Micah 3:5-12 Sermon Commentary
Proper 26A
After spending a sustained amount of time in the books of Genesis and Exodus over the summer and early Fall, in the month-long lead up to Advent, the Lectionary plops us down into 4 different prophetic books. So part of the commentary each week will be to orient us to the argument of the book…
Psalm 43 Sermon Commentary
Proper 26A
If you rounded up some Old Testament scholars and especially those who are experts on the Book of Psalms, you would likely find consensus among most of those people that Psalms 42 and 43 belong together such that you really cannot look at one without the other. Some might contend this had originally been a…
1 John 3:1-3 Sermon Commentary
Proper 26A
Note: Since this passage is the suggested one for All Saints Day rather than Proper 26, preachers who wish to preach on 1 Thessalonians 2:9-13 may feel free to consult previous commentaries on it found on this site at (https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2023-10-30/1-thessalonians-29-13-3/) and (https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2020-10-26/1-thessalonians-29-13-2/). In a culture that was once enamored with the concept of love,…
Matthew 23:1-12 Sermon Commentary
Proper 26A
Jesus has confounded and humbled the leaders by his words, challenging them in such a way that they have had to realize that they do not, in fact, know it all. As we ended last week, the leaders of the synagogue are not able to answer Jesus’s question about the Messiah and now they do…
Deuteronomy 34:1-12 Sermon Commentary
Proper 25A
A Sunday Too Soon Looking at this reading and the liturgical calendar, I can’t help lamenting that the text has come just one Sunday too early. November 1 is celebrated, in many church traditions, as All Saints Day — an opportunity to remember our ancestors in faith. Certainly, this story of Moses on the cusp…
Psalm 1 Sermon Commentary
Proper 25A
Psalm 1 is such a positional psalm. By that I mean that from start to finish this song is all about where a person is situated and what their posture or position is. We begin with a negative litany of where a blessed person must not be. A blessed person does not walk with sinners,…
1 Thessalonians 2:1-8 Sermon Commentary
Proper 25A
In verse 4’s heart of this Sunday’s Epistolary Lesson lies a perhaps largely unnoticed but most extraordinary claim: God has “entrusted” [pisteuthenai*] Jesus’ friends “with the gospel [euangelion].” No news is greater than that of salvation through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ that we receive with our faith. Yet the apostle audaciously…
Matthew 22:34-46 Sermon Commentary
Proper 25A
These two sections seem like odd bedfellows, as though Jesus seized the opportunity of having the Pharisees “gathered together” to give them a little food for thought. But maybe they are more connected than they seem. Are these the same Pharisees that sent their servants to challenge and entrap Jesus earlier in the chapter (last…
Matthew 22:15-22 Sermon Commentary
Proper 24A
The challengers come to Jesus feeling sly and like they have an Ace in their pocket. They leave their encounter with Jesus amazed even though they have “lost.” You’d think they had just watched a street performer do the most amazing trick they’ve ever seen! What’s probably happened, though, if they were truly listening to…
Sermon Commentary Library
Our weekly sermon commentaries are Lectionary-based, which across its three-year cycle, encompass a vast array of biblical texts. Filter the Sermon Commentary Library to search Scripture texts by book and chapter to find commentary, illustrations, and reflections to spark ideas.
Looking for something else? View our Heidelberg Catechism sermon resources and our Reformed Connections to the RCL section that traces Lectionary texts to specific parts of the Heidelberg Catechism and the Belgic Confession.