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Romans 10:5-15
Proper 14A
This Sunday’s Epistolary Lesson ought to make perhaps especially its proclaimers’ ears perk up. Particularly its end, after all, emphasizes the extreme importance of the work of proclamation. In Romans 9 Paul insists that salvation doesn’t depend on people’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. However, that raises the question of whether people have…
Romans 9:1-5
Proper 13A
Pain saturates this Sunday’s RCL Epistolary Lesson. Romans 9 nearly overflows with what Paul calls his sorrow and anguish over widespread Jewish failure to faithfully receive God’s grace. It’s grief that’s a close relative of what some of Romans 9’s proclaimers also feel. It’s similar to the sorrow we feel over the failure of some…
Romans 8:26-39
Proper 12A
So many Christians cherish this passage that it’s sometimes easy to lose sight of its central meaning. Paul talks in it about pivotal truths like providence, predestination and justification. Yet all of those things are like signs along the road that point to one central truth: God’s love is as invincible as it is sometimes…
Romans 8:12-25
Proper 11A
Parents take better care of their attractive children than they do their less attractive ones. At least that’s what an article in the 2008 edition of The New York Times reported Canadian researchers discovered. Researchers at the University of Alberta observed more than 400 parents’ treatment of their children during 14 different trips to supermarkets….
Romans 8:1-11
Proper 10A
Few cinematic images are more powerful than that of a courtroom as a verdict is announced. In classic movies, the judge often verbally polls each individual member of the jury. Each offers crushing repetition. It’s especially poignant when the verdict is “Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!” The fear of having some great power or person pronounce us…
Romans 7:15b-25
Proper 9A
Those who find it relatively easy to lose weight can’t see the not-so-civil war that’s constantly being waged inside those who must struggle to drop pounds. I, for example, want to do the good that is eating less junk food and more healthy food. In fact, I know that I should eat fewer potato chips…
Romans 6:12-23
Proper 8A
Among the first times our text’s “The wages of sin is death” grabbed my attention was via a billboard. At that its grammar captivated me. I even remember asking my grammarian dad why Paul used a plural noun like “wages” with a singular verb like “is.” Now when I drive past that same billboard, however,…
Romans 6:1b-11
Proper 7A
Baptisms are usually joyful occasions. In the church I pastor we gather children to a place where they can watch what’s happening. Most of us end up smiling before the baptism’s all done. However, as a colleague has noted, if we really understood what’s happening when we baptize people, we might be more sober about…
Romans 5:1-8
Proper 6A
Is there any phrase in the English lexicon that’s stranger than “to die for”? After all, when we claim something is “to die for,” we’re not describing something that’s as tragic as death itself. I’ve never heard anyone say, for instance, that racial injustice or a global pandemic was “to die for” – even though…
Romans 8:6-11
Lent 5A
Romans 8: is there a better loved, more soaring passage in the New Testament than this one? There is much here to linger over, savor, celebrate. The Lectionary carves out only six verses but the truth is, Romans 8:1-17 form such a logical—and also lyric—unit that I would suggest reading all 17 verses, and indeed,…
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