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Jeremiah 18:1-11
Proper 18C
Illustration: One of the most delightful challenges of pastoring is attempting answer kids’ questions about God. They are unfiltered and haven’t yet learned the church rules dictating what one can wonder, ask or assert about who God is and how God works in the world. (Maybe this is what Jesus intended when he wished that…
Psalm 1 2025
Proper 18C
The Hebrew Psalter opens with a beatitude. But unlike Jesus’s well-known Beatitudes in Matthew 5 and Luke 6, Psalm 1’s blessing is not for something a given person is or does. No, this blessing gets pronounced over those who do not engage in certain activities. As beatitudes go, then, this one is rather different. A…
Psalm 112 2025
Proper 17C
Depending on where you are “at” these days, it could well be the case that reading Psalm 112 is a little difficult. Sunny promises tumble over top of one another in these ten short verses. Lyric descriptions of all the good things that come to righteous and good people stack up like cord wood. There…
Jeremiah 2:4-13 2025
Proper 17C
Kicked When You Are Down Immediately, in chapter two, Jeremiah seems to be working counter one of MLK’s principles of non-violent resistance. That resistance “seeks to win friendship and understanding.” Instead, against the backdrop of Babylon’s siege of Jerusalem, Jeremiah seems to be standing over the people saying, “you know, if you think about it,…
Psalm 103:1-8 2025
Proper 16C
As lyric psalms go, it is tough to beat Psalm 103. The RCL is having us look at only the first eight of the psalm’s twenty-two verses but we know this poem stays on high notes of beauty and praise throughout. In a couple of the congregations to which I have belonged the pastors used…
Jeremiah1:4-10 2025
Proper 16C
Context I’m spending a bit more time this week on some background information, as well as a potential framing for a series (see below: Illustration) since we are going to be in Jeremiah for much of the late summer and fall. In fact, the book of Jeremiah provides far more in terms of historical context…
Psalm 82
Proper 15C
Some translations of Psalm 82, including the New International Version I typically look at, put scare quotes around the three instances of the word “gods” in this short psalm. Sometimes such scare quotes get called air quotes if invoked by a preacher or other public speaker. If you say, “Well, according to certain ‘experts’ ….
Jeremiah 23:23-29
Proper 15C
Dreams and Discernment Taken on its own, this text would leave us thinking dreams are a terrible way of knowing the truth. But then consider a couple experiences in the book of Genesis — I’m thinking of both Jacob and Joseph — and the prophet Joel who promises that one day God’s people will “see…
Genesis 15:1-6
Proper 14C
Illustration I suppose it’s fair to say that Hebrew Scripture has been in the cultural zeitgeist long enough that its contents are public domain. I mean, I don’t even know who would be qualified to bring a lawsuit on behalf of … Moses? At the same time, I do think you could make a plausible…
Psalm 33:12-22
Proper 14C
When I was somewhere around the age of 9 years old and my brother was 5 years old, my Dad bought us a Shetland-Welsh Pony. We had moved out to the country the year before and so had our own barn and fenced-in pasture. I had said I was interested in having a horse or…
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