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Matthew 5:21-37
Epiphany 6A
Say the word “radical” to the average person and the name of “Jesus” will likely not be the first thing that springs to anyone’s mind. If you think about “radical acts,” the Sermon on the Mount is unlikely to come to mind, either. Radicals throw Molotov cocktails at police and stage sit-ins and carry placards…
1 Corinthians 3:1-9
Our text marks what may feel like a rather abrupt change in tone. After all, in the Epistolary Lesson the RCL appoints for this week, Paul portrays the Corinthian Christians quite differently than he did at the beginning of his first letter to them. In chapter 1:4-9 the apostle refers to them as graced by…
Matthew 5:13-20
Epiphany 5A
At a restaurant in California some while back I asked the waitress if their cioppino was good. She assured me it was. Cioppino is a wonderful seafood stew, and the server assured me theirs contained a lot of very fresh clams, shrimp, calamari, and more. I ordered it. And . . . it lacked all…
1 Corinthians 2:1-12 (13-16)
Epiphany 5A
Already on the first pages of J.K. Rowling’s first “Harry Potter” book we knew she was going to come up with a whole little universe of wild and funny things. The first such gadget we encounter is Dumbledore’s “deluminator.” It was the opposite of a cigarette lighter—you did not use the deluminator to light a…
Matthew 5:1-12
Epiphany 4A
Suppose you could combine the personality traits of the Beatitudes and put them all into one person. What would Mr. or Miss Beatitude look like? Well, he would be consistently kind and yet also a bit shy, shunning the limelight. He would always downplay his own actions by claiming they were never enough to achieve…
1 Corinthians 1:18-31
Epiphany 4A
In a fine sermon commentary on this text (from which I drew numerous ideas for this commentary), Scott Hoezee suggests that there’s a danger in spending as much time in church and around Christians as some preachers and teachers do. It’s that this whole Christianity business all starts to make too much sense to us….
Four Pages: All-Surpassing Power
This sermon was preached at the Calvin Symposium on Worship, January 30 & 31, 2014 Theme: God’s all-surpassing power is our hope in every weakness. Doctrine: Hope Image: Jars of Clay Need: To own that we are fragile & ordinary. Mission: To celebrate that God’s all-surpassing power is enough. Introduction to Scripture Brothers and…
Four Pages: Inconceivable! Bright Comfort in Death’s Shadow
Heidelberg Catechism Lord’s Day 22; preached in Bethel Christian Reformed Church, Sioux Center, Iowa PAGE 1: TROUBLE IN THE TEXT The Biblical text for this evening seems like a strange place to look for comfort. Jesus himself said it was “the hour when darkness reigns.” The hosts of hell were met in gleeful array around…
Matthew 4:12-23
Epiphany 3A
We’ve come to call it “the Holy Land.” From the Mediterranean Sea in the west to the country of Jordan in the east, from Syria in the north to the Sinai in the south, travel companies, tour groups, and tourists treat this piece of Middle Eastern real estate as a unity. It’s where Jesus walked…
1 Corinthians 1:10-18
Epiphany 3A
The Reformed expression of the Christian faith’s many strengths have not always included Christian unity. Reformed Christians’ actions have sometimes tweaked an old saying to sound something like, “Where two or three are gathered in Jesus’ name … there you have three or four Reformed denominations.” Presbyterians sometimes talk about “split p’s”. So this Sunday’s…
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