Blog

Weeping. Rejection. The Cross. All that sounds more fitting for Holy Week, rather than for some ordinary summer Sunday. And so you might wonder, then, why you’re hearing an account like this now, rather than then, or even, perhaps, nearer the end of the Church year. Well, there’s a reason for it: some portions of the Church year are bound to actual historical time, and this is one of them. The destruction of Jerusalem’s temple, and of Jerusalem itself, in A.D. 70, which Jesus

The unjust steward doesn’t merely hand back paid bills, no; rather, he changes them. And the master commends him for such shrewd dealings. What’s that all about? Here’s what I hear: the steward is the pastor. For indeed, every preacher Christ has ever sent has been exactly this: unjust, squandering what’s entrusted to him, still bound for the same exit as the rest of mankind. O, vanity of vanities, indeed! I, and all those whom Christ has called and ordained to stand in His s

A false preacher or teacher never professes to be a deceiver; they claim to come in the Lord’s name, to preach and teach the Lord’s words. They do not appear as a manifest wolf; they come as a wolf in sheep’s clothing: they will look and act like a sheep. How, then, do you know a false prophet, a false teacher? Not by their works, their success, or their charisma; rather, by their fruit. A prophet’s fruit, a teacher’s fruit, is their preaching and teaching: what they say abou

“I have compassion.” Those words sound forth despite the weariness, despite indifference. “I have compassion,” Jesus says, not as a conclusion to three days’ worth of teaching; no, rather, because of it, and as remedy to it. “I have compassion,” says He, using the same word He has always used of Himself, and asks only what is on hand. “Seven [loaves],” comes the answer, and a few small fish besides. Nothing really, set against three days, let alone a lifetime. Regardless, He

Outward righteousness, righteousness that compares one against another, righteousness such as that of the scribes and Pharisees could not enter the kingdom of heaven then, and it cannot enter now. Yet beware overcorrecting; beware of caring nothing for the Law. “Unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees,” Jesus says. He does not say, “Unless your righteousness comes in below that of the scribes and Pharisees.” Such is the danger when, he

On his knees, in front of his partners, Simon is a truer picture of you than you would care to admit: no longer as one with a fine catch and a decent reputation, standing on his own two strong legs, sure of himself and needing no one; rather, as one on his knees, face down in the bottom of the boat, only now realizing Who has been standing this close to him all along, and therefore cannot for his life think of one reason the Lord should remain. Weigh your own heart against wh

Behold the speck and the plank. You see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, and you see it well; you have measured it to the grain. Yet there is a plank in your own eye. You have not seen it, cannot see it; you are blind to it even as you reach for their speck. You are the blind one who would lead the blind, and the ditch is where you are both bound. First remove the plank from your own eye. Go on, take it out. You can’t. The measure comes back full, pressed down against you, a

God does not brighten the old worn face; there is no face left to brighten. Rather, He strikes His emblem upon you. At the Font His Name was spoken over you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the sign of the holy Cross was traced upon your forehead and upon your heart, the King’s own mark come down upon the silver. It is not the face lost in Adam; it is the Cross of Christ, the sign that you are His: bought, claimed, and current again in the kingdom. The emblem is struck, the

The work, whether in the oil field, at your desk, in your shop, or in your own yard, is a good thing; cows are a good thing, as are chickens and goats and what-have-you; the retirement that was earned over decades is a good thing. Families are a good thing; children and grandchildren: blessings from on high. Even extracurricular activities, such as softball, are good things, in and of themselves. God gives all these things, and gives them richly and daily, without ceasing. Ye

Beloved, Lazarus was carried; he had always been carried. And so have you. Consider how you came here, to the very gate of heaven. You came to the holy Font. If you were carried there as an infant, as many of you were, then you know the carrying was literal: someone bore you in their arms to the water and the Word. Your parents, grandparents; your sponsors: those who loved you, brought you, unable as you were to walk or speak for yourself, unable to confess or choose or cont