Pentecost Sunday – May 19, 2024 Acts 2:1-21 Ezekiel 37:1-14 Psalm 104:24-34, 35b Romans 8:22-27 John 15:25-26, 16:4b-15 Get ready for a holy adventure! Get ready to enter the spiritual twilight zone, to join the mystics and go one step beyond into the paranormal. Not the supernatural, because the natural world is more amazing than we think! But into the restless and wondrous naturalistic spirit, inspiring all creation. Strap on your seat belt, put on your helmet, and get ready... Read more
The Seventh Sunday after Easter – May 12, 2024 Acts 1:15-17, 21-26; Psalm 1; I John 5:9-13; John 17:6-19 I grew up seeing the motto, “prayer changes things,” every time I opened the refrigerator door. I suppose my prayers were answered, because now over six decades later I am a healthy and robust member of the Medicare generation. Prayer makes a difference, so say some medical researchers, although the mechanics of prayer are beyond the scope of science. Still, in... Read more
The Adventurous Lectionary – The Sixth Sunday of Easter – May 5, 2024 Acts 10:44-48 Psalm 98 I John 5:1-6 John 15:9-17 I have to confess that when I read today’s readings, the first thing that came into my mind was the Led Zeppelin song, “Whole Lotta Love.” Love is the anthem and heart of today’s readings. God is love and God’s love invites us to love in action. Those who love go beyond the ego and its needs and... Read more
The Adventurous Lectionary -The Fifth Sunday of Easter – April 28, 2024 Acts 8:26-40 Psalm 22:35-41 I John 4:7-21 John 15:1-8 Today’s passages join mysticism and theological reflection. They are a primer in theology and also inclusion. Creation abounds with revelation for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear. All is miracle, as Walt Whitman claims, and miracles are built into the nature of things without having to resort supernatural intervention. Today’s scriptures are mystical, energetic, and... Read more
The Adventurous Lectionary – The Fourth Sunday of Easter – April 21, 2024 Acts 5:4-12 Psalm 23 I John 3:16-24 John 10:11-19 Often described as Good Shepherd Sunday, today’s readings cover the full gamut of theology, spirituality and ethics and serve as an appropriate prelude to the upcoming holy days of Earth Day (April 22) Arbor Day (April 26) and May Day, Beltane (May 1). We need theologies, spiritualities, and ethics that honor both heaven and earth, eternity and change,... Read more
The Third Sunday of Easter – April 14, 2024 Acts 3:12-19 Psalm 4 I John 3:1-7 Luke 24:36b-48 You can’t manage or control a resurrection. You can’t even fully understand it. You can’t put it into your normal understanding of reality. Like all mystical experiences, resurrection is always life-shattering and initially beyond belief. We can neither expect nor plan a resurrection. But, when it comes, we are amazed and transformed. Can we who have heard the resurrection stories countless times,... Read more
The Second Sunday of Easter Acts 4:32-35 Psalm 133 I John 1:1-2:2 John 20:19-31 Some Sundays the preacher receives too possibilities for preaching. There are so many entry points we don’t know where to start. Today’s scriptures have too much going on to cover in just one sermon. They could easily be part of a sermon series on practices of Easter. Or, if you want to deviate from the lectionary, as I have occasionally done with this scripture, you can... Read more
What should we do with Holy Saturday? At first glance, Holy Saturday is a day in which nothing happens. In which the future is uncertain and the realm of God is here and not-yet. In which no one expects a resurrection. Holy Saturday is the time in which we live, when our future, the future of our nation, and the future of our planet is uncertain. During Holy Week, most of us focus on the palms, the passion, and the... Read more
Good Friday Script The Seven Last Words of Christ? Only a Suffering God can Save As far as memory reaches, I remember the songs of the cross, “The Old Rugged Cross,” “How Great Thou Art,” “Are You Washed in the Blood,” and “It is Well with My Soul.” But, one stands out, the African American spiritual, “Were You There When They Crucified My Lord.” As the song goes, “sometimes I causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble,” when I ponder the... Read more
What do you do with Good Friday and the Cross when you’ve abandoned the centrality of the doctrines of substitutionary atonement and the divine necessity of Jesus’ death? Like many progressive Christians, I grew up hearing the mantras “Jesus died for our sins,” “Jesus died so that we might have eternal life and escape God’s wrath,” “Jesus paid the price for our salvation,” and “sin deserves death and Jesus stood in our place.” Recently, I saw a billboard with the... Read more
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