Before you can even make out the words being spoken, the Kentucky accent rolls out of the speakers, to ask the question, “Who would you say is the most important person in your life?” “Definitely my mother,” answers the even deeper accent of Wanda Jean as she told a story about the love her mother showed. This is just one of the stories recorded by the organization, Story Corps, who have been crossing the nation recording everyday people’s short stories about their life, their joys, and the people and the things they love. For 20 years, Story Corps have been collecting these stories so that they can live into their mission “to help people feel more connected and less alone, increase hope and decrease fear of the other, and to shine a light on our best and truest selves.” It is a noble effort in a day and age where division and separation and profits are seemingly more important than hearing a two minute story from a woman in Eastern Kentucky about her mom’s capacity to care for her family and the impact she had. Browsing through these beautiful stories, I was reminded that there is a certain vitality that comes when we allow ourselves to ponder these big questions about who we are, what we should do, and how we should do it.
In his letter to the Romans, Paul writes to remind the people where the core of their identity stands. And in what is quite literally my favorite passage of scripture, Paul describes how the Spirit intercedes for us when our prayers are mere sighs too deep for words. He goes on to paint the image of God the Father and Christ the Son, standing in the corner of those who love God and are convicted by that love to change how they move through the world. And it is this Holy Trinity into which we are baptized that we find our identity. The big questions we come asking today is who are we? What are we supposed to do? And how should we do the work given to us to do? There is, as with all things on this fragile earth, good news and bad news in the answers to these questions. In my own prayer, I am especially aware of this ahead of the election of the Ninth Bishop of the Diocese of Lexington, taking place in just six days.
The bad news of the life of a Christian, is that it’s not a life guaranteed of ease with no problems ahead. We will get sick, the bills become burdensome, the relationship will become strained, or some other unfathomable difficulty will find us, and in those moments, we remember the good news. Because the good news is that while Christianity is not necessarily an easy life, there is a promise of a certain sort of ease to living into God’s love. And when our world begins to feel so prickly and unbearable, we return to the very font which each of us worshipping in person passed by this morning on the way to our seats, to remember that nothing can sperate us from God’s love.
And unfortunately, in Christianity, there’s no guarantee of a path laid out ahead with known turns and bumps in the road. We all navigate a life full of choices and opportunities and disappointments, and when we aren’t sure what we ought to do, we can return to this baptismal font and remember that our primary task as Christians is to follow Christ, and that is good news. The good news is that Christianity is as complex and intricate as this world in which we live, and when we follow Christ’s example, we get to discern how we ought to move in this world; we remember that nothing can break the ties that bind us to the sacrificial love of God the creator, Christ the redeemer, and the Spirit who sustains us along the way.
And regrettably, being a Christian doesn’t mean that our life will be lead without mistakes. We will mess up individually and collectively in our efforts to live into God’s love and to follow Christ’s example. But hear me when I say there is no shame in imperfection, only in a pride that keeps us from seeking help. One of our greatest and heaviest collective sins is the idea that we make our own path, even when it comes to our salvation. Mistakes are part of this world, but what is promised to us in our baptism is the gift of the Holy Spirit. The good news is that, as Paul says, this Spirit intercedes even when words fail, and we are left with only heavy and prayerful sighs, and we don’t know how to go on.
The truth is, the Good News of Christianity is that we are all in it together. It’s why it matters to come together as the community of faith of the Church of Our Saviour in Madison County. It’s why it matters that we pray for each other as part of the Diocese of Lexington, especially as we are in intentional prayer ahead of next Saturday’s election of the Ninth Bishop of our diocese. Because it is all of us. It is all of us who revisit the font, who remember who we are at our core; even and especially when our prayerfully sighs are too deep for words. The Good News of Christianity is that we can rest in God’s love, Christ’s example, and the Spirit’s guidance, but only when we remember who we are—that at the core of our identity is not where we grew up or our family or the things that surround us, but it is, quite simply, our baptism.
The Good News of Christianity is that it’s incredibly simple and overwhelmingly complex all at the same time; the Good News is that God is present with us in all of life’s circumstances. The Good News is that the hope of the resurrection is absolutely unrelenting. And the Good News is that nothing, not death, not things yet to come, not anything in all of creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Thanks be to God.
A sermon delivered on July 26, 2026 to the people of the Church of Our Saviour in Madison County, Kentucky for Proper 12A on Romans 8:26-39.
Becca Kello 