PastorSarah

Rev. Sarah Buteux June 20, 2021 Mark 4:35-41 To watch this morning's service click here.   March 18, 1990. It was a dark and stormy night. Maybe not on the streets of Brookline, but certainly on the canvas as it was lifted off the wall of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Rembrandt’s “Storm on the Sea at Galilee,” along with 13 other masterpieces, was stolen 30 years ago in the largest art heist in U.S. history.   On that fateful night, security guards were duped into allowing two men disguised as police officers to enter the museum. They tied up the guards, absconded with the art, and the rest is history.   No one knows who stole it. No one knows who sold it. No one has ever been caught. No one has ever confessed. The greatest mystery in the contemporary art [...]

Rev. Sarah Buteux                             Mark 4:26-34 Proper 6, Year B (To watch this morning's sermon, click here.) The greek philosopher Heraclitus once said… anyone?…  "You cannot step into the same river twice.”  (Audience participation - that’s what I’m talking about! I love it! Yes.)  The greek philosopher Heraclitus once said, ”You cannot step into the same river twice.”  I’m sure he said other things too, but when it comes to the saying of Heraclitus, that’s about the only one any of us knows.  Right? And that’s ok, because it’s a good one.  "You cannot step into the same river twice,” because it is not the same river and you are not the same person.  The water moves on and so do we. The river is always changing [...]

by Rev. Sarah Buteux             Pentecost, Year B, Acts 2:1-21   I don’t like being lost, but it helps if there’s someone else with me.  I don’t like walking into a meeting blind, but I don’t mind it as much if I know I have an ally in the room.  I don’t particularly like job interviews or making a motion at a town hall meeting or preaching to a congregations I don’t know, but it helps if there’s a friendly face in the crowd.  When you’re not exactly sure where you stand, what to do, where you’re going, or what’s coming next, it can be hard to hold it together. I don’t like that feeling. I suppose no one does. But when times like that come, it sure helps to know that you are not alone.  [...]

by the Rev. Sarah Buteux Easter 3, Year B Luke 24:36b-48 What would you do if the authorities were out to get to you?  What would you do if the very people whose job it was to protect and serve you, treated you like you had target on your back?  Would you fight or take flight?  I’ll give you a moment to think about it….  I don’t know about you because we are still apart, but my first instinct would be flight. I’m terrified of pain and I’m too young to die, so I’d run if I could and I’d hide.  Had I lived back in Jesus’ day, I doubt I would have had the courage to accompany the other women to the tomb. I probably would have hung back and hid out with the disciples. I certainly wouldn’t have [...]

  Easter 2 B, John 20:19-31 by the Rev. Sarah Buteux My parents didn’t believe in training wheels. In all fairness, I’m not sure anyone’s parents did back in the early 80’s. It was a lawless time when hair was big, seatbelts were optional, and smoking happened in “sections.”  So when I learned to ride a bike, my Dad just ran alongside me until I found my balance… and then I was off.  We lived on a quiet street - a circle in fact - so once I got going I just kept going. My parents waved as I went around and around and around and then finally grew tired and went inside.  That was all well and good until I realized that although I had learned how to ride a bike, I hadn’t yet learned how to stop one. [...]

Rev. Sarah Buteux Lent 3, Year B John 2:13-21 “Father forgive me for the times I desired a seat at a table you would've flipped.”  - Juliany Gonzalez Nieves   Friends, this is the point in our service where I ask you to pray with me before I begin to preach. And more often then not, I pray the words of the Psalmist: “O God, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, our rock and our redeemer” (19:14).  I cling to those words most Sundays, because the last thing I want to do is get this wrong. But I don’t feel like I can pray those words today because I already know I’m going to get this wrong.  I don’t trust that the words of my mouth or the mediations [...]