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Job 23:1-9, 16-17
Proper 23B
If you read the John Grisham novel The Firm, you may recall the horrifying moment when a young lawyer and his wife discover that the house so “generously” provided to them by the young man’s law firm is bugged to the hilt. Every conversation they had had, every lovemaking sigh, every TV show they had…
Psalm 90:12-17
Proper 23B
The middle section of Psalm 90 – omitted by this week’s lection in the RCL – deals with the wrath of God, and that is probably why the Lectionary averts its eyes from that part on every occasion when Psalm 90 pops up in the Lectionary. Yet it is a key part of what is…
Job 1:1, 2:1-10
Proper 22B
Comments, Observations, and Questions As most everyone knows, the Book of Job is essentially one long disquisition on the age-old question of theodicy: Why does a good God let bad things happen to good people? The conversations that take place around this question eat up the bulk of this book until finally God comes on…
Psalm 8
Proper 22B
Comments, Observations, and Questions The Lectionary usually reserves Psalm 8 for Trinity Sunday as it is assigned for that day in both Year A and Year C of the RCL. Oddly, it is not a cinch to see how Psalm 8 fits a Trinitarian theme but since in Year B we are getting this psalm…
Psalm 19:7-14
Proper 21B
Admittedly Psalm 19 all-but begs to get split into two parts. That does not mean, however, that the Lectionary was correct to cave into doing just that. Whoever wrote this poem saw unity in it even if the rest of us ever since have had to work a bit to connect the first 6 verses…
Esther 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22
Proper 21B
There is not much Esther in the Revised Common Lectionary, and few pastors have ever complained or requested more. The Lectionary likewise does little with Song of Songs or Jude, and if you follow only the Lectionary, you would be unlikely to generate a long series of sermons on Nahum or Revelation, either. And it’s…
Psalm 54
Proper 20B
In TV shows and movies—often as part of a comedic scene but sometimes in a more serious vein too—we have all seen the musical and visual effect that signals someone is having a flashback of a memory or is getting ready to recount something from his or her past. As you can see in the…
Proverbs 31:10-31
Proper 20B
What are we to make of this conclusion to Proverbs? In the past some women saw it as a kind of blueprint for life and so were honored if they could be seen as fitting this profile of the “wife of noble character.” Not surprisingly, more recent times have witnessed other reactions. Some now more-or-less…
Psalm 116:1-9
Proper 19B
For many of us, we cannot read the opening verses of Psalm 116 without thinking of the lovely song based on it that has become popular in recent years. What the song gets right is the lyric words of the first two verses because the psalmist swiftly moves from the grateful observation that God heard…
Proverbs 1:20-33
Proper 19B
In Plato’s dialogue Phaedrus Socrates tells an ancient Egyptian legend about a king named Thamus and a god named Theuth. Theuth, it seems, was an inventor of great tools and new technologies. One day he showed King Thamus a vast array of his inventions, climaxing with his most recent innovation: writing. The inventor proudly told…
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