How God likes to use power (Christ the King, 11/23/2025)

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Readings (Track 1)

“May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power” Paul writes. On this Feast of Christ the King that “glorious power” is worth wondering about.

How does God use this “glorious power”? In our first reading from Jeremiah, “I will attend to you [the shepherds] for your evil doings,” which, as Jeremiah had been warning, meant bringing in the Babylonian army to destroy Jerusalem. “Then I myself will gather the remnant”—through the various leaders who brought waves of exiles back to Jerusalem. And through “a righteous Branch” for David—which turns out to point forward to our other readings.

In Zechariah’s song “He has raised up for us a mighty savior, / born of the house of his servant David. / … save us from our enemies, / from the hands of all who hate us.” That sounds like military power.

In the Gospel the “righteous Branch” of whom Jeremiah spoke, the “mighty savior” Zechariah celebrated, is on stage for… the crucifixion? At first glance, profoundly disturbing, and we’re there with the two disciples leaving (fleeing?) Jerusalem on the road to Emmaus: “But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel” (Luk 24:21). It took Jesus’ resurrection and post-resurrection teaching to enable us to see that Friday as “Good.” There, as Paul puts it, God “was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.” Or, as Paul puts it to the Corinthians “in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself” (2Co 5:19). So Jesus’ words (“Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”), expressions of weakness, or power? Recall Jesus’ words from John’s Gospel: “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (12:32).

What does God use power for? Clearly, when necessary, to attend violently to the shepherds destroying and scattering the sheep. But our readings—as well as the rest of Scripture—suggest that God would greatly prefer to use that power, as Paul puts it, “to reconcile to himself all things.” Will God succeed, succeed in turning all enemies into friends? Scripture leaves that question open, much to the dismay of the commentators who’ve tried to find a clear answer in the Book of Revelation. Why does Scripture leave the question open? Perhaps because our desires and decisions also matter. The story is still being written.

What Scripture does not leave open is how God wants us to use that power. Back to Paul: “May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully giving thanks to the Father…” This may be why Paul calls love the greatest of God’s gifts, for it is love that “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1Co 13:7).

We have, obviously, enemies, and we want God to do something about them. “Love your enemies” is no easier now than when Moses (Exodus 23:4-5) and Jesus (Matt 5:44) first said it. It may help to recall another of Paul’s observations in that “Love Chapter”: “now we see in a mirror, dimly” (1Co 13:12). That applies both to us and our enemies, so sometimes they’re seeing things that we don’t, that we need to see. In any case, as today’s Collect celebrates, “the King of kings and Lord of lords” is about freeing and bringing together all those divided and enslaved by sin, and calls us to be part of that. (And the weekly General Confession reminds us that “those divided and enslaved by sin” is not entirely in our rearview mirror!)

God’s glorious power. The Holy Eucharist is many-faceted. Today’s Feast and readings might remind us that it, and, precisely, the words of institution, is also a celebration of that glorious power. “This is my Body.… This is my Blood.” Royal words, royal gifts, to empower us to share in our King’s work.

Much of what I’ve been exploring in these texts is captured in one of the prayers buried toward the back of the Book of Common Prayer on p.816. So I invite you to turn to it, stand as you are able, so that in celebration of this Feast of Christ the King we can pray “6. For our enemies” together:

O God, the Father of all, whose Son commanded us to love our enemies: Lead them and us from prejudice to truth; deliver them and us from hatred, cruelty, and revenge; and in your good time enable us all to stand reconciled before you; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

A Two Year Lectionary (Excel Files)

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A few years back I created this lectionary for my own use, and am posting it in case others might find it useful. It includes the books shared by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox canons and excludes the Psalms, for which the monthly cycle in the Book of Common Prayer is used. The colors mark the Old Testament (blue), Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books (gold), and New Testament (tan).

The two year lectionary (an excel file):

Two Year Lectionary v3Download

The monthly Psalm cycle from the Book of Common Prayer (an excel file):

Monthly Psalm CycleDownload

Praying “Your kingdom come” (23rd Sunday after Pentecost, 11/16/2025)

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Readings (Track 2)

This morning’s Collect focused on Holy Scripture: “Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life…” How might that work with today’s readings?

More precisely, the themes in some of the readings recall that petition in the Lord’s Prayer: “your kingdom come.” How might the readings help us better pray “your kingdom come”?

Our first reading from the prophet Malachi: “See, the day is coming.” The day, the day of the Lord, the Lord’s decisive action. Like many other descriptions of the day of the Lord, the text focuses the Lord sorting things out: the arrogant, the evildoers, “you who revere my name,” each will get their due. (We’re still a couple weeks out from Advent, but this wouldn’t make a bad Advent reading!)

That sounds pretty good: the arrogant and evildoers, “you who revere my name” neatly separated. But our tradition, informed by Holy Scripture, has us confessing at each Eucharist “we have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed…” That separation isn’t as stable as we’d like.

When we pray “your kingdom come” it’s pretty much inevitable that we focus on where we perceive God’s agenda and our agenda aligning. And that easily becomes a focus on only where those agendas align, so that “your kingdom come” and “my kingdom come” become indistinguishable. In our polarized national context, it’s easy to see this happening among those with whom we disagree. So the challenge is to stay alert to the possibility that God might have some questions about our agenda. Easier said than done. In the midst of the English civil war, Oliver Cromwell to the Scottish clergy: “I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.” Among the many spiritual disciplines on offer today, that may be one of the more relevant.

What do our enemies want us to hear as we read Holy Scripture? They won’t always be wrong.

What of today’s Gospel reading? The temple in Jerusalem was one of the axes of Jesus’ ministry. Even after his resurrection his followers were worshipping in the temple, like Peter and John that day that they encountered the man lame from birth (Acts 3:1ff). It would have been natural for the disciples to assume that “your kingdom come” could only mean increased glory for the temple. And already it was glorious, “adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God.” So Luke is probably underplaying the shock of Jesus’ words (“As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”). It’s a warning to us: to pray “your kingdom come” is to write our merciful God a blank check. Our merciful God, so there’s no reason to fear, but also no reason to assume that we know what God will do with it.

Our reading from 2nd Thessalonians is the odd man out, included not because it relates to the other readings, but because the lectionary—justifiably—wants to include some of the letter somewhere, so here we are. No direct connection to “your kingdom come,” but not entirely disconnected. Like the other petitions in the first half of the Lord’s Prayer, it’s self-involving. In Thessalonica, praying “your kingdom come” means I make my decisions about time, talent, and treasure as a member of the community of believers. Following Paul’s example, idleness is not an appropriate response. Where idleness is not an issue, the broader principle holds: to pray “your kingdom come” is to commit to live together in a way that witnesses to the hope of that kingdom.

“Your kingdom come.” Our texts have encouraged us to understand this as playing out in our future. True enough, but not the whole truth. We started with Malachi’s announcement of “the day,” shorthand for “the day of the Lord.” But recall that we refer to Sunday as “the Lord’s day.” We’re already encountering that use in the New Testament. From the first chapter of the Revelation: “I was in the spirit on the Lord’s day” (1:10). The core of “the day of the Lord” is in our past, whether we think of it as Easter Sunday, Holy Week, or that whole stretch from the Incarnation to the Ascension. Every Sunday, a celebration of the Resurrection, a celebration of the Lord’s victory as anticipated in Psalm 98.

2 With his right hand and his holy arm
has he won for himself the victory.

3 The Lord has made known his victory;
his righteousness has he openly shown in the sight of the nations.

The tomb is empty. Jesus 1, Death 0. Or, more accurately, Death 0, Jesus 1, since this world is God’s home turf.

And so, while the Church is not the Kingdom, it’s the context in which we get a foretaste of the Kingdom. Paul again: “For the kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom 14:17). The Risen Christ has showered on us the Holy Spirit, and with “your kingdom come,” we pray that these gifts spread out to the ends of the earth. Amen.

“Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength” (22nd Sunday after Pentecost, 11/9/2025)

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Readings (Track 1)

Today’s readings are, as it were, the soundtracks from three points in our history as the people of God. What is their good news (their Gospel) for us today? Each in their own way are echoing the Gospel as proclaimed in Isaiah 40. That chapter’s first verse: “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.” Its last verse: “but those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint” (v.31).

In our first reading the prophet Haggai speaks in a profoundly discouraging situation. Some of the Judean exiles are back from Babylon, but the rebuilt temple is a constant reminder of the splendor of the temple the Babylonians destroyed, and Zerubbabel, a Davidic heir, is “governor,” not king. We can sympathize: some of us can remember when the pews were packed and affiliation with a congregation was simply part of being a good community member. So Haggai: take courage, work, do not fear! Why? “I am with you… my spirit abides among you.”

The prophet continues: “Once again, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land; and I will shake all the nations, so that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with splendor, says the LORD of hosts” (Hag 2:6-7). With all due respect to George Frederick Handel’s brilliant rendering of these verses, they’re a problem, because nothing recognizably like this happens in Haggai’s lifetime. Centuries later Herod the Great fills the temple with splendor, just in time for Jesus to pronounce it a “den of thieves” and for the Romans to destroy it! It’s an example of something common even to true prophets: the short- and long-term are conflated. God, as we often observe, does time differently than we do.

Nevertheless, “I am with you… my spirit abides among you.” That’s the comfort Isaiah talked about. Not consolation (as in “consolation prize”), but an assurance that God’s still active that strengthens the hearers. “Those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” So Haggai: “work.”

Notice that that line from Isaiah doesn’t read “Those who see the LORD acting” but “Those who wait for the LORD.” So waiting for the LORD is not like waiting for the mail: it expresses itself in the strength Isaiah describes, in celebrating before the final battle. (That is, by the way, one of the fundamental dimensions of the Eucharist. Isaiah (elsewhere) had prophesied: “On this mountain the LORD of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever” (25:6-8a). Every Eucharist foreshadows that feast, that new world in which everyone is welcome, there’s room for everyone, there’s enough for everyone. We celebrate particularly on Sunday, when our Lord took that decisive chomp out of Death.

If that waiting for the Lord is sustained by remembering God’s mighty acts—preeminently the resurrection—it’s equally sustained by the “God moments” in our past or present, often in the form of particular people. It’s what Paul was talking about in last Sunday’s reading:
“We must always give thanks to God for you, brothers and sisters, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of everyone of you for one another is increasing” (2Th 1:3). Yes, Cain, we are each other’s keeper, and the choices we make in our dealings with each other nurture or sap our capacity to faithfully wait.

The ending of our reading from Paul’s letter was the inspiration for associating our readings with Isaiah 40: “Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and through grace gave us eternal comfort and good hope, comfort your hearts and strengthen them in every good work and word.”

That reading started with Paul trying to quash the rumor that the “day of the Lord” had already arrived. He works the problem from two angles. First, he recalls an expected sequence of events, perhaps drawing from Jesus’ teaching as recorded in Matthew (24:1ff), Mark (13:1ff), and Luke (25:5ff). Attempts to make sense of this sequence in the subsequent centuries of the Church’s life have not been encouraging. Second, he paints the larger picture: “God chose you as the first fruits for salvation.” There is a rich harvest coming; you’re the beginning of it. That’s a designation every generation can own: for every generation is in a unique situation, and, in God’s generosity, the first fruits in anticipation of a rich harvest. It’s why Jesus told parables like the sower and the mustard seed. “Yet now take courage, O Zerubbabel, says the LORD; take courage, O Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all you people of the land, says the LORD; work, for I am with you, says the LORD of hosts.”

“Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.… but those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” OK, preacher, how does Jesus’ argument with the Sadducees regarding the resurrection relate to that?

In this way, I think: what makes it hard to believe Isaiah’s words then and now is the same thing tripping up the Sadducees, the assumption that we know how the world works. The Sadducees: if there’s a resurrection it’s a continuation of life as we know it, which leads to absurdities like one woman simultaneously married to seven brothers.

As you may recall, Matthew and Mark also tell this story, and in their accounts Jesus begins his response with “You are wrong, because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God” (Mat 22:29; cf. Mk 12:24). Centuries later Hamlet makes a similar point to Horatio in Shakespeare’s Hamlet: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” I find Hamlet’s words a useful benchmark: is that therealization that our encounters with Scripture and God’s power are generating? Sadly, there are too many ways of reading Scripture that narrow our focus, confirm our prejudices. Oh, that our readings more often generated the awe and wonder reflected in Hamlet’s words!

God’s future: not the continuation of life as we know it. As we celebrate in the Eucharist, in God’s future, everyone is welcome, there’s room for everyone, there’s enough for everyone. Let us hear again Isaiah’s words: “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.… but those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”

Wielding those two-edged swords, imitating the Merciful Father (All Saints, 11/2/2025)

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Readings

Today we celebrate the Feast of All Saints, the last of the Principal Feasts in the Church Year. On the one hand, a celebration. God’s mighty acts celebrated at Christmas, Epiphany, Holy Week, and Pentecost have borne fruit. We’re surrounded by—as Hebrews puts it—“so great a cloud of witnesses.” Hallelujah? Hallelujah! On the other hand, as today’s collect reminds us, our race isn’t over. “Give us grace—we prayed—to follow your blessed saints in all virtuous and godly living,” And today’s readings encourage us to think about what that following involves.

Our reading from Ephesians is perhaps the most straightforward. Paul often works with the triad of faith, hope, and love. He celebrates his hearers’ faith and love, and then focuses on encouraging their hope. So the reading and today’s hopeful feast flow together nicely.

Aside from the obvious challenges posed by today’s Gospel, today’s psalm presents its own challenges. It’s probably included because older translations offered “saints” rather than “faithful” in vv. 1, 5, and 9. But there’s no consensus among scholars regarding how it was used, how it was understood. Those beds in v.5: are we to imagine the nave filled with beds? Unlikely. If the beds are in homes, are the two-edged swords metaphors for their tongues? (Recall that in one of Isaiah’s servant songs we hear “He made my mouth like a sharp sword” [49:2].) We don’t know. All we have is the text itself, about which more in a bit.

Our reading from Daniel: older translations like the RSV offered “saints” rather than “holy ones” in the last verse, which perhaps explains its inclusion. I wish the lectionary had given us a longer reading. In the vision itself the four beasts dominate the stage until the “Ancient of Days” cuts it short and gives eternal dominion to “one like a son of man.” Jesus paid particular attention to this vision. He cites it at his trial (he is “coming with the clouds of heaven” [Mk 14:62]), and it’s almost certainly the inspiration for his use of “the son of man” as a self-designation. In the interpretations of the vision that follow in the chapter it’s unclear whether this “son of man” is an individual or collective figure or both, but it is clear that considerable suffering is involved, the fourth beast making “war with the holy ones and…prevailing over them” (v.21). Between this chapter, the songs of the suffering servant in Isaiah to which Jesus also paid particular attention, and the way this world’s politics typically play out, not surprising that Jesus’ faithfulness involved cross and resurrection, ditto his followers’ faithfulness (these saints we’re celebrating).

In preparing this sermon I was reminded of the multiple decisions Jesus had to make. There was that voice at his baptism: “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased” (Lk 3:22). And immediately afterwards, led by the Spirit into forty days of temptation, of decisions. How to respond to “You are my Son, the Beloved”? How to enact, for example, today’s psalm (“Let the praises of God be in their throat * / and a two-edged sword in their hand; / To wreak vengeance on the nations * / and punishment on the peoples”)? The Zealots, for whom the only good Roman was a dead Roman, would have been happy to help Jesus figure that one out. Multiple decisions, some of them reflected in our Gospel reading.

The first part of our Gospel reading, the paired Beatitudes and woes: I’d guess that he got it as much from his mother as from multiple Old Testament texts: “He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, * / and has lifted up the lowly. / He has filled the hungry with good things, * / and the rich he has sent away empty” (Lk 1:52-53 // BCP 92). Sing that often enough at home and it’s going to shape a kid! So, “Blessed are you who are poor…” That’s good news for our world. We’re getting a better future than we have any reason to expect, one shaped not by Daniel’s four beasts, but by the Son of Man.

The thing is, the Zealots would have been quite happy to say “Amen!” to those verses. It’s in the next verses that things get interesting: “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you…” Where is Jesus getting that? “Love your enemies” comes from a careful reading of Moses. From Exodus: “When you come upon your enemy’s ox or donkey going astray, you shall bring it back. When you see the donkey of one who hates you lying under its burden and you would hold back from setting it free, you must help to set it free” (Exod 22:4-5). That’s love: not an emotion, but seeking the other’s good.

And that command and the rest are grounded even more deeply. On the one hand, the alternative is to simply perpetuate the cycles of violence, pointless reruns of Daniel’s four beasts from the great sea. Paul captures Jesus’ alternative: “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Rom 12:21). On the other hand, love your enemies because that’s how God acts. A few verses after today’s reading: “But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (6:35-36).

The “ungrateful and the wicked:” in Scripture that would be usually God’s people, as another bit from Isaiah reminds us (God speaking): “I have not burdened you with offerings, / or wearied you with frankincense. / You have not bought me sweet cane with money, / or satisfied me with the fat of your sacrifices. / But you have burdened me with your sins; / you have wearied me with your iniquities” (43:24).

“Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (6:35-36). Why that adjective? Not only does it capture what Jesus has been saying, but it’s the first adjective used in God’s self-description to Moses, easily the most important description of the divine character in Jesus’ Bible: “”The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious… (Exo 34:6). ‘Merciful’, in Hebrew raḥḥûm, from reḥem ‘womb’. (For some of us it pretty much takes a lifetime for that to sink in.)

“Let the praises of God be in their throat * / and a two-edged sword in their hand; / To wreak vengeance on the nations * / and punishment on the peoples.” After Jesus, the Zealot reading of this text is a non-starter. But what of those swords that are our tongues? I brought in Paul a bit ago; let’s hear a bit more of that exhortation from Romans 12: “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.… Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all” (12:14-18).

Early in our marriage one of the best pieces of advice I got was from a Jewish friend that went something like this: “When you’re angry with your wife, remember that the next day you’ll probably want to reconcile. Try not to say things that will make the reconciliation more difficult.”

In today’s collect we prayed “Give us grace so to follow your blessed saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those ineffable joys that you have prepared for those who truly love you.” In today’s world, whether in face-to-face conversations or on social media where our words and likes go instantly around the globe, that “virtuous and godly living” is intimately tied to our decisions about that sword that is our tongue. Probably can’t hurt to remember that as we continue our Feast of All Saints.

Songs for Pilgrims (20th Sunday after Pentecost, 10/26/2025)

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Readings (Track 2)

Today’s readings include Psalm 84. Since it’s perhaps not one of the more familiar psalms, let’s ease into it by recalling Psalm 23 (BCP 612):

1 The Lord is my shepherd; *
I shall not be in want.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures *
and leads me beside still waters.
3 He revives my soul *
and guides me along right pathways for his Name’s sake.
4 Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I shall fear no evil; *
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff, they comfort me.
5 You spread a table before me in the presence of those who trouble me; *
you have anointed my head with oil,
and my cup is running over.
6 Surely your goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, *
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

Psalm 23 is often described as a psalm of trust, of pilgrimage. The goal’s at the end: “the house of the Lord;” the psalm describes the pilgrimage, the Lord’s reliable shepherding. There are dark moments (“the shadow of death,” “those who trouble me”), but these do not get the last word.

Now, Psalm 84:

1 How dear to me is your dwelling, O Lord of hosts! *
My soul has a desire and longing for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh rejoice in the living God.
2 The sparrow has found her a house
and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young; *
by the side of your altars, O Lord of hosts,
my King and my God.
3 Happy are they who dwell in your house! *
they will always be praising you.
4 Happy are the people whose strength is in you! *
whose hearts are set on the pilgrims’ way.
5 Those who go through the desolate valley will find it a place of springs, *
for the early rains have covered it with pools of water.
6 They will climb from height to height, *
and the God of gods will reveal himself in Zion.
7 Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer; *
hearken, O God of Jacob.
8 Behold our defender, O God; *
and look upon the face of your Anointed.
9 For one day in your courts is better
than a thousand in my own room, *
and to stand at the threshold of the house of my God
than to dwell in the tents of the wicked.
10 For the Lord God is both sun and shield; *
he will give grace and glory;
11 No good thing will the Lord withhold *
from those who walk with integrity.
12 O Lord of hosts, *
happy are they who put their trust in you!

It’s not hard to recognize Psalm 84 as another psalm of trust, of pilgrimage. Here the goal (“your dwelling”) is at the start (vv.1-3); the rest of the psalm is mostly a description of the pilgrimage. Again, no lack of potentially dark moments (“the desolate valley,” plenty of heights to climb), but these do not get the last word.

There are differences. Psalm 23 so focuses on the shepherding that the “I” sounds pretty passive. Psalm 84 pays more attention to the Lord’s empowerment during the pilgrimage (“whose strength is in you,” “they will climb”). And the speakers are more obviously making choices: better “to stand at the threshold of the house of my God / than to dwell in the tents of the wicked.” And notice Psalm 84’s repeated “happy”:

3a Happy are they who dwell in your house!
4a Happy are the people whose strength is in you!
12b happy are they who put their trust in you.

In passing, while ‘happy’ isn’t a bad translation, the problem is that English doesn’t have a word that matches the Hebrew ´ašrê. It’s ‘happy’ in the sense of well-positioned. Happy is the one whose house is built on rock. The Common English Bible offers “truly happy.”

One commentator writes “Enthusiastic joy in YHWH, the theme developed in the first strophe of our psalm (vv.2-5), and unshakable trust in him, the essential statement of the third strophe (vv.9-13), are the two basic attitudes on the basis of which human paths succeed, because they kindle in the human person an inner strength that empowers to withstand obstacles and overcome them” (Zenger in Psalms 2, 358; verse numbers reflect Hebrew text).

How might we hear this psalm today? Two suggestions. First, to talk of joy and trust is not to go full Pollyanna. The psalm’s well aware of the desolate valleys, the heights that look unclimbable. We daily make choices about what we focus on, what we dwell on, that nurture or not our capacity for joy and trust. What’s the first app I open in the morning, the last before calling it a night? There’s a reason our Book of Common Prayer starts with the daily offices (and bless the folk that created the apps that save us the constant turning of pages!).

That said, joy and trust work differently. Trust is anchored in who we are as a people. Jews trust the God who brought them out of Egypt. So the big annual celebration is Passover, and, no longer being under Pharaoh, the Sabbath means working six days a week, not seven. Christians trust that same God who raised Jesus from the dead. So we gather every Sunday to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection, and remember that whatever the situation, God bats last.

Joy is more complicated. Paul: “Rejoice in the Lord always” (Phil 4:4), but joy’s not evident in long stretches of his letters. The largest group of psalms in the Psalter: they want joy, they look forward to joy, but at the moment: Help! After all, were joy more often in the present, we’d talk less about trust.

Second, after all the talk in our psalms about the temple, since the Romans destroyed the temple in ad 70, where does that leave us? From our brothers Peter and Paul:

Peter: “Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Pet. 2:4-5)

Paul:“In [Christ Jesus] the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God. (Eph. 2:21-22)

No need for a single temple in Jerusalem when there are parishes (temples!) scattered around the world, even in Beaver Dam. So we should expect to experience something of the pilgrim’s joy described in Psalm 84 as we come together here? That seems to be the idea, despite the fact that as we and the apostles know (recall Paul’s letters to the Corinthians!) parishes can generate great pain as well as great joy.

The potential for good and evil in every parish is one of the reasons our Eucharistic Prayers ask our God for not one, but two transformations. From Prayer A:

“Sanctify them [the bread and wine] by your Holy Spirit to be for your people the Body and Blood of your Son…
Sanctify us also that we may faithfully receive this holy Sacrament, and serve you in unity, constancy, and peace…”

Being the temple implies no less!

And this is perhaps the appropriate moment to notice today’s Gospel. Jesus is working multiple agendas: how to pray, what attitudes make entry into God’s kingdom easier or harder, and also—with Psalm 84 ringing in the ears—what behaviors are appropriate or not in the temple.

We’re social animals. And in this culture, as in many others, the default is to sort out the pecking order, no matter where we are. The Pharisee’s prayer is a classic example of that sorting out. But the problem isn’t just some Pharisees; Jesus’ own followers are just as capable of the same behavior. There’s not much distance between “God, I thank you that I am not like other people” and what Paul was hearing in Corinth: “’I belong to Paul,’ or ‘I belong to Apollos,’ or ‘I belong to Cephas,’ or ‘I belong to Christ’” (1 Cor. 1:12).

What of the tax collector’s “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”? That’s an essential part of our liturgy. The pause between the invitation to the general confession and the confession itself is for us to remember, individually and collectively, that we’re dealing with more than words on a page. The Eucharistic Prayer (and remember, ‘Eucharist’ is simply the transliteration of the Greek word for ‘thanksgiving’) is our thanksgiving for God’s mercy to us sinners. But the point is not to stay there, but to enter more deeply into the joy and trust of Psalm 84.

What is life? Not just one darn thing after another, but a pilgrimage to the living God. With David: “You show me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy; in your right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Ps. 16:11).

Faith as Defiance (19th after Pentecost, 10/19/2025)

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Readings (Track 2)

Just before today’s Gospel reading Jesus tells his disciples “The days are coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it” (Lk. 17:22). Discipleship, praying “your kingdom come,” it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Losing heart is a real danger, and Jesus has a parable about that.

If the unjust judge gives the widow justice, how much more will God grant justice to those “who cry to him day and night”! And Jesus continues: “I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them.”

“Quickly”? Rather than resolve the tension present throughout the history of God’s people, Jesus leans into it. God and humans do time differently; God’s “quickly” rarely feels like quickly to us. That can be a deal-breaker (“lose heart”); Jesus doesn’t want it to be a deal-breaker. God will grant justice. The real question: “when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

In today’s collect we prayed that we “may persevere with steadfast faith in the confession of your Name.” The widow in Jesus’ parable shows us what that looks like: continuing to cry out for justice as long as necessary.

OK, we could say “Amen” at this point and go on to the Creed. But that could leave us assuming that we had a reliable idea of the justice we needed, and had only to keep praying until God gave us that justice. Our other two readings might want us to wonder about that.

Paul to Timothy: “All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.” Paul is speaking diplomatically. Put less diplomatically: “All of us are works in progress. All of us need teaching, reproof, correction, training. “Proficient, equipped for every good work”? That’s the goal, not the present reality. God uses many tools for our salvation; Scripture is one of these tools, an essential tool.

Paul’s words guided the reformation of the Church of England in the 16th Century. The first task: get the Bible into English in the parishes. Then: when and how would it be heard? The monasteries had frequent daily offices for hearing Scripture and praying, but not the parishes. So Archbishop Cranmer reduced the multiple offices to two (Morning and Evening Prayer) and created a lectionary so that every parish could hear most of Scripture over the course of the year.

So our Book of Common Prayer opens with various orders for Morning and Evening Prayer, and at the very end there’s the schedule of Scripture readings. The challenge, of course, is how this works in the 21st century. So Good Shepherd, like many parishes, orders copies of Day by Day, and various smartphone apps put the offices at our fingertips. This is part of our Episcopal identity that could use more attention, so that Coffee Hour is predictably the time when the clergy are besieged by questions (“Why’s Jesus talking about bringing a sword, rather than peace?”).

Why bother? My favorite example comes from the beginning of Matthew’s Gospel. We’re introduced to Joseph, Mary’s fiancé, whom Matthew describes as “righteous.” That sounds promising, but on learning of Mary’s pregnancy, Joseph’s best idea is to dismiss her quietly. So God sends a dream “for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,” and Joseph’s righteousness gets an upgrade. That’s not a bad picture of the people of God. We’re righteous, but our notion of righteousness means that we’re about to dismiss Mary—if we haven’t done so already. We need the teaching, reproof, correction, and training that regular encounters with Scripture can provide.

Then there’s that strange story in our first reading. Jacob—from whom you should never buy a used car—had cheated his brother Esau, and now Esau was coming to meet him—with 400 of his armed retainers. So Jacob prays for deliverance and (in answer to the prayer?) a “man” wrestles with him all night. Jacob remembers it as having “seen God face to face.” In any event, that’s the crisis; the subsequent encounter with Esau goes smoothly.

I wonder about that story. Esau is a problem, but perhaps God’s the bigger problem. Perhaps Jacob got it right and it was God with whom he wrestled all night. Maybe prayer is like that. I pray for justice; perhaps I shouldn’t expect to emerge from prayer unchanged.

In today’s Gospel we heard Jesus encouraging his disciples to “pray always and not to lose heart.” Yet it’s his questions that I often find most haunting. Last week: “Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” (Lk. 17:17-18) Today: “And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” What answer will we give in the coming week?

What is God up to today? (18th Sunday after Pentecost, 10/12/2025)

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Readings (Track 1)

What is God up to today? My friend Qoheleth (the book of Ecclesiastes) repeatedly argues that we can’t know. At the same time, Qoheleth does a lot of wondering. So, coming off today’s texts, we might wonder: today is God up to something like that?

Our Gospel provides a useful anchor. Ten lepers ask Jesus for mercy; Jesus heals them. One of many healings in the Gospels, one of many acts of power and mercy in the Bible. God desires our health, our shalom. So today’s psalm recalls that archetypical act: the Exodus (“He turned the sea into dry land, / so that they went through the water on foot, / and there we rejoiced in him.”). Where things get puzzling is the human response (“Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?”). So the question here isn’t what God’s up to, but what we humans are up to.

What God’s up to in the situation assumed by our first reading is far from clear. The triumphant Babylonian army has taken some of the Jews into exile in Babylon. What’s God doing? Is God capable of doing anything? Some prophets are announcing that God’s about to bring the exiles back home. So Jeremiah writes a letter, part of which we just heard. Perhaps the main point: “Thus says the LORD of hosts…to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon…” The exiles are there by the Lord’s decision; the Lord’s still in control. The prophets announcing an immediate return have it wrong; you’ll be there for a while. So “multiply there, and do not decrease.” And then, another surprise: “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” Seek the welfare (the shalom) of Babylon, pray for Babylon. If the exiles thought Jeremiah was going to encourage their faith, this is probably not the faith they were thinking about. By faith Abraham left, now by faith they’re supposed to settle in, where it’s hard to walk a few blocks without encountering a temple to another Babylonian god or goddess? This is a faith Qoheleth would have recognized: keeping the faith, remaining faithful despite not having a clue what the Lord is up to.

Then there’s today’s psalm. I noticed the allusion to the Exodus. But then there are these lines:
For you, O God, have proved us;
you have tried us just as silver is tried.
You brought us into the snare;
you laid heavy burdens upon our backs.
You let enemies ride over our heads;
we went through fire and water;
but you brought us out into a place of refreshment.

As the last line shows, these troubles are now in the rearview mirror. But prior to that last line, these troubles would have generated multiple psalms of complaint. “Lord, are you paying attention to what’s happening to us?” So, retrospectively, these lines: “For you, O God, have proved us; / you have tried us [or refined us] just as silver is tried.” Testing, refining, formation: it’s part of the package. From the letter to the Hebrews: “Although he [Jesus] was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him…” (Heb. 5:8-9).

Recall this morning’s collect. That “we may continually be given to good works” isn’t a given—that’s why we have the Confession and Absolution. So we ask that God’s grace “may always precede and follow us.” We probably don’t want to pray that God’s grace “whip us into shape,” but there may not be much of a difference. (Having Vince Lombardi as one of our state’s patron saints may help us with this!)

So God is always testing, refining? That, Qoheleth would argue, claims too much knowledge. Is God going to pass on a good opportunity to test, to refine? Probably not.

Paul’s letter adds another dimension. He writes “even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But the word of God is not chained.” God’s passion for human freedom (recall the Exodus) generates opposition. Our options may be limited; God’s are not. Paul doesn’t understand why in God’s providence he’s chained like a criminal, but he does understand that God’s options are not thereby limited. And Paul’s decisions even within his limited options matter: “Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, so that they may also obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory.” In passing, most of us probably underestimate the effect our decisions have on those around us. In the midst of all that he doesn’t know, Paul knows that his decisions—and Timothy’s—matter.

I opened this sermon with “What is God up to today?” The story that we tell at every Eucharist, whether in the Creed or the Eucharistic Prayer, gives us the broad outline, placing us somewhere between “Christ is risen” and “Christ will come again.” We met that broad outline in today’s readings, whether in the joyful memory of the Exodus, Jesus’ “Go and show yourselves to the priests,” or Paul’s forward look to “the salvation that is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory.” But within that broad outline, today? Qoheleth: “All this I have tested by wisdom; I said, ‘I will be wise,’ but it was far from me. That which is, is far off, and deep, very deep; who can find it out?” (Eccl. 7:23-24). Perhaps we’re with the exiles, in Babylon by the Lord’s decision. Perhaps we’re in the middle of that proving and refining described by the psalm, wondering about the wisdom of having prayed “that your grace may always precede and follow us.” Perhaps we’re with Paul, in a situation where it’s good news that while our options are painfully limited, God’s are not.

The point, of course, is not to celebrate our ignorance, but to recognize that it’s not unfamiliar territory for God’s people. And in the midst of this ignorance our decisions still matter. So we might start with this: when grace does meet us, whether in small ways or great, are we there with the Samaritan at Jesus’ feet, giving thanks, or with the other nine, leaving Jesus scratching his head?

But rather than invite an “Amen,” perhaps a postscript is necessary. To confess ignorance is not to underwrite passivity, as two of my favorite Old Testament protagonists show us.

Nehemiah is a layperson in the Persian civil service. He makes no claim that God has asked him to do anything. But he sees an opportunity, wrangles a royal charter, and rebuilds Jerusalem’s walls.

Esther and her cousin Mordecai are Jews living in the Persian capital. Through a strange series of events she becomes queen, and then learns of a planned genocidal attack on her people. The Lord’s name does not even appear in the book, but rather than go to ground she uses her position to thwart the attack, as celebrated even today in the annual feast of Purim.

Qoheleth got it right: we often haven’t a clue what God’s currently up to. But Qoheleth also gets this right: “Whatever your hand finds to do, do with your might” (Eccl. 9:10a).

How do we do community? (17th Sunday after Pentecost, 10/5/2025)

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Readings (Track 1)

This Sunday our readings go in quite different directions, so we’ll look first at Lamentations and then at our Gospel.

Lamentations. Since Pentecost our Old Testament readings have had us listening to the prophets’ warnings: if you continue to turn away from the true God and continue to oppress the vulnerable (who, like you, bear the image of that true God), things will turn out badly. In last week’s reading the Babylonian army had Jerusalem surrounded, and soon after that were inside. But rather than a triumphant “I told you so,” what Scripture gives us are five powerful laments.

If you look at them in the pew Bibles, you’ll notice that chapters 1, 2, 4, and 5 all have 22 verses, and chapter 3, 66 verses. Why? The Hebrew alphabet has 22 letters, so we’ve got five acrostic laments, each verse beginning with the next letter in the alphabet, giving voice to grief from A to Z, and then back again. Chapter 3, the centerpiece, devotes three verses to each letter, so 66 verses total.

Grief over the loss of the beloved city, or—poetry is open-ended—a loved one, or a cherished dream: Lamentations knows that that’s hard work, but necessary work, and work in which there are no short-cuts. It’s part of being human. So, grief from A to Z, and then again, as often as needed.

Mercifully, the Bible doesn’t end with this book. There is an “after,” and the Bible explores what this “after” can look like. I could sketch out this exploration, but that might give the impression that grief is something to be moved past to get to the important part. No: grief is just as important as any other part, and we’ll know when we’re ready to wonder about that “after.”

We never want to be in a situation in which we need that book, but it’s there when and as often as we need it.

Deep breath. Our Gospel reading. Today’s reading comes directly after the rich man and Lazarus story we heard last week. That story was part of Jesus response to the Pharisees. Verse 14 in that chapter: “The Pharisees, who were lovers of money heard all this, and they ridiculed him.”

How do we speak truthfully about the Pharisees? It’s clear from the Gospels that Jesus had much more in common with the Pharisees than he had with the Sadducees, the Herodians, the Zealots, etc. When God looked for someone to spearhead the mission to the Gentiles, God drafted Paul the Pharisee. And, pulling back the camera, we acknowledge with gratitude the beauty and holiness that rabbinic Judaism, child of the Pharisees, has continued to produce over the centuries. What drove Jesus’ opposition to the Pharisees was the twofold recognition that (1) too many of their leaders were not successfully resisting the temptations of power, and simply stuck, and that (2) his own disciples were too often not even recognizing that these were temptations to be resisted! The Gospel accounts of Jesus’ opposition—written decades later—have more to do with the conduct the church leaders should avoid than with what the Pharisees were doing.

So how is Jesus instructing the disciples?

Don’t be the cause of someone else stumbling. You’re responsible for each other.

If another disciple sins, rebuke. If that disciple repents, forgive—as often as necessary.

Following these instructions isn’t a matter of having more faith/trust. As Yoda put it “Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.”

If you’ve followed these instructions, don’t give yourself airs. You’ve just done what needed to be done. (By the way, we don’t want to misuse that “worthless slaves” as a starting point for our self-definition. Jesus is happy to use hyperbole to help us avoid fatal mistakes, as in the prayer that starts “God, I thank you that I am not like other people…” [Lk. 18:11])

OK. Jesus probably doesn’t get the warm-and-fuzzy award for these words. And as we look at these instructions, I think we see that Jesus is envisioning a more cohesive—and, frankly, riskier—community than we often settle for. The “safe” way of doing community is through a general hands-off pact: I’m OK, you’re OK, and we’ll leave it at that. “If another disciple sins, you must rebuke the offender.” But rebuke only works if through experience I know that the person rebuking me is doing so out of concern for me, not as an exercise in one-upmanship. That is, Jesus’ vision of community is of one that’s nurtured over time, not one that comes into being overnight.

A community that’s nurtured over time: that’s also behind “And if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven times and says, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive.” We’re slow learners. Sometimes my first “I’m sorry” is “I’m sorry I got caught out,” then, later, “I’m sorry that my action didn’t produce the result I intended.” Hopefully I eventually get to “I’m sorry that I even thought that was a good idea.” So seven times a day may be at the low end of the possible scenarios.

Pulling back the camera, how well have we attended to Jesus’ instructions? Too often, not very well, with results that periodically go sideways very publicly, the abuse scandals being simply the latest example. “She weeps bitterly in the night, / with tears on her cheeks…” We have Lamentations also to grieve over these failures.

So why does Jesus even bother? There’s a new world to be created. And God/Jesus, ever hopeful, who prefers to redeem rather than replace, doesn’t choose folk well-suited for the task, but folk like the disciples, folk like you and me, folk like Paul.

Speaking of Paul, what does our second reading contribute to all this? Perhaps this, that Paul really cares that Timothy get it right. It matters to Paul. And so, in a bit, when we pray “joining our voices with Angels and Archangels and with all the company of heaven,” we’re not talking about a crowd that doesn’t care how the game goes, constantly at the concession stands or doing the wave. They care and intercede, and, supported also by their care and intercession, we’ll again go forth to “love and serve the Lord.”

Live like this God: generously (16th Sunday after Pentecost, 9/28/2025)

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Readings (Track 1)

One of my favorite sayings about optimists and pessimists runs like this: the optimist thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. The pessimist agrees. In that context, we might hear Paul’s words as hopeful: there are alternatives.

On the one hand, Paul tracks with the cynic and stoic philosophers: choosing contentment is key to happiness. Then and now that means swimming upstream in a culture that constantly and stridently proclaims that happiness depends on always having more. (It takes effort to swim upstream, hence our collect’s “running to obtain your promises.”)

Notice that the problem is not wealth, but the desire for wealth. Good work can produce wealth, but when the desire for wealth replaces a commitment to good work, it’s never pretty, as in the typical grocery store: too many products that are simply bad for our health, produce like tomatoes that retain the name, but not the taste.

But Paul sets his invitation to contentment in the context of our confession of God as generous Creator (“God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment”). Luke Johnson puts this provocatively: “human existence is in itself a gift from God that cannot in any significant fashion be improved by material possessions.”

But preacher, doesn’t “contentment” mean “boring”? Well, notice how Jesus does contentment, spending so much time at the table that his enemies: “Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!” (Matt. 11:19). OK, preacher, but doesn’t “contentment” mean stagnation? Here the historian Lynn White Jr is helpful: technological progress—harnessing water and wind power—is driven by the monastic commitments to find an alternative to slavery (the source of this power in the classical world) and to live out Paul’s injunction “to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share.” Contentment—Paul thinks—frees us to mirror God’s creative generosity.

“God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.” That’s deeply rooted in the opening chapters of Genesis, and it’s easy to forget how counter-cultural it was/is. Israel, remember, lived between the two cultural powerhouses of Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) and Egypt, with Mesopotamia being more relevant in this context.

The creation stories in Mesopotamia ran something like this: sowing, harvesting, keeping the canals dredged: that’s backbreaking work, and finally the minor gods had enough and revolted. The major gods solved the problem by creating humankind—to do the work no one else wanted to do. So if you’re wondering why life is the way it is…

In that context—and that’s the context in which these chapters of Genesis took their present shape—one of the big surprises is that we humans aren’t created to solve a divine problem. So if we weren’t created for that, what were we created for? Genesis—and the rest of Scripture—wonders about that question.

But back to our reading. Living like the gods is a common human dream. And Scripture happily encourages it—as long as we remember how the Living God lives. “God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.” So go and do likewise: “do good…be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share.”

Jesus’ story in our Gospel reading covers much the same ground as our second reading. No surprise: Jesus and Paul are drinking from the same wells. We might notice the last bit: “If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.” As Christians our faith is properly centered on this someone. But if “they” aren’t listening to Moses and the prophets, that “someone” isn’t going to be convincing. Moses and the prophets: to hazard a summary: the generous Creator expects us to live generously. If “they” find that unbelievable Jesus isn’t going to register. This is why the quality of our parish life is so important: the world badly needs to be able to see what living generously looks like. Our common life is an intrinsic part of our message.

We can imagine responding to Jesus and Paul in good weather; what about in nasty weather? I’m thankful for Jeremiah. In the middle of the Babylonian siege Jeremiah’s cousin comes to him asking him to buy up some family property—a field. The timing could not be worse, for that field is almost certainly currently occupied by some unit in the Babylonian army. Responding to the request and to the divine word, Jeremiah buys the property and dots all the legal i’s and crosses all the legal t’s so that the family’s ownership will remain undisputed. Even in nasty weather by God’s grace Jeremiah is able to act generously, in imitation of this generous God.

Now, a sidebar. While today’s texts have a lot to say about what we do, our images of God are equally important. Jesus is not the Son of just any god, but of the God revealed in Moses and the prophets, the generous God who digs very deep for our healing. Do I believe in that God? Most days that’s a work-in-progress. And what image of God reigns in my gut profoundly shapes what I feel, think, and do.

We might wrap all this up by noticing that the story Jesus tells is open-ended. On the personal level it challenges us: how are things around my gate? On the local, state, and national levels, who are getting our votes? Those concerned that the rich man continue to feast undisturbed, or those concerned that Lazarus not lay at the gate indefinitely. We pray “God bless America;” what are we doing to encourage God to think that’s a good idea?

It turns out that imitating God and encountering God dovetail in surprising ways. “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink?… And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me’” (Matt. 25:37-40).