For 40 days, Jesus wandered in the wilderness – inhabiting that arid landscape without food or shelter to speak of. He was accompanied only by desert-dwelling creatures and that ruinous tempter, the devil; weighed down by nothing more than his own thoughts and the lingering memory of his dunking in the Jordan River (how he must have longed for another drenching in the Jordan’s depths, during those weeks in the desert!). I wonder where his thoughts took him, as his stomach grumbled and his shoulders baked in the sun, whether he used the time to develop a strategy for his ministry, to chart a clear course and map out his miracles, or whether his thoughts were too muddled by hunger, so that he could think of only one thing: bread. Continue reading →
I can almost picture Jesus, walking down an empty road, dusting himself off, after having fled the angry mob of childhood friends that just tried to throw him off the cliff. “Well, that went well… Not.” What is going ON here? Jesus has been baptized by his cousin John in the Jordan River and spent 40 days in the wilderness, being tempted by Satan (we’ll get back to that story in a couple weeks). He emerges from the wilderness ‘filled with the power of the Holy Spirit,” energized by a clear sense of vision and mission, ready to launch his ministry. Of course, Nazareth is among his first stops. Jesus grew up in Nazareth.
According to the gospel of Luke, the angel Gabriel made a house call on Mary there, back when he first announced the news that Mary would bear the son of the Most High. We have no evidence that anyone else knew about that encounter; but then there were all the angels at his birth; and the shepherds spreading news throughout the countryside. And you know how word travels. So you figure the neighbors must have gotten wind of it sooner or later: that the child of Mary and Joseph was supposed to be someone special; that God had plans for him – they might even have heard the words messiah, or anointed one.
Maybe that’s part of the problem here. Maybe Jesus had become the hometown darling; the local kid destined for big things; the one on whose coattails the whole village would ride…right into the promised kingdom – where surely they would all receive honorary appointments and special favors because of their close ties to the Messiah. Surely, God would look upon this backwater town with special favor, after all they had done to help raise the Son of God…right? Continue reading →
This is, perhaps, one of the most potent and power-filled texts in all of scripture. It’s hard to choose; there’s lots of good stuff, but this is one of those where-the-rubber-hits-the–road scriptures, a pull-no-punches, here’s-what-it’s-all-about text. In these few verses, Jesus’ purpose is laid out. It’s a job description for the messiah, and, by extension, for the Church his followers founded. Continue reading →
I am still a little starry-eyed, in the wake of Epiphany. The lights on our Christmas tree, candles in the windows, stars hung in the sanctuary all fill me with a sense of warmth and wonder. It’s a bit magical, and I want to hold onto it. Those three magi – the wise men – who traveled from the east? Preacher Barbara Brown Taylor says their journey began when a star lodged in the right eye of each. “It was so bright [She writes,] that none of them could tell whether it was burning in the sky or in their own imaginations, but they were so wise that they knew it did not matter all that much. The point was, something beyond them was calling them, and it was a tug they had been waiting for all their lives.”[1]
The star revealed to them a child, a newborn babe …and something more Continue reading →
A young Sudanese woman – maybe a teenager, maybe in her early twenties, lies on her side on a bare mattress, her elbow resting on a pillow. She is dressed in a mustard-colored wrap and head covering with a coral-colored skirt. Next to her lies a newborn baby, bundled in a teddy-bear print blanket. Boy or girl, I can’t say. His or her dark, curly hair is damp; eyes are closed; a finger brushes tiny lips. They are in a hospital in a refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya. I do not know their story; the photograph and its caption are all I have to go on. Is the young mother content, apprehensive, relieved? Or all three? Continue reading →
What did Mary expect, as she approached Elizabeth’s home, as she headed down the path toward the front door of her older cousin’s house, mind still whirling with the details of her encounter with an angel named Gabriel. Did she expect Elizabeth to embrace her and her wild tale, or did she expect – even hope – that the older, wiser Elizabeth would set her straight? Would help her to get her head out of the clouds and her feet back on the ground? Mary had had time to think it over, on her journey across the countryside. Re-examined in the light of day, the whole thing seemed preposterous. That God would ask her to take on such a monumental role… Continue reading →
I have been preoccupied with questions recently. You may have noticed. The sermon series that carried us through the fall included a whole collection of responses to the question: “Why go to church?” When the Rev. Martin Copenhaver joined us in late September to guest preach, the title of his second hour talk was, “What questions does the church need to ask?” I have the list he generated – all good and provocative questions, like, “What is God up to in our time?” and “What is God’s intent for us?” So perhaps it’s no surprise that I gravitated to the question, repeated no fewer than three times in this passage. “What shall we do?” Continue reading →
