This week’s Preacher Party gets started a day early to help those of you who may be writing for all of the Three Days. So whether you’re struggling to put words together for Maundy Thursday, or you’re putting the finishing touches on your Easter sermon, we are here for you!
As Rev. Dr. Rachael Keefe reminds us in this week’s RCL post, “It doesn’t matter how long you have been preaching these texts, you don’t have to find something new to say. We just need to find something truthful and authentic to share with our people …” And if you are preaching from the Narrative Lectionary, you might want to explore what it means to “look for the living among the dead” in our own contexts. Looking for liturgy? This week’s Worship Words might help.
However we can encourage and support one another through this week and into Resurrection joy, let’s do it! Very soon, we will get to say those words we’ve been longing to say for the past 40 days: “Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!”
Rev. Jo Anne Taylor is an Evangelical Covenant Church pastor serving in the United Methodist Church. She blogs at pastorsings.com and she likes to sing (just not in close proximity to others at this time).
RevGalBlogPals encourages you to share our blog posts via email or social media. We do not grant permission to cut-and-paste prayers and articles without a link back to the specific post. For permission to use material in paper publications, please email revgalblogpals at gmail dot com.
RevGalBlogPals 
This morning I had an “aha” moment as I read John 2, the miracle of water into wine at Cana, in the context of Maundy Thursday. Why have I never before seen the connection between “water for purification” being turned into wine and Jesus washing his disciples’ feet and pouring wine for them? And that whole conversation with his mother about it not yet being his time? I don’t usually preach a sermon on Maundy Thursday, but if I did, I’d want to explore this more.
LikeLike
Wow! Great connection! Must think about that!
I’m going with the original ending of Mark. The women fled and didn’t tell anyone! Haven’t tackled it in a good many years, so hey, this is the year. Sermon title: “What?!”
LikeLike
Love it! We think we’ve got it bad with pandemic disorientation- imagine what those women felt!
LikeLike
Love that title. Its given me the idea of dramatising the reading a bit. If I can get the timing right, as the reader reads the end of the verse – I’ll cut in going something like “What, no, that can’t be right – can you read that again….”
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s a little like Haydn’s surprise symphony …. lull the congregation almost to sleep with familiar words, then wake them up with a jolt! I like it.
LikeLike
I love the Mark text. It seems so real to me with everyone running in terror and not telling anyone. I’m not sure what I am going to preach about, but when I was reading the text this year, I started to think about the angel’s direction to go back to Galilee. Perhaps Galilee is a better place to encounter the risen Christ than the holy city of Jerusalem. What does that say about our religious institutions?
LikeLiked by 1 person
We don’t like to think of ourselves as Pharisees or Sadducees, do we?
LikeLike