Claimed, gathered and sent

Here are some thoughts on this coming Sunday's second reading. This was sent out to the people of St. Timothy Lutheran Church. I'd like your input. Let's brainstorm.  Second Reading: Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16 1Let mutual love continue. 2Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. 3Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured. 4Let marriage be held in honor by all, and let the marriage bed be kept undefiled; for God will judge fornicators and adulterers. 5Keep your lives free from the love of money, and be content with what you have; for he has said, “I will never leave you or forsake you.” 6So we can say with confidence,   “The Lord is my helper;   I will not be afraid.  What can anyone do to me?”   7Remember your leaders, those who spoke the word of God to you; consider the outcome of their...

This is the sermon I preached on Sunday, the fourth Sunday of Creation, Universe Sunday., 8/25/19. I shared this with the people of St. Timothy Lutheran Church. The text was Colossians 1:15-20. Today we celebrate universe Sunday. The image of the Cosmic Christ stresses that Christ’s lordship is an eternal presence through time and space, encompassing all of Creation in the ultimate fulfillment and consummation of God’s will for the cosmos. The text from Colossians was probably a hymn in the early church, one that preceded Paul, which he used and added to. There are two parts of this hymn, the first regarding Christ and his role in creation. The second concerns Christ and his role in the church. As we consider Christ and his role in creation, we see a number of words that are repeated, the most frequent of them being “all.” It appears eight times in this short passage, and it says it all. Christ is “the firstborn of ALL creation,” the one in whom “ALL things have been created,...

This is the sermon I preached last Sunday, the Third Sunday of Creation, at St. Timothy Lutheran Church. The gospel text was Luke 8:22-25.  We mostly read of Jesus and his disciples with crowds. It’s rare that Jesus has time alone to minister to his disciples, which is the scene before us. It is a crossing story. Crossings can be dangerous. Any decision to cross the unknown for the sake of transformation is fraught with danger. Jesus’ decision was to go to the foreign country of the Gerasenes. Let’s look a bit deeper and discern the choice, the crisis, the call, and the calm in this crossing story. The choice was to go across to the other side of lake (v. 22). Choices that do not have the potential of life threatening crisis within them are trivial and non-transformative. Television advertising gives us enough examples of trivial choices that fed to us as being truly revolutionary. Jesus’ choice was for the sake of spreading the kingdom of God. The exhausted Jesus slept in ...