Sermons
At Open Icon Baptist Church, we value preaching that engages deeply, humbly and honestly with Jesus, the Bible, and the pain and joy of living in the real world. And since going permanently online, we have been able to welcome great preachers from all over the world without having to wait for them to visit our shores.
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26 July, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
When grief leaves us wordless and a hard parable unsettles us, Jesus promises that nothing – not even death – can separate us from God’s love.
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20 July, 2026
Preacher: Geoff Leslie
Topic: Jacob's ladder, nature and spirituality, new creation, Sacraments, Stairway to Heaven, suffering and hope
Scripture: Genesis
We don’t need a stairway to heaven. We need eyes to see it already here, in nature, in the body, in ordinary life.
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12 July, 2026
Preacher: Craig Bartlett
Topic: addiction and grief, generous sowing, Indigenous reconciliation, open table, parable of the sower, Red Road, rural ministry, Sun Dance
Scripture: Matthew
Sowing without sorting the soil first: reckless, generous welcome amid addiction, loss, and quiet hope.
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5 July, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Being “inclusive” doesn’t end the old habit of exclusion – it just relocates it. Jesus offers a different yoke instead.
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28 June, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Topic: Abraham and Isaac, child sacrifice, fear and religion, law and grace, populism, scapegoating, slavery metaphor
Scripture: Genesis
Fear-driven religion and fear-driven politics run on the same engine. Paul knew it. Abraham discovered it. Grace is the only thing that breaks the cycle.
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7 June, 2026
Faith is not a mental exercise — it’s the reaching, grasping, hoping of beggars who trust that God’s grace will prevail.
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31 May, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Topic: belonging, church identity, Hospitality, image of God, Reconciliation, Trinity
An ancient icon of the Trinity shows us a table of radical hospitality — and calls us not just to sit at it, but to become it.
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24 May, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Topic: consumerism, eucharist, Feast of Tabernacles, Holy Spirit, living water, nationalism, paraclete, Pentecost, thirst and longing
Scripture: John
Jesus offers living water to a world sold counterfeit spirits — but bad experiences with cheap substitutes needn’t put us off the real thing.
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14 May, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Topic: Ascension, change and loss, church identity, Community, Holy Spirit, liminal space, multilingual worship, Pentecost
Scripture: Acts
When everything familiar has gone and the new thing hasn’t arrived yet, the disciples’ upper room is closer to home than we might think.
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10 May, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Topic: Evangelism, fasting, interfaith, Islam, Paul in Athens, Ramadan, Reconciliation, religious diversity, spiritual formation
Scripture: Acts
Paul in Athens, a Muslim Uber driver, and a Georgian bishop walk into a sermon — and together reframe what Christian interfaith encounter could look like.
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3 May, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Philip asked Jesus to show him God. The answer dismantles centuries of angry-God theology — and exposes the retributive impulse hiding in all of us.
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26 April, 2026
Preacher: Nathan Nettleton
Jesus came that we might have life in abundance — but abundant life can’t be hoarded. The moment we try to secure it for ourselves at others’ expense, it stops being life at all.


