September 24, 2023 - The Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

Divine Vineyard Owner, help us to see all people, ourselves included, with the eyes of your gracious love. Amen.

            I was listening to an interview recently with a professional taster. Doesn’t that sound like a fun job – people are so interested in your tasting notes that you can make a living out of tasting things and telling people what you taste? Well, someone asked him why it is that we can taste something today and then taste the exact same thing tomorrow and it tastes different. His answer was that the food or drink hasn’t changed, rather, we have. Our mood, how hungry we are, our hydration level, what our allergies are like, when the last time we brushed our teeth was, and what else we’ve had to eat or drink that day all change the chemistry of our mouths. The taste hasn’t changed, but the taster has.

September 17, 2023 - The Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

O God of our salvation, your presence makes all the difference, thank you for being with us. Amen.

            Sometimes, in order to understand a story, there is a central part of it that we can’t miss. Think about trying to understand the history of the United States without discussing the Civil War, or watching Star Wars without knowing the identity of Darth Vader, or having a healthy relationship with a spouse and not knowing what their childhood was like. Some parts of the story are so integral that, without those details, the rest of the story falls apart. Well, that’s how central the story of the Exodus that we heard this morning is when it comes to our faith.

September 10, 2023 - The Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

O Lord, we thank you for giving us to one another, help us to live with one another. Amen.

            A fitness coach that I’ve worked with is a world-class coach – Dan John has worked with NFL teams, Olympians, and collegiate champions and he’s learned a lot about helping people grow. In college, he was a discus thrower, and he still works with a lot of track and field athletes and likes to tell the story of teaching a group of young athletes who were learning how to throw. He told the group that the discus throw is a simple movement: twist, step, twist, jump, and he demonstrated it. Simple. Then a young athlete tried to mimic the motion and tripped over his own legs, fell to the ground, and complained “You said this was easy.” Coach responded, “No. I said it was simple, not easy.”

September 3, 2023 - The Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Lectionary Readings

Holy Spirit, set us ablaze with your love, that we might be lights to the world. Amen.

            “Earth’s crammed with heaven, and every common bush afire with God, but only they who see takes off their shoes; the rest sit round and pluck blackberries.” That is a part of a poem by Elizabeth Barret Browning, an English poet who lived in the 1800s. It’s one of my favorite lines in poetry, or prose, and you’ve probably heard me quote it before. My hope is that if you haven’t yet heard me say it enough to have it memorized, that, eventually, you will. In a nutshell, that’s what faith is all about – being alive to the fact that, indeed, every bush is afire with God. As our first reading this morning is Moses’ divine encounter at the burning bush, it is good to remember that earth is crammed with heaven.