If you want to find a strong way to confront the purity codes, biblically, personally or spiritually, this book of very clean sermons is for you.

-Rev. Dr. Donna Schaper

Senior Minister, Judson Memorial Church

Rev. Stell's collection explores the vulnerability, passion, and engagement that it takes to serve as a congregation's first LGBTQ pastor. It is impossible to ignore the transformation, both of himself and the church, as they embark on a journey through new terrains. Here we are reminded that stories have the power to connect and nurture everyone who is willing to hear them.

                                                                      -Rev. Larissa Kwong Abazia

Director of Church Relations

Princeton Theological Seminary

At a time when the world as we know it seems to be unraveling before our eyes, these brief sermons by William Stell will inspire renewed confidence in the Gospel of God. Here, the Scriptures saturate every sermon with their living promises of hope. Here, in everyday language good news comes all the way down, even to those so abused by religion and oppressed by injustice that they can no longer cross the threshold of the church door. From Mr. Rogers, to Sister Perryman, to 12-year-old Hazem, we meet in Stell’s sermons witnesses—both earthy and angelic—who bring us the ancient Word with contemporary power. For those lamenting the supposed decline of the mainline pulpit, here is evidence from a new generation of pastors that new light continues to break forth from God’s Word, making its hearers “free, clean, and loved.”

-Rev. Dr. James Kay

Joe R. Engle Professor of Homiletics and Liturgics,

Princeton Theological Seminary

___________________

Rev. William Stell is the solo pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Bordentown, New Jersey. He is the first openly LGBTQ pastor in the area.