Claimed, gathered and sent

This is the message I preached Sunday, 5/22 at St. Timothy and St. Mark Lutheran Churches . The scripture text was  John 16:12-15 . Today’s gospel text made me scratch my head. Today, we celebrate the Holy Trinity, but this passage’s emphasis on the Holy Spirit sounds more like Pentecost. After digging a bit deeper, my light bulb came o n. Jesus taught his disciples about the role of the Holy Spirit in relationship to the Father and to himself. Just as the Christian life is all about relationship to God, relationship to each other and relationship to our community, so the Holy Trinity lives and works in relationship and community. In the final verses of today’s gospel, we get a clearer picture of this text’s bearing on the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. Jesus taught his disciples that the Holy Spirit does not act independently of the Father or the Son. The Holy Spirit glorifies Christ and only reveals what comes from the Father and the Son. The Holy Spirit ...

This is the message I shared with God's people at St. Mark Lutheran Church and St. Timothy Lutheran Church on Sun., 5/31. The scripture text was Romans 8:12-17 . How many of you are familiar with the series of books and pictures called, Where's Waldo? For those of you unfamiliar with this series, the pictures consist of a sea of people and you have to locate the character, Waldo in the midst of the busy pictures. It is quite a challenge to do so. Today is Holy Trinity Sunday. When looking at today's readings, we may wonder, "Where is the Trinity?" Although the word trinity is not used in the Bible, our God in three persons is woven into the very fabric of our reading from Romans. Did you notice the names for God in the Romans reading? Just shout them out when you see them. This passage starts out in an odd way, " So then..." This tells us that Paul is drawing conclusions from the previous verses in which he made it clear that the ...

Given the following scenario, what would your answer be? Is this a valid question? One of the members of your church comes into your office one afternoon with a question about the Holy Spirit. She attended church with a friend on Sunday, and there was lots of talk about the Spirit, and lots of energy in the worship. “Pastor,” she said, “I never hear about the Holy Spirit in the Lutheran Church—it seems like we spend all of our time talking about God the Father and Jesus. What does the Holy Spirit do, anyway?” Explain the role of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church and life of a Christian. Guilty as charged! Migliore writes that often the church has been suspicious of movements that have stressed the power of the Holy Spirit. I even experienced some of that from a member of my candidacy committee because of past involvement with the charismatic movement. As mentioned in a recent lecture, the Holy Spirit is the “least understood” [1] person of the Trinity. By...