I’m going to be honest. I don’t think Jesus loves “king” language. But here we are on the Last Sunday in Ordinary Time of RCL year B, and our readings, as always on this Sunday, are all about kings and kingship, and the surely strange application of that title to Jesus. (Readings can be found… Read More
Revised Common Lectionary: Love, Love, Love, Love
A preaching superstar once said that every preacher really has just two or three sermons in them, which they re-package every week. (He said that one of his is, “Christianity’s weird, odd. Why would anyone possibly want to be a Christian?” I’m pretty sure it was William Willimon, but I’m happy to be corrected.)… Read More
Thursday Prayer
God who greens and unfolds leaves, green me this day. There is so much in me that is closed and protected. There is so much that is fearful and hidden. There is so much that is almost ready if only… But you are the Sun that warms, That finds my spiritual chlorophyll, burrowing inside, basting… Read More
Narrative Lectionary: Rocky Beginnings, Risky Business (Acts 17:1-9, 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10)
It is an oft-heard complaint among pastors that congregants are stuck on some long-ago and impossibly wonderful golden age of church life. When the sanctuary was full! And we had two services! And we almost didn’t have room for all the children! It almost makes you long for a story of a knock-down, drag-out fight,… Read More
Narrative Lectionary: The End Is Near Edition (Mark 13:1-8, 24-37)
The End Is Near. It is hard to read this week’s appointed verses without going to that well-aged, somewhat humorous image of the prophet of doom: the wild-eyed, shaggy-haired, tattered-clothed man yelling into the crowd, “The end is near!” And, if we can put end-of-the-world associations aside, this time, he’s right. We can see that,… Read More
Narrative Lectionary: First, Last, and Everlasting (Mark 10:17-31)
Our passage for the first Sunday in Lent is set in motion by an urgent question: “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” What is eternal life? What, in particular, did Jews mean when using such a phrase, given the scant evidence in the Hebrew Scriptures for any developed notion of an… Read More
Narrative Lectionary: Parables Edition (Mark 4:1-34)
Years ago I had a professor who described his class- a survey of Christology- as being akin to “roller skating through the Louvre”- by which he meant: his job was, essentially, to say, “Look at this! Look at that! Look at this! Look at that!” Our journey through Mark reminded me of that professor and… Read More
Narrative Lectionary: Uneasy Homecoming Edition (Ezra 1:1-4; 3:1-4, 10-13)
I’ve been watching a TV show in which the heroine is a tortured private investigator with unusual abilities, who, it’s been clear from the beginning, has a painful history of loss and displacement. In a recently watched episode an evil villain who believes himself in love with her (and who also has unusual abilities) managed… Read More
Narrative Lectionary: Come Back to Me (Hosea 11:1-9)
We remain with the Northern Kingdom this week, as the prophet Hosea, about a hundred years after the ministry of Elijah, continues to entreat the people to return to faithful worship and covenant loyalty to their God. The journey Hosea takes is extraordinary. The scroll begins with God telling the prophet to act out the… Read More
Narrative Lectionary: Lovingkindness Personified (Ruth 1:1-17)
Tucked between a narrative telling of descent into chaos, and another telling of the rise of kings, we find Ruth (at least, that’s where we find her in the Christian bible). “In the days when judges ruled,” the story begins, and so it follows the book of Judges. But it tells the story of an… Read More
