Sermons – Roots Moravian Church

Religion & Spirituality

About

Roots Covenant Church is a new, young, urban, multiethnic faith community in Saint Paul, MN.The Roots Covenant Church Podcast is where you can listen to our weekly worship gathering messages where we explore the scriptures together.

Episodes

  • With You in the Valleys

    This sermon examines the spiritual significance of valleys, arguing that God is present in moments of struggle and limitation rather than just in times of success. It explores themes of healing and quiet faithfulness as alternatives to the…

  • Salt, Light, and Shalom

    This sermon from Roots Moravian Church's "Non-Anxious Misfit" series, titled "Salt, Light, and Shalom," examines Jesus' teachings in Matthew 5:13-16. It emphasizes that believers are salt and light due to their identity in Christ, not thro…

  • New Heaven & New Earth

    The final message of the Revelation: Unveiling Reality series, this homily by Pastors T.C. & Osheta explores the vision of a new heaven and new earth from Revelation 21, highlighting God’s desire for global shalom.

  • Judgment as Liberation

    This sermon interprets the Book of Revelation's depiction of judgment, comparing it to a controlled prairie fire. It suggests that these judgments expose systems of domination and violence, illustrating God's liberating love that purifies…

  • Unmasking Empire

    This sermon interprets John's visions in Revelation not as end-times prophecies, but as unveilings of empire's true nature, both historically and presently. It contrasts the domination inherent in political and religious systems with the c…

  • From Weeping to Worship

    In this message, Pastor Osheta shares personally and vulnerably about her own grief and skillfully weaves together the thrown room scene from Revelation chapter 5 with a positive vision for living with ambiguous grief and loss. It’s a mess…

  • Faithful Witness

    In a world shaken by headlines of political violence, our fall teaching series turns to the book of Revelation—not as a codebook for predicting the end of the world, but as a vision of Jesus Christ, the Faithful Witness. Revelation was wri…

  • Protest, Parody, & Peace

    In this message, Pastor T. C. explores the way Jesus enters Jerusalem on the first “Palm Sunday.” Rather than being a “triumphal entry,” as it is sometimes known, it was instead a carefully-planned protest , a parody of imperial power, and…

  • The Call to Discipleship

    In this powerful and deeply personal sermon, we explore the true meaning of discipleship through the lens of one man’s journey from gang life to following Jesus. Using Mark’s Gospel and insights from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s The Cost of Disci…

  • Bonhoeffer in Harlem (Interview with Dr. Reggie Williams)

    Interview with Bonhoeffer Scholar, Dr. Reggie Williams This video interview is the kick-off of our new teaching series on Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s classic, The Cost of Discipleship . Dr. Reggie Williams is Associate Professor of Theological S…

  • Rooted in Jesus

    In this sermon, Pastor T. C. Moore teaches on Matthew chapter 7 in the penultimate message in the “Center of Gravity” series. He organizes the chapter into four parts: vv.1–6 “See Clearly”; vv.7–14 “Trust Deeply”; vv.15–23: “Discern Wisely…

  • Practicing Integrity

    In this sermon, Pastor T. C. Moore explores the contrasting motivations of fear-based obedience and love-based obedience, using the Sermon on the Mount as a lens to understand Jesus’s teachings. The message begins with a reflection on old…

  • Peace without Spiritual Bypassing

    This week’s Advent message wrestles with the theme of peace—not as an escape from reality but as a profound and embodied hope amid life’s struggles. The sermon critiques “spiritual bypassing,” a harmful practice where spiritual truths are…

  • City on a Hill

    This week’s sermon continued our exploration of Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, focusing on the metaphor of being the “light of the world” and a “city on a hill” (Matthew 5:14). Pastor highlighted the historical appropriation of this metaphor…

  • Blessed are the Peacemakers
  • Blessed are the Pure in Heart
  • Blessed are the Merciful
  • Blessed are Those Who Hunger and Thirst for Righteousness
  • Blessed are the Meek
  • ICON Intro

    In this message, Pastor T. C. introduces the teaching series, ICON: Portals into the Heart of Jesus by exploring how contemplation of Jesus through contemplative practices like Visio Divina restore the image of God in us. As II Corinthians…

  • Making Room for Humility

    In this message, Pastor T. C. homes in on the theme of humility in the Magnificat using Mary as an example and draws upon insights from Dr. Dennis Edwards’ new book Humility Illuminated .

  • Making Room for Silence

    Pastor Osheta kicks off the “ Making Room in Advent ” series with a message entitled “Making Room for Silence.”

  • Material

    The third Path Point of PAX’s Scripture StoryArc is Material : “ Jesus is the key to understanding Scripture. ” In this message, Pastor T. C. contrasts a Jesus-centered approach to Scripture to a “Flat Bible” approach. As disciples of Jesu…

  • Myth

    What we think the Bible says leads us to develop deeply-held beliefs and those deeply-held beliefs are often the basis for relationships, families, vocation, and politics. So, it’s important that what we think the Bible says, is actually t…

  • Manifesto, Part 2

    In this message, Pastor T. C. continues Living Word series with the “ Manifesto ” of PAX’s Scripture StoryArc: We are given Scripture as a divine instrument to become like Jesus. 2 Tim 3:15-16 is a common text used to describe the role of…

  • Manifesto, Part 1

    In this message, Pastor T. C. kicks off the Living Word series by introducing the “ Manifesto ” of PAX’s Scripture StoryArc: We are given Scripture as a divine instrument to become like Jesus. In the Gospel of John, John the Baptizer is sp…

  • Stewardship

    In this message, Pastor T. C. kicks off a new teaching series on Stewardship .

  • Enneagram for Liberation
  • Traveling Mercies
  • Reconstructing Hope

    In this message, Pastor T. C. kicks off an Eastertide teaching series on the book of First Peter.

  • Under God’s Wing

    In this sermon, Pastor T. C. explores the episode in Jesus’s story when he is warned that Herod wants to kill him but he is defiant, unflappable. But it’s what Jesus says next that has echoed through history. Jesus weeps over Jerusalem and…

  • Missions

    In this sermon, Pastor T. C. explores the problematic concept of “missions” and reframes it as God’s dream for the world to restore Shalom . God tells Israel to “seek the peace of the city” in Jeremiah 29—and that city was Babylon. What if…

  • Unity

    In this message, Pastor Osheta teaches on what Moravian history has to teach us about unity. We are united in our picture of God in Christ; united in our commitments to remembering our journey of faith, to being curious about the ‘other’,…

  • Journey of Faith

    In this message, Pastor Osheta preaches on the “Journey of Faith” from the story of Jesus calming the storm.

  • Jesus-centered

    In this message, Pastor T. C. homes in on another area of overlap between Roots and the Moravian Church: a Jesus-centered reading of the Bible.

  • Community of Misfits

    In this sermon, Pastor T. C. teaches on the kind of community God is forming in Christ—a community of misfits. Jesus didn’t gather the best and brightest, he gathered the overlooked and underestimated. Jesus did this to demonstrate the nea…

  • #2 Be a Good Neighbor

    In this message, Pastor T. C. approaches the second way to be Christian (Be a Good Neighbor) from the standpoint of engaging with politics. To be a good neighbor, we must care about the policies that affect our neighbor’s lives and the col…

  • Hospitality

    In this sermon, Pastor Osheta helps us think about the Resurrection Rhythm of Hospitality that the early church practiced and how it applies to us today.

  • Apostles’ Teaching

    In this message, Pastor T. C. explores the first “Rhythm of Resurrection” from Acts 2: “ They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching. ” Acknowledging this passage’s potential to cause discomfort for those of us who have experienced s…

  • Together

    In this second message of the “ Easter People ” series (which is about practicing rhythms of resurrection), Pastor Osheta builds upon the introductory message delivered in person on Easter Sunday, by introducing the primary mode through wh…

  • Sin

    In this message, Pastor T. C. reflects upon 1 John 1.8-9 and Dr. Howard Thurman’s devotional on these verses in “ 40-Day Journey with Howard Thurman .” Pastor T. C. challenges the sin-as-law-breaking ‘mental model’ and contrasts it with si…

  • The Sound of the Genuine

    In the wrap-up message in the “Zip Code” series, Pastor T. C. explores Dr. Howard Thurman’s concept of “The Sound of the Genuine” in light of the beginning of the Lenten season.

  • Ethnic Identity & Social Location

    In this message Pastor T. C. explores the way we locate ourselves ethnically, racially, and relative to others in society. In Acts 21, Paul attempts to navigate what Dr. Willie James Jennings calls the “diaspora anxiety” of the Jerusalem e…

  • Faith Stream Awareness

    In this message, Pastor T. C. continues in the “ Zip Code ” series by exploring the concept of “ Faith Stream Awareness. ” Recognizing the streams/traditions/denominations that have formed us and their relationship to other branches in the…

  • Zip Code – Intro

    Pastor T. C. kicks off a new teaching series called “ Zip Code: Homing in on Who We Are to Know Where We’re Going. ” This message explores a passage from Paul’s letter to the Colossian church about finding identity in Christ. Identity sets…

  • Bearing the Light

    The season of Christmastide is giving way to Epiphany, when the days lengthen because the Light is breaking in. In this message, Pastor T. C. draws upon the light/darkness motif in the prologue of John’s gospel to point to the ways the Lig…

  • Advent – Mighty God & Everlasting Father

    In this message, Pastor T. C. explores two of the four “throne names” from Isaiah 9 and their relationship to the strength of vulnerability and God’s reign of justice and righteousness.

  • Advent – Wonderful Counselor

    In this sermon, Pastor Osheta explores the first of four titles for God’s anointed king in Isaiah 9, “Wonderful Counselor.”

  • Family & Privilege

    In this message, Pastor T. C. confronts an important relational dynamic that affects forging family: privilege. Pastor T. C. draws from Jesus’s teachings and from the letters of the apostle Paul, as well as pointing to a new resource on pr…

  • Practicing Family

    Pastor T. C. continues the teaching series “The Church as Forged Family” with a message about how embodied practices forge family. Before we think of ourselves as family, and before we call ourselves family, we have to participate in famil…