Rev. Chelsey Harmon lives in Vancouver, BC and is a bivocational pastor at The Bridge Community Church (CRC) in Langley, BC. Chelsey is also on staff at Churches Learning Change, a non-profit that aims to help congregations and leaders pursue personal and congregational transformation. She earned her M.Div. at Calvin Theological Seminary (2009), a ThM in Spiritual Theology at Regent College (2023) and is currently a part-time PhD student at the University of Edinburgh’s School of Divinity where she studies historical examples of Trinitarian mysticism and theology.
Chelsey has been writing sermon commentaries for the CEP website since 2019.
Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43
Commentary
Proper 11A
In the midst of a number of parables about the Kingdom, Jesus gives us another one leaning into the imagery of seeds and plants and weeds. This one is told to the crowd but only explained to the disciples. We might read some significance into the fact that Jesus is expounding upon the muckiness of…
Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
Commentary
Proper 10A
We have the benefit of Jesus’s own interpretation for this parable, though the parable itself is told to one group and the explanation is only given to the disciples. It shouldn’t surprise us that Jesus emphasises the nature of the ground onto which the sower throws the seeds because it reveals his heart: as the…
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
Commentary
Proper 9A
Over the next number of weeks the lectionary will be giving us pairs of verses that skip over sections. Although some of us will feel relieved to not have to address things like the “woes” that are in verses 20-24 of chapter 11, some of us might feel like an interpretative angle has been forced…
Matthew 10:40-42
Commentary
Proper 8A
The lectionary gives us a whole sermon to focus on what translators like to label as the “Rewards” section of Jesus’s mission instructions. What a misleading title! I mean, it makes sense why we like the title: who doesn’t like a prize? And we’ve also been chugging along for a few weeks now listening to…
Matthew 10:24-39
Commentary
Proper 7A
We continue this week with Jesus speaking to his disciples as he commissions them to go out and to heal, cure, and generally spread the good news. But these words have such a ring to them that it’s also pretty clear that there’s something bigger, more universally true, being said here than some warnings for…
Matthew 9:35-10:8 (9-23)
Commentary
Proper 6A
Our passage this week begins with Jesus feeling significant compassion for the crowds surrounding him. He was meeting a lot of them, going with his disciples from city to village and at every turn he encounters need after need. Matthew describes him as continuously proclaiming the good news and curing every disease and every sickness:…
Matthew 9:9-13,18-26
Commentary
Proper 5A
Notice who is willing to utilize the doctor in their midst. First of all, even a tax collector becomes a disciple! That tax collector is joined by others, sinners and cheats every one, at dinner with Jesus. The waiting room is full! And though some of the Pharisees complain about this practice, there is one…
Matthew 28:16-20
Commentary
Trinity Sunday A
Comments, Questions, and Observations The eleven finally make it to Galilee where Jesus told them to meet him. In the gospel of Matthew, there are no upper room stories, so this meeting on the mountain in Galilee is the first time that the disciples actually encounter the resurrected Jesus in the narrative. After all they…
John 7:37-39
Commentary
Pentecost A
The setting is the end of the Festival of Booths (or Tabernacles). The Festival remembers the way that God provided for the Israelites in their desert wanderings and is when they ask for God to send rain for the year’s crops. The people also looked to the future hope promised in passages like Ezekiel 47,…
John 17:1-11
Commentary
Easter 7A
Jesus speaks the heart of the Trinity out loud in prayer for the disciples to hear. He speaks in the third person about himself at the beginning, but very quickly moves more passionately, intimately, and emphatically into the first person. This only deepens the significance of the words’ revelation about the heart of God. And…
About Chelsey Harmon