Posts Tagged ‘6th Sunday After Pentecost’
A Restful Yoke
In our lectionary text today, Jesus extends a gracious invitation to all who are exhausted. He offers rest for those who take his yoke upon themselves and earn from him, for he is “gentle and lowly in heart,” and his yoke is “easy” and his burden is “light.”
Read MoreThe Coolest Little Playhouse
South Camden has the coolest little playhouse with high-quality seating, sound, and lighting. It is well crafted for the works of famed playwrights like Tennessee Williams, Eugene O’Neil, and David Mamet. It’s the perfect neighborhood theater, but the neighbors and I have never sat for a performance. South Camden is not exactly Tennessee Williams’ territory,
Read MoreOtherness to Outsider
There is a unique pain associated with this brand of dismissal, akin to the sting of rejection but accompanied by shock and disbelief (“I thought of all people they would understand!”).
Read MoreAn Invitation to Imperfection
We start Advent not with shepherds and angels and babies meek and mild. Instead we start with apocalyptic warnings. I don’t like it. I prefer the kids in animal and shepherd costumes—the cute Christmas. But we don’t always get what we want. Instead we start Advent with a passage that is full of images of floods, and people disappearing, and thieves.
Read MoreWill One Thing
Jesus and the disciples are on the move. They enter a village and receive life-giving hospitality from two sisters in the intimacy of their home. Martha prepares the meal while Mary sits listening at the feet of Jesus. It is a beautiful scene that lasts but for two verses before Martha barges into the living room from the kitchen, upset that her sister has left her to do all the work by herself.
Read MoreDance to the Music
Poor Isaac, dying in a state of deception, betrayal, sorrow and loneliness. Yes, in our reading we encounter him comfortably ensconced within his mother’s tent, basking in the early hours of love at first sight, but things go very wrong by the time we get to chapter 27! There, the family of the patriarch is divided as rivals, Isaac and Esau on one side of the breach, and Rebekah and Jacob on the other. Can such soap-opera-caliber mess be the fruit of God’s plan for Isaac’s family: brothers at war over inheritance, Mom and Dad playing favorites among their children, lies, trickery, and deceit? In the end, fear leads Isaac to give his beloved Rebekah over to another man, an act that mimicked his father’s failures. Despite the moment of love and contentment we see in our reading, it seems this patriarch is destined to continue in family tragedy and community chaos, and to die in sadness and regret.
Read MoreFamily Matters
In this week’s text Jesus turns toward Jerusalem where he will confront the brutal reality of sin head on. On his way to the city that he loves, he takes…
Read MoreVulnerability and Authority
Rebirth of mission.
Read MoreDazzled
Imagine that it’s 1633 and you are hearing for the first time that the sun does not revolve around the earth.
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