Taylor Mertins
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Taylor Mertins
thirty something pastor, podcast host, and fan of parables
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463 епизода
The Closest Thing To The Grace Of God
There’s a deep pleasure in the gospel that we don’t talk about very much, and it’s the pleasure of being surrounded by others in such a safe, fun, and...
The Big Beginning
For some reason the Holy Spirit is pleased to let these words stand as they are before us in the beginning of all things and the beginning of the Bibl...
A Crowded Table
whenever we gather at this table, in this room, on a day like today, we’re certainly here in this time and place with these people, but we’re also in...
The Fullness of Time
Chances are you’ve felt interrupted a time or two this Christmas season; you had a plan and then you watched it fall apart. And chances are your life...
The Hopes And Fears Of All The Years
Whenever we come to the table for communion, we share this short and ancient creed: Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.
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Keep Lent In Advent
Lent and Advent are the most challenging seasons of the Christian calendar because during them we receive the most difficult, demanding, bad news ever...
Things Without Mystery Have No Power
Let there be no mistake, we, all of us, stand on the threshold of God’s kingdom. We never really know from moment to moment when an opportunity will c...
The End Of The World (As We Know It)
“Jesus always comes to us in the brokenness of our health, in the shipwreck of our family lives, in the loss of all possible peace of mind, even in th...
One Bride For Seven Brothers
I’ve joked before, though its not really a joke, about how despite the beauty of the wedding liturgy, it would be far more appropriate if the couple m...
At The Same Time
A saint is simply someone whose life manages to be a crack through which God’s grace peaks through.
The End is Music
God uses music to help us enter the mysteries of life, death, and life after death.
We sing our faith. The words and melodies of our mus...
The Story Behind The Story
Baptism is the gift of God’s living water that never runs dry. And it’s not just a sign of God’s love. It’s a sign of God’s love for the ungodly. Like...
The Church Is God's Message For the World
It’s by grace, and only by grace that Jacob makes it to the well and to the banks of the Jabbok river. It’s by grace, and only by grace, that the conn...
The Relief from Captivity
From his very first sermon Jesus identifies the work of the Lord with rescue, release, and relief.
And the rest of the New Testament is...
The Relief from Productivity
One of the most compelling and evergreen reasons to follow Jesus is that discipleship is playful. There’s a dance to the life of faith and it’s fun, o...
The Relief from Keeping Up
Dave Zahl writes, “The very notion of a weekly Sabbath breaks the twenty-four-seven cycle of more and reminds us that we are God’s treasured children,...
The Relief from Status Anxiety
When Jesus commands the disciples to be like children, he’s telling us to recognize how much we’re like children no matter how old we actually are. Be...
The Relief From Control
We're all obsessed with control and we tend to mask it under the guise of efficiency. We adopt and adapt new behaviors and practices that promise orde...
The Relief From Rejection
Salvation has personal, domestic, social, economic, and theological dimensions. Salvation, in the New Testament, is the same word for health and well-...
The Relief From Regret
All of us have some moment we would redo if given the chance, some past decision or action or utterance that we would take back if we could.
The Relief From Deserving
The prodigal perfectly proclaims the paradox of the gospel: Jesus dies and is resurrected for us whether we deserve it or not. Like the younger brothe...
The Place of Grace
Hosea’s life becomes the parable of his preaching.
Gomer, Hosea’s wife, mother of his three oddly named children, whom he loves and cheri...
The Story of Starting Over
It’s not too late to change your mind
It’s not too late for the truth this time
It’s not too late to fall on your knees
It’s not to...
The Surprise of Salvation
When healing comes, its usually quiet and unexpected and surprising. Sometimes it requires a crack in the sidewalk before the root of healing can take...
The Truth Is A Cave
Elijah climbs the mountain on a hope and a prayer, looking for a theophany. He comes looking for fire, wind, smoke, and earthquake, a decisive declara...
The Slippery Slope of Sin
One day, in the city of David, shadows darken as a cross is raised. Upon which is nailed the last king to come from the line of David. What does God d...
The Early Church
There’s only once church that matters, and it’s not a church that’s wealthy, or powerful, or prestigious, or bursting at the seems, or filled with acc...
Praise Is Awe Leaving The Body
Idolatry is real and it is more destructive than anything we can imagine.
Idolatry is believing that social media is actually social whe...
Blessed To Bless
Saint Augustine said, “You are the Body of Christ. In you and through you the work of incarnation must go forward. You are to be taken. You are to be...
Pursued By Mercy
Hear the Good News: The mercy of God is going to catch you. It might happen in a backyard summer celebration. It could happen in church on a Sunday. O...
Praise Is What We're Made For
The world rings with praise only because the whole of creation is in on it!
Praise the Lord! The sun and moon, the sea, fire and snow, s...
Graves Into Gardens
God works in ways seen and unseen. The psalmist can only sing this song as one who has made it to the other side and is able to look back and see how...
Today Is The Only Day There Is
Good music, and I mean good in the true and beautiful sense, good music has a magic to it. It hits us, brings forth from us feelings we didn’t know we...
But
Matthew tells of an angel who comes like lightning to roll back the stone. Mark recalls the women waking up early to go anoint Jesus’ body, John start...
The Liturgy of Love
If you don’t have one already, Holy Week will give you a low anthropology. It shows us at our worst. It’s not just the story of good vs. evil. It’s al...
Learning By Heart
There are these threads in the scriptures that if you just start to pull on one of them you’ll begin to see how the whole thing is bound together. And...
The Liturgies of Life
Little things matter! Everything we do, whether we realize it or not, enfolds us and those near us into a vision of what we might call “the good life....
The Spirit Meets You Where You Are
Our God is nothing if not incarnational. That is, despite what others may say, we have a very materialistic faith. God takes on flesh and moves into t...
You Might Not Love What You Think
Amazon, Instagram, and Facebook (just to mention a few) are frighteningly good at captivating and capturing our imaginations as we spend our days expl...