Is 45:1, 4-6; Thes 1:1-5; Matt 22:15-21. What does God want? This is the question that Jesus is posing implicitly to the Pharisees and Herodians. What does God want? The answer is simple: Everything. God wants everything – all of who we are. Jesus is making the point that it’s not so much what we […]
Is 25:6-10A; Ps 23:1-3A;3B-4,5,6; Phil 4:12-14, 19-20; Matt 22:1-14 We might call it overreaction—both the King’s disappointment to his royal invitation and the recipients’ blasé response to this royal invitation, White House dinner or Papal Audience. It’s exaggerated to make us sit up and take notice. That’s what a parable does. The King has gone […]
Ez 18: 25-28; Ps 25; Phil 2: 1-11.; Matt 21: 28-32 St. Paul, in this classic letter to the Philippians, says: “Do nothing out of selfishness…; rather, humbly regard others …, each looking out not for his own interests, but also for those of others. Have in you the same attitude that is also in […]
Is 55: 6-9; Phil 1: 20-24, 27; Matt 20: 1-16 All parables reveal something about the nature of God. This one reveals that “The Lord’s ways are not our ways, nor are his thoughts our thoughts.” In this parable, the vineyard owner is God. Those who come to work early in the morning are the […]
Ez 33: 7-9; Rom 13:8-10; Matt 18:15-20 Loving is “the fulfillment of the law,” Paul says in Romans today. In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus is forming his disciples for leading his church. He is forming us too. To Love — as best we can: in this particular situation, or that particular issue, on a given particular […]
I Kings 19:9a, 11-13a; Rom 9: 1-5; Matt 14: 22-33 “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless wasteland, and darkness covered the abyss, while a mighty wind swept over the waters” (Gen 1:1-2). We all recognize this as the opening of the Bible, the first lines […]
Pioneer Days, Fort Harrod, Harrodsburg, KY Sunday, August 20, 2017, 10:00 AM Under the Osage Tree Text: Matthew 15:21-28 The Canaanite woman comes as a beggar. Notice she has no name. When I was a professor of drama at Berea College, I used to tell students that when a character has no name in a […]
Kings 3:5,7-12. Romans 8: 28-30. Matt 13: 44-46 The treasure in the field. Today’s social media show us what the world views as a treasure. Instead of ‘the pearl of great price,’ we hear terms like ‘The jewel in his crown,’ ‘the prize he long sought.’ Using the standards of the world, we can easily […]
Wis. 12:13,16-19; Rom. 8:26-27; Matt. 13:24-43 Pay attention to mustard seed incidents. Notice them and cultivate them carefully. The readings speak of patience and a trust in God’s power to bring about growth in us. It is God’s power of which we stand in awe. Growth and transformation is the secret of the Christian life. […]
Is 55:10-11; Rom 8:18-23; Matt 13:1-23 In the Gospel today we see that God is a prodigal sower; he scatters seed widely, hoping for a fruitful result. The question for us is: do we cooperate with God’s wide and abundant sowing? You and I want to be good soil. We don’t want to be rocky […]