Claimed, gathered and sent

This is the sermon I preached (yes, I'm finally over COVID and I'm back!) on Sunday, Dec. 10 at St. Timothy Lutheran Church . The text is Mark 1:1-8.     It is impossible not to love Mark’s version of things. He cuts right to the chase. There is no birth story. His gospel is the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The rest of the gospel explains how he can make that claim.  The good news doesn't start with the gospel or anything else in the New Testament, because the story of salvation and God's loving interaction with humanity began in Genesis "in the beginning;" Immediately after Mark’s introductory verse, he goes back to the prophets of Israel and the promises God made through them. Mark cites Isaiah, but what we have here a mash-up of Isaiah, Malachi and the author of Exodus (Exodus 23:20; Malachi 3:1; Isaiah 40:3). We hear “the voice of one crying out in the wilderness” (v. 3). “The wilderness is key to Israelite history. It was in the wilderness t...

This is the sermon I preached Sunday at St. Timothy Lutheran Church . The gospel was John 1:29-42. I want to take a minute to clarify something. There are several people named John in the New Testament. John the Baptist is not the same person as John, the author of the Gospel. I will be very specific as I refer to each in my sermon. Jesus’ baptism again??? Didn’t we just read about John the Baptist baptizing Jesus last week? Here it is again? Jesus’ baptism is in all four gospels, but in John’s gospel, we don’t see John the Baptist actually baptizing Jesus. He’s more of an onlooker to what was happening. We are seeing John the witness, not John the Baptist. In the reference to Jesus’ baptism in today’s gospel, God and the Spirit are the actors. The purpose of the baptism isn’t as much to encourage Jesus and prepare him for his mission, but to reveal Jesus as the Lamb and Son of God. We have a kinder, gentler John the Baptist in today’s gospel. He is not shouting “Repent!!” as in the fi...

   This Sunday I'll be preaching on Luke 3:7-18 . O nce again, we encounter John the Baptist in Sunday's gospel, Luke 3:7-18. I have a couple of questions of this text. First, how do we get from John calling his audience a brood of vipers to " So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people" (v. 18). Huh? Where do you see the good news in this passage? John is certainly an interesting character and example for us all to point to Christ and not ourselves. What do you all think? picture

This is the message I preached Sunday, Dec. 5, 2021 at St. Timothy Lutheran Church . The text was Luke 3:1-6 . Who is this John and what is his message and what does it have to do with me? Every second Sunday of Advent we meet up again with John. He is prominent in all four gospels. What   more is there that we can possibly learn from him? What does God want to say to us this week, in this place, through this gospel passage?   Let us pray. Lord, when we encounter the same characters at the same time each year, we may groan, “Not John the Baptist again!” Open our eyes, our hearts and minds to all you have to reveal to us today through your word. Amen.   Luke begins his story of John by anchoring it in time and space, in history. We have a proverbial gallery of luminaries, first the secular, political rulers, then the religious leadership.   However, after our list of luminaries, we find these words, "…the word of God came to John son of Ze...

This is the sermon I preached at St. Timothy Lutheran Church on Sunday, Jan. 26. The text is Matthew 4:12-23.   Today’s gospel starts out with bad news. Jesus’ cousin, John the Baptist, has been arrested. Hearing this, Jesus “withdrew to Galilee” (v. 12). This opening verse is not simply a way to mark time, but it signals that John’s arrest is a dangerous situation for Jesus, and he must choose how to respond. For now, Jesus pulls away to carry out his ministry of proclamation in and around Galilee (Audrey West, workingpreacher.org). Throughout Matthew, we see this or similar statements, “…so that what had been spoken through the prophet…might be fulfilled” (v. 14). Normally these words refer to a time when such and such will happen. However, rather than the time being fulfilled in today’s gospel, the place is being fulfilled—Galilee of the Gentiles. God means to embrace everyone, Jew or Gentile. How shocking! God did what God said he would do. God’s Messiah had been promis...

This is the sermon I preached at St. Timothy Lutheran Church on Sunday, 12/9/18. The text was Luke 3:1-6 We have in the very beginning of today’s gospel a list of 7 rulers of that time. Imagine these verses as a movie in which we see the known world, the center of which is Rome and we slowly zoom in – but not where we expect. Now , who of all of these does God choose? Emperor Tiberius-nope Pontius Pilate—nope Herod-nope Philip-nope Lysanius-nope Anna’s and Caiaphas-nope John…yep…wait…who? Once again, God chooses the most unlikely candidate in the most unlikely place. After all, Judea, in which were Jerusalem and Bethlehem, was a mere backwater of the world and John the Baptist was a nobody. But what God is doing through him will affect everything—even up to the emperor. In this list, we also have a foreshadowing of what was to come in Jesus’ confrontations with Annas and Caiaphas, Herod and Pilate. This, after all, is the world of a God who is completely involved i...

Here are some thoughts on this coming Sunday's gospel. This is what was sent out to the people of St. Timothy Lutheran Church. Gospel: Mark 6:14-29 14 King Herod heard of [ the disciples’ preaching, ] for Jesus’ name had become known. Some were saying, “John the baptizer has been raised from the dead; and for this reason these powers are at work in him.” 15 But others said, “It is Elijah.” And others said, “It is a prophet, like one of the prophets of old.” 16 But when Herod heard of it, he said, “John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.”   17 For Herod himself had sent men who arrested John, bound him, and put him in prison on account of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, because Herod had married her. 18 For John had been telling Herod, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” 19 And Herodias had a grudge against him, and wanted to kill him. But she could not, 20 for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he protected him. ...