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Acts 8:26-40
Easter 5B
May I just ask a rather simple, straightforward question: Where in the whole wide world did this Ethiopian fellow get a copy of Isaiah?? I mean, it’s not like he had downloaded it onto his Kindle. It’s not as though while he was in Jerusalem he found it on the “remaindered scrolls” table at the…
1 John 4:7-21
Easter 5B
Comments and Observations When I read this passage, I hear the Beatles’ famous song, “All You Need Is Love.” But I don’t hear John agreeing with John, Paul, George, and Ringo–not completely. Though he insists on the absolute importance of love, John has more important things to say about love than “all you need is…
John 10:11-18
Easter 4B
Comments and Observations: Today we don’t have shepherds in the wider society. Today we have managers. But shepherds and managers are not the same. Whenever Jesus uses the pastoral image of a shepherd for himself, the point is nearly always the same: as the good shepherd of his sheep, he will risk his life and…
Acts 4:5-12
Easter 4B
Comments and Observations If only the Common Lectionary had gone on just one more verse! Stopping shy of verse 13 deprives us from seeing one of the great passages of the Bible. Because it is there that the ruling authorities—who are seeking to hush up the apostles—find themselves powerfully impressed that the people doing all…
1 John 3:16-24
Easter 4B
Comments and Observations Rarely is taking a test a joyful experience, but the author of I John has woven four tests into his letter/sermon designed to bring his readers joy. “We write this to make our (yours and mine?) joy complete.” (I John 1:4) The way to complete joy, he says, is to be sure…
Luke 24:36-48
Easter 3B
Comments and Observations The end of Luke’s Gospel sums it all up pretty well. In swift strokes of Luke’s quill, we move from Easter Sunday evening directly to the Ascension of Jesus (just beyond the bounds of this lection). We learn from Luke’s other New Testament contribution, Acts, that Jesus lingered in physical form for…
Acts 3:12-19
Easter 3B
Similar to what Jesus taught him and the other disciples at the end of Luke 24 (the Gospel lection for this same week in the Year B Lectionary), Peter in Acts 3 suggests that the healing of the crippled beggar—who was even then still hanging on Peter’s pant leg—is less a startling, previously unheard-of event…
1 John 3:1-7
Easter 3B
Comments and Observations As I meditated on these words, two pictures from my last church came to mind. I saw 50 fresh faced, neatly dressed girls, ranging in age from 8 to 13, sitting behind me in the choir loft as I preached from this text. This was on a Sunday that honored those girls. …
John 20:19-31
Easter 2B
Comments and Observations: Doubting Thomas. Don’t you hate it when you make one mistake and it defines you from then on out?! One little mistake and Thomas becomes a morality lesson, a byword, a counter-example of anything we’d ever want to be. In truth, however, there is more than a little of Thomas in all…
Acts 4:32-35
Easter 2B
Comments and Observations Acts 4 is enough to break your heart. Was it really true at the earliest stage of the Christian community that the believers were completely one in heart and mind? Did they really share absolutely everything even as they fell adoringly and reverently at the feet of the apostles, hanging on their…
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