem before his resurrection. There is a lot that happens in that week, so it is helpful to pay attention to that story across several days rather than just on Sundays. You might even considering taking time to read that story slowly over the course of this coming week. If you open Luke's Gospel, then you can read one chapter from Luke 19-23 on each weekday.

4/6/2025 God is Doing a New Thing

After weeks of penitential and solemn texts, our Lectionary passages for this Sunday offer a different tone. In the midst of Jesus’ sacrificial journey towards Jerusalem, our Old Testament passages proclaim God is doing a new thing, and that God’s redemptive action can fill even those tired and downcast with laughter and joy.  As pastor Karla Conditt Daniels tells us, our New Testament readings serve as reminders; before we can experience the fullness of God’s Spirit, we must empty ourselves of selfish and miserly beliefs. Only then can we be filled with the goodness of God, made known in Jesus the Anointed One.