September 23, 2018 - Proper 20B

Lectionary Readings

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit ☩ one God and mother of us all. Amen.

            Today’s Gospel text from Mark is iconic, and I mean that literally. Sunday School classrooms and nurseries around the world have paintings of Jesus taking a little child into his arms as he teaches his disciples that “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.” The reason why this Biblical scene so often appears in relation to ministry with children is that it is a sweet and endearing depiction of Jesus. The image seems to reassure nervous parents that it’s okay to leave your child under the watchful eye of Jesus. And certainly, commending our loved ones to God’s care and keeping is a good thing to do. But this enacted parable that Jesus offers about children coming to him is not, at its root, a story about a cuddly Jesus; rather it gives us a radical and subversive example what it means to follow Jesus.

October 4, 2015 - Proper 22B

Lectionary Readings

In the name of God- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            Imagine that you lost everything. You get into an accident on the way to work and your car is totaled. When you get to the office, you find out that you’ve been fired. So you go home, only to see several fire trucks in front of the place where your house used to stand. Tragically, all of your children also died in that fire. Your phone then rings and it’s your doctor calling you with the test results, and it isn’t good news. Then your neighbor comes over to you and says “What did you do to make God so angry at you?” You insist that your actions didn’t warrant such calamities, but everyone around you insists that this is all your fault. The question that haunts you is “Why did this all happen to me?”

September 20, 2015 - Proper 20B

Lectionary Readings

In the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

            Silence. Our world is so full of stimuli that we are often uncomfortable with silence. There are a lot of reasons why we are silent. Sometimes we are speechless and there just aren’t words that fit the situation. Sometimes we are silent because we are hoping to hear the still small voice of God in prayer. Other times we are silent because we’re afraid of saying the wrong thing. Those of you who are teachers, or students, know that silence in class often means that someone didn’t do the assigned reading. Sometimes silence is a form of protest or anger, as in giving someone the “silent treatment.” Sometimes we are silent when we are guilty and have chosen to “plead the Fifth.” Sometimes we are silent because we just don’t know what to say. Sometime we are silent when we have a question, but are afraid of what the answer might be. Silence comes up twice in the gospel text from Mark this morning, and looking into the meaning behind these silences shows us something about what it is like to follow Jesus.