Ephesians 2:11-22 It’s almost impossible to hear this lesson from Ephesians without thinking of where we and our conflicted nation are today. We hear that Christ “has broken down the dividing wall,” and I’m very tempted to turn this sermon into a [...]
Mark 6:14-29 Around 2000 years ago there was a man who proclaimed that God's beloved community was just around the corner. It upset the powers that be, and so he was executed. But shortly afterwards rumors began to circulate that he had [...]
2 Corinthians 12:2-10 Christians can be so amusing to watch, except of course when we’re engaged in crusades and inquisitions. Nothing funny about that. But when it’s the small-scale, everyday jostling for recognition and influence we can look pretty comical. That’s all [...]
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27 How appropriate that this lesson occurs during Pride month! Given the culture wars of the past 50 years, this reading from 2 Samuel has become one of the most over-scrutinized passages in the Bible about an intriguing love [...]
Mark 4:35-41 Mark accepted and retold all sorts of stories about Jesus doing and saying things that exceeded everybody’s expectations. After all, if you’re part of a community that stakes its entire life on the outrageous story of the living, humanly divine [...]
Ezekiel 17:22-24; Mark 4:26-34 One of my favorite comedies is the Coen Brothers' movie, "Raising Arizona." Hi, the main character, falls in love with Ed (short for Edwina), the policewoman who keeps snapping his mugshots as he is repeatedly arrested and sent [...]
Mark 3:20-35 "A house divided against itself cannot stand." So says Jesus. You could call this his "House Divided Speech." Of course, if you google "House Divided Speech," you'll find a speech by Abraham Lincoln, not Jesus. And I suspect most of [...]
John 3:1-17 Nicodemus sneaks up to Jesus after dark and says how impressed he is with Jesus’ credentials, but Jesus doesn’t seem to be paying attention. Instead he launches into something totally unrelated. “You’ll never see God’s new world unless you’re reborn [...]
Acts 2:1-21 Who knows what to do with the Holy Spirit? Mystery writer Dorothy Sayers once wrote a tongue-in-cheek catechism back in the 1940s, where she tried to imagine what typical members of the Church of England might answer if they were [...]
John 17:11b-19 Jesus prayed that his followers might be preserved from division and falsehood, from the destructive forces we see at work in the world every day. It seems that the jury is still out on whether his prayer was ever granted. [...]