Had there been news feeds or social media back in Jesus’ day the title or caption might read: “Fisherman Makes Mega-Bonus Catch after Doing Favor for Stranger.” I wonder how many clicks, “Likes” or “Shares” Simon may have received had he told his story today...
The best way to understand why Jesus causes such a stir among the temple goers of Nazareth in Luke chapter 4 is by overlaying the contents of 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 with the gospel text. The text begins by saying that all in the synagogue spoke...
Some of you may remember, back in the day, when no one owned movies. If you wanted to watch something, you had to wait until it was offered on television at a certain day and time according to a schedule printed in the newspaper or...
The scene leading up to the first of many signs that Jesus would perform is a slice of real life. There’s a wedding going on and the guest list includes Jesus, his mother, and Jesus’ disciples. Like many weddings you and I have attended, there...
Today’s story about Jesus’ baptism begins by setting a tone among the people there on the scene. The people were filled with expectation. All were questioning in their hearts concerning who might be the Messiah. In other words, the people were inspired to seek and find...
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Think about all that that one single sentence says. In the beginning, the Word was with and also was God. I can think of nothing else in the...
Jesus increased in wisdom and years, in divine and human favor. How can that be so if Jesus is both fully human and fully God? I suppose that this statement refers only to Jesus’ humanness. As a human, he might have room to increase in...
As if out of a scene from Call the Midwife, two pregnant women converse in Poplar. One of them has traveled from the modest home of her husband’s family in the West End of Judea to a village in East London to call on kin,...
‘Tis the season of Advent, a season of not only quiet anticipation for Jesus’ arrival, but specific time set aside for us to prepare for Jesus’ coming by doing things we haven’t yet thought about. How about that? Are there things you haven’t yet thought about...
What is a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin anyway? At best, it sounds like some sort of trade, a deal where a person must do “A” to qualify for “B”. It would be hard to argue against this idea: that forgiveness of...