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Psalm 103:1-8
Proper 16C
There are some pieces of music, certain poems, some scenes in movies that are so lyric, so moving, so flat out beautiful that it doesn’t matter how often you hear it, read it, or see it: it gets you every time. Psalm 103 is like that. I usually balk a bit when the Lectionary slices…
Jeremiah 1:4-10
Proper 16C
Sometimes it feels as though the Lectionary has a mild case of Alzheimer’s, because it seems to forget that we just talked about a certain text, just a few months ago. Now here it is again in the cycle of readings. That’s the case on this Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost, deep in the heart of…
Psalm 82
Proper 15C
What are we to make of Psalm 82? Who are the “gods” that get referred to multiple times? If you as an orthodox believer are convinced there really are no other gods beyond the God and Father of Jesus Christ, then these references to other gods may be a bit unsettling. But as I read…
Isaiah 5:1-7
Proper 15C
This will be a hard text to preach in many settings. I’ve tried to imagine preaching it in my last congregation, a congregation of privilege located in a neighborhood of disadvantaged people. My church had a number of ministries in that neighborhood, because we understood our responsibility for the poor. A significant number of our…
Psalm 33:12-22
Proper 14C
Suppose you are a person who is very leery of civil religion, of the possible idolatry that can come when people equate a given nation with God’s kingdom. Well, in that case, Psalm 33:12a might give you pause, or it might flat out trouble you a bit. “Blessed is the nation whose God is Yahweh.” …
Isaiah 1:1, 10-20
Proper 14C
Our reading for today is arguably the most important of the Lectionary’s 69 selections from Isaiah, because it summarizes the message of this truly “major” prophet. Verse 1 reveals the author, place and time of this prophecy. Most significantly, it tells us why we should listen to the prophet—what he writes is the “vision” he…
Psalm 49:1-12
Proper 13C
At times there is a very fine line separating the poems we call Psalms from the biblical literature we call Wisdom such as in the Book of Proverbs. Psalm 49 is a classic example of a definite blurring of that fine line. In fact, Psalm 49 sounds sufficiently like any number of passages in Proverbs…
Hosea 11:1-11
Proper 13C
Marcion was the first to do it, but surely not the last. In the middle of the second century after Christ, Marcion taught that the God of the Old Testament was different than the Father of Jesus Christ. The God of the Old Testament was angry, violent, judgmental, and not worth following if you were…
Psalm 138
Proper 12C
Psalm 138 has features shared by many psalms of praise. There are vows to praise God. There are references to the poet’s motivations for praising God. There is the ardent hope that eventually all the earth and all the kings and peoples of the earth will learn to praise Israel’s God as well. Like most…
Hosea 1:2-10
Proper 12C
How on earth can you preach this strange and sordid text? Well, ask yourself this question. How do you get someone to stop doing something dangerous when they simply won’t listen to you? The other day my youngest grandson, a daring dynamo of perpetual motion, had entered a goofy phase and was riding one of…
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