Claimed, gathered and sent

Here are some thoughts on Sunday's gospel. I'd love your input. This was sent to the people of St.Timothy Lutheran Church .  Gospel: John 10:1-10   [Jesus said:] 1 “Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2 The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5 They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.” 6 Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.   7 So again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did n...

This is a devotion I shared with the people of St. Timothy Lutheran Church.  The reason for the many Lutheran references is because of the original intended audience. The principles apply to all Christians, however. Have you ever heard the term “liminal space?” It is:   a threshold…Liminal spaces are transitional or transformative spaces. They are the waiting areas between one point in time and space and the next. …we have the feeling of just being on the verge of something. Liminal space is, of course, a literal space …But there are also spaces of liminality in our mental states. This, too, is a type of liminal space” (betterhelp.com/advice/general). As Lutherans, we think of that kind of space as living in the “now/not yet” of the kingdom of God. It is not the past, which is behind us and we are not yet in the future, which is unknown. Doesn’t it seem fitting to our lives today? It’s not an easy space to inhabit and it often makes us uncomfortable because we w...

This is my sermon for the people of St. Timothy Lutheran Church . The scripture text was 1 Peter 1:17-23.   Our second lesson uses the imagery of being in exile. The readers understand that they are strangers in a strange land (sundaysandseasons.com). Doesn’t that describe our current situation? We have not been this way before. There is no Siri, Google, or any other kind of physical GPS that can navigate us safely through this morass of Coronavirus. We feel disconnected from friends and family, from our church family. We may even wonder where God is in all of this. This lesson speaks to our needs today. Peter was addressing Gentile believers who were living in a hostile environment, feeling like strangers in the world. Their time on earth may have been as a time of exile (v. 17). For Gentile believers this was true in several ways: they may have been living away from their homeland, Christians saw themselves as exiles on earth whole real home was heaven and Peter’s readers...