Tag: Series A
-
Palm Sunday (Passion According to St. Matthew)
Matthew 26:1-35 Jesus is surrounded by failures. The woman who anoints him does a beautiful work, Judas who betrays him, the eleven other disciples who claim to be faithful but later abandon him. And this is nothing unique to this moment in time. Among people, we are a mixed bag. We have good intentions at…
-
Fifth Sunday in Lent (John 11:1-45)
The Lord had an existing relationship with the family. He loved them. He cared about Lazarus in his illness, the suffering he was enduring. (v. 5) We should keep this in mind, first of all, as we see what He does. Because of this love, he stayed two days longer, to the point at which…
-
Fourth Sunday in Lent (John 9:1-41)
Times of disaster often bring out the theologian in people. We want to know why bad things happen. This is called “theodicy.” It comes from the Greek words for God and justify, and it cuts two ways. First, it serves to justify God’s right to send suffering, and this is what happens when we try…
-
Third Sunday in Lent (Text: John 4:5-26)
Ignorance about God is a serious problem. Now, very few people would actually say they don’t know much about God. More common is the idea that we know enough about God to get by. You know, as much as country music songs teach us about God and Jesus and the importance of saying prayers. But…
-
First Sunday in Lent (Matthew 4:1-11)
Jesus’ ministry begins not in a lush garden in the presence of God as it was in the beginning, but in the wilderness of a world that is under the curse of sin and death. His ministry after being baptized in the Jordan and declared to be the Son of God, goes immediately into the…
-
The Transfiguration of Our Lord (2 Peter 1:16-21)
“While I was thus in the act of calling upon God, I discovered a light appearing in my room, which continued to increase until the room was lighter than at noonday, when immediately a personage appeared at my bedside, standing in the air, for his feet did not touch the floor. “He had on a…
-
Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany (Matthew 5:21-37)
Jesus cuts to the chase. He doesn’t sugar coat His message to lure people in with fluffy words, only to hook them. Right away, He gets to what His work is about by confronting us our failures by the Ten Commandments. But He doesn’t quite follow the order given on Sinai (Exodus 20:1-20)—first our duty…
-
Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany (Matthew 5:13-20)
There are two errors that we can fall into with good works: One error is that we can prove to God and others by our actions that we are good. The proof that we are right with God is that we are busy doing the things God apparently wants. This happens in many Christian churches…
-
Purification of Mary and Presentation of Our Lord (Luke 2:22-32)
The Gnostics of the first century imported many strange ideas into the Christian Church. Named after their chief aim: knowledge/gnosis, they believed the story of salvation was that the stuff of this world was evil and foreign. Our true selves were meant to dwell in spiritual forms. They taught that Jesus came to impart this…
-
Second Sunday after the Epiphany (John 1:29-42a)
Every year in January, the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is a chance for manufacturers to tout their latest innovations, upgrades in the most attractive way. This year’s convention had everything from a foldable tablet to a spoof toilet paper robot by Charmin. But every year the theme is celebrating the new and leaving the old…