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Isaiah 25:6-9
Easter Day B
Easter Sunday may not seem like an ideal time to compare God’s kingdom to Isaiah 25’s lavish feast. After all, many of those who proclaim and hear the Old Testament lesson the Lectionary appoints for this Sunday will spend at least some of Easter preparing, eating and cleaning up food. Yet nearly every culture and…
Psalm 31:9-16
Lent 6B
The Revised Common Lectionary has two suggested readings from the Psalms for this Sixth Sunday of Lent, Palm Sunday. The first, Psalm 118, emphasizes the positive side of this day with lots of verses that anticipate Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. The second, Psalm 31:9-16, zeros in on the tragedy of Palm Sunday, the gathering…
Isaiah 50:4-9a
Lent 6B
Isaiah 50:4-9a’s juxtaposition of beauty and brutality is so jarring that it may be disconcerting. Yet that combination is part of what helps make our text in so many ways reminiscent of daily life. After all, it sometimes feels as if we’re almost constantly moving from beauty to brutality (and then, so often, right back…
Psalm 119:9-16
Lent 5B
The Revised Common Lectionary has two suggestions from the Psalter for this Fifth Sunday of Lent—Psalm 51:1-12 and Psalm 119:9-16. Psalm 51 is, of course, the quintessential Lenten Psalm, full of guilt and contrition because a terrible sin has been committed by a man who was sinful from birth. Psalm 119 is all about how…
Jeremiah 31:31-34
Lent 5B
When I was in Sunday School, we sang, “Into my heart,/ come into my heart, Lord Jesus./ Come in today,/ come in to stay,/ come into my heart, Lord Jesus.” As we sang, we imagined Jesus standing and knocking as long it takes for us to faithfully open the door to and invite him into…
Psalm 107:1-3, 17-22
Lent 4B
Psalm 107 was originally a liturgy of thanksgiving offered at one of Israel’s great festivals, as evidenced by the opening call to give thanks and the repeated refrain, “Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men.” The theme of this thanksgiving is the often-repeated word, hesed,…
Numbers 21:4-9
Lent 4B
Snakes have had, at best, a mixed reputation throughout history. Some people have associated them with healing. A snake, after all, represented Asclepius, the Greek god of healing. The modern symbol of the medical profession is also a snake wrapped around a branch. What’s more, in some passages in Scripture, snakes also have somewhat positive…
Psalm 19
Lent 3B
As I begin this piece, I am thinking about Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Underground Railroad, which follows two escaped slaves, Caesar and Cora, as they journey on a literal underground railroad to the north and freedom. On this Third Sunday of Lent we are a little less than half way on our journey…
Exodus 20:1-17
Lent 3B
If we were to poll North Americans about what God is like, most of those who believe in God might say God is nice or forgiving. If we were to poll them about what God looks like, many would answer God looks like a loving grandparent or kind uncle or aunt. How can we know…
Psalm 22:23-31
Lent 2B
Psalm 22 is the quintessential Lenten Psalm. Most obviously, Jesus quoted verse 1 on the cross and many scholars think that he quoted the rest of the Psalm throughout that dark time of God-forsakenness. Certainly, the Psalm has lines that perfectly fit other moments of his crucifixion. And the first Christians used this Psalm more…
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