Rev. Brent L. White

Kudos to Northpoint for making fun of itself. As someone in charge of a “contemporvant” worship service, I breathe a small sigh of relief that we don’t conform to all these stereotypes—but is it just because we don’t have the budget?

I just read this challenging Wendell Berry essay, “Peaceableness Toward Enemies,” in his collection of essays entitled Sex, Economy & Community. Happily, after reading it in one of these old-fashioned, analog things called books, I found it online. (Thank you, Internet. I hope Berry is getting compensated in some way!) He wrote it shortly after the first Gulf War in 1991, but it could have been written this morning. Berry, a genteel Kentuckian, has no discernible partisan ax to grind. It’s safe to say whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican, libertarian or socialist, he disagrees with you.

Instead of a partisan harangue, he presents what I view as a Christian alternative (although he’s writing for a largely secular audience) to the usual way we understand war, peace, and diplomacy in this country.

Here’s one highlight: Read the rest of this entry »

Sermon Text: Luke 15:11-32

[This week I’m including a video of the sermon taken with my Flip camcorder. The quality is pretty good, with one glaring exception: the aspect ratio of the Flip doesn’t quite conform to the aspect ratio of the finished mp4 movie. This means that my head gets chopped off at times! I apologize! If we do it again, we’ll fix that problem. Also, we’ll use a tripod! Still I think it’s a nice first effort.]

The following is my original manuscript.

I’ve read that when you’re learning a language, the hardest thing to master is humor and jokes. This is surely true—I think about my own children and how long it took them to figure out jokes and how they worked. The first jokes they learned were knock-knock jokes. “Knock, knock.” “Who’s there?” “Boo.” “Boo-hoo.” “Why are you crying?” And then they’d burst into laughter. But then they would make up their own: “Knock, knock.” “Who’s there?” “Cat.” “Cat who?” “Dog.” And they’d burst into laughter. Wait! That doesn’t make any sense.

Just last week, my son Townshend asked me, “Why did the chicken cross the road?” “To get to the other side,” I said. Duh. “No,” he said, “Why did the chicken really cross the road?” I didn’t know the answer to that question! I can’t explain that joke, and the easiest joke of all time! Jokes are tough. Even as we get older, the last thing we want to do is have to explain a joke. If you have to explain it, the joke loses its humor; its power; its effectiveness. Read the rest of this entry »

Here is the first of two videos we showed in Vinebranch on Sunday related to our theme of mothers and daughters. These videos are part of our “Relatively Speaking” sermon series, which concludes next week on Father’s Day.

Here’s the VBS video we showed in Vinebranch this morning to accompany the children singing. Obviously, the kids—over 500 of them—had a blast, and I’m pretty sure the 180 or so teenage and adult volunteers did as well. I know I did!

This will make you smile. Enjoy!