open icon
baptist church
baptist church
Preacher: Alison Sampson
At Open Icon Baptist Church, we value great preaching — 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. Click here to meet the inspirational preachers depicted in the gallery above, none of whom have preached for us!
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Alison Sampson
Alison Sampson is an ordained Baptist pastor, a preacher, a writer, a dreamer, and a frequent maker of soup. After many years as a member and then a pastor of our church, then known as South Yarra Community Baptist Church, in 2016 she moved to Warrnambool to set up and pastor Sanctuary Baptist Church. There, queer, neurodivergent and questioning folk found a home and assumptions about church were exploded. After returning to Melbourne in 2024, she became part of the ministry team at Manningham Uniting Church. Alison is passionate about communicating with diverse people, facilitating encounters with the Spirit through Word, ritual, conversation and prayer, encouraging others in their ministry, and sanctifying every area of life.
Sermons by Alison Sampson
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20 December, 2015
Understanding Mary as a god-bearer opens up new possibilities, for we can all be god-bearers, carrying God’s love and longing for justice into every place that we go.
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29 November, 2015
In the fact of the climate apocalypse, we hold on to our hope: hoping and working for the radical, impossible change that is necessary.
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8 November, 2015
Every coin you are holding already belongs to God: every bitterness, every hurt, every disappointment. Do not hold a single one back.
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11 October, 2015
In Christ we have been given a new identity that dissolves the labels of first and two-thirds world, and invites us all to be poor.
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13 September, 2015
Preacher: Alison Sampson
Topic: Church, Grace, Hospitality, Love, Relationships, Service
Scripture: James
Good gossip, listening in love to each other’s stories and seeking the presence of God, helps us to build connection and community and to grow in love.
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30 August, 2015
Preacher: Alison Sampson
Scripture: Mark
There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that another person can do to you that can make you unclean or defiled in the eyes of God.
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16 August, 2015
Preacher: Alison Sampson
Topic: Church, Identity, Relationships, Suffering, Weakness
It is in our woundedness, this woundedness we try to avoid and would rather not acknowledge, that we find our identity as the body of Christ, our identity as the church.
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9 August, 2015
When we respond to the call to model our lives on his life, the life of the One who has seen the Father, then, like him, we must not sidestep or avoid suffering.
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12 July, 2015
Preacher: Alison Sampson
Scripture: Mark
We have been adopted as the children of a king who does not withhold his love until we comply, who does not ask us to sing for our supper, who does not use us or abuse us, but longs to bind up our wounds.
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31 May, 2015
Preacher: Alison Sampson
Topic: Failure, Grace, Reconciliation
A sermon in response to a broken relationship in the church
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14 May, 2015
Love is our purpose; we are not abandoned, not fearful, judgemental or self-righteous, for we are made in the image of God, who is gentle and wise, witty and loving, generous, forgiving, compassionate and kind.
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3 May, 2015
Because we really don’t have the whole truth, the Spirit will be heard only when we are together, listening to one another in love.
