The Nexus Podcast

A Consolation You Could Believe In (S16 Episode20)

Who are the people in your life that you can actually relax around? You know, the ones you don’t have to rehearse for, impress, or hold yourself together in front of? Hold that thought, and now, consider the moral, intellectual, or spiritual giants in your life that you look up to? Would you describe their company as relaxing?

This Sunday I want to linger over a strange but persistent pattern in the Gospels, but particularly in Luke. The people most aware of their mess and flaws in life seem oddly comfortable around Jesus, while those most confident in their goodness felt threatened by him. That should unsettle us a little and have asking why that was?

So, this week we will explore how some of our most admirable assumptions about human potential may quietly be costing us more than we realize, like fuelling exhaustion, perfectionism, and division. Moreover, I want to examine why Jesus seems stubbornly unimpressed with our optimism about ourselves.

In the end, my hope is that if you’ve ever felt tired of pretending, suspicious of easy answers, or feel quietly burned out by the pressure to have it together, this Sunday will feel like a big relief.

A Tribute to Murray (S16 Episode19)

Today we pay tribute to Murray and the role he has played in our community over the past 15 years. We hope you will join us then as we remember one of the pillars of our community.

Anthropology (S16 Episode18)

Nexus, we are on our way into a new series that will occupy much of our winter and spring, and I couldn’t be more excited about it. In a season where we are exploring the ways we are shaped and formed, the question behind this series is this: what if the way we talk about being human is quietly shaping everything? How does our understanding of what it means to be a homo sapien shape our relationships, our expectations, our politics, and even our faith, without us ever really noticing? So, starting this Sunday at Nexus, we’re beginning a new conversation by asking a deceptively simple question: what do we actually believe about human nature?

Along the way, we’ll look at familiar cultural voices, surprising moments of honesty, and the way Jesus seems to locate people before he ever tries to fix them. The goal this Sunday isn’t to make anything tidy or come to any quick conclusions. Rather, it is just an invitation to notice the assumptions we’re living with about who we are and to ask ourselves if those assumptions are helping us flourish, or are they quietly setting us up for disappointment? As always at Nexus, the goal isn’t agreement. It’s curiousity.

The Criminality of Despair (S16 Episode17)

Happy New Year Nexus! I hope you had a meaningful Christmas and rang in 2026 in the best possible way (even if that was sleeping). Our new years arrive, for many of us, with equal parts hope and heaviness. We know that life doesn’t magically reset when the clock strikes midnight and what we carried from last year still comes with us. This Sunday, we’ll sit with that reality together as we begin our year at Nexus with a sermon I am calling The Criminality of Despair.  

My hope is to remind us that while success is never guaranteed, giving up on ourselves and the world isn’t the path we’re called to. We’ll reflect on Ecclesiastes, Jeremiah, Nehemiah, and the quiet turning point for the prodigal son, as a gentle encouragement for us all to keep moving, even if all we have is the next honest step. I hope to see you all on Sunday!

The Magnificat (S16 Episode16)

Christmas is just around the corner now friends, and for this final of Sunday of Advent, we are inviting everyone to bring some kind of “sweet” finger food for after the service. It should be a fun and meaningful morning. Also, don’t forget about our Christmas Eve service at 4pm at St. Andrew's. We would love to see you all as we welcome in Christmas together.

I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself though as we are still in the season of Advent. Advent is often described as a season of waiting, but what if the real question isn’t whether we’re waiting, but where we’re waiting? This week, I want to listen closely to Mary’s song and her unsettling claim that God looks with favour on the lowly. Not the impressive. Not the powerful. The lowly.

As we trace Mary’s story and song, we’ll explore why God so often seems to meet people not at their strongest, but at their most exposed, and why that truth is both comforting and deeply disrupts the stories we tell about ourselves.

Theotokos (S16, E15)

Friends, this week we’re stepping into the Advent story through the eyes of Mary, a teenager in a nowhere town suddenly asked to carry God into the world. It’s a beautiful scene, until you remember it was also terrifying, disruptive, and about as far from “silent night” as you can get.

And apparently, the church has always struggled with this story (so at least we are in good company). In fact, a few hundred years after the fact, church leaders tried to sort out what Mary’s “yes” actually meant. And, well, let’s just say it did not go smoothly. Picture a theological debate that somehow drifted into something resembling an ancient fist fight or an episode of Jerry Springer. Yes, really, it was that bad. Christians have never needed much help making things weird.

But underneath the chaos of the story is a question Advent keeps putting in front of us: What does it mean for ordinary people to carry something of God into the world? What does Mary show us about fear, vulnerability, and how the smallest “yes” can reshape a life? We’ll sit with the mystery this Sunday, and laugh a little at our own species, while trying to see where this story might be trying to nudge us next.

Ancestors of the Faith - Community Reflections (S16 Episode12)

This week, we’re setting aside our typical rhythms at Nexus for a Looking Glass Sunday—a morning to pause and notice our ancestors of faith. We want to use this Sunday morning to reflect on the ones who steadied us, surprised us, encouraged us, nudged us toward grace, or simply showed us what a faithful life can look like in the ordinary and unpolished places.

We’ll hear from a handful of our own community members as they share brief reflections on the people—known or unknown to us—who left fingerprints on their faith in life-giving ways. Along the way, we’ll be invited to hold up the mirror ourselves, to wonder who helped make us who we are today… and maybe even what kind of presence we’re becoming for someone else. It’ll be reflective, grounding, and maybe even quietly hopeful. So, listen in as we look back to see forward a little more clearly.

Hope, Longing & God's Dream (S16 Episode13)

Another season of Advent begins, and here again are the competing pulls of hectic shop-till-you-drop fervor and quiet invitations…to stillness and taking time to reflect on our longings and hopes…to consider what Jesus’ coming might mean for me personally, and the world I was born into…to love through giving our presence (see what I did there?).

But what a world. This is a bit of a situation. Is God aware?

Do the ancient promises (still) mean anything?

Dare we believe God will make all things beautiful in their time? 

It can be hard to find hope. We might more easily notice an ache of shrivelling anxiety, or maybe just more of a numbness settling in. 

A longing with no hope of fulfillment is a very uncomfortable thing. But let’s courageously notice what we yearn for – our hopes for our lives and for the world. Because it is possible that we are not alone in our waiting. It’s possible that one day our most tender hopes will be met by our God of Love who will bring about a transformed world. 

As we wait… in the meantime…we have a beautiful, important, and sacred invitation to partner with God and others to build the dream. 

So, listen in as we consider together what Jesus could mean for us and the world. 

The Story that Holds Them All (S16 Episode11)

Why do stories move us so deeply? Why do we keep turning to them to make sense of our lives? As we wrap up our Narratology series, we’ll step back and look at the bigger picture — not just the seven plot lines we’ve explored, but the deeper pattern that gives every story its power. This Sunday I want to explore why humans can’t help but narrate their lives, why our souls refuse “raw experience,” and why the stories we tell ourselves quietly shape everything from our wounds to our hopes.

Across Scripture — this strange, beautiful library of messy, contradictory, astonishing stories — an unexpected pattern emerges. Like birds flocking in perfect synchronicity without a leader, the countless little narratives of the Bible give rise to one great story: the story of Jesus, the story that gathers and transforms every other story we live. It’s the tale that holds our quests, our monsters, our losses, our homecomings, and our rebirths.

Listen in as we reflect on what it means to let that larger story hold your smaller one — in the middle chapters, in the unresolved moments, and in the parts you’d rather edit out. And what I hope we come to see this week is that faith isn’t certainty; it’s participation. It’s entrusting your life to a story spacious enough to hold everything you bring to it. And maybe, just maybe, discovering that hope is not about predicting a happy ending, but trusting the One still writing.

Rebirth (S16 Episode10)

Well, we have come to the final plot line in our series, and of all the plot lines, this one probably feels closest to the heartbeat of faith itself. And, for everyone who’s ever told me that The Shawshank Redemption is their favourite film (or the GOAT of films), this is its Sunday to shine. We are going to be exploring the Rebirth plot line, the one where freedom begins not with escape, but with surrender.

Through the story of Nicodemus meeting Jesus in the night, and Andy Dufresne crawling through the dark toward the light, we’ll reflect on what it means to be set free by grace and to let old stories die so something new can begin. Both Nick and Andy remind us that sometimes the hardest prisons to leave are the ones we’ve made for ourselves, and that rebirth rarely begins in triumph. It starts when we are stuck in the dark, with a whisper of hope that maybe, just maybe, the story isn’t over yet.

Now, someone casually mentioned to me this week that they had never seen The Shawshank Redemption. I felt bad for them. Consider this your excuse to give it a watch or rewatch. Listen in as we explore the Rebirth plot line and the grace that ambushes us in the most surprising places.