We haven’t posted in a while, it’s been a busy late winter and spring for two part-timers on this earth and church ministry project. So much good to see. But, we’ve done some pulpit supply and guest preaching along the way, so over the next few months we’ll share some sermons here for you to ponder.

A sermon is more than just a written text-it’s a physical, breath-moved event at a specific time and place on earth in a community and worship setting. It emerges from careful, ongoing listening for God within scripture, prayer, relationships, community, society and the wider creation.

And hopefully a sermon invites and encourages deepened prayer and contemplation, truthful conversation, energy, imagination, recognition, good next steps for persons and community grounded in God’s word and spirit, and faith, hope and love. I hope that sermons help us ‘see more’ of the world where God has placed us, and begin to discern honestly for ourselves, and in community, how God calls you to live.

So, may these sermons be practical encouragements in trusting in the presence of God, growing in prayer, and discerning step by step your faithful, compassionate, courageous work with God. (And maybe they can be just be further examples and contributions among many others to preaching, writing, speaking & listening that opens hearts to God’s restorative work in all creation.)

1st Sunday After Pentecost, May 31, 2026,Bethany Lutheran, Spanaway, WA

Putting the Lawn in Order, or Descending to the Good,

The Rev. Evan Graham Clendenin

Lectionary Readings Link

*Tahoma, as revealed to one at Bethany Lutheran, Trinity Sunday 2026*

Blessings and much thanks to you all on this 1st Sunday after Pentecost. Thank you for having me here to be with you for worship, to pray together, to celebrate the sacrament of communion together, and to listen for words of life together- in scripture read, and in all God sends us as guidance, nourishment, and energy for faithfully putting life in order.

And so I invite us all to listen again once more to this passage from 2nd Corinthians:

Finally, brothers and sisters, farewell. Put things in order, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. 2 Cor 13:11

Put things in order. These words from the apostle Paul offer good guidance for you, I imagine, at this moment in the life of Bethany. Soon you welcome your new pastor! Blessings to her and her family as they move and settle in, get their feet under them, and blessings to you as you welcome her, open to discovering, learning and following what God is giving you church community for life together, now and in the coming days.

You’ve probably been putting things in order all along in a season of staff change, and maybe have some last minute matters to still put in order , or things to prepare, adjust, repair, mend, restore, complete. Put things in order.

Where is the visitation list? The binder of phone numbers, information about the church and neighborhood? How about tips on a good auto mechanic, counselor, doctor, or places to pick mushrooms? Maybe preparing some meals, or other ways of showing welcome and openness to the new person arriving as your pastor. You meet her part way, as she arrives, settles, and reaches out to begin to get to know you and this place. This all takes time, so I pray for you to receive patience and compassion as the new relationship begins.

And maybe you are also putting your lawn in order. Who does the lawn-care around here? You put in a lot of work, attention and time to tend all this beautiful ground. Trees, playground, raised beds, landscaping, pioneer cemetery, historic site, and of course, a few acres of grass, green grass. When I was here back in April, I enjoyed looking around the grounds. Now, I didn’t find any camas out there, but I read the historical sign about a group of settlers harboring native people against persecution and trumped-up prosecution. I saw hallowed cemetery ground, open to sunlight, growing with grass, flowers and wonderful native ‘garry oaks’.

And I imagined more garry oaks, and native grasses, and camas lilies growing there. I imagined inviting friends and neighbors, reaching out to local tribes, to re-discover together how to put in order a native oak savannah as an honor of this place and those whose lives throughout time are part of it.

Now my dream for you may not raise any sparks here, but maybe you can accept it as a way to say that God, in whose image and likeness we are made and restored, healed, put in order- God puts things in order for living life.

God gives and God restores an order to places and people, a life-giving pattern of beauty and goodness, beyond any one creatures ability to understand it, but not beyond our ability to be part of its life, its deeper grounds of peace. God goes out, looks and thinks about how to help life grow well here.

I’m not making that up! Just read the scripture. On the third day, God puts in order the earth’s capacity for green growth and seed-bearing:

Then God said, “Let the earth grow-up with grass, grass with seeds, and every kind of fruit trees whose fruit have seeds.” And so it was. The earth grew up green: plants yielding seed of every kind, and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it. And God saw that it was good.

God puts in order, but to do so, God gets down low, close to the ground, and looks to see the good there. And you and I can also get down close to the ground to look for the good to grow there.

Look…like someone gathering camas bulbs from the oak prairie, who distinguishes the nutritious from the poisonous, the 6-pointed purple-blue flowers yielding not only seeds, but edible bulbs sweet when you roast them.

Look… like a cascade foothill diary farmer looks to assess the pasture and hay, and to just delight in the dewy grass and three-leafed clovers.

*well, these are the allegheny foothills, but this grass feeds dairy cows…*

We all can look… as we sit, stand, get down close to behold the simple grass receive their sacraments of life, drinking sunlight and eating carbon dioxide, turning all this into a gift that energizes the soil, animals, and the whole, very good creation.

And when we get down and look, we are doing what God has made us to do. To get down, get down close with the grass and creatures and see them with the eyes God gives to us as participants in the divine life. We descend, get down low, close to the plants and soil. We don’t master or dominate it. We descend, as John and Jesus and so many disciples went down to the river Jordan. We descend, get down close with the creatures, accept the baptism they offer us, receive the light of Christ they shine for us.

And we are sent out as disciples of that light, that energy, that pattern of life we have been given in faith by a loving God. And day by day thru the grace of Jesus Christ, the love of God and the community of the Holy Spirit we can put it in order a place for life where we are, at home, at church, on the ground where we are given to be for a time.

Descending to What’s Good