allsaintsjonesboro Sermons

Living in the Flow of Christ’s Grace

A sermon for the Twenty-Second Sunday after Trinity, by Fr. Jerome Leckband.

Parable of the Unforgiving Servant; Nicola Sarić.

Jesus warns in the parable of the unforgiving servant that if we do not forgive others from the heart, our heavenly Father will not forgive us. These words are challenging because forgiving is hard. Holding grudges, imagining revenge, or hoping others get what they deserve comes naturally to us. Yet, Jesus calls us to something better.

The heart of the Christian life is forgiveness—God’s extravagant, endless forgiveness. Peter asked if he should forgive seven times, and Jesus answered, “seventy times seven,” meaning without limit. We live in the ongoing flow of Christ’s grace, poured out in Baptism and given in His body and blood in Holy Communion. This is the forgiveness that frees us, and this is the forgiveness we are called to share.

When forgiveness feels impossible, remember that Christ has already paid your unpayable debt. He invites you to place your anger and pain into His hands and live as one who is continually washed in His mercy. Listen to the entire sermon below.

allsaintsjonesboro Sermons

Sin and Death Undone

A sermon for the Twenty-First Sunday after Trinity, by Fr. Dan Suelzle.

This past Sunday’s sermon draws upon Isaiah’s vision of a future feast on Mount Zion where God will eternally defeat death, which is the consequence of sin. While sin and death are enemies too great for mankind to conquer, Jesus began fulfilling this promise in His earthly ministry. He takes Isaiah’s promise, where sin, suffering, and death are undone, and instantiates it in the present. We see this in the Cana miracle where His powerful Word healed the nobleman’s dying son, offering a “glimpse” of victory over death. However, this sign ultimately pointed to the greater work of Christ’s death and resurrection. He took our sin upon himself, and the grave gladly swallowed him up. But the grave could not contain him and he forever remains the one with authority over death itself. This Word of Christ remains powerfully present in the Church as Christ continues to speak—through absolution, Baptism, and the Eucharist—to deliver forgiveness and eternal life, assuring us that our enemies of sin and death have been vanquished. Listen to the entire sermon below.

allsaintsjonesboro Sermons

A Communion of Saints

A sermon for the Feast of All Saints, by Fr. Josh Leigeber.

What does it mean to be a “saint”? Not fundamentally someone in stained-glass, or someone who performed famous miracles — but simply this: one who is baptized into Christ. One born again of water and the Spirit. One united to the only Holy One — Jesus — whose righteousness is given as a gift.

In the Beatitudes, Jesus isn’t describing a list of spiritual heroes who managed to achieve a higher plane. He is describing the baptized — the poor in spirit, the meek, those who mourn, those who hunger for righteousness — all the ones who have learned the central cry of the Christian life: less of me and more of Christ. This is the life that Holy Baptism gives. In baptism the old Adam dies, and a new man rises in Christ. Baptism joins us to the death and resurrection of Jesus, and so, the blessings Jesus speaks actually belong to you now.

Because Christ alone is the righteous One, He is the Saint of all saints — and His holiness is given to His people in the Gospel and in the font. Therefore the beatitudes are not a ladder for you to climb; they are a description of the life you already receive from Jesus, by grace, as His child.

So on the Feast of All Saints we rejoice not only in those who have gone before — but that we, even now, truly share the same baptismal union with Christ. We are His saints — even down to the littlest baptized infant — awaiting with them the resurrection and the fullness of the kingdom of which we’ve already been made a part. Listen to the entire sermon below.