Search Results: epiphany

John 1:29-42

Epiphany 2A

The lamb of God.  Agnus Dei.  The lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.   Agnus Dei tolle peccato mundi.  It is so familiar to us.  Even if you Google that Latin phrase Agnus Dei, you instantly get over 10 million hits.  And that’s in Latin!  (Maybe these days quid quo pro…

Read More

Matthew 3:13-17

Epiphany 1A

Poor John.  It didn’t look right.  What was going on here?  This was not the public appearance of Jesus that John had set everyone up to see (cf. Matthew 3:1-12 for goodness sake!!!).  As Matthew 3 ends, you can almost picture John the Baptist carrying on with the rest of that day’s baptisms with a…

Read More

Luke 9:28-36

Transfiguration Sunday C

[…] manages to radiate the energy and light of a lightning bolt is mighty powerful and mighty bright. Yet we are told that for a time during this epiphany of glory, the disciples were sleepy!  It took a bit, apparently, before they even fully woke up (and then saw something so odd they must have […]

Read More

Luke 6:27-38

Epiphany 7C

If you are a preacher who likes to highlight the fact that Jesus was always friendliest toward the very same “sinners” that were shunned by the religious authorities of his day, then it can be a little disconcerting to hear Jesus in this passage use the word “sinners” in what sounds like a pejorative way. …

Read More

Mark 1:21-28

Epiphany 4B

It was the Sabbath and so, naturally, the Jews of Capernaum went to the synagogue.  Some of them went sleepily, others went with a great weariness following a busy week of work.  Still others trekked over in a rather irritable mood for who knows why–maybe it had been no more than that they were out…

Read More

Mark 1:14-20

Epiphany 3B

Comments and Observations If Mark were a Broadway play, then the first 13 verses are like the overture.  As we come to verse 14, the curtain is about to go up on the drama and when it does we see . . . Galilee.  We’re not in a bigger city like Jerusalem or Sepphoris or…

Read More

Mark 1:4-11

Epiphany 1B

Comments and Observations: Fans of Peter Jackson’s films in The Lord of the Rings trilogy will recall the opening sequence in the final film, The Return of the King (all this years before Jackson’s—in my humble opinion—disastrous return to Tolkien in his Hobbit trilogy!).  As the movie opens, we are taken back hundreds of years…

Read More

Mark 1:29-39

Epiphany 5B

Usually we are far too casual about God’s kingdom. “Your kingdom come, your will be done” we say each time we intone the Lord’s Prayer, but when we finish our prayer and open our eyes, we do not see any such kingdom.  It is difficult for us to conceive of a kingdom that is not…

Read More

Mark 1:21-28

Epiphany 4B

It was the Sabbath and so, naturally, the Jews of Capernaum went to the synagogue. Some of them went sleepily, others went with a great weariness following a busy week of work. Still others trekked over in a rather irritable mood for who knows why–maybe it had been no more than that they were out…

Read More

Mark 1:14-20

Epiphany 3B

If Mark were a Broadway play, then the first 13 verses are like the overture.  As we come to verse 14, the curtain is about to go up on the drama and when it does we see . . . Galilee.  We’re not in a bigger city like Jerusalem or Sepphoris or Rome.  Nope, little…

Read More