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Hebrews 2:10-18
1st Sunday after Christmas A
God’s power cannot cut it. That’s both the bottom line and the upshot of this part of Hebrews 2. Isn’t that weird, though? Isn’t that counter-intuitive? How often haven’t most of us said or thought something along the lines of “If only I were in charge . . . If only I were in control…
Luke 2:1-20
Christmas Day A
Psychologist Jonathan Haidt once published some very intriguing data on what he calls “elevation,” which is the opposite of disgust. We all know that there are any number of things that disgust us or cause us to feel revulsion. When we witness hypocrisy, cruelty, betrayal, and the like, we recoil–there are even certain physical sensations…
Titus 2:11-14
Christmas Day A
Yes, this text is aptly Christmas-like enough, being all about the “appearing” or Epiphany of God’s Son into our world. It’s all about God’s “indescribable gift” to the world and so has plenty of Advent and Christmas Day resonances. Yet in a real way this is the Christmas story for the day after Christmas, the…
Matthew 1:18-25
Advent 4A
Suppose that one day you were reading a story in which an elderly woman is talking to her pregnant granddaughter. “Now listen, my dear,” the old woman says, “I would ask that you name this child after your grandfather and so give him the name Nelson.” Suppose the young woman agrees. “OK, Grandma, his name…
Romans 1:1-7
Advent 4A
“To God’s beloved ones in Rome.” Such a simple, such a commonplace way to open a letter. We read such a salutation in all of the New Testament’s many epistles. And it’s easy to breeze right past it, hurry on by to get to the meat of the letter, the real important stuff about the…
Matthew 11:2-11
Advent 3A
Last year it was the cups at Starbucks. But every year somebody finds something by which to allege that a coordinated war is being waged on Christmas. Last year since Starbucks stopped putting Merry Christmas on its red holiday paper coffee cups, some customers did a coy end-run on it all by giving their names…
Luke 1:46b-55
Advent 3A
Our news media are full of stories about invasions: invasive species, invading armies, invasive procedures, and, on the entertainment page, invasions of aliens or zombies. Since it is about real life, the Bible is also full of stories about invasions of one sort or another. More importantly, its central story is about God’s invasion of…
James 5:7-10
Advent 3A
You can parachute right down onto James 5:7 if you want to and pretend nothing else is going on here but . . . good luck. Truth is, starting a reading at verse 7 here is like walking into a room where, unbeknownst to you, a horrible fight had just been taking place between two…
Matthew 3:1-12
Advent 2A
Across the United States in recent weeks, there have been tidal waves of accusation and blame, counter-accusations and blame, judgments and more judgments from the left and from the right and from all points in between. Political parties are said to have been judged by the voters. Individual politicians are said to have been repudiated…
Romans 15:4-13
Advent 2A
Acoustics are everything when it comes to how a text is heard but in these days of political turmoil—a roiling pot of many feelings that is bubbling up in also the church—Paul’s call to “accept one another” for the sake of God’s greater glory is bracing. Right now a lot of people I know—including the…
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