September 25, 2022 - The Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

Compassionate God, help us to see what you would have us to see and not be blinded by the distractions all around us ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            If last Sunday’s parable of the dishonest manager is the most difficult parable there is, we might have run into the second most challenging parable this morning. Sure, it seems like a fairly straightforward parable about the consequences of ignoring the needy, but, as always, Jesus doesn’t give us the parables as moralistic fairy tales. Instead, the parables are about the shocking, subversive, and saving grace of God. What makes this parable difficult is that there are so many things going on in it that we can be distracted from those notes of grace.

September 18, 2022 - The Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

Gracious Lord, help us to follow you, especially when we do not know how to ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            I hate this parable. Yes, I know that in Second Timothy we read that “All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,” but still, I hate this parable. I mean, seriously, “make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth”? That sounds more like something from an Enron deposition than it does Jesus. The parable does not have a clear meaning, it’s confusing, and just has a general feel of “ickiness.”

September 4, 2022 - The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

Help us, gracious God, to love in you all things and above all things ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            In the reading from Jeremiah, we have that wonderful image of God as the potter and us as the clay. Psalm 139 speaks of the intimacy and profoundness of God. And Philemon is the only Biblical book with only one chapter – so preaching on an entire book is rare opportunity. For the last week and a half, I’ve been trying to plan a sermon about one of those three texts.

August 28, 2022 - The Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

O God of grace and glory, thank you for inviting us to eat at your table ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            Ambition used to be a vice. Shakespeare wrote of the “canker of ambitious thoughts” and for most of history, ambition was seen as perhaps the greatest vice. The saying was “Fling away ambition: by that sin the angels fell.” St. Augustine wrote of ambition as a “pernicious sin,” saying that ambition is the primary obstacle in the way of Christian faithfulness. Today, we tell people to “reach for the stars” and that “you can do anything that you set your mind to,” which is an absolute lie. We speak of ambition not as a vice, but a virtue – an up-and-coming person is described as “ambitious.” Just this week, Meghan Markle debuted a podcast and the first episode is called “The Misconception of Ambition.” She says she had always thought of ambition as a good thing until meeting the Royal Family and was chided for it. Markle picked up the lesson that we teach in our society – you deserve the best and the only thing holding you back is how bold and ambitious you are.

August 21, 2022 - The Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

Loving God, set us free from all that holds us back from finding our rest in you ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            One of the best feelings in the world, at least as I’ve experienced it, is actually the lack of feeling. When you’ve been in pain and the pain goes away, it’s one of most wonderful feelings there is. Sometimes it’s a sunburn, sometimes a headache, sometimes a pulled muscle, sometimes the relief doesn’t come until after surgery to fix a knee, shoulder, or back, but there’s simply nothing like that feeling of relief. That release from pain, which might also call liberation or salvation, is what God intends for us all and one of the ways that God seeks to grant us this relief is through the Sabbath.

August 14, 2022 - The Tenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

Gracious God, help us to find the fullness of joy in following you ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            At St. Luke’s, we have an identity statement. I’ve never been much of a fan of mission statements because organizations invest a lot of time and money into creating one, and then everyone promptly forgets about it and gets back to business as usual. Furthermore, the mission statement of a Church is really quite simple: to do whatever it is that the Holy Spirit tells us to do. But an identity statement is different as it helps us to remember not what we are supposed to do, but rather who we are. And the difference between those two is significant.

August 7, 2022 - The Ninth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

O Lord, help us to worship you in Spirit and Truth ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            Ritual without justice is heresy. This is the message of the prophet Isaiah and one that the Church must always bear in mind. So often we think that religion is about what we think of God. But we have little evidence in Scripture or Tradition to suggest that God is concerned more about what we say in the Creed than how we treat our neighbors. When the people of God get into trouble it is by neglecting to do justice. To be clear, worship is always the foundation. There’s a reason why the Ten Commandments begin with prohibitions against serving false gods or using God’s name inappropriately. Worship is at the very heart of what it means to be God’s people. But what good is a heart without the rest of the body? This is what Isaiah and the prophets of God challenge us to see – faith isn’t simply about rituals, it is about justice. And if we practice some perversion of the faith without justice, well, that’s heresy.