Tag Archives: ordinary time

Happy New Year

Luke 23:33-43 I was reminded by a mentor from my fellowship this week that today is the New Year’s Eve of the church calendar, a threshold between the year behind us and the new year ahead of us. This is the last Sunday of Year C, and next week on Advent 1 we begin theContinue reading “Happy New Year”

Crying in Church

1 Samuel 1:4-20 & 1 Samuel 2:1-10 As you may have noticed, I am not a particularly stoic person. When we sing a particular hymn, or read the words of a particular psalm, or even at times when I am preaching or teaching or sitting with folks going through something hard, tears come to myContinue reading “Crying in Church”

Who will save us?

Mark 8:27-38 Who do people say that Jesus is? A savior, a prophet, a healer, a friend, a sacrificial lamb, a judge, a Messiah, a wisdom teacher, a radical, a revolutionary, a Palestinian Jew, the Son of God, just a really good dude with some good ideas—the list goes on. I’ve even heard questionably earnestContinue reading “Who will save us?”

Being Human, and Being Better at it

Mark 7:24-37 The reality of the incarnation is one of the greatest scandals of history. Not the fact that God came to earth, plenty of deities have done that in mythology from all over the world. Not the fact that a human woman gave birth to a somehow more-than-human child, since of course the mythsContinue reading “Being Human, and Being Better at it”

What Comes Out

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 Amid a spike in Covid and other illnesses as end-of-summer travel bugs collide with back-to-school germs, its hard not to be on the side of the Pharisees when they ask why Jesus’s disciples are eating with unwashed hands. So I want to be very clear- Jesus is not condemning hand hygiene.Continue reading “What Comes Out”

A Day in the Life

Mark 1:29-39 There are some days when I feel especially grateful to the hundreds and thousands of people who contributed to the composition and preservation of the Scriptures. Today, as we read this passage from Mark, is one of those days. A lot of people over two thousand years and many continents made it possibleContinue reading “A Day in the Life”

What To Do at the End of the World

Matthew 25:31-46 Lately, I’ve been having a lot of conversations about the end of the world. The pandemic, the once-in-a-generation cataclysms that are happening multiple times a year, the horrors of war and genocide all have us anxious, and grieving, and exhausted. A friend who lives and works in Jerusalem recently said to me “IContinue reading “What To Do at the End of the World”

Keeping the Light-Together

Matthew 25:1-13 There is a lot going on in the world and in our individual lives right now that might be affecting our sleep. The time change and the changing seasons, shortened days and longer nights are the least troubling of these, but still they affect us in our bodies and impact our ability toContinue reading “Keeping the Light-Together”