Claimed, gathered and sent

This is the reflection that was sent out to the people of St. Timothy Lutheran Church . I would appreciate your thoughts and comments. Gospel: John 8:31-36 31Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; 32and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” 33They answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free’?”   34Jesus answered them, “Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. 35The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there forever. 36So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.” Bondage is a problem all over our world: financial bondage, the bondage of refugees, bondage to sickness, bondage to grief and sadness and bondage to sin, death and the power of the devil as Martin Luther tells us in The Small Catechism. Sometimes we may feel like we ar...

This is the sermon I preached at St. Timothy Lutheran Church l ast Sunday, 11/20/19. The text was 2 Timothy 3:14-4:5.  Everything about our lives in Christ revolves around relationship: relationship with God, relationship with each other and relationship with our community. At the center of all of this we find scripture, holding it all together. We find two critical themes in 2 Timothy concerning scripture as 1. gift of God and 2. for the practical life of God’s people. As the gift of God, scripture was intended to be part of a lively dialogue, a life-giving and dynamic interpretation, with commentaries emerging to respond to changing times, rather than as an unchanging and infallible document. God-breathed scriptures are inspiring, not imprisoning. They guide our paths, but don’t determine exactly each and every step we take. Scripture energizes and motivates instead of imprisoning and suffocating us. The sacred writings of Timothy’s childhood were the Hebrew Scr...